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C.J. Cherryh was born Carolyn Cherry on September 1, 1942. She was raised primarily in Lawton and received her BA in Latin from the University of Oklahoma. She taught Latin, classics, and ancient history in Oklahoma City public schools. She eventually quit teaching to pursue writing full time and is the author of many science fiction novels and short stories. Ms. Cherryh has won three Hugo Awards for her writing: Best Short Story in 1979 and Best Novel in 1982 and 1989.
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Angie Debo traveled with her parents to the place that would become Marshall, Oklahoma in 1889 via covered wagon. She obtained her teaching certificate at age 16 and went on to obtain a Bachelors Degree, Masters Degree, and her doctorate. She wrote And Still the Waters Run in 1936, and though it was initially refused publication because it dealt with the theft of Indian lands by the white man and represented Oklahoma in a less than favorable light, it was finally published in 1940. Debo went on to write eight more books completing her last when she was 85.
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Best known for his novel, Invisible Man, Ralph Waldo Ellison was born in Oklahoma on March 1, 1913. Early on, he studied trumpet and piano and for a time lived with several jazz musicians in Oklahoma City. Invisible Man won the National Book Award in 1953. He died on April 16, 1994, of pancreatic cancer. His second, unfinished novel, Juneteenth, was published (in condensed form) five years after his death.
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John Hope Franklin, author of the preeminent source on African-American history, was born in Rentiesville on January 2, 1915, and graduated from Booker T. Washington High School in Tulsa. He earned his doctorate in history from Harvard University in 1941. His book, From Slavery to Freedom, was originally published in 1947 and is continually updated. In 1995, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
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Susan Eloise Hinton was born July 22, 1948, in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She started writing while still a student at Will Rogers High School, and her most popular book, The Outsiders, was based on the divided groups in that school. Published in 1967, The Outsiders became the second-best-selling young adult book in publishing history. She also wrote Rumble Fish, That Was Then, This Is Now, and many more.
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Navarre Scott Momaday was born on February 27, 1934, in Lawton, Oklahoma. In 1969, Momaday brought Native American literature into the mainstream with his novel, House Made of Dawn, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Mr. Momaday was recently named Oklahoma's 16th Poet Laureate. His term runs through 2008.
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