
DATE: Tuesday, October 14, 1997             TAG: 9710140270

SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY GUY FRIDDELL, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   93 lines

MEMORIAL HONORS SPONG'S CAREER OF PUBLIC SERVICE FRIENDS GATHER TO HONOR THE MEMORY OF LEGISLATOR AND LAW SCHOOL DEAN.

In a memorial service Monday afternoon for William B. Spong Jr., three close friends spoke for hundreds outside the entrance of the sun-drenched faded pink-brick Wren Building at the College of William and Mary. A former U.S. senator, Spong died Saturday in Portsmouth at 77.

The scene in Williamsburg was one in which Spong had been very much at home while he was dean of William and Mary's Marshall-Wythe Law School from 1976 to 1985. He rescued it from near decertification and led it to national prominence.

All three speakers stressed Spong's nearly lifelong service to education.

``Traveling with Sen. Spong was a course in the rule of law, a class in big band music, and a seminar in sports,'' said Bob Crouch, who chauffeured Spong in 1971 and 1972 through all but one of Virginia's counties. ``Anyone who was with the senator for much time at all became his student.''

Now U.S. attorney for the western district, Crouch declared, ``In public service, Mr. Spong of Virginia was the best of his day and among the greatest of Virginians.''

During Spong's six years in the U.S. Senate, Crouch said, ``He lived the motto of Virginia-born Sam Houston: `Do the right thing and risk the consequences.'

``He earned the affection and respect of both political parties. He later acknowledged that his political fortune was the victim of his Senate duties. He chose to sacrifice the votes of civic club meetings to his votes in the Senate.''

William C. Battle, who managed Spong's 1966 Senate campaign, termed him ``an uncommon man of many facets who slaved and worked for education in Virginia.''

Spong's life was filled with laughter. Of his friend's ever-ready humor and his slow, deliberate delivery, Battle marveled, ``The things he said wouldn't have been a bit funny if somebody else said them.''

Shortly after Spong came to the Senate, he proposed to the media at a Washington Press Club banquet that something be done about Asian countries' infringing on copyrights of U.S. songs.

He told of a bill he was proposing with the co-sponsorship of Sens. Hiram Fong and Russell Long.

``It will be called the Spong-Long-Fong Hong Kong song bill,'' Spong drawled, dwelling on each word over the audience's rising laughter.

And Spong, Battle recalled, had ``a great facility of always being where trouble was but he was never in it.''

A band of friends at the University of Virginia Law School, just back from World War II, set out late from a horse show in Middleburg to buy alcoholic beverages for the evening's ball.

They headed late in the day for the nearest watering hole, which was in those dry times in Washington, D.C.

Trying to beat closing time, the driver was doing 75 in a 55-mph zone when a state trooper halted them near Washington. Listening to their story, he noticed Spong's serious, concerned face peering in horn rims over the back of the front seat.

``Follow me!'' the officer said and led them, siren screaming, lights flashing, across the District of Columbia's Key Bridge and pulled up in Georgetown in front of a liquor store.

The officer had the store open after hours for them. Leaning in the car window, he said to owl-eyed Spong: ``Young man, you see to it that these fellows have a safe trip back to Middleburg!''

``Why did he pick Spong? I don't know. And why was Spong Spong? I don't know that either!'' Battle exclaimed to the throng laughing on the shade-dappled lawn. ``Spong was almost magical as a teacher,'' said Tim Sullivan, president of the College of William and Mary and former law school head.

``He taught without seeming to teach and you learned without realizing you were being taught,'' Sullivan observed.

``He was the most thoughtful person of his generation, a great man who loved Virginia, the beauty of its land, the decency of its people.

``He was a teacher and a builder who believed profoundly in the power of education and struck many a blow for civility.''

A private interment service will be held later at the University of Virginia.

Widower of Virginia Galliford Spong, he is survived by a daughter, Martha Kingman Spong; a son, Thomas Nichols Spong and his wife, Misty Cupp Spong; and five grandchildren. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

BILL TIERNAN/The Virginian-Pilot

Former Sen. William B. Spong Jr., above, who died Saturday, was

praised by three speakers, including William C. Battle of

Charlottesville, left, who managed his 1966 campaign for election to

the Senate.

BILL TIERNAN/The Virginian-Pilot photos

Friends and family members of the late William B. Spong Jr. gathered

Monday afternoon on the lawn of the Wren Building to honor him. At

right is James H. Latimer, a retired political writer for the

Richmond Times-Dispatch, who was one of the guests.