Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 8, 1995 TAG: 9510090062
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TODD JACKSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ROCKY MOUNT LENGTH: Medium
To begin to understand why Franklin County's school administration building was named after the late Peggy S. Love on Saturday, backtrack to 1953.
The county's school system was made up of a scattered group of one-room schoolhouses.
The first section of the county's high school - added to many times since - was just being finished.
And Superintendent Harold Ramsey hired Peggy Love to be his secretary and clerk of the School Board.
Over the years, new schools were built, more students enrolled, and the politics and day-to-day business of running a school system became more complicated.
But Peggy Love, according to those who honored her Saturday, never wavered.
The job she was doing when she retired in 1991 is now done by four people.
"She understood everything, because she had been there from the start," said Love's husband, Floyd.
At one point in her career, Love served as clerk of the board; took care of the division's payroll; ordered all of the division's textbooks; and was the secretary for the superintendent, the director of instruction and two other administrators.
And she still made time to raise three children, become a leader in her church and take part in other civic activities.
"Peggy Love reached a level unattainable by any of her colleagues," School Superintendent Len Gereau said during the dedication ceremony.
The dedication was held in the School Board's newly renovated meeting room on the bottom floor of the administration building on Bernard Road.
A portrait of Love that will hang inside the building was unveiled by her children. Love, who also served on Rocky Mount Town Council from 1990-94, died last year of brain cancer at the age of 63.
A number of speakers Saturday - including Gereau, Rocky Mount Mayor Broaddus Shively, Harold Ramsey's daughter Bobbie Brooks and some of Love's co-workers - described their memories of the woman who was the heart and soul of the school system for four decades.
They used such words as: trustworthy, unpretentious, committed, efficient, understanding and loyal.
"There will never be another Peggy Love," said Morris Law, a former associate superintendent.
"Day after day, year after year, without batting an eye, Peggy did her job. Today, the school system is giving her an A+ for her performance,'' Brooks said.
Betty Blair, the school system's public relations director, grew up across the street from Floyd and Peggy Love.
She was the last to speak Saturday, and her words were the ones Floyd Love liked best.
Blair compared Love to a thread woven through a piece of fabric.
"That's what she was," Floyd Love said. "Sometimes she was on top and you could see her, and sometimes she was underneath. But she was still there."
"And she still is," said Love's daughter Ann.
by CNB