Michael G. Cartwright (MGC) is the son of Billy Lee Cartwright and Mary Frances Sullivan [Cartwright Wilson]. He was born July 26, 1957. His brother (Paul) and sisters (Annette and Joan) sometimes call him “Mike,” but his wife Mary calls him “Michael,” and his children (Hannah, Erin, Jamie and Bethany) call him “Papa.” Michael’s colleagues in higher education receive emails from him signed “MGC.”
Since 1980, Michael has been married to the Rev. Mary Wilder Cartwright, which means that on more than one occasion, he has been introduced as “our minister’s wife” but more often as “Pastor Mary’s husband.” And during that brief period from 1983 to 1985 when he served as the pastor of Tabernacle United Methodist Church in Townsville, North Carolina, members of the congregation called him “Mr. Cartwright” or “Pastor Michael.”
One person, many names. At age 57, Michael finds himself inhabiting multiple roles in the workplace (cabinet level university administrator, college professor, leader in church-related higher education circles, scholar). Occasionally, MGC chooses to refuse an identification, e.g. he is not and will not consent to being called the father of the cat “Tonks” with whom he coexists in the parsonage at 215 Pine Hills Drive, Nashville, IN 47448.
At the end of the day, Michael knows that for his aunts and uncles in the Cartwright clan, he will always be “Billy’s boy” and his mother’s siblings aptly name him “Mary’s son.” This is but one of the ways that he takes his place on the intersecting family trees where the various lines of the Cartwrights and Starrs merge with the Sullivans and Wootens, connections that extend to the furthest corners of the earth where the human family coexists with the other inhabitants of God’s creation.
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