(CHARLOTTESVILLE – WINA)   The University of Virginia’s Board of Visitors voted Thursday to rename Ruffner Hall, and honor the late Walter Ridley.   He was a Newport News native who became the first African-American to receive a doctoral degree from UVA.   When Ridley graduated in 1953, he was the first black who earned a doctorate from a historically white university in the South.

William Ruffner, whose name will be deleted from the building, was Virginia’s first Superintendent of Public Instruction.  A committee that researched the contributions of Ruffner and long ago Alabama Congressman Jabez Curry recently provided its findings to the board.  There was a time crunch Thursday, and the board agreed to consider deleting Curry’s name from the UVA Education School at a future meeting.