Ed Prescott wasn’t good at everything, just good at everything he tried, it seemed.

Prescott, a lifelong Columbus resident, passed away Dec. 22 at age 89. He spent his 44-year working career divided among WCBI-TV, where he worked his way up from camera man to general manager, a Lowndes County Justice Court judge (two terms) and Lowndes County sheriff (three terms), retiring in 2000.

At each stop in his career, he earned a reputation for kindness, sense of fair play, ability to communicate with people from all walks of life, strong work ethic and genuine interests in others.

“He was one of the nicest, sweetest, most caring people that I know,” said District 3 Justice Court Judge Peggy Phillips, now in her 13th term. “He was one of those people that could talk to people in a way they could understand. I think that’s what made him a good judge — especially a justice court judge. We are the only court where people can actually talk to a judge and get information — not legal advice — but information on how the court works. Ed was just so patient with people. He really wanted them to understand what was happening.”

Lowndes County attorney Tim Hudson saw that quality in Prescott as a young sheriff’s deputy.

“I guess we’ve been friends for 40 years or more,” Hudson said. “I got to know him when he was in justice court, and I would have cases there. We sort of had the same philosophy about our jobs. He wanted to get it right. He didn’t get overly concerned about the technicalities. What was important was making the right decision. I think people recognized that. It might not go your way, but you knew you were getting a fair shot.”

Hudson said Prescott was one of the people who inspired him to go to law school. In 1980, Hudson ran for county prosecutor, the same year Prescott ran for sheriff.
Both won. In fact, Prescott never lost an election in five campaigns, two for judge and three for sheriff.

Although 16th Circuit Court Judge Jim Kitchens had known Prescott since childhood – Kitchens’ grandfather and Prescott were friends – he first got to know him as a young assistant district attorney.

“One of the first big cases I helped prosecute was the Clint and Darnell Baldwin case,” Kitchens said. “It was a kidnapping, rape and murder case and it got a lot of attention. Ed was the sheriff at the time and the thing that impressed me was how hard he had worked on that investigation. He wasn’t the kind of sheriff that handed everything off to his staff. He was extremely involved.”

The 1996 case was one of the first involving DNA in the county, Kitchens recalled, and Prescott was a quick study.

“Ed seemed to know all about it,” Kitchens said. “He ran a tight ship. You could tell. When he was there, Lowndes County became known as one of the best sheriff’s departments in the state.”

But Rex Prescott, the elder of Ed’s two sons, said his dad approached being sheriff as a job, not a title.

“I can remember as a kid, we had a front room where you could sit. When dad was sheriff, people were coming to the house all the time to talk about their situation or cases or what they had heard,” Rex said. “Sometimes they just came to get his advice. They would come to the house and sit in that front room and talk to dad. We knew not to go in there if the door was shut. People would come all hours.”

TV station in a pasture

Hudson said Prescott had a way of setting people at ease, often using stories from his days at WCBI. Prescott began working with the station when it first began broadcasting in 1956 out of a little cinder-block building located in a pasture on Highway 12 east of the Columbus city limits.

“He had a million stories about working at the station,” Hudson said. “I remember him telling stories about people who came to the station. TV was new to a lot of them. Ed said one time a guy came to the station who was really upset and wanted to talk to John from ‘As The World Turns’ about something terrible he had done to one of the ladies on the show. He thought John was there in that little building out in a pasture. Ed had a knack for drawing on his experiences from everything he did to reach people.”

“Obviously, he was a smart man,” Kitchens said. “But more than that, he was a man of his word. He wasn’t one to brag, but if said he would do something, he’d do it. You could count on him. I think people trusted him because of that and it helped him. When he was sheriff it wasn’t unusual for him to get information on a crime from somebody he helped get convicted. They didn’t hold a grudge because they knew he had been fair with them.”

Passing the torch

Blake Prescott, Rex’s son and Ed’s grandson, was a teenager when Ed retired after his third term as sheriff. He knew him more as a grandfather than a sheriff.

“We were very close,” Blake said. “Really, he was almost as much a dad to me as a granddad because we spent so much time together, fishing or being out at his camp on the river. He was always somebody I could talk to and could get advice from.”

Blake said it was his grandfather’s example that inspired him to pursue a career in law enforcement. Blake served as a Lowndes County deputy sheriff for 13 years.

“I was on night shift pretty much the whole time I was there and every night at the beginning of the shift, I’d go by his house and see him and we’d talk about what was going on in my job and that sort of thing. Later, after I left the department, I would call him every day at 4 p.m. And if I didn’t call by 4:15, he’d call me. That was our routine.”

Rex said the best example of his father’s legacy came in the years after he left public service.

Although it had been almost a quarter-century since Prescott left the sheriff’s office, he is well-remembered.

“There were so many people at the visitation and the funeral services, people had known from years and years ago,” Rex said. “He left an impression on people that lasted. They all said how much they respected and appreciated my dad. I don’t want to sound like I’m bragging, but when you are a sheriff, people find out what you are made of pretty quick. Everything you do comes out. The bad ones don’t stay around long. Well, I’ve never heard a bad thing said about my dad. I think that tells you what kind of man he was.”

Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].

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