Oliver Hill, Civil Rights Pioneer (1907-2007)

Posted by Stephanie Taylor on August 6, 2007 at 05:00 PM

Oliver W. Hill, a civil rights lawyer who was on the forefront of the fight to desegregate public schools, died Sunday at his home in Richmond, Virginia. He was 100 years old.

In 1940, Mr. Hill won his first civil rights case in Virginia, one that required equal pay for black and white teachers. Eight years later, he was the first black elected to the Richmond City Council since Reconstruction.

He was later involved in the series of lawsuits against racially segregated public schools that became the Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, a decision that was threatened earlier this year by narrow 5-4 rulings against desegregation.