BURLINGTON — William Ward Lasley Sr., 96, died Feb. 2, 2024, in the room in which he was born on West Davis Street on Oct. 13, 1927. His parents, Ralph Kerr Lasley and Jennie (Trix) Howe Ward, were also Burlington natives from 1887 and 1898. He was valedictorian of the Burlington High School class of 1944, as his father was in 1906. He attended Davidson College for 3 academic years before 3 days at Fort Bragg for the Army pre-induction physical convinced him the Navy could not be worse.
He graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1950, lettering in Track. He commanded the minehunter USS Bunting, Division 83 of 4 minesweepers, and the USS Belle Grove, LSD-2. At the Office of Naval Research, he was an early project manager of deep submersible ALVIN. As Advisor to the CNO for Mine Warfare, he and a civilian PhD performed the initial planning for the successful mining of North Vietnamese harbors in 1972, helping to end our participation in that war. Retiring as a Captain in 1980, he continued to live in Alexandria, VA, until returning to Burlington in 2013, but kept his membership at Front Street UMC active since 1940.
