Kiffin’s mother, Loula Ayres Rockwell. A self-reliant and independent woman, Loula was widowed when Kiffin was less than a year old. She took a job as a schoolteacher so she could stay in Newport Tennessee and not move in with her parents in South Carolina because she wanted to maintain her ability to infuse her own ideals into her children. She soon became principal of the Newport Elementary School, which was remarkable for the time. The school would not have another female principal for over 100 years. Later, when she became dissatisfied with the medical care Kiffin’s older brother Paul was receiving, she went to medical school and became a Doctor of Osteopathy. (Photo courtesy of Sybil Robb)