A native of Lee county, she was the daughter of John C. and Henrietta (Browning) Wynn of Jonesville. She was a person of many talents and tireless energy. The writer first remembers her as a piano teacher and director of school musical programs at Stickleyville School about 1912, prior to her marriage to James E. Laningham.
Even though they reared four children, her long life has been of endless activity, but she was best known as the first regent of the Lovelady Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution, a life member and Lee County Director of the Historical Society of Southwest Virginia, and co-author of “Early Settlers of Lee County,” along with Mrs. Hattie (Muncy) Bates.
She was past president of the Lee county Garden Club, member of the Eastern Star Powell Valley Chapter #13, an active member of the First United Methodist Church and Methodist Women’s Circle, Homemakers Club, and was the principal organizer of the first Pennington Gap High School Band in the early 1930’s.
Mrs. Ann Wynn Laningham died on Thursday, September 3, 1987 at her home in Pennington Gap, Va., at age 96. Funeral services were conducted at the Firs Methodist Church in Pennington Gap by her pastor on Sunday, September 6, 1987. Interment was in the Memorial Garden at Woodway, Lee County, Virginia.
Mrs Laningham is survived by the following children: John W. Laningham, Jonesville, Va.; Col. Wm. B. Laningham, of Orlando, Fla.; and twins Mary Ann and James E. Laningham of North Carolina. She was proceeded in death by her husband and a grandson, John W. Laningham, Jr.
Survivors from her family also include two brothers: Browning Wynn of Jonesville, and Richard Wynn of Knoxville. Two sisters, Mrs. Mary Wynn Hall of Dayton, Ohio, and Mrs. Jim Wynn Litton of Jonesville, Va., and four grandsons, one granddaughter, three great-grandsons, and one great-granddaughter.
By: Mrs. Bonnie Ball
From: Historical Sketches of Southwest Virginia, Publication No. 21 – 1987