Carlton Townes

At just 18 years old, Carlton Townes is already taking the city of McKenzie by storm.

As a high school senior, the first African American Tennessee DECA Vice President of Marketing from his town and the organizer behind McKenzie’s first-ever Community Prayer Service, Townes had a busy 2025. Luckily for McKenzie, the young man doesn’t plan to slow down.

When asked what it means to make history, Townes turned the focus away from himself. He talked about the students watching him. He talked about family. He talked about what it means for someone younger to see what he’s done and decide they can be the first to do something, too.

He wants his success to be a mirror for the kids coming up behind him — proof that they can be the first in their family to attend college, land a certain job or chase something bigger than what they see around them. He wants them to look at someone from their own town, from their side of the tracks, and know it’s possible to exceed expectations.

Before receiving any title or winning any election, Townes’ sense of purpose was shaped by the support he received from his family.

“In order for me to run in my life, there were people who came before me who had to take tiny steps,” Townes said. “My grandmother walked so that we could run. Her mother walked so she could run. In my family, there’s always been someone who had to walk in order for the next person to be able to run.”

Townes’ great-aunt clips every newspaper article written about him and calls to read it aloud. “Our boy done been in the paper again,” she’d say.

When he was considering whether to run for DECA state officer, it was his great-grandmother, Marsha “Mimi” Townes, he talked it through with — and prayed with before making his decision.

Mimi died on January 8 of this year after a brief illness. Townes carried her illness through December, the hardest month he can remember. Her death shifted something in him.

“Bringing in the first of the year with my grandma being in the hospital, it really tore me at me,” said Townes. “I mean, that’s my girl. That’s my rock. Everybody has their girlfriends or friends or besties or pals that just bring out the best in them. Well, that’s my grandmother.”

Going into a monumental year, Townes was especially crushed.

“Some people would have been angry with God,” said Townes. “I was angry, but then I became more at peace with it. I’m at peace because I don’t have to worry about her hurting anymore. But I’m still kind of mad. Why couldn’t He just let her see me graduate, or let her be at this next community prayer service, or be at my farewell for DECA in February?”

But even in his grief, Townes found peace and a sense of heightened purpose. His great-grandmother endured a time of segregation, gave up her own education opportunities and laid down a path for her family. Mimi led her life with love, leaning on God and becoming a strength for her family. Townes wanted to be a reflection of her even after her death.

“I feel like, every single day, there’s parts of her that I see in me now,” said Townes. “The love that my grandmother had that she poured into me is what I like to pour into everybody.”

Townes doesn’t care where someone comes from, what they believe or what labels they carry. He wants to know people as they are.

“You can put the worst person in front of me,” he says, “and I want to know them for who they are.”

That mindset led him to organize McKenzie’s first Community Prayer Service in September 2025, centered on unity. He reached out across churches, counties and communities, inviting anyone who wanted to come. Black or white. Republican or Democrat. Regular churchgoer or someone who hasn’t prayed in years.

A projected 185 people attended the first community event at McKenzie’s downtown Veteran’s Park.

Now Townes is planning a second service, scheduled for March 1 at McKenzie’s Park Theatre, focused on “Seasons of Life.” It will include speakers, praise and worship and a symbolic chain-breaking exercise he encountered at a youth camp in Florida — an opportunity for participants to release whatever is holding them back.

The theme feels especially personal for Townes this time around. He’d been planning the service through the grief of losing Mimi, pushing through exhaustion and self-doubt. He’d also recently come to the realization that it has been almost five years since he lost his older brother, Lorenzo Townes. Two of his biggest inspirations, the people who made him into the young man he is today, are gone.

“God knew what he was doing leading me to this topic,” he said, “because now I’m able to talk with people about it.”

Townes is equally honest about what it costs to move through the world the way he does. He was among those who received racist threatening text messages that circulated in the region last year.

“I was so terrified,” he said. “I didn’t want anyone to think of me differently.”

He speaks plainly about inequities he has seen — underfunded schools in majority-Black counties, teachers stretched thin, young people written off before they’ve had a chance.

He notes how his aunt, who works at McKenzie Housing Authority, tells every child who comes through that they are going to be somebody someday. It’s a detail that inspires him.

“The thought that just because you’re Black, you can’t be great — that should not be a thing,” he says. “Everyone has the potential to be great.”

When he faces prejudice, his response is to work harder and want more — for McKenzie, for Carroll County, for the world.

That drive recently took him beyond McKenzie. Just days before his interview with The Banner, Townes returned from a DECA trip that included meetings at the state capitol, where he spoke with legislators about career and technical student organizations and their impact on Tennessee students. He admitted the moment felt intimidating, even more so when State Representative Tandy Darby (R-Greenfield) referred to him as “Mr. McKenzie.”

“I was like, wait a minute — I’m talking to state senators and representatives,” he said with a laugh. “As long as I didn’t have to talk to the governor, I was fine.”

Looking ahead, Townes plans to study nursing, pursue certification as a nurse midwife and eventually earn a degree in hospitality and tourism. He hopes one day to open a hotel in McKenzie and bring economic opportunity home.

But that’s the long game. Right now, Townes is focusing on finishing high school.

Asked whether he ever imagined being here, he laughed and shook his head. “I never imagined myself being a state DECA officer. I never imagined having this kind of impact on my community,” he said, then paused. “Give me ten more years. Let’s see where God takes me.”

Mimi and Lorenzo walked so Carlton could run. Now he’s running — and clearing a path for whoever comes next.