Ada Fisher, the first Black admitted to the University of Oklahoma Law School, dies

Jet, Nov 13, 1995

Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher, the first Black admitted to the University of Oklahoma Law School, recently died of cancer at her home in Oklahoma City, OK. She was 71.

An honors graduate of Langston, a state-run Black college, Fisher was denied admittance to the law school for more than two years because Oklahoma contended the state had planned to open a separate Black law school someday.

In January 1948, the Supreme Court rejected the state's argument and maintained that the state did not provide equal opportunities for Black students in graduate education. She was represented by then-attorney Thurgood Marshall. The Supreme Court ordered the state to provide her with a legal education. Marshall later became the first Black member of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Fisher finally was admitted into the law school in June 1949 with strict conditions placed upon her. A uniformed guard was posted to prevent interracial mingling, she was forced to sit in a raised chair apart from the other students behind a sign reading Colored: and she had to use the side door to the cafeteria and sit at a table separated from the rest of the room by a chain.

The determined Fisher graduated in 1951 and worked for a while as a lawyer. She returned to the university in 1968 to earn a master's degree in history and joined the faculty at Langston University.

Ironically, in April of 1992, Fisher said she "had come full circle" when she was named to the University of Oklahoma Law School's board of regents.

She is survived by a daughter, Charlene Factory; a son, Brace; a sister, Helen Huggins; four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.