As we continue our Founding Five series, we honor Jay Lawrence “Larry” Corby—a decorated United States Marine, Correctional Captain, writer, historian and founding Director whose vision, voice and hands-on service helped shape nearly every part of the Correctional Peace Officers Foundation.

Some people leave behind a list of accomplishments. Others leave behind an organization that still carries their ideas, their values and even the practical lessons they taught.

Jay Lawrence “Larry” Corby left both.

Larry was one of the five correctional professionals who founded the Correctional Peace Officers Foundation. He was also the first of the Founding Five to pass away, leaving the CPOF family to confront a painful reality in 2014: the organization created to stand beside grieving correctional families was now grieving one of its own.

Yet Larry’s passing did not bring his work to an end.

His influence remains visible throughout CPOF—in the families welcomed to PROJECT 2000, the memorial traditions that honor the fallen, the publications that preserve correctional history and the calendars that carry that history into homes and institutions across the country.

His legacy can even be found in the CPOF trailer that travels to PROJECT each year. Larry personally taught CPOF Warehouse and Facilities Manager Dusty Miller how to drive it, passing along one more practical skill that continues to serve the Foundation today.

That was Larry.

He did not stand at a distance and simply offer ideas. He became involved. He taught others. He wrote, built, planned, researched, traveled and spoke. When there was work to be done, Larry was there—often doing it with his own hands.

A Life Shaped by Service

Jay Lawrence “Larry” Corby Jr. was born on October 1, 1944, in Berwyn, Illinois, to Jay and Jane Corby.

Before beginning his correctional career, he served his country with distinction in the United States Marine Corps. His six years of honorable military service included a tour in Vietnam—an experience that remained an important part of who he was, even when he did not speak openly about it.

His daughter, Camie Corby Gould, later recalled bringing her sons to their grandparents’ home on Veterans Day in 2013. She asked her father to tell them about his experiences in Vietnam. The family watched historical programs while Camie prepared one of Larry’s favorite meals: fried chicken with what the family affectionately called “burny” mashed potatoes and corn.

It was not until later that evening that Larry began sharing his stories.

The moment reflected two defining parts of his character: his deep appreciation for history and his reluctance to draw attention to his own accomplishments.

Following his military service, Larry joined the California Department of Corrections in September 1969. He began as a Correctional Officer at Folsom State Prison in Represa, California, working what was often described as the “toughest beat in the state.”

Over the next 30 years, he advanced through the ranks and served at California State Prison, Sacramento, as well as at the California Department of Corrections headquarters.

Larry eventually became a Captain within the Department’s Planning and Construction Division. There, he officially managed security requirements during the construction of 13 prisons and numerous renovation projects.

At his memorial, former California Department of Corrections Director James Gomez spoke more broadly of Larry’s instrumental involvement in the work surrounding 22 California prisons—a scope of achievement that surprised even Larry’s own children.

His work required more than an understanding of architecture or construction. It required the perspective of someone who had worked inside a prison and understood the consequences of every gate, corridor, control point and security decision.

Larry knew that the way a correctional facility was designed could directly affect the safety of the people working inside it. He helped ensure that staff safety was considered before a facility ever opened its doors.

He retired as a Captain in January 2000 after more than 30 years of state service, leaving a physical legacy throughout California’s correctional system.

But Larry built much more than prisons.

Speaking Up for Correctional Professionals

When Larry believed something needed to be said, he said it—or he wrote it.

His advocacy for correctional professionals began long before websites, email newsletters or social media made it possible to distribute information instantly.

Larry created and wrote for The Granite, an early publication associated with the California Correctional Peace Officers Association. Producing it was a family operation.

A large mimeograph machine was set up in Larry’s workshop, where its ink rollers printed his views and concerns about the correctional profession. Camie and her brother, Jarrod, helped collate the pages by repeatedly walking around the family dining room table. The oversized paper then had to be stapled twice through the middle with an extra-long stapler and folded by hand.

