Dr. Harry F. Hodge Jr., a former dean of the College of Education at MTSU, passed away May 9.

Dr. Harry F. Hodge Jr.

Hodge, 81, was a native of Nashville and son of the late Harry F. and Elizabeth Ford Hodge. He joined the MTSU family in July 1980 as education dean and served in that post until 1986, when he began teaching classes full-time as a professor. He retired from MTSU in May 1993.

A 1948 graduate of Hume-Fogg High School, Hodge served as a naval corpsman in the Marines. He attended Peabody College and was a graduate of the University of Tennessee.

After teaching in Oak Ridge, he earned his doctoral degree at Auburn University and taught at Memphis State and UT-Memphis before taking the deanship of the College of Education at Arkansas State University in 1967.

Hodge, who was instrumental in starting the Stones River Woodworkers Group in Murfreesboro, is survived by his wife, Betty Ann Campbell Hodge; his children, Deborah Nettles of Houston, Texas, Richard Hodge (Jocelyn) of Murfreesboro and Brandon Hodge (Emily) of Hendersonville; a sister, Ruth James (Wayne) of Tulsa, Okla.; and grandchildren Christopher Nettles (Kelley), Richard Nettles, David Hodge, Megan Hodge, Graham Hodge, Campbell Hodge and Hayden Hodge. He was preceded in death by a sister, Ann Sensabaugh, and a brother, George Edward Hodge.