Charles City County civic leader Harmon White dies at 88

When his daughter was in the eighth grade, Harmon White took her out of an all-black school in Ruthville in 1965 and enrolled her in nearby Charles City County School, which had integrated just the year before.

"I didn't understand why he was moving me. He said, 'Trust me. It's a good thing.' I didn't want to go," said his daughter, Saundra Quiero of Hampton.

"He told me, 'When you grow up and have kids, it'll be better for them [because of this].' We were one of the first families to integrate the schools."

In doing this, Mr. White, a quiet and reserved but warm and welcoming man, continued to do what he always had done.

"He always was trying to make Charles City a better place," Quiero said.

Mr. White, who served two terms as Charles City sheriff during the 1970s, died of myelodysplasia Friday in a Mechanicsville hospital. He was 88.

A funeral will be held Tuesday at noon at Liberty Baptist Church in Charles City, where he had been a longtime clerk, Sunday-school superintendent for 30 years, deacon, committeeman and member of the senior choir and men's chorus. Burial will be in the church cemetery.

"He was involved in everything. When I was a child, he had a meeting every night," his daughter recalled.

Mr. White had been a life member and treasurer of the county branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Weeks before he died, he found the lapel button he wore as he tramped with more than 250,000 demonstrators during the civil-rights March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on Aug. 28, 1963 -- the occasion of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech.

He worked with the Charles City County Civic League, served on the county Planning Commission and county fair committee, attended School Board meetings while his children were in school and was a former Parent-Teacher Association president and a Masonic leader.

Born on a Charles City truck farm, he walked several miles to school daily until he dropped out in the 11th grade. "His family was in such dire need. There was no work. He joined the Civilian Conservation Corps and sent part of his check home," Quiero said.

Drafted into the Army during World War II, Mr. White often spoke of a night in North Africa when he and his soldier-brother, John, unexpectedly met. "All they could do was cry and hug because they hadn't written or seen each other for a long time," Quiero said.

An entrepreneurial spirit who encouraged his children to save their money, he had owned a grocery store, run a farm and founded Charles City Oil Co. Inc., which he ran with his brother for about 20 years, until 1989. He also retired during the 1970s as a truck driver at Fort Eustis.

In addition to his daughter, survivors include his wife of 63 years, Juanita Crump White; a son, Harmon Ryan White of Charles City; a brother, John White of Hopewell; and four grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.