In 1943 Mildred Nichols Hamilton broke the gender barrier by taking a seat in the formerly all-male press box at Oklahoma Memorial Stadium to cover the university’s football team. At the time she was the editor of The Oklahoma Daily. She went on to have a long career in journalism, working for 30 years as a feature writer for the San Francisco Examiner. After retiring, she earned a master’s degree in history at San Francisco State University.
Hamilton died in 2010 and her estate has left a $1 million gift to establish an endowed scholarship program for women journalism students at the University of Oklahoma’s Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communications. The first five students to receive Hamilton Scholars will be named later this month. Each will receive $2,000 per year for four years.