Larry was not simply writing words. The Corby family was physically assembling and distributing them.

His work required long hours, pencil and paper, a typewriter, face-to-face conversations and a willingness to challenge those in authority when he believed correctional officers deserved better.

Later, Larry wrote for and helped create The Peacekeeper. When the CPO Foundation’s CPO Family magazine began publication in 1989, he continued using the written word to educate, advocate and preserve the stories of the correctional community.

Larry believed in accountability. He took responsibility for what he wrote and what he said, even when his position was unpopular. His words were never detached from action. They were part of his lifelong effort to advance the profession and improve the lives of the people serving within it.

His leadership also included many years of service to the California Correctional Peace Officers Association. Larry served on its Executive Council and as State Secretary, advocating for line staff and helping the organization’s leadership pursue goals for correctional officers.

After retiring from the Department, he remained involved through CCPOA’s Retired Chapter, where he continued serving as Secretary.

Larry believed correctional professionals deserved respect, representation and a voice. He spent much of his life helping provide all three.

Five Officers With an Idea

In the early 1980s, Larry joined Don Novey, Glenn Mueller, Sal Osuna and Richard “Dick” Waldo around a shared belief: when a correctional professional died in the line of duty or a family faced catastrophic hardship, the correctional community needed to do more than pass a hat and offer condolences.

The five men envisioned an organization that would remain with families beyond the funeral and after the initial attention had faded.

In 1984, their vision became the Correctional Peace Officers Foundation, and the five founders became its original Board of Directors.

Larry became a lifelong National Director and served as Secretary. But, as with so much of his life, his involvement went far beyond his title.

A small office was rented, and Larry’s wife, Charleene, began working there. She also volunteered at correctional facilities during shift changes, asking officers to become members and help support the growing mission.

CPOF was not simply Larry’s work. It became a shared commitment within the Corby family.

Camie and Jarrod grew up watching both of their parents give their time to the Foundation. The work sometimes meant missed celebrations, extended travel and family plans that had to yield to tragedies, memorials, funerals, conferences and catastrophic situations.

Years later, Camie wrote honestly that there were times when she resented how frequently her parents were gone. As a child—and later as a mother raising children of her own—she did not always understand the full picture.

She understood it more deeply at her father’s funeral.

The time Larry and Charleene had given was not lost. It had been invested in a national family that would eventually surround the Corbys with the same compassion they had spent decades offering to others.

The Heart Behind PROJECT 2000

Few parts of CPOF meant more to Larry than PROJECT 2000.

What began in 1990 as a gathering to honor correctional professionals who had died in the line of duty grew into one of the Foundation’s most meaningful traditions. Larry helped shape PROJECT into far more than a memorial ceremony.

He understood that honoring the fallen also meant caring for those they left behind.

That belief became especially personal following the death of Correctional Officer William E. Donaldson, who left behind a young wife and a four-year-old daughter named Mandy. Mandy reminded Larry of his own daughter, and the Donaldson family became part of the CPOF family.

Mandy attended the first PROJECT 2000 and returned year after year. Her grandparents traveled with her, her mother supported newly bereaved widows and Mandy welcomed other children who had also lost a parent.

As she grew older, Mandy saw that PROJECT needed something specifically for teenagers. She called Larry with an idea.

Larry listened.

The space that had once been called the Kids Room became the Kids & Teens Room, and activities were expanded to ensure older children also felt included. It was a seemingly small change, but it represented something Larry understood instinctively: children who had experienced profound loss needed to be heard, included and given a place where they belonged.

Larry loved the CPOF Kids & Teens.

He smiled as each child received a tote bag at the beginning of PROJECT, and at the Sunday Farewell Breakfast, his unmistakable voice welcomed the children and teenagers as they entered to sing and entertain the audience.

Larry spoke at every PROJECT event during his lifetime. Through those remarks, he helped attendees understand why they had gathered and reminded them that the families of the fallen remained at the center of CPOF’s mission.

