Mr. Whitaker received his bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Cincinnati. He started teaching in Finneytown in 1930 when it became a four-room school. Tel also taught in the Cincinnati Public Schools and worked in industry during the war years. He came back to Finneytown as teacher-principal in 1945.

In 1958, Tel became the principal of the new Finneytown High School and Superintendent of the district. His strongest point was recruiting and he assembled a strong faculty and made Finneytown one of the top schools in the area. He stressed academic and extra-curricular excellence at all levels. Tel retired in 1966. Because of his many years of service and dedication to excellence in our schools, the district named Whitaker School in his honor.

The Whitakers have three children: Janet, who lives in Tampa, FL; Bill, an educator in Florence, KY; and Tom, an educator with the America Schools in Japan and the Far East. Telford and his wife Martha both passed away in Florida in 1993.