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First Black Woman to sit on the Manchester City School Board and Black Woman elected to serve as an Alderman for the City of Manchester

Mildred Louise Pryor was born in Cowan, Tennessee on April 8, 1938 to James and Missouri Pryor. She moved to Manchester in 1963 as the bride of Lonnie Norman.

A lot of people in Manchester only saw Mildred as Mayor Norman’s wife, but she was so much more than that.     In an article about Women in Politics by the Manchester Times in 2000, they wrote this about Mildred Norman:  She “cares about the young and old alike.  In her personal and professional life she has cared for babies, toddlers, preschoolers, and senior citizens.  In fact, one could even say she has taken care of the entire city.”

After settling in Manchester, Mildred worked in homes, then at Genesco in Tullahoma and PCA. She then began classes at Motlow for CNA Home Health. Working in home health care, Mildred was proud to have helped many of the people who lived in Coffee County.  She also worked for a time at the Crestwood Nursing Home.

In 1990, Mildred opened Mildred’s Country Friends, a child day-care center in Manchester that included pre-school teaching as well as care for those with handicaps. Over the next ten years, she would expand to three day-care centers and often had senior citizens working with the children as part of the Title V program.

Mildred helped to organize and promote the August 4^th Celebration held by the black community in Manchester each year. She also helped with the Manchester Home Coming Celebration in 1986.  She worked as a substitute teacher for the Coffee County School System and she was the first black woman to serve on the Manchester City School Board. 

She became entrenched in the political arena when her husband, Lonnie Norman, moved from being an alderman and vice mayor to the role of Manchester City Mayor.  After serving as Manchester’s “First Lady”, she launched a successful run for an alderman seat herself and in August of 1996, she was the first black woman elected to serve as an Alderman for the City of Manchester.

When the Bonnaroo Music Festival came to Manchester, Mildred was one of their biggest fans.  She could be seen at the festival every year – sometimes into the wee hours. This earned her the title of “Queen of Bonnaroo.” 

Mildred Pryor Norman passed away on June 3, 2016 and is buried in the Cypress Garden Cemetery in Manchester, TN.  The next year, a tree was planted in her honor on the grounds of Bonnaroo, something she would have been very proud of.