During the desegregation of Fairfax County Public Schools, the school system’s leaders and decision-makers at the local-level were the Fairfax County School Board and the Division Superintendent. From 1954 to 1966, there were four large turnovers on the Fairfax County School Board in 1956, 1960, 1962, and 1964. Unlike the modern 12-member Board, the School Board during desegregation was comprised of seven members appointed by the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, with one member representing each magisterial district, namely: Centreville, Dranesville, Falls Church, Lee, Mason, Mount Vernon, and Providence. Fairfax County Public Schools had two division superintendents during desegregation: W. T. Woodson (1954-61) and Earl C. Funderburk (1961-66).

Below you will find brief biographies, compiled from newspaper articles and obituaries, of each School Board member and superintendent who served during the desegregation time frame. More detailed information about individual School Board members can be gleaned from newspaper articles and School Board minutes. 

The meeting minutes recorded during the 1950s and 1960s were not as detailed as they are today, and primarily focus on issues of budget and school construction. Next to desegregation, the largest issue confronting the school system from 1954 to 1966 was explosive enrollment growth. From September 1954 to September 1966, student enrollment swelled from 28,700 to 101,832, and 84 new schools were constructed. Transcriptions of the minutes related to desegregation as well as position statements by Robert F. Davis and W. T. Woodson and can be found under the Minutes and Writings sections of this website.

• School Board: December 1953
• School Board: February 1956
• School Board: January 1960
• School Board: June 1962
• School Board: November 1962
• School Board: January 1964
• Superintendent W. T. Woodson
• Superintendent Earl C. Funderburk
• Sources

The Fairfax County School Board

December 1953

Due to the creation of the Mason Magisterial District, the Fairfax County School Board underwent a reorganization in December 1953, increasing from six members to seven members. Centreville District Representative Charles O. Benham resigned in early January 1954. He was replaced on February 3, 1954, by Robert W. Darr. The other members of the School Board following the reorganization were Almorine M. Crowther, Robert F. Davis, Floyd Kirby, Sarah D. Lory, Fred W. Robinson, and Richard E. Shands.

Almorine M. Crowther
Almorine Mary Cunningham was born in 1903 in Manassa, Colorado. She married Horace Crowther in 1920 in Salt Lake City, Utah. Almorine Crowther served on the Fairfax County School Board from 1949 to 1956. She was a member of the Groveton Elementary School Parent-Teacher Association and at one time served as its president. Mrs. Crowther also directed Red Cross activities in the Groveton area and was active in The Church of Latter-day Saints in Alexandria. She passed away in April 1958.

Robert W. Darr
Robert William Darr was born in 1915 in Missouri. He was a graduate of Missouri State College and served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II. Mr. Darr was 38 years old when he was appointed to the School Board. He lived in Centreville where his wife taught elementary school and his daughter attended school. Mr. Darr worked as a dispatcher with Capital Airlines.

Robert F. Davis
Robert Fisher Davis was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1905. He moved to Washington, D.C., in 1928, and, in 1933, he co-founded the law firm of Stevens, Davis, Miller and Mosher. Mr. Davis was a graduate of Indiana University and also held degrees from George Washington University and American University. He worked as a patent attorney in Indiana, New York, and Washington, D.C., and was admitted to practice law before the U.S. Supreme Court. During World War II, he served as a pilot in the U.S. Navy. After the war, Mr. Davis was an aviator in the U.S. Naval Reserve and held a commercial pilot’s license. Robert Davis was appointed to the Fairfax County School Board in 1952 and, after the formation of the Mason District, served as its representative until 1960. Mr. Davis was also a member of the American Bar Association, the American Patent Law Association, and the American Chemical Society. During his time on the School Board, Mr. Davis had two sons enrolled in Fairfax County Public Schools. On August 28, 1959, he wrote a position letter to School Board Chairman Samuel Solomon regarding desegregation.

Floyd E. Kirby
Floyd Elmer Kirby was born in 1911 in Falls Church, Virginia. Unlike many School Board members of the 1950s and 1960s, Mr. Kirby and his family were not new to Fairfax County. His Kirby ancestors have been documented as far back as the 1820s in the Falls Church and Chesterbrook areas. An early Fairfax County public school, called the Kirby School, was built in 1885 on land donated by Floyd Kirby’s grandparents, Joshua and Henrietta Kirby. Floyd Kirby’s father, Sheriff Eppa P. Kirby, was instrumental in the formation of the Fairfax County Police Department. Floyd Kirby served as a deputy sheriff in Fairfax County in the 1940s. He lived on Westmoreland Street near Falls Church, and made a living as a certified public accountant and as a private tour guide at the U.S. Capitol building. In 1955, he served as a member of the Democratic Committee of Fairfax County from Dranesville District.

