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It was hard to find a place to pull over at the neat Grainger County Rocky Branch Road residence. A large group of kin and friends were on hand to celebrate popular resident Ruble Cameron’s 90th birthday. The lively and personable Ruble, clad in his up-to-date casual wear, had been completely surprised by the event. Noble’s daughter, friend Tammy Dutton, had let me in on her dad’s surprise party and I was eager to see my old friend.

With commercial pilots now in demand, Noble had devoted many years at training pilots while at the same time working at his formal job. Having began flying hardly a half century after the first Wright Brothers flight, Noble had seen and learned a good deal of the coming of newer flight technology and adapted it to his teaching, so while at the party we made plans to record his story.

Soon meeting at the Morristown Airport, we found Nobel with his friends, long-time flier Bob Shoun, who was manning the airport along with helper Jesse Garcia. After some catching up with those two, Noble and I settled for a good visit.

Born at home in Grainger Co. in 1933, Noble was the son of Jack and Cornelia Foster Cameron and had sisters Shirley, Virginia and Judy. To support his family during the Depression days, father Jack had worked at a tile factory in Indiana, but soon returned to Grainger County. Back at home Jack had rented his family a home before taking a TVA job and building the family a home of their own.

As a youngster Noble had contacted pneumonia and started school two years later than the normal age and would begin school at the one-room Limestone School. During Noble’s second year the school would be divided into two rooms with a curtain between the lower and higher grades that would extend to grade 7.

A stove sat in the middle of the school to provide heat.

“Everybody brought their lunch, and if they brought milk, they put it in Richland Spring where we also got out water”, he recalled. “We’d get morning and afternoon recesses and had an outdoor toilet, and I remember when a girl fell into the toilet. My teachers were Paralee Parrott, and Gladys Whitt, and we had a fun time and got a good education considering the situation. That school is still barely standing.”

Noble would move on to Rutledge Elementary for the 8th grade, before taking his dad’s ’53 pickup truck to Rutledge High School, where he graduated in 1954. Following high school, Cameron would join the Army and head to Ft. Jackson for basic training and on to Ft. Belvoir from training as heavy equipment mechanic. His first posting would be at California’s Beale Air Force base, where a runway was being constructed while his next posting would be on island of Guam In the Pacific Ocean.

“The people on Guam would drive around in old military jeeps and plow their fields with water buffalo”, he told. “There was a lot of jungle and on our time off, we would ramble through that jungle.. After I got back home, I read that a Japanese soldier had finally given up on the island.”

Discharged from the Army in 1957, he would return home and work as a driver for the Renfro Company for a week before taking a job at in the maintenance department at the Berkline furniture factory, where he would retire after 41 years of service. Long having an interest in flying, Cameron used his G.I. Bill to begin taking flying lessons in 1967 where the legendary Evelyn Johnson would serve as his primary instructor. While still working at Berkline, Cameron began piling up commercial, multi-engine and instrument ratings.

“Evelyn was really thorough”, he continued. “She continued as the flight examiner and gave me a bunch of students. I would teach them to fly and she would give the test. The first thing they had to learn was to take off and land, then do solos. The scariest time I had was when one student landed before his landing gear was down. They would do maneuvers and take offs and landings until they became proficient.”

“After retiring from Berkline I kept instructing and taught over 100 students. A number of those students became commercial pilots, including Dennis Greene who became a UPS pilot. In that time, I flew more than 9,500 hours. I finally quit instructing in 2003. Evelyn was a friend to me.”

Cameron still remains a fixture at the airport. He and Dr. Dennis Duck often take flights to surrounding areas, where they sometimes stop for a “$50 hamburger” (that includes the cost of the fuel and maintenance for the flight). Noble had graduated from high school with Dr. Duck’s dad Bruce.

Still in amazing physical and mental shape after 90 years, Noble lives near the old family Grainger County home place where he enjoys being around his sisters and brothers-in-law Johnny King and D.K. Woods. His daughters by his first wife Dixie, Tammy and Melanie, keep close contact with their dad, while grandson John Paul has provided Noble with 6 great grandchildren.

Noble would lose his second wife, Barbara, in 2016, and would later meet the attractive and lively Mary Jane Lockhart at the Morristown Community Center. The two have spent a happy five years driving to different places and enjoying life.

With the vitality and energy of a much younger person, Noble ended: “I used to garden all the time, and I keep active. I walk everyday and swim two or three times a week. A rocking chair will put you away in no time flat.”