Frank S. Tavenner, Jr. was born in Woodstock, Virginia in 1895. He took an A.B. degree at Roanoke College in 1916, an A.M. at Princeton University in 1917, and a LL.B at the University of Virginia in 1927, after which he began the practice of law in his home town. In 1933 Tavenner was appointed assistant U.S. attorney in the Western District of Virginia and in 1940, became U.S. attorney. Following World War II he was assigned by the Department of the Army to be Counsel and later Acting Chief of Counsel, Prosecution section for the IMTFE from late 1945 to the end of the trial in 1948. From 1949 until the mid-1950's Tavenner was Chief of Counsel for the House Committee on Un-American Activities. He died in 1964.