Andrew Jackson Hays Jr. ’53

Cotton was still a major crop in the South for years after the Civil War, and Hill School graduate Jack, aka “Pedro,” made it his life’s work. He was a cotton merchant, buying bales from farmers and selling them to domestic and foreign textile mills. He died May 22, 2014, in his   native Memphis.

His nickname, Pedro, came about in the mid-1940s when some Mexican baseball players “jumped” to Major League American teams and vice versa. Jack was called “Pedro” after the first name of one of these Mexicans he liked, according to close Memphis friend Devant Latham.

College found him competing for the basketball manager position and bickering for his club, Tiger Inn. His roommates were Lynn Parry, Nick Colby, John Cameron, Charlie Richardson, Ernie Preston, John Baay, Morgan Firestone, and Ned Slaughter, who remembers Pedro’s “subtle sense of humor.”

In 1961, Pedro married Florence Pittman, and they enjoyed gardening and raising vegetables together. He was a fine golfer who reveled in duck hunting. He was out front in the Cotton Carnival, Memphis’ equivalent to Mardi Gras, which also promoted cotton use.

He leaves behind Florence, sons Andrew J. III and James B., and two grandchildren. Devoted pal Devant Latham said it well: “Pedro was a methodical man.”