Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher
by Mike Wimmer
Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher was a leading activist, attorney, and educator who opened higher education to African American students in Oklahoma and laid the foundation for the Brown v. Board of Education decision.
Ada Lois Sipuel was born in Chickasha in 1924 and married Warren Fisher in 1944. After graduating from the segregated Langston University in 1945, Fisher volunteered to be the successful test case for admission to the University of Oklahoma Law School represented by NAACP attorney Thurgood Marshall and Oklahoma attorney Amos T. Hall. When denied admission on the basis of race, Fisher filed a suit asserting that she must be admitted to the OU Law School since there was no comparable facility for African American students. Losing in state courts, Marshall argued the case before the Supreme Court which reversed the lower courts in 1948. The state quickly created a makeshift law school in the state capital building with three part time instructors and one potential student. Ada refused to attend. Instead, further litigation was initiated to prove the two law schools were not equal.
Fisher was finally permitted to attend classes at the University of Oklahoma law school in 1949, although under segregated conditions. She graduated in 1951 and passed the State Bar examination the same year. She practiced law in Chickasha and later became head of the Social Studies Department at Langston University. She earned a master’s degree in history at the University of Oklahoma in 1968.
In April 1992, more than 45 years after she was denied admission to the law school, Governor David Walters appointed Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher to the University of Oklahoma Board of Regents. She died in 1995. Her son, Bruce Fisher, now works for the Oklahoma Historical Society, and her daughter, Charlene Factory, works for the Oklahoma City Public School District. Ada’s sister, Helen Huggins, lives in Oklahoma City.
Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher by Mike Wimmer was dedicated on February 10, 2004 and the commission was managed by the Oklahoma State Senate Historical Preservation Fund, Inc. The painting is located inside the North hallway of the Oklahoma State Senate wing on the fourth floor of the Oklahoma State Capitol and can be viewed daily from 8:30-5:30 when the Senate is not in session.
The Artist
Born
and raised in Muskogee, Oklahoma, Mike Wimmer began his career as
an artist during the seventh grade. He earned his B.F.A. from the University
of Oklahoma, where he met Don Ivan Punchatz. Wimmer later moved to
Arlington, Texas to be Punchatz apprentice at Punchatz famous Sketch
Pad Studio. Wimmer learned valuable knowledge regarding the
business aspect of illustrating as well as various painting techniques
and the working methods of the local Dallas illustrators. After his two and a half year apprenticeship, he moved back to Norman, Oklahoma and
set up his own studio using all that he had learned in Texas. Since
then Wimmer has become very successful illustrating children’s
books such as “Flight: The Journey of Charles Lindbergh” by
Robert Burliegh which was the winner of
the Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children in 1990. He also illustrated “All the Places to Love” by Patricia MacLachlan which
was published in 1994 and won the Oklahoma Book Award
for Best Illustrated Children’s Book 1995. Wimmer’s latest
book, “Will Rogers” by Former Governor Frank Keating, was
published in 2002 and has won the 2003 Spur Award from the Western
Writers Association of America. Even though Wimmer has worked for some
of the largest corporations in the world including Disney and Procter
and Gamble, Wimmer finds the greatest artistic pleasure within his
creation of fine art.