John Sparks Patton

John Sparks Patton (September 23, 1894 -- October 30, 1961) was a Louisiana politician and educator who was an early advocate of taxpayer-funded school textbooks and a member of the Long faction of his state's Democratic Party.

Patton was born in the village of Lisbon in Claiborne Parish in northwestern Louisiana. He was his parish school superintendent from 1920-1937 and was president of the Louisiana Teachers Association (since Louisiana Association of Educators) from 1923-1924.

He sought the position of state education superintendent in 1928 on the intraparty ticket with Huey Pierce Long, Jr., but lost to T.H. Harris. He ran again in 1932 without affiliating himself with any gubernatorial candidate that year but was again defeated. Long implemented Patton's "free" textbooks proposal.

Patton was elected to the Third District seat on the Louisiana Public Service Commission in 1938. He was unseated by James Houston "Jimmie" Davis of Shreveport in 1942. Davis served on the PSC, a utility rate regulatory body, for only two years, for he was elected governor in 1944.

Patton returned to Homer, the seat of Claiborne Parish, to resume his career as a school administrator. Thereafter, Governor Earl Kemp Long appointed him superintendent of the Louisiana School for the Deaf in Baton Rouge. He served in that capacity until his death.

References

*"John Sparks Patton", "A Dictionary of Louisiana Biography", Vol. 2 (1988), p. 635
*T. Harry Williams, "Huey Long" (1969)
*"Louisiana Schools", XXXIX (March 1962), publication of Louisiana Teachers Association