To Larry, PROJECT was never simply an annual event. It was a promise renewed each year: the fallen would be remembered, their families would remain part of the correctional community and their children would never have to navigate their loss alone.

One of Larry’s favorite reflections expressed his belief that material success would eventually matter very little—but making a difference in the life of a child could change the world.

His relationship with Mandy and his love for the CPOF Kids & Teens gave those words life.

Preserving Correctional History

Larry was a devoted student of history, particularly the history of prisons and the correctional profession.

When he visited a facility, he wanted to know its story—when it opened, how it had changed, who had served there and what significant events had shaped it. History was not merely a collection of dates and facts to Larry. It was a way to understand the people and institutions that formed the profession he loved.

That passion made him the driving mind behind CPOF’s original calendars.

The calendars did more than mark the months of the year. They became a way to preserve and share the history of correctional institutions, honor the profession and connect correctional employees across generations.

Long before digital archives made historical images immediately accessible, producing those calendars required research, photographs, careful organization and a genuine understanding of what would be meaningful to correctional professionals.

Larry brought all of that to the project.

His interest in preservation also extended to the effort to establish a National Corrections Museum on the grounds of Folsom State Prison. He was proud to be part of the team that developed the concept and helped advance the effort.

His commitment to that vision remained so important to him and his family that, following his death, they requested donations to the museum’s building fund in place of flowers.

Larry knew that understanding where corrections had been could help guide where the profession was going. He wanted its stories, sacrifices and achievements preserved for those who would follow.

The Person Behind the Work

Larry’s accomplishments could make him appear larger than life: Marine, Correctional Captain, union leader, writer, founder and national advocate.

But the people closest to him also knew the husband, father and grandfather behind those titles.

Larry shared 47 years of marriage with Charleene. Together, they built a family that included their daughter, Camie; their son, Jarrod; and grandchildren Caden, Connor, Jarrod Jr. and Cameron Rose.

The same hands that helped plan secure correctional facilities and build CPOF also constructed a fort for his grandchildren. The same man who could speak firmly to correctional leaders cared about the appearance of the home he shared with his wife.

When Larry was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, his thoughts remained focused on Charleene. Even as his illness progressed, he wanted the house painted and the carpet replaced so it would be nice for her.

That concern was characteristic of Larry. He looked ahead. He planned. He wanted the people he loved to be cared for.

His daughter later recalled that Larry was not a boastful man. He did not routinely tell his family about the full scope of his accomplishments.

Some of what he achieved, they learned only after he was gone.

When CPOF Lost One of Its Own

Larry died peacefully at home on March 18, 2014, following a brief battle with brain cancer. He was 69 years old.

He was the first of CPOF’s Founding Five to pass away.

For an organization built to respond when correctional families experienced loss, Larry’s death brought the mission painfully close to home.

Charleene later wrote that she had never imagined she would be the one who needed CPOF. Yet the compassion shown to her and her family proved once again that the Foundation truly takes care of its own.

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation honored Larry’s service by distributing a statewide notice of his passing and lowering the flag at Department headquarters to half-staff. Correctional professionals and organizations from across the country offered tributes to a man whose influence had reached far beyond California.

At Larry’s funeral, the CPOF National Honor Guard formed ranks in his honor. Camie, who had attended so many PROJECT memorial ceremonies, now walked through that formation for her own father.

At the conclusion of the service, members of the Honor Guard approached Larry one at a time. Each placed a challenge coin on his chest and rendered a final salute. By the time Camie stepped forward, the coins formed what she described as a shield over him, with a large Marine Corps coin resting on top.

She placed her hand on her father’s chest and offered one final, deeply personal observation: the man who had spent years helping CPOF honor others had perfected the art of a funeral.

His service was filled with honor, love and gratitude—the same things he had worked to give other correctional families.

Through the Eyes of His Son

Larry’s son, Jarrod, also reflected on how much he learned about his father during the memorial service.