Sarah D. Lory
Sarah Miriam Drury was born in April 1904 in Iowa. She married Hillis Lory in 1924, and the couple lived in New York and California before moving to Fairfax Station, Virginia. Her husband, Hillis Lory, served on the Fairfax County School Board in the early 1950s. When he resigned in February 1953, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors appointed his wife Sarah in his place. Mrs. Lory was a former teacher and principal. She had two children enrolled in Fairfax County Public Schools at the time of her appointment to the School Board.

Fred W. Robinson
Frederick Webb Robinson was born in Hayesville, North Carolina, in March 1888. He moved to Herndon, Virginia, in 1922, and operated a dairy feed and farm machinery business. Mr. Robinson was one of the longest-serving members of the Fairfax County School Board. He was the Town of Herndon’s representative to the School Board as early as 1926, and was School Board chairman from 1940 to 1953. In September 1955, Mr. Robinson was appointed chairman of a bi-racial citizens committee to study the integration of Fairfax County Public Schools. The Washington Post reported that Robinson “who has advocated a policy of voluntary integration in the county which retains segregated schools, said yesterday he is ‘happy to head the committee,’ which will advise the school board on questions regarding integration” (Sept. 7, 1955, Page 44). The formation of the committee met with strong opposition from white supremacist groups and the School Board acceded to their demands (See Minutes, September 20, 1955).

Richard E. Shands
Richard Eppes Shands was born in 1897 in Washington, D.C. He graduated from Western High School and, during World War I, served as an officer in the U.S. Navy. Mr. Shands studied law at the University of Virginia and George Washington University, and was a practicing attorney in Washington, D.C., for nearly 60 years. At the time of his appointment to the School Board, Mr. Shands lived in McLean. At various times, Richard Shands served as the president of the McLean Lions Club, president of the National Capital Area Chapter of the Boy Scouts of America, and president of the Fairfax County Chamber of Commerce.

February 1956

In January 1956, a conflict between the Fairfax County School Board and the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors led to the dissolution of the School Board. On February 2, 1956, six newly appointed members began serving on the School Board. The seventh member, chairman Robert F. Davis, was the only member of the previous board reappointed by the Board of Supervisors. The new board members were Clyde W. Gleason, Theodore S. Heriot, C. Turner Hudgins, Hillis Lory, Merton S. Parsons, and Samuel S. Solomon.

Clyde W. Gleason
Clyde Walter Gleason was born in Milford, Wisconsin, in 1899. He obtained his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Wisconsin, and his Ph.D. at Ohio State University. Mr. Gleason was a professor of psychology, and at various times was on the faculty of Bowling Green State College, Gettysburg College, Ohio State University, the University of Pittsburgh, and the University of Wisconsin. After moving to Washington, D.C., Mr. Gleason worked as a division chief with the Veterans Administration where he pioneered vocational rehabilitation programs. Clyde Gleason was 56 years old at the time of his appointment as the Mount Vernon District Representative to the School Board. He lived in the Woodley Hills neighborhood had two children; a son in college and a daughter in high school.

Theodore Stark Heriot
Theodore Stark Heriot, Jr. was born in April 1908 in Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico. His parents, Theodore Heriot and Laura Lippitt, natives of South Carolina and West Virginia, respectively, met in Mexico where Laura Lippitt was teaching school. The couple married in Mexico and moved to Puerto Rico, where Mrs. Heriot taught at a missionary school for girls. Theodore S. Heriot, Jr. studied at Lehigh University and the Georgia Institute of Technology. He moved to Washington, D.C., around 1934, and, in 1944, settled in Herndon, Virginia. An electrical engineer, Mr. Heriot was working as the wire chief of the Chestnut office of the Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company when he was appointed the Centreville District Representative to the School Board. At the time of his appointment, he had two children enrolled in Fairfax County Public Schools.

