Annie Mae Kemp Chestnut was born April 28, 1930. She is the youngest child of Ed and Isadora Kemp and the last surviving sibling. Like many of her generation, she made a living doing farm and day work in her younger years. She is also remembered for “doing hair” for many young girls years ago. In the early 1970s, she began working at Georgia Pacific, and she continued there until her retirement in 1993.

At the age of sixteen (16), she married Lenwood Chestnut. To this union, ten (10) children were born, two of which died as infants. She and her husband raised their remaining children to honor the Lord and work in the church and to work hard in life. Although her husband and oldest child (Betty), have gone on to be with the Lord, her family now includes: fourteen (14) grandchildren, twenty-one (21) great-grandchildren and one (1) great great-grandchild.

After getting married, she became a member of Union Chapel FWB Church in Whiteville, NC where she served on: the Mother’s Board, the Senior and Gospel Choirs, the Kitchen Committee and over the Sunshine Band.

She has always loved planting her garden and fishing. She still plants a garden every year, and she goes fishing every chance she gets.