The author, Steve Bailey, is outreach coordinator at the Anson County Historical Society.
Hoyt Patrick Taylor Jr., who was born in Wadesboro on April 1, 1924, served as North Carolina’s lieutenant governor from 1969-73, following in the footsteps of his father (a former mayor of Wadesboro), who was lieutenant governor from 1949-53. The two are the only father-son pair to have held the office.
The younger Taylor earned undergraduate and law degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and served in the Marine Corps in both World War II and the Korean War. He subsequently practiced law in Wadesboro.
In 1955, he was elected to represent Anson County in the North Carolina House of Representatives and served through 1967, the two last years as speaker. In May 1968, Taylor won the Democratic primary for lieutenant governor over Margaret Harper, the first major party woman to campaign for the post. He then defeated state Rep. Don H. Garren in the general election, 55-45 percent.
He served as lieutenant governor for Gov. Bob Scott from 1969-73. He ran for governor in 1972 but was defeated by Skipper Bowles in the primary, 372,000 votes to 310,000. Taylor was one of many people who received a couple of votes for the vice presidential nomination at the 1972 Democratic National Convention.
In his 2014 book “The Making of a Southern Democracy,” political scientist Tom Eamon describes Taylor as a calm and reasonable politician, but lacking somewhat in hunger for political power and sometimes informally described by contemporaries as being a little lazy.
After the defeat in 1972, he retired from electoral politics and resumed practicing law in Wadesboro, where he was a member of several boards.
In 2005, Taylor published the book “Fourth Down & Goal to Go” in which he told about life and politics in Anson County and North Carolina, generally.
Taylor was married to Elizabeth Lockhart-Taylor for more than 60 years. They had three children and four grandchildren. He died on April 22, 2018, at age 94 in Wadesboro. He was a member of the Calvary Episcopal Church of Wadesboro, a Rotarian and a Freemason.
The North Carolina General Assembly honored Taylor and his father in a resolution in 2010. South Piedmont Community College also honored Taylor by naming their community center “The Lockhart-Taylor Center,” after Taylor and his wife.