UT Tyler Office of Marketing and Communications

UT Tyler to Host Justice Clarence Thomas on Sept. 16

June 23, 2014

Media Contact:  Hannah Buchanan
Editor/Writer–Strategic Communications & Media Relations
Marketing and Communications
The University of Texas at Tyler
903.539.7196 (cell)

June 23, 2014

Media Contact: Beverley Golden
Director
Marketing and Communications
The University of Texas at Tyler
903.566.7303 or 903.330.0495 (cell)

United States Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas will be the featured speaker at The University of Texas at Tyler R. Don Cowan Fine and Performing Arts Center on Tuesday, Sept. 16, Susan Thomae-Morphew, executive director, announced.

Sponsored by Drs. Lawrence L. Anderson and Svetislava J. Vukelja and Rod and Merle Mabry/UT Tyler, Justice Thomas will be the first speaker of the 2014 – 15 UT Tyler Distinguished Lecture Series. The lecture will begin at 7:30 p.m.

Season tickets are on sale now at the UT Tyler Cowan Center box office by calling 903.566.7424 or online at www.cowancenter.org. Box office hours are 9 a.m. – 4 p.m. Monday through Friday.

“Our President, Rod Mabry, has worked on getting our first Supreme Court Justice for a couple of years. We were thrilled when Justice Thomas accepted the invitation to open the 33rd year of the UT Tyler Distinguished Lecture Series,” Thomae-Morphew said.

Justice Thomas was born in the Pin Point community of Georgia near Savannah on June 23, 1948. He married Virginia Lamp in 1987 and has one child, Jamal Adeen, by a previous marriage.

He attended Conception Seminary and received an A.B., cum laude, from Holy Cross College, and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1974. Justice Thomas was admitted to law practice in Missouri in 1974, and served as an Assistant Attorney General of Missouri from 1974 – 77, an attorney with the Monsanto Company from 1977 – 79 and legislative assistant to Sen. John Danforth from 1979 – 81.

From 1981 – 82, he served as Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Education, and as chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission from 1982 – 90.

Justice Thomas became a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1990. President George H. W. Bush nominated him as an associate justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat October 23, 1991.

For more information about the 2014 - 15 season, visit the UT Tyler Cowan Center website.

One of the 15 campuses of the UT System, UT Tyler features excellence in teaching, research, artistic performance and community service. More than 80 undergraduate and graduate degrees are available at UT Tyler, which has an enrollment of more than 7,500 high-ability students. UT Tyler offers courses at its campuses in Tyler, Longview and Palestine as well as a location in Houston.