Ralph E. King

Ralph Elijah King, Sr. (June 16, 1902 – December 2, 1974),^[1] was a physician from Winnsboro, Louisiana, who served three non-consecutive terms as a state senator for Catahoula, Franklin, and Richland parishes in the northeastern portion of his state. King's tenure stretched from 1944 to 1952 and again from 1956 to 1960.^[2] His tenure of office corresponded with the first administration of Governor Jimmie Davis and the second and third terms of Earl Kemp Long, with whom King was politically allied.

In 1960, King was unseated by his fellow Democrat, J. C. "Sonny" Gilbert, a farmer from Sicily Island in Catahoula Parish, who years later switched his affiliation to Republican.

King and his brother, John William King, Jr. (1908-1969), were sons of John King, Sr. (1877-1955), and the former Martha Ada Gregory (1881-1972). Dr. King's son, Ralph E. King, Jr. (1931-2006), a farmer, was married to the former Mary Christine Sullivan (1932-1993); the couple had two daughters, Debra Ruth King (1953-1981) and Terri King Reboul (1956-2013). The Kings are interred at Myrtle Memorial Cemetery in Winnsboro.^[1]

King operated King's Hospital in Winnsboro for fifty years until the facility closed in 1973. He died the next year.^[1]

In 2008, nearly thirty-four years after his death, Dr. King was posthumously recognized as an honorary pallbearer at the funeral of his first Senate successor, Billy Boles of Monroe.^[3]