RUSTON, La. — Ruston High junior Alex Hunt needed not look far for inspiration for his English assignment in Mrs. Emily Howell’s class on an example of a paragon of success.
It turns out that Hunt is a descendant of local business legend Thomas Lewis (T.L.) James, a man who needs little to no introduction in North Louisiana.
“In (Advanced Placement) Language and Composition, we had a unit around the thematic topic of success,” Howell said. “Our anchor text was Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers.” This is a book that explores kind of the machinery behind success. It’s separated into two parts: the first being opportunity. Gladwell explores what kind of opportunities we have to have in order to be successful, and within that, we look at things like how much practice matters and hard work.
“And the second part has to do with legacy. The students were given a choice to pick a paragon of success to write about, and they had to explain that figure’s success through the theories of Gladwell. So Alex chose T.L. James, which was really divergent thinking on his part, considering most students choose someone well-known or famous.”
For Hunt, it was a chance to really dig into the kind of person James was and how he helped shape the Ruston community at large.
“T.L. James is somebody I’ve always heard about growing up here, and how he started his businesses (in North Louisiana),” Hunt said. “His parents were immigrants here, and anytime I go to my grandparents’ house, they have a huge picture of him. I knew he did well in the timber business, but I also learned about the successful dredging businesses through all of the research I was able to do. And I learned how generous he was — he donated the money for a football field at Ruston High (now known as James Field at Hoss Garrett Stadium). He also donated money to Grambling and Centenary.”
That generosity was something was really struck Hunt, noting James was generous whether he had plenty to share or not.
“Even when he didn’t have much at all, he would donate to children’s hospitals and orphanages,” Hunt said. “I think it was great to learn how generous he was and it made me extremely honored and proud to be part of his legacy.”
Click the link below to read the essay in its entirety.
