Pearsall, Thomas J. (Thomas Jenkins), 1903-1981

Thomas J. Pearsall was an attorney of Rocky Mount, N.C., who was the chief author of the 1956 Pearsall Plan for school integration in North Carolina and chairman of the board of the Roanoke Island Historical Association, 1975-1981.

Thomas Jenkins Pearsall was born on 11 February 1903 in Rocky Mount, North Carolina. He married Elizabeth Braswell and lived in Rocky Mount for most of his life. The couple had two sons, Thomas J. Pearsall, Jr., and Mack B. Pearsall.

Thomas Pearsall was a lawyer and businessman, and held farming interests in Nash, Edgecombe, and Halifax counties. During most of his life Pearsall was active in Democratic Party politics. He served in the North Carolina House of Representatives from 1941 to 1947, and was Speaker of the House in 1947.

After leaving the legislature in 1947, Pearsall continued an active public career. In 1954, Governor William B. Umstead appointed him chairman of the Governor's Advisory Committee on Education, whose purpose was to study school desegregation and make recommendations to the governor and the legislature. In 1955, Governor Luther Hodges appointed a similar committee, the North Carolina Advisory Committee on Education, to continue to study desegregation, and Pearsall again served as chairman. Based on the work of these two committees, Pearsall wrote the 1956 school desegregation legislation known as the Pearsall Plan. This plan shifted the responsibility for student assignments, student busing, and the power to close the public schools from the state to local school boards. The North Carolina legislature adopted the plan in 1956.

Pearsall served on three other educational committees in North Carolina: the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees of the University of North Carolina; the Governor's Commission on Education Beyond the High School; and the Special Committee of the Board of Trustees of the University of North Carolina. As chairman of the latter committee, Pearsall guided the reorganization of the consolidated UNC system and the expansion of the state's community colleges.

In 1975, Pearsall became chairman of the board of the Roanoke Island Historical Association. He served in that capacity until his death on 5 May 1981.