|
Reatha Clark was born in Pavo, Georgia on April 11, 1938. Her father Willie was a farm laborer who left the family when Reatha was a child. Her mother, Ola Watts Campbell then moved the family to Moultree, Georgia where she worked as a domestic to support her three children. Reatha graduated from high school in Moultree in 1954 as valedictorian. She was awarded a scholarship to attend Clark College in Atlanta, Georgia, as a home economics major.
Her chemistry professor at Clark College was Dr. Alfred Spriggs, a fantastic teacher and role model. A black Ph.D. chemist, he inspired Reatha to pursue a career in chemistry. This meant she would be going to graduate school. In her senior year at Clark she applied for, and was awarded, a Woodrow Wilson scholarship. This, along with the support of her family, enabled her to enroll in the University of Chicago as a graduate student in chemistry. In 1958 she began her graduate studies in physical chemistry with a focus on thermodynamics. She earned her master's degree and Ph.D. at the University of Chicago where her studies included the thermochemistry of fused salts, fluorine compounds, and interhalogen compounds. She was awarded her Ph.D. in physical chemistry in 1962.
Reatha Clark met N. Judge King while at Clark College when she attended a Morehouse College basketball game. Judge was a chemistry major at Morehouse. After graduation he taught chemistry at Englewood High School in Chicago and later earned his Ph.D. in chemistry from Howard University. Reatha married N. Judge King in 1961. They have two children, N. Judge III and Scott.
After almost six months of searching for a position as a research chemist, Dr. Reatha Clark King finally found one at the National Bureau of Standards in Washington, DC. Her first project as a team leader was to determine accurate heats of formation of gaseous fluorine compounds. After three years of painstaking research her team achieved its goal. Her work proved to be extremely important to NASA because of its applicability to the space program. After five years at the National Bureau of Standards, Reatha left because her husband accepted a teaching position at Nassau Community College in New York and she wanted to keep the family together. In 1968 she joined the chemistry faculty at York College where she later became an associate dean. During this time she earned her MBA degree in business administration. She left York College in 1977 to become president of Metropolitan State University in Minneapolis, Minnesota. After a successful tenure there she joined the General Mills Foundation as executive director and a vice president of the General Mills Corporation, where she stayed until her retirement on May 31, 2002. She is currently chair of the General Mills Foundation Trustees.
Dr. Reatha Clark King's awards and honors include honorary doctorates at several institutions, the Exceptional Black Scientist Award from the CIBA-GEIGY Corporation, and being listed by Ebony as one of the top 50 black executives in corporate America. She has served on educational, community, and corporate boards and she was recently inducted into the International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame. At her induction she said that in her view, "...adult and continuing education sustains civilization, strengthens democracies, and helps individuals and communities prosper...".
|
This short biographical "snapshot" provides basic information about the person's chemical work, gender, ethnicity, and cultural background. A list of references is given along with additional WWW sites to further your exploration into the life and work of this chemist.