Alice Pollard Clark
Pioneering black jurist (born 1940)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alice Gail Pollard Clark (born February 12, 1940) is a retired American judge from Maryland. In 1997, she became the first African American woman to serve as district judge for Howard County, Maryland.
Alice Gail Pollard Clark | |
|---|---|
| Born | February 12, 1940 |
| Education | |
| Occupation | Judge |
Biography
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Alice Gail Pollard was born on February 12, 1940 in Washington, D.C.[1] She grew up on Randolph Place in the LeDroit Park neighborhood of Northwest, Washington.[2] The area would become notable as the home of four black women who would eventually become pioneering jurists, one of them Clark.[3] Pollard graduated from Washington's Paul Lawrence Dunbar Senior High School in before heading to university.[4]
Educator
Clark attended Howard University and graduated with a bachelors degree in Science in 1961. She would go on to became a science teacher in the District of Columbia Public Schools system. In 1963, she received a Masters degree from Catholic University of America.[1] After teaching for eight years, she became a guidance counselor. After spending nearly twenty years as an educator and counselor, she returned to university to attend law school in her late thirties.[5] Clark graduated from the University of Maryland School of Law in 1982 and passed the bar exam the following year.[6][7]
Legal career
In 1990, she became the first black woman attorney in the Howard County office of the Public Defender.[1] In 1995, she was appointed by Maryland Governor Parris N. Glendening to Howard County's circuit court.[2] The following year, she was named Outstanding Assistant Public Defender of the Year for Howard and Carroll Counties.[4]
In 1997 at age 57, she became the first African American woman appointed to the district court bench in Howard County.[8][2] Her appointment by Maryland Governor Parris N. Glendening filled the vacancy of former District Judge Lenore R. Gelfman.[2] Clark would continue to work with education and youth while a jurist.
Clark retired from the bench on February 11, 2010, after reaching age 70, the county's mandatory retirement age.[1]
Legacy
Today Clark's accomplishments are recognized on the LeDroit Park-Bloomingdale Heritage Trail in her hometown of NW Washington.[3][9][10]
