Celebrating Native American Heritage Month: Jessie Elizabeth Moore, first Native American woman to hold state office in Oklahoma

Jessie Elizabeth Moore, born 1871 in Panola County, Indian Territory in the Chickasaw Nation, in what is now southeastern Oklahoma, is the first Native American woman to hold state office in Oklahoma.  

She was appointed Deputy Supreme Court Clerk in Oklahoma City in 1914, and admitted to the bar in 1923.  In 1924, she was appointed Assistant Commission of Charities and Corrections for Oklahoma.  During the Great Depression, she served as director of the Women's Division of Emergency Relief in Oklahoma County. 

She was elected to serve as a law clerk of the Oklahoma Supreme Court and Criminal Court of Appeals in 1926.

She passed away in 1956.

Celebrating Black History Month: Tom Colbert, Chief Justice Oklahoma Supreme Court

January 4, 2013, Tom Colbert was sworn in as Chief Justice of the Oklahoma Supreme Court, appointed by then Governor Brad Henry.  He remains in that position today.  He is the first African-American to hold this post.  Born in Oklahoma City, he graduated from Sapulpa High School (near Tulsa) and earned an associate's degree from Eastern Oklahoma State College in Wilburton.

After teaching public school in Chicago and serving on the Criminal Investigation Division of the US Army, he returned to Oklahoma and received his JD from the Oklahoma University School of Law in 1982.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Colbert