C. Turner Hudgins
Clifton Turner Hudgins was born in Mathews, Virginia, in May 1914. He came to Washington, D.C., in the 1930s and attended the old National Law School. Mr. Hudgins worked as a rent-control officer for the District of Columbia, and served as a legal officer with the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II. After the war, Mr. Hudgins worked as an attorney for Acacia Life Insurance Company and taught law at Benjamin Franklin University. C. Turner Hudgins was 41 years old when he was appointed the Falls Church District Representative to the School Board. In addition to his work on the School Board, Mr. Hudgins was once president of the Sleepy Hollow Elementary School Parent-Teacher Association and president of the Sleepy Hollow Citizens Association.

Hillis Lory
Frank Hillis Lory was born in 1900 in Iowa. He married Sarah Drury in 1924, and the couple lived in New York and California before moving to Fairfax Station, Virginia. Mr. Lory was an author and lecturer. He had served on the Fairfax County School Board once before, from 1951 to 1953. At the time of his second appointment to the School Board, as Lee District Representative, Mr. Lory worked as a special assistant in the International Educational Exchange and was a foreign affairs officer in the U.S. Department of State. He had one daughter of high school age. Prior to coming to Fairfax County, Mr. Lory had served as a Superintendent of Schools in Iowa.

Merton S. Parsons
Merton Stanley Parsons was born in South Paris, Maine, in 1907. Mr. Parsons was 48 years old, and was working as an agricultural economist with the United States Department of Agriculture when he was appointed to the School Board. He was a graduate of the University of Maine and had obtained his Ph. D. from Cornell University. Merton Parsons lived with his wife, Elizabeth, and their three children in the Town of Fairfax.

Samuel S. Solomon
Samuel Sidney Solomon was born in 1923, in New York City. His parents were immigrants to the United States from Russia. Mr. Solomon was 32 years old when he was appointed the Dranesville District Representative to the School Board. He lived near Falls Church and was active in school, city, and charitable affairs. He also served as the vice president of the Haycock Elementary School PTA, and was chairman of the Dranesville District of the County Federation of Civic Associations. He had two children in elementary school at the time of his appointment.

January 1960

In January 1960, Robert F. Davis, Clyde W. Gleason, C. Turner Hudgins, and Samuel S. Solomon were replaced on the Fairfax County School Board by four new members: Joan Butler, Waldron E. Leonard, F. Merritt Ruhlen, and Berge Thomasian. Three incumbents, Theodore S. Heriot, Hillis Lory, and Merton S. Parsons, were reappointed by the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors.

Joan Butler
Joan Mary Collet was born in July 1921 in Jamshedpur, India. Her parents, Walter Collet and Frances Willis, were natives of New York and Maryland, respectively, and were living in India where Walter Collet worked as an engineer. Joan Collet went to high school in Scarsdale, New York, and attended Swarthmore College and Columbia University. In 1948, she married Scot Butler in Newtown, Connecticut, and the couple moved to Arlington County, Virginia. At the time of her appointment as Dranesville District Representative to the School Board, Joan Butler lived in McLean and her two children attended Churchill Road Elementary School where she served as vice president of the PTA. A homemaker and former secretary of the McLean Citizens’ Association, Mrs. Butler resigned from the School Board to care for her children.

Waldron E. Leonard
Waldron Earl Leonard was born in September 1897 in Monongah, West Virginia. During World War I, Waldron Leonard left school to join the military. He rose to the rank of sergeant during the war and was later promoted to the rank of colonel in the Texas National Guard. Colonel Leonard came to Washington, D.C., in 1935, and worked in the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of the Interior before being named Chief of the Veterans Information Center in 1945. Colonel Leonard was 61 years old, and was working as the Director of the Division of Services to Veterans and War Workers in the Veterans Administration, when he was appointed the Mount Vernon District Representative to the School Board. He had three daughters, two of whom were enrolled in Groveton High School when he served on the School Board. After his appointment on the School Board ended, Colonel Leonard served as a member of the U.S. Senate Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee for 13 years.

F. Merritt Ruhlen
Frank Merritt Ruhlen was born in March 1909 in Plain City, Ohio. He graduated from Ohio State University and Harvard University Law School. Before World War II, he practiced law in Rochester, New York, and during the war he served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps. After the war he worked for the U.S. Civil Aeronautics Board. At the time of his appointment as the Mason District Representative to the School Board, Mr. Ruhlen was 50 years old and had three children in Fairfax County Public Schools. After his term on the School Board expired, Mr. Ruhlen served as an administrative law judge on the Civil Aeronautics Board until his retirement in 1972.

