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class of 1935
inducted in 1987
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Wilmot E. Fleming
State Senator
Former State Senator Wilmot E. Fleming
served the 12th District of Montgomery-Bucks County for fourteen years.
Initially elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1962, he
would eventually be elected to the Pennsylvania Senate in 1964, where he
served until his untimely death in 1978.
Senator Fleming was a managing partner in the Wilmot Fleming Engineering
Company and a trustee of Beaver College. He was a graduate of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. His other activities included
membership in the Jenkintown Rotary Club, the Jenkintown Board of School
Directors (of which he was president), Board of Trustees of Abington Memorial
Hospital, Board of Trustees of Grace Presbyterian Church, Montgomery Regional
Board of the former Industrial Valley Bank and Trust Company.
Senator Fleming's special area of interest was education and, more
specifically, maintaining local control of schools. He was a leader in the
fight against mandatory school mergers in Harrisburg.
The Times Chronicle aptly described Senator Fleming in the following words:
He was a rare man in public life, practically devoid of ego. He did not
expect to be treated as a VIP and did not want it, and he left the petty game
of 'perks of power' to those who view public office as an opportunity for
self-advancement rather than public service...[he
was] a full time senator, completely accessible to press and public, and
rarely turned down an invitation to meet with constituents, whatever the
circumstances...No politician could do more to honor the memory of Wilmot E.
Fleming than to try to be like him.
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