Suffolk-Chesapeake City-Nansemond County Virginia USGenWeb Archives Obituaries......Sears, Wilbur E. Sr., 1980 

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Ex-Suffolk Police Chief Dies At 68 

  Wilbur Earnest Sears, who was police chief for both Chesapeake and Suffolk 
during three decades as a law enforcement officer, died Thursday in a 
Portsmouth hospital. 

  Sears lived at 2101 Dock Landing Rd. in Chesapeake at the time of his death. 
He was 68. 

  His survivors include a widow, Dorothy Hawkins Sears. 

  Sears began his law enforcement career in 1946, when he left a civil service 
job with the Naval Shipyard to become a Norfolk County police patrolman.  He 
worked his way up through the ranks to captain.  When the county merged with 
the town of South Norfolk in 1963 into what is now Chesapeake, he became the 
new city's police chief. 

  Six years later, he was named Chesapeake public safety director and put in 
charge of all police, fire and animal-control services. 

  He retired from that post on Nov. 1, 1975.  Two weeks later, he was named 
Suffolk's police chief. 

  He resigned from the latter post on Oct. 31, 1976, because of failing 
health. 

  At the age of 66, after less than a year of retirement, Sears launched an 
unsuccessful campaign, as an independent, to oust Chesapeake's Democratic 
Sheriff John R. Newhart. 

  He was an elder of Hodges Ferry Presbyterian Church and a member of Great 
Bridge Masonic Lodge 257; Portsmouth Scottish Rite Bodies; and Portsmouth and 
Suffolk Shrine clubs. 

  He was past chairman of the board of trustees of Khedive Shrine Temple and 
past president of Chesapeake Shrine Club. 

  He was a charter member of Tall Cedars of Lebanon; past president of the 
Police Association of Virginia and Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police; 
and a member of Fraternal Order of Police; Chesapeake Better Businessmen's 
Club; and Esther Chapter 37, Order of the Eastern Star. 

  Other survivors include two daughters, Mrs. Pat Sears Smith of Eden, N.C., 
and Mrs. Judy Sears Dowe of Bristol; three sisters, Mrs. Mildred Hall of 
Seabrook, Md., Mrs. Margaret Geabhart of Suffolk, and Mrs. Jenny Hanes of 
Portsmouth; two brothers, Charles Sears of Portsmouth and Edwin Sears of 
Chesapeake; and four grandchildren. 

  A funeral will be held Saturday at 2 p.m. in Snellings Funeral Home, 
Churchland Chapel, by the Revs. W.L. Snead and Willis Joiner.  Burial with 
Masonic rites will be in Greenlawn Memorial Gardens. 

  Memorial donations may be made to the Shriners' Crippled Children's 
Hospital, care of Khedive Shrine Temple; or Hodges Ferry Presbyterian Church. 

  The family will be at the funeral home tonight from 7 to 9. 

[photo, captioned:] 
WILBUR E. SEARS SR. 


Wilbur Earnest SEARS, Sr., former Chesapeake & Suffolk police chief, 
b. 31 Aug 1911, Norfolk, d. 28 Aug 1980, Portsmouth, 
interred in Greenlawn Memorial Gardens*, Chesapeake, 30 Aug 1980, 
"Suffolk (VA) News-Herald," Vol. 58, No. 208, Fri., Aug. 29, 1980, p. 1 

*Additional information: 

Cedar Hill list, an extension of the Southampton County 
   Historical Society {SCHS} Cemetery Project: 
   http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/nansemond/cemeteries/cedar_a.txt 

A photo of Chief SEARS - added by Tom Whitehurst - & one of his grave marker 
   - added by Anonymous - are posted with Find a Grave Memorial #50842758. 

D.Cert. 80-026822 

His parents, Wilbur Thomas & Luna Doxey (SIMMONS) SEARS, are buried in 
   Olive Branch Cemetery, Portsmouth. 


Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by 
File Manager Matt Harris (zoobug64@aol.com). 

file at: 
http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/suffolk/obits/s620w1ob.txt