Thomas Hendricks Taylor

Thomas Hendricks Taylor, president of Howard Payne College, was born on July 5, 1885, at May, Brown County, Texas, the only son of Henry Percy and Frances Miranda (Lester) Taylor. He attended a local country school and the preparatory department of Howard Payne College in Brownwood. He later entered Baylor University, where he earned a B.A. degree in 1907; in 1920 he received an M.A. degree there.

He began teaching at Howard Payne College in September 1907 and remained there for forty-eight years. When Howard Payne assumed senior-college status in 1913, Taylor became registrar, a position he held for three years. He became dean of the institution in 1916 and served in that capacity until October 1929, when the board of trustees elected him president of the college. During the twenty-six years of his tenure as president, capital funds for the institution's endowment increased from $30,000 in 1929 to $2½ million in 1955, and property holdings grew from seven acres to nearly 400 acres. During the same period Howard Payne was approved by state, regional, and national accrediting agencies.

After his retirement in 1955, Taylor compiled eighteen bound volumes of manuscript materials on Central Texas Baptist history and on Howard Payne College. He served as county chairman of the Democratic party in Brown County from 1920 to 1961 and was a Baptist. He was on the Texas Board of Public Welfare from 1940 to 1947. Taylor was married to Myrtle E. Evans on June 16, 1907; they had five children. He died on December 5, 1961, and was buried in Eastlawn Memorial Park in Early, near Brownwood.