Ward Swank
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Ward Swank | |
|---|---|
| Mayor of Harrisonburg | |
| In office September 1, 1938 – September 1, 1944 | |
| Preceded by | James O. Stickley |
| Succeeded by | Bernard Denton |
| In office September 1, 1932 – September 1, 1936 | |
| Preceded by | John W. Morrison |
| Succeeded by | John W. Morrison |
| Member of the Virginia Senate | |
| In office February 28, 1923 – January 12, 1932 | |
| Preceded by | John Paul Jr. |
| Succeeded by | Aubrey G. Weaver |
| Constituency |
|
| Personal details | |
| Born | Ward Clinton Swank November 10, 1885 Edom, Virginia, U.S. |
| Died | June 2, 1949 (aged 63) Virginia, U.S. |
| Resting place | Woodbine Cemetery, Harrisonburg, Virginia |
| Party | Democratic |
| Spouse |
Elsie Miller (m. 1918) |
| Children | 2 |
| Education | University of Virginia (BA, LLB) |
| Occupation |
|
Ward Clinton Swank (November 10, 1885 – June 2, 1949) was a Virginia lawyer and politician who served for a decade in the Virginia Senate, then for nearly a decade as mayor of Harrisonburg, Virginia during the Great Depression.[1]
Born near Edom in Rockingham County, the youngest of at least ten children of the former Mary Elizabeth Horn (1847–1917) and her husband John Perry Swank (1833–1918). In the 18th century, Mennonite Swank (a/k/a Shank or Schwenk) ancestors had emigrated from Switzerland and various German states and established farms in then-developing Rockingham County, and for centuries had intermarried with other long-established Germanic families in the Shenandoah Valley including the Horns.[2] His paternal grandfather, John Swank had married Mary Acker.[3] Although named only in postwar rosters, his farm laborer father, who clearly married his mother in 1863, may have renounced the Mennonites' pacifist teachings and served as a private in the 7th Virginia Cavalry late in the conflict.[4][5] Virginia's public schools were established after the conflict, and Ward Swank attended the Rockingham County public schools, graduating from Harrisonburg High School in 1908. He then traveled to Charlottesville to attend the University of Virginia, from which he received a bachelor's degree in 1911, and also participated in the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity and the Imp society. He graduated from the University of Virginia Law School in 1913.[6]
Swank attended officer candidate school during World War I, then sat on the local draft board, and later became active in the American Legion.[7][8] As 1918 ended, Shank married Elsie R. Miller (1894–1991) of Stephens City in Frederick County at the Shenandoah Valley's northern end, and who had graduated from the State Normal School (teacher's college) in Harrisonburg in 1917.[9][10] She outlived him by decades, and bore two daughters during the marriage, Carolyn Miller (b. 1925) and Janice Newton (b. 1930).[11]