“Felix Grundy Norman , was born January 4, 1808, near Smyrna, Rutherford County, Tenn. and died August 5, 1885 at Tuscumbia, Alabama. He received an academic course and in 1828 came to this (then Franklin) County and taught school. He was afterwards a merchant, but read law under Hon. William Cooper and was licensed in 1841. The same year he entered the legislature, and served for eight successive years. From 1845 to 1847 he was Master of the Grand Lodge of Freemasons in the State. He was living in Tuscumbia in 1872. A Lawyer, a Democrat, a Presbyterian and a Mason. He was denied early educational advantages, but was taught in the rudiments by an older brother. He began life as a merchant, but later taught school for several years. He studied under William Casper, was admitted to the bar in Tuscumbia in the early thirties, and practiced at that point and the surrounding country until his death.

He was Mayor of Tuscumbia for many years, and represented Franklin County in the Legislature a number of times in the legislature for sessions of 1841, 1842, 1844, 1845 and 1847-8, inclusive. Although he supported the Confederacy with his means and influence, he was debarred from active participation on account of his age.[trifelixgrundy]

Felix Grundy Norman, grew up in the early settlement of west Tennessee and once spoke about his childhood and the difficulties his family faced each day, in the United States Senate, With eloquence, he related the following, “I was too young to participate in these dangers and difficulties, but I can remember when death was in almost every bush, and every thicket concealed an ambuscade. If I am asked to trace my memory back, and name the first indelible impression it received, it would be the sight of my eldest brother, bleeding and dying under the wounds inflicted by the tomahawk and scalping knife. Another, and another went in the same way. I have seen a widowed mother plundered of her whole property in one night; from affluence and ease reduced to poverty in a moment, and compelled to labor with her own hands to support and educate her last and favorite son-him who now addresses you. Sir, the ancient sufferings of the West were very great. I know it. I need turn to no document to tell me what they were. They are written upon my memory-a part of them on my heart. Those of us who are here are but the remnant, the wreck of large families lost in the settlement of the West.” xvii[Earlysett]

He was the son of John Norman and Margaret [Stockird or Stockard] Norman who lived at Smyrna, Rutherford county, Tenn. Married: August 17, 1848 at Dickson, to Jane Lavinia Cook. Jane, was born in Huntsville, Ala., Feb. 22, 1824, and died June 25, 1901. She was a daughter of Henry Cook and Jane [Shelton] Cook, of Spotsylvania County, Va., and a sister of Mrs. Amanda Barton. They resided for some years in Huntsville, later locating to Tuscumbia
where they spent the remaining years of their lives, in the former for some time as government agent for the disposition of Indian lands. Children: 1. John Henry Norman; 2. Felix Grundy Norman,[Jr.], m. Della Phares, Salinas, Calif.; 3. Mary Barton Norman, m. John R. Charlton, La Verge, Tenn.; 4. Kate Cook Norman, m. Hall S. Kirkpatrick; 5. Thomas Edgar Norman, m. Lee Ellis, Memphis; 6. James Beverly Norman, last residence: Tuscumbia.”

He and his wife are buried in the Oakwood Cemetery at Tuscumbia. Mrs. Norman before her marriage was Jane L. Cook, a daughter of Henry Cook and Jane Cook and Mr. and Mrs. Norman were the parents of several well-known children