I first knew him when I was about three or four years old as my father’s friend and co-worker. One Christmas when my family lived in one of Jessie Buckner’s rental houses on Academy Street in downtown Maynardville, he sent me a Tonka™ truck. He sent me scraps of wood from his carpentry to play with. When one of the small schoolhouses closed down upon its consolidation into one of the county’s larger elementary schools, he sent me a canvas bag of building blocks. He never knew the countless hours of joy playing with those blocks gave me. They were one of my most treasured possessions, and I played with them far beyond the age that my peers would have considered proper.

When I was in fifth grade and perfecting my art of “playing school”, I found myself in need of a teacher desk. This friend of my father’s (and by all accounts my friend as well) personally built me a table to use for my teacher desk. This table was like many he built for use throughout the Union County Public School System, but mine was special—he personally built it just for me! He charged five dollars for the materials, and Mother, Dad and I scraped together every spare cent of change in the house to pay for it. Today that table sits in my home library, and there is no amount of money that would cause me to part with it. He built our family one other table, this one for the portable black and white Philco™ (and later the portable color RCA™) television. This table was similar to others he built for the school system’s kitchens.

There was one item this fine man built for our family of which I was never fond. The houses I grew up in had no indoor bathrooms, so Dad had our friend make a bedside commode for our chamber pot (what my sister-in-law Agnes called “Ms. Jones’ stew pot”). That is the only thing he built that I was most happy to never have to look upon again.

When I was in high school, and my father was dying of cancer, this fine man and two other fine Union Countians (Patricia McKelvey and Woodrow Cole) sent me a gift that most notably contained several pairs of tube socks. The socks meant more to me than just warm feet.

I always found it comforting, when I was a student at Maynardville Elementary, to know that my friend was working in the maintenance shop next to the old central office (present site of the Union County Elementary and Middle Alternative School). Occasionally, but not often, I would see him while I was on the playground and as he went throughout the schools I attended, tending to maintenance needs. Appreciation to this fine individual was expressed in the 1980 Echo, the Horace Maynard High School yearbook: “We, the student body of HMHS, wish to express our appreciation to Mr. Irby Monroe, Maintenance Supervisor of the Union County Public School System, for his dedication to duty. The comfortable conditions of our physical environment enhance learning.”

There may not have been a lot of Union County students, especially in his later years with the school system, who even knew Irby, but almost all benefitted from his craftsmanship. In the earlier days of education in Union County, funds were scarce, and essential supplies such as furniture were difficult to obtain. One of Irby’s most significant contributions to Union County education was the furniture he built. It would be difficult to count the number of tables, bookshelves, cabinets and other furnishings that Irby constructed. Many of these pieces of furniture are still used in Union County’s schools today after Irby’s retirement some thirty years ago.

In my role as supervisor for the Union County Public Schools, I make it a habit when I visit the schools to look for Irby’s furniture. Almost every shelf in Sharps Chapel Elementary’s library was built by Irby. Irby himself passed away more than a quarter of a century ago, but those shelves are as solid today as when he put the last nail in them. It is practically impossible today to purchase furniture of such quality without spending a lot of money for custom construction. Sharps Chapel’s library assistant, Lisa Brantley, once told me I could have those shelves if I could find her others of equal or greater quality. The shelves remain at Sharps Chapel’s library, for both she and I know that for some things there just is no replacement.

I taught several years at Luttrell Elementary before I inherited, from a retiring teacher, a set of cubbyholes that Irby had made. This was a long shelf, just the perfect size to fit under the chalk tray of one of the classroom blackboards, divided into 24 sections and just the right size to allow students to store the books and supplies that their more modern desks could not hold. I jealously guarded that shelf until I left teaching to become a principal, then passed it on to my successor.

Much of Irby’s handiwork remains today in several of Union County’s schools. Sadly, I have seen many cases in which low quality furniture was more recently purchased by the school system, much of it scrapped and forgotten years ago. Even sadder, I have witnessed some of Irby’s furniture being discarded. Some people just don’t realize what treasures of the past they are allowing to slip away. I have some friends (most notably veteran Union County teacher Carolyn Murr and Maynardville Elementary principal and bookkeeper Lisa Carter and Shirley Robbins) who help me preserve Irby’s handiwork.

Irby’s workmanship is easily distinguishable. Each piece he made used the same type of wood, was stained the same color, and was trimmed out the same way. Much of it was custom-made to teacher specifications. Irby was precise—everything he constructed was perfectly level and in square.

Not only did Irby construct furniture for classrooms, he also repaired dilapidated furniture. I have seen more than one old teacher desk with a new top fashioned by Irby Monroe. Irby saved the school system untold amounts of money through such thrifty practices. Irby Monroe was one of many modest, behind-the-scenes employees who helped the Union County School System span the bridge from the lean times of the past so we could reach the present.

Not only did Irby use his talent to benefit the school system. In the years since Irby’s passing, I have shared memories with many people who knew him in ways I didn’t. I learned at an estate auction a couple of years ago that Irby built Minnis Mize’s farmhouse in the mid-twentieth century. This house still stands on Main Street in Maynardville, next door to Raymond Buckner’s home.

Martha Atkins Carter shared with me that Irby had a degree to practice law. The story goes that Irby’s father wanted him to be a lawyer and insisted that Irby attend law school. The dutiful son graduated from law school, then presented his degree to his father with the wish that he be pleased with it. Irby never spent one day in the practice of law.
In his younger days, Irby was a regular attender of Maynardville Baptist Church and often sang solos. He was also noted for being a fine cake baker. He often made cakes for Union County school teachers. Maynardville Elementary bookkeeper Shirley Robbins told me that she had one of Irby’s cake recipes that teacher Ruby Jean Keck had shared with her. I asked Shirley if she would make that cake for the First Baptist Church of Maynardville’s 175th Anniversary Celebration held on Sunday, August 13, 2017. Shirley and I were probably the only ones present who were privy to this bit of historical significance. As I feasted on that cake, I meditated with each bite upon the wonder that Irby Horace Monroe, after having befriended me for the first 26 years of my life, was feeding me physically 26 years after his death.