The street where Dr. Clemmie Embly Webber and her late husband, Paul Webber, made so many contributions to the Orangeburg community was officially named in the couple’s honor Monday afternoon.

A portion of Boulevard Street has been renamed Webber Boulevard, a location where the Webber family once owned two businesses. One of those businesses was the College Soda Shop, a popular gathering place for Claflin University and South Carolina State College students in the 1940s and 1950s. It was there the Webbers instilled life lessons and values to the young students.

Former S.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Ernest Finney was one of those young people on whom the Webbers forged a lasting impression. As a high school junior, Finney recalled getting off a train to make his home in Orangeburg on that same street now named after the Webbers.

He took a job at the College Soda Shop, where Finney said the Webbers taught him how to manage a business, but more importantly, how to treat people. Looking at 95-year-old Clemmie Webber, Finney told the crowd at New Mount Zion Baptist Church yesterday she and her husband had a profound effect on his life.

State Sen. John W. Matthews Jr., D-Bowman, quoted Dr. George Washington Carver to describe the Webbers, noting Carver said a person’s mark on the world is measured by how much evidence of their existence they leave behind.

“Certainly, Mr. and Mrs. Webber have left a lot of evidence,” Matthews said.

A large portion of that evidence can be found in the Webbers’ three children, Paul, Carolyn and Sheryl.

“It’s a wonderful honor. It’s something we’re very proud of,” said Paul Webber III, the Webbers’ oldest child and a senior judge in the District of Columbia Superior Court.

Webber III said his mother was elated when she heard news of the honor.

“She said that it’s wonderful and that I wish Paul was here to see it,” he said.

The story of the Webbers and Orangeburg spans the better part of a century.

After graduating from S.C. State, the couple lived in Aiken for several years before returning to Orangeburg.

Clemmie Webber took a job teaching in Cordova, while her husband began a career in business.

In addition to the Campus Soda Shop, the Webbers owned and operated the Riverside Soda Shop, Webber Homes, Webber Motor Sales and the Orangeburg Tigers baseball team at various times.

Paul Webber was also an assistant football coach at S.C. State, where he garnered all-conference honors for his play on the gridiron during his collegiate years. He earned a master’s degree in economics from Columbia University.

After taking a 10-year hiatus from education to manage the College Soda Shop, Clemmie Webber returned to teaching as a chemistry and physics teacher at Wilkinson High School.

Webber desperately wanted to be a doctor in her younger years but financial reasons stifled her dream. She made a vow to herself to help as many students get into medical school as she could.

Webber held true to that vow by becoming an advisor to pre-med majors at S.C. State. Through her letters of recommendation, she helped many students get accepted into medical school.

Webber went on to receive her doctorate degree from American University. She retired as a chemistry instructor at S.C. State, where she played an instrumental role in establishing the I.P. Stanback Planetarium and Museum on campus.

She has co-authored several scientific books and pamphlets and has also authored a few books of her own, including “The College Soda Shop: An Education for Life” and “The Treadwell Street Saga,” which reflects on her experience growing up in Orangeburg in the 1950s.

She served as chair of the Orangeburg Consolidated School District 5 Board for eight years.

Clemmie Webber was named National Mother of the Year in 1983 by the American Mothers Committee and is a past winner of the Order of the Palmetto, the state’s highest civilian award. In 2003, she was named Orangeburg Citizen of the Year.

n T&D Staff Writer Lee Tant can be reached by e-mail at ltant@timesanddemocrat.com or by phone at 803-534-1060. Discuss this and other stories online at TheTandD.com.

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