Ralph Donald Turlington Sr. (October 5, 1920 – May 12, 2021) was an American politician from the state of

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, a ...

Early life

Turlington was born in

Gainesville, Florida Gainesville is the county seat of Alachua County, Florida, and the largest city in North Central Florida, with a population of 141,085 in 2020. It is the principal city of the Gainesville metropolitan area, which had a population of 339,247 in ...

in 1920. Turlington was in the inaugural class of the P. K. Yonge Developmental Research School, where he was a distinguished alumni, graduating in 1938. He attended the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

, where he was also a distinguished alumni, to obtain a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

degree in business and

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

for his master's degree in the same field. After completing his education, Turlington served in the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

and the

Korean War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Korean War , partof = the Cold War and the Korean conflict , image = Korean War Montage 2.png , image_size = 300px , caption = Clockwise from top: ...

. After the war, he worked at the University of Florida. In 1947, he became a faculty member of

Alpha Kappa Psi Alpha Kappa Psi (, often stylized as AKPsi) is the oldest and largest business fraternity to current date. Also known as "AKPsi", the fraternity was founded on October 5, 1904, at New York University and was incorporated on May 20, 1905. It is cu ...

Professional Business Fraternity. He received a Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Florida in 1968.

Florida House of Representatives

He was elected to the

Florida House of Representatives The Florida House of Representatives is the lower house of the Florida Legislature, the state legislature of the U.S. state of Florida, the Florida Senate being the upper house. Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution of Florida, adopte ...

in 1950 for

Alachua County Alachua County ( ) is a county in the north central portion of the U.S. state of Florida. As of the 2020 census, the population was 278,468. The county seat is Gainesville, the home of the University of Florida since 1906, when the campus ope ...

. He would serve until 1974, eventually also serving as speaker from 1967 to 1969. He was the Florida Commissioner of Education from 1974 to 1987. He was elected to Constitutional office in Florida more times than any other person in the history of Florida. Following his service as Commissioner of Education, Turlington joined the American College Testing Program (ACT) and served full-time as a consultant to longtime friend Dr. James W. Carr.

Personal life

Turlington was married to Ann Gellerstedt (until her death in 2003) and had two children, Donald and Katherine. Turlington died on May 12, 2021, at the age of

100 100 or one hundred (Roman numeral: C) is the natural number following 99 and preceding 101. In medieval contexts, it may be described as the short hundred or five score in order to differentiate the English and Germanic use of "hundred" to des ...

, in Durham, North Carolina.

Legacy

A large building at the University of Florida, Ralph D. Turlington Hall, is named after him. It is located in the center of campus, houses multiple departments in the College_of_Liberal_Arts_and_Sciences, and over a hundred classrooms. The

Florida Department of Education The Florida Department of Education (FLDOE) is the state education agency of Florida. It governs public education and manages funding and testing for local educational agencies (school boards). It is headquartered in the Turlington Building (nam ...

headquarters in Tallahassee, the Turlington Building, is also named in his honor.

References

1920 births 2021 deaths Florida Commissioners of Education Harvard Business School alumni People from Gainesville, Florida Military personnel from Florida Warrington College of Business alumni Speakers of the Florida House of Representatives Democratic Party members of the Florida House of Representatives American centenarians Men centenarians United States Army personnel of World War II United States Army personnel of the Korean War {{Florida-politician-stub