Chair man of the plank

Heymatt:

One of my family members is running for a school board seat. Why is such a group called a "board"? Is it political? Social?

-- PWaggen, the net

No, it's furniture. The board in question is what they all sit at, in the ooooolden days probably a big, long piece of wood that served as a table. They might just as easily have been called the plank as the board. The guy who ran the meeting got to sit at the head of the table in a chair instead of on a stool or bench. (Chairs were scarce in early Colonial America.) He, of course, became the chair man of the plank.