This is a True Story that was in a newspaper in Sevier County Tn.
Jim Nabors ( Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C )
Woman believes singer is father
By PENNY BANDY
A Sevier County woman who believes she is Jim Nabors daughter
is suing the state. Office of Vital Records in order to get her birth
certificate. Deborah Ann Hughes, 45, said she wants nothing from the
celebrity. She only wants the document for basic reasons, including
getting her family medical history. Kent Tankersly, an office supervisor
at the Office of Vital Records in Nashville, said Hughes birth certificate
is sealed and he cannot say why. Tankersly said the only way Hughes
can get her birth certificate is through a court order. He said the only
two reasons birth certificates are sealed is if there is an adoption or if
paternity has not been established by a court. Since the state adoption
law that kept records private has recently changed, adopted children
can get their adoption records.
Two of Nabors employees at his Naborly Productions in Nashville
said Hughes belief about Nabors relation to her is only a rumor that has
been circulating for some time.
We made a joke about it when we heard it, said one of Nabors
producers, who then asked not to be quoted.
Also asking not to be quoted after making several comments was
one of Nabors assistants.
It's a very old claim that has never been substantiated, the woman
said.
There's no need to prove it. There has just been talk and rumor and
innuendo. It's a false claim as far as we know. That's what I believe.
Nabors manager Barbara Pulchinfki said Nabors had a simple
statement to make about the situation: There is no truth to the matter.
The truth is what Hughes said she would like to find.
You wouldn't think (a birth certificate) would be such a hard thing
to get, she said.
But when Hughes send $180 and a request for her birth
certificate from the Office of Vital Records, she received a document
indicating all factual information, including the names of both parents,
is unknown. Hughes, an ordained Pentecostal minister, said her
maternal grandfather raised her and that her mother, Barbara Jean
Hughes, stayed in and out of their home in Chattanooga.
When she learned who her mother was at age 7, she said, she was
naturally curious about her father. However, no one would tell her his
identity.
They told me in a roundabout way (Nabors) is my father, Hughes
said about her maternal family.
Hughes said she finds it suspicious that her mother has never had a
job, yet always seems to have money. She said Barbara Hughes had
her own home at the age of 17.
Hughes has reason to seek her family medical history.
After she began researching Nabors in 1993, Hughes had three heart
attacks in a year and a half, which she attributes to stress. She said
when she drove to Nabors hometown in Sylacauga, Ala.,
her mother had a heart attack.
Hughes also said she has had four knee surgeries.
The doctors say I may have what's called a football knee, she said. I
don't know if it's hereditary or what. Health matters aside, Hughes said
not having her birth certificate has ruined her life. She may need Social
Security in the future, but can¹t get it without a birth certificate.
Hughes said her grandfather enrolled her in school and went with
her to get a driver's license.
How he did it, I don't know Hughes said.
She said Erlanger Medical Center in Chattanooga, where she was told
she was born, told her they didn't have her birth certificate on record.
I went to the library and looked through the newspapers to see if I was
listed as being born, I wasn't listed, Hughes said.
She said, Barbara Hughes met Nabors in 1953 when Nabors
started a show in Chattanooga called Holiday for Housewives. Hughes
was born in August 1954.
(Nabors) picked my mom out of the audience when a girl who
was supposed to sing with him never showed, Hughes said about her
mother's first meeting with Nabors.
My mother told me, My daddy is her first true love. My
grandmother had told me Jim Nabors was my mother's first boyfriend,
Hughes said. When she exhausted all her resources to get her birth
certificate, including soliciting help from Gov. Don Sundquist and state
legislators, Hughes called the White House. Someone there told her to
sue the state of Tennessee because her Constitutional rights had been
violated. Hughes said she hasn't spoken to her mother in five years,
but she has sent Nabors birthday and Christmas cards through the
years.
It hurts, Hughes said. I would like to have a relationship with him
and he ignores me. I got enough of that from my mother.
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