Rose Marie Ingle was remembered Sunday as a passionate advocate for education.
The former Chattanooga Board of Education member, 79, died early Sunday.
"She knew her own mind and didn't mind speaking it," said Janice Boydston, who was elected to the city school board at the same time as Ingle in 1981. They were the only women on the board at the time, and they served together until the Chattanooga and Hamilton County schools systems merged in 1997.
Ingle was very conservative and watched every penny of the school system's budget, but "when money needed to be spent, she supported it," Boydston said.
"She felt there is no price you can put on a quality education," she said.
Ingle was a PTA volunteer and former X-ray technician when she was elected to the District 4 school board seat. She represented Brainerd, East Brainerd, Concord and Tyner, where she lived and raised her four children with her late husband, a Chattanooga Police Department employee.
She ran unopposed in subsequent elections. She also served as Southeast district coordinator in the Tennessee School Boards Association Legislative Network.
In 1990, when then-Gov. Ned McWherter proposed school reform that would encourage consolidation of districts, Ingle lobbied against it. The same year she tangled with then-County Executive Dalton Roberts when he accused city schools of financial mismanagement.
Ingle ran for a county school board seat in 1998 but lost to attorney Joe Conner.
She later served as chairwoman of a Citizens Review Committee set up by former Chattanooga Police Chief Jimmie Dotson to review internal affairs cases.
When the Tyner Hall of Fame was inaugurated in 2008, Ingle was named along with former Hamilton County Mayor Claude Ramsey and current County Commission Chairman Larry Henry, among others.
"She's always been a big advocate for the community and very diligent in her work," Henry said Sunday. "We've been good friends over the years, and she's really going to be missed."
Funeral services are set for 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at Heritage Funeral Home on East Brainerd Road.
In an interview the day before the city and county schools merger took effect in 1997, Ingle reflected on her service.
"I always look back and think I could have done more or done it differently for the children's sake. I would have been more staunch in a lot of respects," she said.
She worried that a budget-strapped new system would threaten good programs.
"If people did not think more money produces a better education, then there wouldn't be any private schools or Ivy League colleges," she said.