1. Clara Luper is best known for her leadership role in the 1958 Oklahoma City sit-in movement, as she, her young son and daughter, and numerous young members of the NAACP Youth Council successfully conducted carefully planned nonviolent sit-in protests of downtown drugstore lunch-counters, which overturned their policies of segregation.
The success of this sit-in would result in Luper becoming a leader of various sit-ins throughout Oklahoma City between 1958 and 1964.
The Clara Luper Corridor is a streetscape and civic beautification project from the Oklahoma Capitol area east to northeast Oklahoma City.
In 1972, Clara Luper was an Oklahoma candidate for election to the United States Senate.
Clara Luper continued desegregating hundreds of establishments in Oklahoma and was active on the national level during the 1960s movements.
Clara Shepard Luper was born in 1923 in rural Okfuskee County, Oklahoma.
Clara Luper's father, Ezell Shepard, was a World War I veteran and laborer.
Clara Luper was a member of Zeta Phi Beta, a historically Black sorority.
In 1950, Clara Luper became the first African American student in the graduate history program at the University of Oklahoma.
Clara Luper became the advisor for the Oklahoma City NAACP Youth Council in 1957 while working as a history teacher at Dunjee High School in Spencer, Oklahoma.
From 1958 to 1964 Clara Luper mentored the members of the NAACP Youth Council during its campaign to end the segregation of public accommodations through sit-ins, protests, and boycotts.
Clara Luper sent letters continuously to Katz but was ignored for 15 months.
Clara Luper was a civil rights activist, but she was a teacher first.
Percer and Clara Luper had a silent agreement that, he and his men would not harm her students if they practiced non-violence.
From 1958 to 1964 Clara Luper was a major leader of the fight to end segregation in Oklahoma.
Clara Luper led the campaigns to gain equal banking rights, employment opportunities, open housing, and voting rights.
Clara Luper served on Governor J Howard Edmondson's Committee on Human Relations.
Clara Luper was a prominent figure in the national Civil Rights Movement.
Clara Luper was active in the NAACP and attended the association's annual conference every year with the Oklahoma City Youth Council.
Clara Luper took part in the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches where she received a deep cut in her leg on "Bloody Sunday" when 600 civil rights marchers were attacked by state and local police with tear gas and billy clubs.
Clara Luper was later reassigned to John Marshall High School where she continued to teach history and media studies.
Clara Luper supported the strike by allowing the workers to use the NAACP Youth Council's Freedom Center in Oklahoma.
In 1972, Clara Luper was an Oklahoma candidate for the United States Senate.
Clara Luper taught American history for 41 years, beginning at Dunjee High School and working at other Oklahoma City schools; she retired from John Marshall High School in Oklahoma City in 1991.
Clara Luper's students were so influenced by her civil rights success that they strived against segregation themselves.
Clara Luper received hundreds of awards and was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame, the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame, and the Oklahoma Afro-American Hall of Fame, among others.
In December 2006, Clara Luper was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Oklahoma City University.
The scholarship is meant to emphasize values that Clara Luper stood for, including community service, leadership, and education.
Clara Luper is survived by her three children, Calvin, Marilyn Luper Hildreth, and Chelle Marie.
Clara Luper is survived by a sister, Oneita Brown; five grandchildren; eight great-grandchildren; and one great-great-grandchild.
On March 7,2018, University of Oklahoma President David L Boren announced the naming of the Department of African and African American Studies in honor of longtime educator and civil rights leader Clara Luper, who made many contributions to diversity and inclusion efforts in Oklahoma.
Clara Luper's book Behold The Walls is an acclaimed first-hand account of the campaign for civil rights in Oklahoma City during the 1960s.