Berge Thomasian
Berge Thomasian was born in 1922 in New York City, and was a fighter pilot in the U.S. Army Air Forces in Europe during World War II. He earned his bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in industrial management from Boston University. Mr. Thomasian moved to Washington, D.C., in 1952 and went to work for Melpar Associates as a plant manager and later for Servonics, Inc., where he was a vice president. He then founded and became president of Applied Sciences Industries in Alexandria, Virginia. Mr. Thomasian was 37 years old when he was appointed the Falls Church District Representative to the School Board. He lived near Seven Corners, and his only child, John, attended Sleepy Hollow Elementary School.

June 1962

In June 1962, Joan Butler resigned as the Dranesville District Representative to the School Board. She was replaced by John D. K. Smoot. 

John D. K. Smoot
John Daniel Kurtz Smoot, Jr. was born in 1918 in Washington, D.C., and grew up in McLean, Virginia. At age 16, he enrolled in Spartanburg Junior College in South Carolina, and then attended George Washington University. During World War II, Mr. Smoot enlisted in the U.S. Army and served in the Coast Artillery Corps in the Pacific. After the war, Mr. Smoot passed the Virginia Bar Exam and began practicing law. From 1955 to 1958, he was chairman of the Northern Virginia Health and Hospital Commission and played a key role in the design and construction of Fairfax Hospital. At the time of his appointment to the School Board, Jack Smoot, as he was known, lived in McLean and was the father of four children, two of whom were enrolled in FCPS. Because of his experience in construction and development, Mr. Smoot was appointed by Supervisor A. Claiborne Leigh of Dranesville District to aid the FCPS school construction program. The program was under intense scrutiny because it had been alleged that substandard construction was being permitted in some schools.
 

November 1962

In November 1962, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors removed all seven members of the School Board and declared their seats vacant. “The events of the past several months and particularly of the past week make it obvious this board (of Supervisors) can never have confidence in the School Board as it is presently constituted” (Washington Post, Nov. 6, 1962). According to the Washington Post, the Board of Supervisors made it clear they would not reappoint any members of the School Board who opposed its authority.

The move was condemned as a “power grab” in the local press, because School Board members served “at the pleasure of the supervisors” (Washington Post, Feb. 14, 1963). The drastic action by the Board of Supervisors had resulted from a series of clashes between the School Board and the Supervisors over budget and school construction issues. In particular, the Supervisors wanted school construction authority transferred to the county, and five members of the School Board refused.

In early November 1962, Waldron E. Leonard and John D. K. Smoot were reappointed to the School Board because both men had favored turning over school construction authority to the county. They were joined by new members Martha Gertwagen, Eugene L. Newman, and Sarah Lahr. Kenneth Clark was appointed to the School Board on November 21, and William Hoofnagle joined the Board in early December. Waldron Leonard resigned in December 1962, and was replaced by Howard E. Futch in January 1963.   

Kenneth N. Clark
Kenneth Newton Clark was born in Morrow, Ohio in March 1915. He received a bachelor’s degree from Miami University of Ohio in 1936, and a master’s degree in public administration from Syracuse University in 1938. During World War II, Mr. Clark served in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific. After the war, he moved to the Washington, D.C., area and was the eighth person hired at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) when it began operation in March 1947. In 1955, Kenneth Clark and his wife became founding members of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Fairfax. Mr. Clark also served as board president of the Falls Church Child Guidance Clinic. Kenneth Clark resided near Merrifield, Virginia, and was working as the personnel director of the IMF, when he was appointed the Providence District Representative to the School Board.

Howard E. Futch
Howard Elwyn Futch was born in 1928, in Washington, D.C., and grew up in Arlington County and Alexandria, Virginia. He enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1946, and was a veteran of the Korean War. Mr. Futch studied Advanced Management at the University of California, Los Angeles. In January 1963, he replaced Waldron Leonard as the Mount Vernon District Representative to the School Board. At the time of his appointment, Mr. Futch worked as an industrial specialist for the U.S. Department of Defense, and was chairman of the Fairfax County Federation of Citizens Associations. In his later years, Howard E. Futch resided in Brevard County, Florida, and served as a representative in the Florida State House from 1992 to 2000, and as a Florida State Senator from 2001 until his death in 2003.

Martha Gertwagen
Martha Louise Osborn was born in Rose, New York, in December 1912. She grew up in Washington, D.C., and married Harry B. Gertwagen. At the time of her appointment as the Mason District Representative to the School Board, Mrs. Gertwagen had formerly served as president of the Weyanoke Elementary School PTA, and had twice served as vice president of the Fairfax County Federation of Parent-Teacher Associations.

