Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher VS Dr. George Henderson

A key figure in Oklahoma's civil rights movement, Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher applied for admission into the University of Oklahoma law school. Denied admission because of her race, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Sipuel v. Board of Regents of University of Oklahoma, a precursor to Brown v. Board of Education, that the state of Oklahoma must provide instruction for blacks equal to that of whites. After the state's failed attempt to comply by creating Langston University School of Law, grossly inferior to other law schools, Fisher became the first African-American female to be admitted to an all-white law school in the South when she was admitted to the University of Oklahoma.

Fisher's story will be shared by Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange, Chief of the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. Appointed by President Bill Clinton, Miles-LaGrange became the first African American on the federal bench in the Tenth Circuit. She also was the first female United States Attorney for the Western District of Oklahoma and the first African-American female elected to the Oklahoma Senate.

Dr. George Henderson became the University of Oklahoma's third full-time African-American faculty member at the Norman campus where he founded the Human Relations Department and became the dean of the College of Liberal Arts. He was the first African-American in Oklahoma to hold a distinguished professorship; the first at the University of Oklahoma to create a degree-granting department; and the first African-American dean of a degree-granting college on the Norman campus. A civil right pioneer, his awards and honors include the C.V. Ramana Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Mental Health of Oklahoman's Children, Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence Medal for the Outstanding College and University Professor and induction into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame.

Claudia Williamson, Miss Black Oklahoma USA, will serve as referee.



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2011