Mr. Charles Larry Bland

He was born August 14, 1948, in West Virginia, in a small house atop Spruce Knob, the highest point in the state. The mountain was his beginning. To those who loved him he was Larry; in business he was Chuck. He finished Circleville High School in 1967 and soon left the mountains for Prince George’s County, Maryland, where he started out in retail management and began building his adult life.

On January 30, 1970, Larry married Mary Booker, his wife and partner of 56 years. In 1971, he entered the fire protection industry as an apprentice with High Point Sprinkler Company. After earning his Fire Protection License and rising to Head Engineer, he founded Eastern Sprinkler Design in 1982. For more than 50 years, he designed fire protection systems for federal, state, and private buildings throughout the Washington, D.C. region and Pennsylvania. He believed in doing work that mattered and in doing it well.

Though he began on a mountain, he was pulled by the horizon of the coast. He lived along the Severn River, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and later near Bethany Beach, Delaware. He liked cruises, long days by the ocean, crab feasts, and football Sundays spent rooting for the Washington Redskins. He had a fondness for small dogs and for the squirrels he liked to watch and feed. He valued time with family, good conversation, and simple pleasures.

He was preceded in death by his parents, Charles Coy Bland and Bertha (Thompson) Estep; brothers Randolph Bland and Gary Judy; and grandparents Sadie and Jason Thompson.

He is survived by his wife, Mary (Booker) Bland; daughters Jennifer Bland Lester and Hollie (Bland) Pailthorp; grandchildren Ann Lester, Kathryn Pailthorp, and Tyler Pailthorp; siblings Charlene (Bland) Sepulveda, Linda Johnson, Jerry Phares, and William Estep; and many extended family members and friends.

Viewings will be held March 4, 2026, from 4–7 PM and March 5, 2026, from 11 AM–12 PM at Fort Lincoln Funeral Home, 3401 Bladensburg Road, Brentwood, Maryland. Funeral services and burial will follow at 12 PM on March 5, with a reception afterward.