Locke 'Was The Old Breed Of Teachers'

Mittye P. Locke, who helped educate children in Pasco County for a half-century and has an elementary school in Elfers named for her, died Wednesday. She was 99.

Locke worked in Pasco County schools from 1928 until she retired in 1979.

"She was the old breed of teachers," said Pasco County Tax Collector Mike Olson, her son. "She was a very strict disciplinarian. She believed kids were there to learn."

The former principal also never called her students "kids," he said. She always said "children."

"She was a strong woman, extremely strong," Olson said. "That was a heart that had been beating longer than just about everybody in Pasco has been born. For the first time in nearly 100 years, it's silent."

Despite her advanced years, Locke made a public appearance as recently as Dec. 16, when she attended a school board meeting. School board members paid tribute to her and issued a proclamation that reviewed the history of Mittye P. Locke Elementary.

Locke was born April 20, 1909, in Tupelo, Miss. Her family moved to Tarpon Springs in 1912 but settled in Elfers six months later.

She attended Elfers Elementary, which one day would be renamed for her, and graduated in 1927 from Gulf High. Her father, Porter Lamar Pierce, was a school board member and spoke at her graduation, according to school district records.

Locke began teaching at Zephyrhills Elementary just a year out of high school. She later taught at Tucker School in Gowers Corner in 1935 before returning to Elfers, where she began teaching at her old school.

She attended college while she was working and graduated from Florida Southern College in Lakeland.

On June 7, 1937, she was named the school's teaching principal. In 1966, Elfers Elementary moved to a new building. Locke stayed on until she retired.

The school board changed the name of Elfers Elementary to Mittye P. Locke Elementary in 1983. Had the board members asked her ahead of time, she likely would have told them to keep Elfers as the name, said Olson, who attended the school in the 1950s while his mother was principal.

"I think she was very much humbled by it," he said.

She served as organist for the First United Methodist Churches of New Port Richey and Tarpon Springs, the First Presbyterian Church of Port Richey and the Order of the Eastern Star.

In addition to her son and his wife, Mary, Locke is survived by a sister, Gwendolyn Knowles of Antioch, Tenn.; two granddaughters; seven great-grandchildren; one great-great-granddaughter and several nieces and nephews.

Visitation will be from 5 to 7 p.m. today at Michels & Lundquist Funeral Home, 5228 Trouble Creek Road, New Port Richey.

Funeral services will be at 11 a.m. Saturday at First United Methodist Church of Tarpon Springs, 501 E. Tarpon Ave.