William S. Hoofnagle
William Sherrill Hoofnagle was born in 1921 in Atkins, Smyth County, Virginia. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Army in Europe. After the war, he earned his doctorate in Agricultural Economics from the University of Virginia. From 1950 to 1986, Mr. Hoofnagle lived in Herndon. At the time of his appointment as Centreville District Representative to the School Board, Mr. Hoofnagle was the chief of the Market Development Branch of the Economic Research Service in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. After his appointment to the School Board ended, Mr. Hoofnagle served as the Chairman of the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors.

Sarah Lahr
Sarah Louise Meyer was born in Lincoln, Nebraska, in October 1915, and graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1938. In 1941, she married Raymond Merrill Lahr, a journalist. The couple moved to Northern Virginia around 1950, and purchased a home in the Holmes Run Acres neighborhood. Sarah Lahr was appointed the Falls Church District Representative to the School Board in November 1962. Prior to her appointment, Ms. Lahr was active in the Fairfax County Federation of Parent-Teacher Associations, and was chosen to represent this organization on the Fairfax County Committee for the Jamestown Festival in 1957. After her appointment to the School Board ended, Mrs. Lahr was named president of the League of Women Voters of the Fairfax area. During the 1970s, she worked as the volunteer coordinator for Fairfax County Public Schools, and was the head of Fairfax County’s School Volunteer Advisory Committee in the 1980s. In 2009, the outdoor classroom at Woodburn Elementary School was named in her honor.

Eugene L. Newman
Eugene Lee Newman was born in 1922 in Springfield, Missouri. He served as a pilot in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Mr. Newman attended Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas, where he majored in electrical engineering. In the 1950s, he worked as an Air Force safety engineer, and traveled to Missouri, South Carolina, Ohio, and West Germany before settling in Fairfax County in 1960. At the time of his appointment as Lee District Representative to the School Board, Mr. Newman was the Chief Safety Engineer of the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts division of the U.S. Department of Labor. He had served as the president of the Bren Mar Civic Association, and had been a delegate to the County Federation of Citizens Associations and the Lee District Association of Civic Clubs prior to his appointment to the School Board. Eugene Newman lived near Bren Mar Park, and his daughter attended Lee High School.

January 1964

In all four cases, the new Supervisors come from different political parties than their predecessors. Newman, the current School Board chairman, has urged the Supervisors to keep the old Board, arguing that partially-formulated budget and desegregation plans warrant continuity among the school system’s policy-makers. ~ Washington Post, Dec. 29, 1963 

School Board Chairman Eugene Newman’s desire for maintaining continuity on the School Board was not shared by the Board of Supervisors. In January 1964, Martha Gertwagen, Sarah Lahr, Eugene Newman, and John Smoot were replaced on the School Board by John A. Goldsmith, C. Turner Hudgins, Carl V. Lyon, and William R. Perlik. Mr. Hudgins had previously served on the Fairfax County School Board from 1956 to 1960. At the time of his reappointment, Mr. Hudgins was the president of J.E.B. Stuart High School’s PTA.

John A. Goldsmith
John Alan Goldsmith was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1920, and graduated from Kenyon College. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific and participated in combat operations aboard a destroyer. After the war, he worked as a journalist for United Press International in Washington, D.C. He was assigned to cover the U.S. Senate, and frequently reported on the topics of security and politics. He also covered every national political convention from 1952 to 1968. Mr. Goldsmith was 43 years old when he was appointed the Lee District Representative to the School Board. At the time of his appointment, he was the vice president of the Fairfax County PTA Council. John Goldsmith served on the School Board from 1964 to 1972.

Carl V. Lyon
Carl Vernon Lyon was born in January 1925, in Clarksburg, West Virginia. He graduated from West Virginia Wesleyan College, and held a master’s degree from American University, and a law degree from George Washington University. During World War II, he served for three years in the U.S. Navy as a radioman in the South Pacific. Mr. Lyon was 38 years old at the time of his appointment as the Mason District Representative to the School Board. He was active in the Fairfax County Republican Party in the 1950s and 1960s, and was described in a Washington Post article as “a local Republican leader.” While in graduate school, Mr. Lyon started working for the Association of American Railroads as an attorney. He was named the Deputy Administrator of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration in 1969, and the Senior Vice President of the Association of American Railroads in 1975.

