Harold P. Sampson

Harold P. Sampson, 97, emeritus dean of the School of Graduate Studies and Extended Campus and professor emeritus of speech communication at Central Missouri State University (CMSU, now University of Central Missouri), passed away on March 6, 2023 in Higginsville, Missouri.
Sampson was born on June 15, 1925 in Jefferson, Ohio, the son of Ernest Sampson and Dora (Peck) Sampson, who preceded him in death. He was also preceded in death by his two sisters and brother. On August 12, 1951, he married Esther Ruth Rieb in Parkston, South Dakota. They were married 50 years when she preceded him in death in 2001. Together they had two children: LuRae Sampson Shreves and Doug Sampson.
After graduating from Jefferson High School in 1943, he served in the U.S. Army Headquarters Company, U.S. Armed Forces Pacific Ocean Area Command during World War II.
He later received a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Education and Speech Education from the University of Sioux Falls, South Dakota. He also earned a Master of Science degree in Speech Communication from the University of South Dakota in Vermillion, South Dakota and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Rhetoric and Public Address from Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois.
Sampson began his 40 years in education by teaching at high schools in Parkston and Watertown, South Dakota. In 1958, he began his career in higher education where he taught speech and forensics at Nebraska Wesleyan University in Lincoln, Nebraska. In 1966, he began his 24-year tenure at CMSU as an assistant professor and director of forensics. He later served as chair of the department of speech and chair of the division of language, literature and communication. In 1973, he was appointed dean of the School of Graduate Studies and Extended Campus. Later his responsibilities also included supervising the Office of Research and Grants and Summer Sessions. Sampson was active with Phi Kappa Phi, Phi Delta Kappa, and Special Care Homes of Missouri. He retired from teaching and university administration in 1990.
Sampson resided in Warrensburg, Missouri from 1966, when he joined the faculty at CMSU, until 2001, when he moved to John Knox Village East in Higginsville. Sampson was an active member of the First Baptist Church of Higginsville where he was a deacon emeritus.
He is survived by his daughter LuRae Shreves and her husband Phil (Warrensburg, Missouri) and son Doug Sampson and his wife Loretta (Springfield, Missouri); four grandchildren: Darin Shreves (Kansas City, Missouri), Katherine Shreves and her husband Lewis Murray (Kanazawa, Japan), Amanda Shreves and her partner Adam McMichael (Kansas City, Missouri) and Andrew Sampson (Berlin, Germany); plus many nieces, nephews, and cherished friends.
A celebration of Harold Sampson's life will be held at the First Baptist Church in Higginsville on Thursday, March 23 at 1:30 pm with Reverend Dr. Greg Fine officiating. Burial will be at Warrensburg Memorial Gardens Thursday, March 23 at 3:30 pm. The family will receive friends at John Knox Village East in Higginsville on Wednesday, March 22 from 3:00 to 5:00 pm and at the Church of the Brethren in Warrensburg on Thursday, March 23 from 4:30 to 5:30 pm.
Memorial contributions may be shared with First Baptist Church in Higginsville, the John Knox Village East Nurses' Education Fund, or the Missouri Baptist Children's Home and left in care of Sweeney-Phillips & Holdren Funeral Home.