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Interview with Bessye Bennett

IntervieweeInterview with Bessye Bennett American, 1938 - 2000

InterviewerInterviewed by Alice A. Bruno American

Date1999 October 4

DimensionsDuration: 1 Hour, 46 Minutes, 59 Seconds

ClassificationsGraphics

Credit LineGift of the Connecticut Bar Foundation

DescriptionOral history interview with Bessye Bennett who was interviewed by Alice A. Bruno on October 4, 1999 for the Connecticut Bar Foundation's History of Connecticut Women in the Legal Profession Project.

Topics discussed include:

- Personal life: grew up in Texas, moved to Baton Rouge, LA, then to Houston, TX, and later CT. Her father was a professor of economics and they moved due to his career. Her mother's path; a teacher, stay at home mom, university librarian, principal, and professor at Connecticut State College. Her huband; worked at an atomic power lab, now working for Connecticut Department of Revenue Services. The birth of her children.

- Education: Black community in southern colleges. Radcliffe College graduate cum laude at 19. Harvard University. UConn Law School.

- Career: First black woman to be admitted to the bar in Connecticut. 1954 Brown case. Her first jobs at the Museum of Comparative Zoology and advertising while attending Radcliff. League of Women Voters. Society for Savings. Connecticut Women's Education and Legal Fund (CWEALF). Partnership with Hyacinth Douglas Bailey. All Aboard, Inc.; she is a trustee. 1996 Crawford Association recognition. Elizabeth Dole.

- Segregation and Ku Klux Klan.

- Life in New England.

Object number2024.38.2a-e

NotesProject Overview: At the turn of the 20th century, other than Mary Hall, women lawyers were virtually unknown in Connecticut. By contrast, at the turn of the 21st century, law schools were enrolling roughly the same number of women as men. Since their earliest time at the bar, women have become leaders in all areas of the profession at a pace out of all proportion to their brief history and number.

In 1999, the Fellows of the Connecticut Bar Foundation initiated the Oral History of Connecticut Women in the Legal Profession Project. Within the framework of this dynamic project, the Fellows have been creating a permanent video, audio, and photographic historical record of milestone achievements of women as they have become more visible and achieved prominence in the field of law. In 2019, a leadership donation of $20,000 from the law firm of Carmody Torrance Sandak & Hennessey enabled the project to significantly broaden its scope and plan for the future.

Through its first two phases, the project worked with award-winning documentarian Karyl Evans and attorney/photographer Isabel Chenoweth to produce fifty-eight oral history interviews with outstanding female attorneys and 118 portraits of women in the Connecticut judiciary.

The oral history interviews have collected the stories of women whose ingenuity, perseverance, and intelligence dismantled barriers that historically prevented women from pursuing careers in the law. Connecticut has benefited from the efforts of these “pioneers” as they enriched the legal profession by joining the ranks of their male peers and paved the way for more women to join the profession. (Source: Connecticut Bar Foundation)