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Interview with Lee S. McKeithen

IntervieweeInterview with Lee S. McKeithen American, 1913 - 2010

InterviewerInterviewed by C. Ian McLachlan American, born 1942

Date2001 April 4

DimensionsDuration: 1 Hour, 15 Minutes

ClassificationsGraphics

Credit LineGift of the Connecticut Bar Foundation

DescriptionOral history interview with Lee S. McKeithen who was interviewed by Judge C. Ian McLachlan on April 4, 2001 for the Connecticut Bar Foundation's History of Connecticut Women in the Legal Profession Project.

Topics Discussed:

- Early Life: Lee S. McKeithen was born on April 24, 1913, in Albemarle, North Carolina. Her father and two brothers were lawyers. She was the youngest of four siblings.

- Early Education: She attended Albemarle Public Schools, and graduated high school at sixteen.

- College: She attended the Women's College at Duke and then Duke Law School, starting in 1932. Her entering law class had six women out of thirty students. She initially studied English as an undergraduate, and decided to study law.

- Law School Experience: She passed the Bar exam in 1934, after two years of law school. She never felt discrimination from male classmates or professors, except for a professor who was difficult with everyone.

- Early Legal Career: Her first job after law school was working with her father at his firm, R. L. Smith & Sons. She was admitted to the Bar in New York in 1941. She argued six or seven cases before the North Carolina Supreme Court. She was the first woman admitted on motion in the First Department of New York.

- Marriage and Family: She married in 1939. Her legal career was interrupted for over twenty years to raise four children.

- Return to Law: After her husband's sudden death in 1968, she was encouraged to take the Connecticut Bar Exam. She took and passed the Connecticut Bar Exam in 1973. She then began working at Cummings & Lockwood in Greenwich, doing real estate and title work.

- Community Involvement: She was involved with American Field Service, where her son participated in an exchange program to Italy. She also served for twenty years on the Representative Town Meeting in Greenwich.

Object number2024.38.14a-i

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)