Like Camie, Jarrod believed he understood the work Larry had done throughout his correctional career and with CPOF. As he listened to Don Novey speak about more than 40 years of friendship with Larry and heard James Gomez describe the many prison construction projects Larry had helped make possible, Jarrod realized there were entire chapters of his father’s service he had never fully known.

“How did I not know that?” he remembered thinking.

Jarrod described March 24, 2014, the day of Larry’s memorial, as a blur. Yet certain moments remained clear: cards arriving from across the country, handwritten messages the family continued reading long after the service and names in the special Marine Corps register that brought back memories of those who had attended.

He especially remembered how members of the CPOF National Honor Guard cared for his mother. Charleene was picked up, escorted to the mortuary and reception and supported throughout the day.

The formal folding and presentation of the American flag was something Jarrod had witnessed before, but at his father’s service it became deeply personal—an experience he described as breathtaking.

On behalf of Camie and Charleene, Jarrod expressed his family’s gratitude to the entire CPOF Board of Directors, Commander Steve Dizmon and every member of the National Honor Guard.

He believed his father would have been proud.

Years later, the Corby family experienced another profound loss when Jarrod passed away on April 12, 2023. His words about his father now carry even greater meaning. They preserve not only what Jarrod witnessed at Larry’s memorial, but also the pride of a son who came to understand more fully the extraordinary life his father had lived.

Pictures Are Memories

Larry often said, “Pictures are memories.”

Charleene reflected after his passing that she had many such memories—some preserved in photographs she could hold and others existing only as pictures within her mind.

There are images throughout CPOF’s history that tell Larry’s story: Larry speaking at PROJECT, standing beside the other founders, working with Charleene, welcoming the Kids & Teens, researching correctional history and helping wherever he was needed.

There are also memories that may never have been photographed: children walking around the Corby dining room table collating pages of The Granite; Charleene speaking to officers during shift changes; Larry teaching Dusty how to maneuver the CPOF trailer; and the conversations, plans and acts of service that gradually transformed an idea into a national organization.

Those moments reveal the true nature of Larry’s legacy.

He did not build CPOF alone, and he would never have claimed that he did. But he gave the Foundation his voice, knowledge, labor, family and heart.

Built to Continue

More than a decade after Larry’s passing, the trailer he once drove still travels to PROJECT.

The publications he helped create became part of CPOF’s historical record. The calendars he envisioned continue to share the story of corrections. The Kids & Teens he welcomed grew into adults, many of whom remain connected to the CPOF family. The memorial traditions he helped establish continue honoring the fallen with dignity.

Even the CPOF National Honor Guard that stood over him at his funeral represented one of his dreams fulfilled.

Larry’s legacy does not exist only in the past. It continues through every person he taught, every idea he put into motion and every part of CPOF that grew from his determination to make things better.

He helped design prisons that protected correctional staff. He wrote publications that gave them a voice. He preserved the history of their profession. He helped establish an organization that would support their families. And he helped create a place where the children of fallen officers could find friendship, understanding and belonging.

Larry built things meant to last.

Some were made of concrete and steel.

Others were made of words, traditions, relationships and promises.

As we honor the Founding Five, we remember Jay Lawrence “Larry” Corby: United States Marine, Vietnam veteran, Correctional Captain, writer, historian, advocate, founding Director, husband, father, grandfather and friend.

He was the first of the founders CPOF had to say goodbye to—but his was not a legacy that could end with his passing.

It lives in the organization he helped build.

It travels down the road to PROJECT each year.

It speaks through the history he preserved and the families he helped bring together.

And it remains within every promise CPOF keeps to take care of its own.

Jay Lawrence “Larry” Corby Jr.
October 1, 1944–March 18, 2014

If you knew Larry, worked alongside him, attended PROJECT with him or have photographs and memories of his service, we invite you to share them with CPOF. Each story helps preserve the legacy of a man who believed pictures were memories—and whose life gave us so many memories worth keeping.