Wells Sessums Family Collection

Cameron S. Wells, Jr. was born on November, 16, 1930 at Hermann Hospital in Houston, Texas. In his youth he was a member of the Boys Scouts as a bugler. His father, Cameron Wells, Sr. was a Scout Master that applied for and organized Troop 141 at Prairie View State College due to segregation. Troop 141 allowed African American children, and especially African American Boy Scouts throughout Texas, to participate in the activities associated with the Boy Scouts which would have otherwise been denied them during that time and place.

He went on to serve in the Army infantry before retiring as a Colonel in 1954. After coming out of the military, he worked as a substitute teacher in the Houston Independent School District (HISD). He was a substitute teacher at the Gregory Elementary School when Lois Brantley was the principal. He worked in HISD for the next 37 years as a teacher at Crawford Elementary,as Principal and ROTC instructor at Jack Yates High School, as Principal and Assistant Principal at Blackshell Elementary, and Principal of Bruce Elementary in Fifth Ward. Despite his job as an educator throughout these years he remained involved in working with the Boys Scouts during this time. He retired from HISD in 1991. He currently resides in Houston, Texas and in January, 2010 he participated in the African American Library at the Gregory School’s oral history project detailing his memories of being a Boy Scout and of the Gregory School.