Euphytee Williams is a “plain country boy” on his way to a presidential inaugural ball, a retired 47-year postman about to see the nation’s top federal employee on his first day on the job.

For a jubilant Williams, President-elect Barack Obama is the embodiment of an idea his St. Mary’s Catholic School teachers drilled into him: always strive to be what they tell you can never be.

Williams, 86, left Saturday and will be among the anticipated millions converging on Washington, D.C., to see Obama sworn in Tuesday as the 44th president of the United States.

“I’m going to Washington because when I was a youngster, I was always told we’d never see the heights Obama has reached,” Williams said Thursday at his home on Adams Street, where he has lived with his wife, Theresa, for 54 years. “I was always told there would never be a black president, never be a Catholic president, never be a Jewish president and never be a president born west of the Mississippi. I’ve lived to see all but a Jewish president.”

Williams can spout election facts and Democratic Party names like he’s talking about his own family. He supported Obama “100 percent from the go.”

“He’s a young man who’s not working only for one group of people,” Williams said, between citing Iowa caucus statistics of a year ago and listing names of Cabinet nominees. “He’s for everybody. He convinced people that he would do the right thing for all people.”

Sixteen years ago, Williams watched from the Capitol mall as President Bill Clinton was sworn in. He keeps a souvenir bag from that trip, but wasn’t planning on taking it with him.

On Thursday, he had already packed his tuxedo for the inaugural ball, a ticket for which his daughter Denise Darasaw, who lives in Silver Springs, Md., had gotten for him.

Mrs. Williams, a retired math teacher in the city schools, will stay behind. “I kept saying there’d be 4 million people there and I’d rather watch on TV,” she laughed. The two have been married 62 years.

Williams grew up in Edwards and attended St. Mary’s Catholic School in Vicksburg. He walked a postal route up and down Vicksburg’s hills for 18 years before becoming the last postman appointed in this district by a U.S. congressman to drive a rural route.

He has plaques from the Vicksburg Post Office honoring his 47 years and 8 months on the job and his record of driving more than a million miles without a wreck.

He also attended Howard University and served in the South Pacific during World War II.

“But I’m just a plain country boy,” he said with a smile.

Off the Culkin Road hills in the county, 13-year-old Davionne Brooks was also packing Thursday, anticipating her own trip to the inauguration.

Davionne, a 7th-grader at Warren Junior High School, was selected for the Junior Presidential Youth Inaugural Conference as an alumni of the National Junior Youth Leadership Program, which she attended in D.C. last April.

“I feel very glad and proud that he’s our president, because of everything he’s accomplished,” she said of Obama. “I’m looking forward to meeting new people and seeing Obama in person.”

Davionne also left Saturday, and during her five days in the nation’s capital will attend classes and seminars in addition to the swearing-in, parade and inaugural ball, all part of the prestigious conference open only to students with top grades and behavior.

She’ll hear keynote speakers Gen. Colin Powell, former secretary of state; former Vice President Al Gore; and Erik Weihenmayer, filmmaker, mountaineer and author of “Touch the Top of the World: A Blind Man’s Journey to Climb Farther than the Eye Can See.”

Though Davionne’s grandmother Ruby Parke, was nearly certain of her own plans to get on a chartered bus to Washington for the celebration, Davionne will be traveling without her family.

“She’ll be well looked-after” by her conference chaperones, said her father, David Brooks, a shift supervisor at DiamondJack’s Casino.

“Because of the type of young lady she is, we know she is going to get up there and be responsible.”

Her principal, Cedric Magee, took her aside Thursday. “He told me he was real proud of me and he wanted me to take lots of pictures to show him,” she said.

But it’s not all academics and history-in-the-making for the teen. Her stepmother, Edna Spratley, a financial analyst at DiamondJack’s, said she’s also been shopping and getting her hair done.

Others in Vicksburg also are making the trip, among them state Democratic Party treasurer and mayoral hopeful Paul Winfield.

“It’s quite obvious to all of us that this is a historical moment, and I’m happy to be a part of it,” he said. “The more important aspect of this, though, is what happens the day after.” He cited the need for bipartisan cooperation, hard work and sacrifice, and said he expects Obama’s inaugural speech to reflect that. Winfield was an Obama delegate to the Democratic National Convention.

State Rep. George Flaggs said he had planned to attend but had to cancel because of unexpected committee demands in Jackson. “My son is going in my spot,” Flaggs said.

Elliott Flaggs, 23, is a former U.S. congressional intern who will begin law school in September.

Eleven fifth- and sixth-grade students from Vicksburg Intermediate School also left Saturday. Three chaperones — VIS Principal Sharon Williams, her husband Michael and Grove Street Alternative School teacher David Sharp — will look after them while the students attend as part of a private education group associated with the Smithsonian Institution.

“We’re going to be in the midst of history being made,” Sharon Williams said. “The kids are really excited.”

And one other local representative will be in Washington for the inauguration — a quilt made by Port Gibson master quilter Geraldine Nash.

While she cannot attend personally, Nash was invited to send a quilt to an exhibit at the Historical Society of Washington, D.C., called “Quilts for Obama: Celebrating the Inauguration of Our 44th President.”

Nash’s quilt depicts a man and a woman toiling in a field, and is called “The Hands that Picked the Cotton Now Help Pick Presidents.”

The collection of 60 quilts from across the country also includes one from Georgetown, S.C. made by the oldest member of first lady-elect Michelle Obama’s family.

Millions of people will watch as Obama is sworn in, and Davionne summed up the goal they all share: “Even if I don’t get to meet him, if I just see him that’s enough for me.”

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Contact Pamela Hitchins at phitchins@vicksburgpost.com.