Jeanne Bragg
“Mrs. Murfreesboro”
As one friend put it, Jeanne Canada Bragg is “just everything.” Known as “Mrs. Murfreesboro” after her seven and a half years of writing a column under that name for the Murfreesboro Post, it still serves her well. She has devoted her time to her family and friends, the community, to her husband’s political career during his time as mayor of Murfreesboro and to many volunteer activities.
Born in Virginia as one of eight children, her family soon moved to Knoxville where she had a very happy childhood.
“We were Catholic and went to Catholic schools,” explained Jeanne, “which at the time were very strict, and we were very much a minority because there were so few Catholics in Tennessee at that time. But I had a wonderfully loving family and had very happy years.”
After high school, she went to Sienna College, a Catholic women’s college for two years in Memphis, then transferred to University of Tennessee Knoxville. That is where she met her husband, former Murfreesboro mayor Tommy Bragg.
“My senior year a friend of mine called to asked me if I’d like to be a counselor,” Jeanne shared. “It was the first year they ever had a co-ed dorm. The dorm was divided into a boy’s side and a girl’s side. I got free room and board, which was really a bonus for anybody. I was the counselor for the ninth floor on the girl’s side, and Tommy happened to be the counselor on the ninth floor for the boy’s side. And that’s how we met.”
Jeanne went on to graduate with a degree in French, though she laughs and says, “I haven’t done a thing with it!”
After graduating from college in 1969, Jeanne, a year older than Tommy, got a job with Dun and Bradstreet in Atlanta as a credit analyst. She worked for a year in Atlanta, where Tommy would visit her. They got married on the day he graduated from college and got commissioned in the Air Force.
Tommy went to law school, and then the couple was sent to Kansas City by the Air Force. That is where they lived until his contract with the military was completed. Then, they moved to Murfreesboro. Tommy went to work for the family business, Courier Printing.
“I knew very few people when we moved to Murfreesboro,” said Jeanne, “It was very hard because everyone here had their own lives. So, I decided to become a member of the Newcomer’s Club. I then worked at the Cotton Patch for Susan Loyd for a while, made a lot of friends there and started settling into a life.”
She culminated her career life for 10 years as a Service Supervisor at State Farm Insurance Company in Murfreesboro at their building that was then located on Broad Street – where Wako Japanese and Hooter’s now stand – before State Farm moved out to their location on Memorial. She “retired” from State Farm in 1983, becoming more involved in the community. Something State Farm got her interested in, as they encouraged their employees to be community minded.
“Bobby Allen, a State Farm agent, and I were challenged as a team to recruit members who were interested in becoming members or renewing their memberships with the Rutherford County Chamber of Commerce,” Jeanne chuckled with the memory of one meeting with a potential member. “We went to see Dr. William Shacklett. He was a current member, but he came out and chewed us up one side and down the other side about why he didn’t like what the Chamber did, he didn’t believe in them, that they never represented anything he wanted them to, but, he said, ‘come back tomorrow.’ So, the next day I said, ‘We’re going back to Dr. Shacklett’s.’ Bobby said, ‘I’m not going back in there.’ I reminded him that Dr. Shacklett had told us to come back. When we got there, a check was waiting for us for him to rejoin the Chamber!”
Her primary involvement in the community for many years after leaving State Farm was related to her children’s (Beth, Anne and John III) schools. She went on to become a board member for the Foundation of the Murfreesboro City Schools where she served for six years, she is Past President with her husband of Mitchell Neilson Parent Teachers Association and a founding member of the Webb School Students’ Parent’s Organization.
She has been a member of Charity Circle for 35 years where she once chaired Patron’s Parties, she is a past president and a founder of the Stones River Garden Club, a past board member of Ascension Rutherford Ambassadors and she was secretary of the Rutherford County Food Bank for many years. It is one of her favorite non-profit organizations.
Though being a mayor’s wife was not something she aspired to do. “In fact, I was totally, totally against it,” she admitted. “I always said if he ran for public office, he’d have to get divorced first, but I knew he’d be so good at it. As one of my brother-in-law’s said, ‘he has something for everybody’. And he has so much common sense. I did it begrudgingly, but I jumped in once I realized nobody wants a mayor’s wife who doesn’t want to be a mayor’s wife. Nobody wants that! The role did eventually teach me to be punctual. I was never punctual before that.”
In the end, she really, really enjoyed the 12 years she spent as the mayor’s wife. She especially enjoyed visiting the many churches and representing the people who work for the city with such integrity. It was an honor. She even won the Tennessee Municipal League’s Spouse of the Year Award in 2014 for volunteerism, advocacy and the personal sacrifices made in the name of public service.
“We were lucky that Tommy served in a time before social media,” added Jeanne, “because people can be so negative on there. I feel so fortunate that we didn’t have any of that to contend with. During our time people were very positive and very encouraging. We had a few complaints, but not many. There are just so many wonderful people here, it was just an honor to represent them. The community.”
She believes in the growth Murfreesboro is enjoying, but she is a bit disappointed that those moving to the community from other places are not getting involved politically or in the community. Many of the new people have little understanding of the community and how it is run, they are just coming because it is a good place to live, they are not interested in why it is such a great place to live. She wants new members of the community to take more of an interest in both local and Tennessee politics for the betterment of all.
Jeanne now spends most of her time pursuing her many hobbies and spending time with her siblings who all live in Knoxville. Among her hobbies are sewing, machine embroidery, cooking and traveling, but she is happiest spending time with her children, grandchildren, siblings, friends and extended family.
“I have a lot of interests, I don’t do many well, but I do a lot of them half-way,” she says humbly.
She has a sewing room that would put any master seamstress to shame where she likes to make monogramed items for friends and family. And she gained quite a reputation as a cook by making tasty treats for community events and for non-profits she has worked with for parties over many years. Plus, she enjoyed cooking for the boarders who went to school with her children at Webb School.
“Tommy’s mother was a great cook, and I wanted to be like her,” noted Jeanne.
Additionally, Jeanne has enjoyed taking oil painting classes from local artist Missy Veazie, whom she feels is a great teacher. And for many years her happy place was playing tennis. Now, she works out twice a week in an environment that she enjoys.
More recently, she has helped Tommy work in their yard. They have a lot of landscaping and Tommy has always been quite the gardener. They are becoming happy home bodies after years and years of service to the community.
“Now I get home and I’m so happy that I just don’t want to leave,” she added.