William R. Perlik
William Robert Perlik was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1925. He served in the U.S. Army during World War II in France and Germany. After the war, Mr. Perlik graduated from Oberlin College in Ohio, and received a law degree from Yale Law School in 1951. He was a founding partner of the Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering law firm, where he practiced commercial and contract law and later specialized in mediation and arbitration. William Perlik was 38 years old when he was appointed the Dranesville District Representative to the School Board. Mr. Perlik had previously served as the vice chairman of the Fairfax County-Falls Church Child Guidance Clinic and was a member of the Board of Trustees of the Northern Virginia Mental Health Association. He had also served as the chairman of the Fairfax County Federation of Citizens Associations during the support drive for the 1960 school bond issue, and was named that organization’s “Citizen of the Year” in February 1961. William Perlik served on the Fairfax County School Board from 1964 to 1971, and was president of the Virginia School Boards Association in 1972.
 

The Superintendents

Wilbert T. Woodson
 

Wilbert Tucker Woodson was the second-longest serving superintendent of Fairfax County Public Schools (1929-1961). He led the school system during the consolidation era, the Great Depression, World War II, and the first decade-and-a-half of the post-World War II baby boom. Superintendent Woodson opposed the racial desegregation of Virginia’s public schools, as evidenced by his July 6, 1959 position statement. On November 1, 1960, Mr. Woodson announced his retirement at a meeting of the Fairfax County School Board (effective June 1961). The following video biography of Superintendent Woodson was created for the “What’s in a Name?” series which airs on FCPS TV channel Red Apple 21.

Earl C. Funderburk

Earl Columbus Funderburk was the seventh superintendent of Fairfax County Public Schools. He led the school system from 1961 to 1969. A native of Ansonville, North Carolina, Superintendent Funderburk held bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education and administration from the University of North Carolina. Before coming to FCPS, Mr. Funderburk served as the superintendent of three school districts in North Carolina (City of Asheville, Elizabeth City, and New Hanover County), and served on the executive committee of the National Education Association. The desegregation of Fairfax County Public Schools, which began while W. T. Woodson was superintendent, was completed under the leadership of Superintendent Funderburk. Mr. Funderburk is largely remembered for his decentralization plan which created the area office administrative system. Earl Funderburk departed FCPS in May 1969, taking a job as the Special Project Director for Administrative-Supervisory Services in the National Education Association.

Sources

• Fairfax County School Board Minutes, Dec. 1, 1953, Meeting #14.
• The Washington Evening Star, Nov. 19, 1953, Page A-43: Floyd Kirby Named As 7th Member of Fairfax School Board.
• The Washington Post, July 1, 1955, Page 30: School Integration by Sarah M. Lahr
• The Washington Post, Sept. 7, 1955, Page 44: Integration Study Group For Fairfax.
• The Washington Post, Jan. 4, 1956, Page 25: School Board Asks Definite Office Term.
• The Washington Post, Jan. 5, 1956, Page 17: Supervisors Ignore School Board Revolt.
• The Washington Post, Feb. 2, 1956, Page 17: Fairfax Drops 6 Members of School Board.
• The Washington Post, Jan. 7, 1960, Page B-5: 4 New Members Named to Fairfax School Board.
• The Washington Post, March 23, 1961, Page B-2: Fairfax Picks Head Of County Schools.
• The Washington Post, June 28, 1962, Page C-25: Smoot Named to School Board.
• The Washington Post, Nov. 6, 1962, Page A-1: Climax to Construction Row: Fairfax School Board Fired in Feud With Supervisors Over Authority.
• The Washington Post, Nov. 9, 1962, Page B-8: School Board Power Is at Issue in Fairfax.
• The Washington Post, Nov. 22, 1962, Page C-1: School Board Gets 4th New Member.
• The Washington Post, Dec. 3, 1962, Page B-1: Leonard Quits Fairfax School Unit; 2 Named.
• The Washington Post, Feb. 14, 1963, Page C-20: Probers Study School Board Firing. 
• The Washington Post, Dec. 29, 1963, Page B-1: 4 New Members Likely to Be Named Next Month to Fairfax School Board.
• The Washington Post, Jan. 9, 1964, Page D-16: 4 Named to Board Of Fairfax Schools. 
• The Washington Post, April 26, 1969, Page B-5: NEA Names Funderburk to New Post.
• U.S. WWII Army Enlistment Records, 1938-1946, www.FamilySearch.org