Hall of Fame Member Biographies

Alice Mary Robertson

The granddaughter of Samuel Worcester, the famous Missionary and Educator to the Cherokee Tribe in Georgia and Oklahoma, Alice Mary Robertson was born in Tullahassee Mission in the Creek Nation in 1854. During her life this daughter of missionary parents attended college in the East, worked for the Office of Indian Affairs in Washington, D.C. and served as a secretary at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania. In 1855 Robertson served as the head of Minerva House, the Presbyterian boarding school for girls in Muskogee which, due to her skillful management, became Henry Kendall College in 1894. The College moved to Tulsa in 1907 and in 1920 it became the University of Tulsa. Robertson also became a federal supervisor of Creek Education and later served as postmistress in Muskogee. She retired from the federal government and took up farming. In 1920 Robertson was elected to one term in the U.S. Congress, becoming the first Congresswoman from Oklahoma and only the second U.S. Congresswoman from any state in the nation. She passed away in 1931 after seventy-seven years of leadership and service. In honor of Oklahoma's Centennial year and her achievements, Alice Mary Robertson is inducted into the 2007 Higher Education Hall of Fame as a Centennial Pioneer Special Recognition member.