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Oral History Interview with Bernice Shedrick

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Oral History Interview with Bernice Shedrick Oral History Interview with Bernice Shedrick Interview Conducted by Tanya Finchum November 20, 2007 Women of the Oklahoma Legislature Oral History Project Special Collections & University Archives Edmon Low Library ● Oklahoma State University © 2007 Oklahoma State University Library Women of the Oklahoma Legislature Oral History Project Interview History Interviewer: Tanya Finchum Transcriber: Amanda Carter Editors: Tanya Finchum, Juliana Nykolaiszyn, Latasha Wilson The recording and transcript of this interview were processed at the Oklahoma State University Library in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Project Detail The purpose of the Women of the Oklahoma Legislature Oral History Project is to gather and preserve memories and historical documents of women who have served or are currently serving in the Oklahoma Legislature. This project was approved by the Oklahoma State University Institutional Review Board on November 10, 2006. Legal Status Scholarly use of the recordings and transcripts of the interview with Bernice Shedrick is unrestricted. The interview agreement was signed on November 20, 2007. 2 Oklahoma State University Library Women of the Oklahoma Legislature Oral History Project Bernice Shedrick – Brief Biography Bernice Shedrick served in the Oklahoma Senate 1981-1996 representing District 21. Born in Chickasha, Oklahoma she received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Oklahoma State University. She was a classroom teacher from 1969-1980. While she was serving in the Senate, she earned her juris doctorate from the Oklahoma City University Law School. She was a candidate for Governor in 1994 and was inducted into the Oklahoma Women’s Hall of Fame in 1996. She is a member of the Payne County Bar Association and the Oklahoma Bar Association. While in office, Shedrick served on multiple committees and championed multiple issues. She served as a primary author of HB 1017, which provided a major commitment to common education in Oklahoma. She also played a major role in the passage of a major capital bond program for Oklahoma higher education. She was one of the original authors of HB 1286, the legislation that established the School of Science and Mathematics in 1983. Shedrick has received multiple awards and honors and among them are the American Jurisprudence Award, “Who’s Who of American Women in Politics,” Outstanding Contribution Award from the University Center at Tulsa, and the Henry G. Bennett Distinguished Service Award, to name a few. The Higher Education Alumni Council of Oklahoma, the Oklahoma State Department of Vocational Education, and the Oklahoma Retired Teachers Association recognized her for distinguished legislative service. Shedrick serves part-time as Administrative Law Judge in Payne County and Logan County. She has two law offices, one in Stillwater and one near Afton. She is a member of the Ethics Commission in Oklahoma. She is a mother of three children and enjoys spending time with her family. 3 Oklahoma State University Library Women of the Oklahoma Legislature Oral History Project Bernice Shedrick Oral History Interview Interviewed by Tanya Finchum November 20, 2007 Stillwater, Oklahoma Finchum Today is November 20, 2007 and my name is Tanya Finchum. I’m with the OSU Library. We’re doing an oral history project called Women of the Oklahoma Legislature and today I’m with Bernice Shedrick from Stillwater [Oklahoma] in her law office here in Stillwater. And she served in the Senate from ’81 to ’96. Is that correct? Shedrick That is correct. Finchum Thank you for joining us today. Shedrick My pleasure. Finchum Let’s start by having you tell us a little bit about your childhood and then we’ll work forward. Shedrick I was born in Chickasha, Oklahoma on August 9, 1940 to Irene May Williams-Link and Arthur Cole Link, Sr. And of my two parents, I was the oldest of four siblings. Both of my parents had been married before, both had deceased spouses, and both had children of a prior marriage. But there were the four of us who were reared in the household together along with an older half-brother, Robert, who was about seven years older than I. We all grew up there until both of my parents died. My father died when I was approximately 11 years old and my mother when I was 13. My older brother was serving in the Korean War during that period of time. He was married. His spouse, who was just a 19 year old young woman attending, then, what was called Oklahoma College for Women in Chickasha, Oklahoma, came out to our home and helped take care of the four of us for a very short period of time. And to her, to this day, I owe a great deal of gratitude and appreciation for her attempt to keep the four of us young siblings together, though we were later separated. Each of us went to live with a family member. 4 I went to live, though, with my older brother and my sister-in-law, Sherry. He later returned from the Korean War and then decided to finish his undergraduate college. First of all, we moved from Chickasha before he came back from the Korean War. I moved from Chickasha, Oklahoma to Wynnewood, Oklahoma with my sister-in-law who was only six or seven years older than I but quite a role model, quite a role model. She was a very intelligent woman, still is—full of life and had a lot to offer in the rearing of her young little sister-in-law. And so we moved there because that was her hometown and her parents still lived there. So I got to be the new girl on the block. And I was fortunate enough that year to be elected president of my class, which was freshman class of my school and I was elected as cheerleader. So that really helped my self-esteem from having lost both of my parents in a very short period of time and also to be physically separated from my brothers and sisters. Sherry and her family just really accepted me with open arms and we did a lot of things together as a family. I’m deeply grateful, not only to her, but to my older brother who is now deceased, but to her family as well. We later moved to Norman, Oklahoma when he decided to go ahead and secure his education and later to Edmond, Oklahoma. And that’s where I met my husband, who we were married for some 32-33 years. We were divorced, but we remained very, very close friends. He recently passed away last year. Finchum And that’s what brought you to Stillwater then. Shedrick Yes, that’s what brought us to Stillwater. His family was in the jewelry business and there was a Shedrick Jewelry Store here and so in 1965 or ’66 we moved here so he could manage the Shedrick Jewelry Store. By that time we had three children. Our daughter, Crystal, our middle child, Michael Scott, and our youngest son, Stephen Link. All Shedrick children. Our middle child is deceased. He died when he was 24 years old in 1985. Finchum So you’re going on forty years here in Stillwater. Shedrick Yes ma’am. Finchum And so your interest in politics started when you ran for president of the high school or before then? Shedrick You know, actually, my quest to be involved perhaps in political decisions or decisions that were made by the legislature actually occurred after I was teaching school here in Stillwater and involved developing the curriculum of what then was touted as an open school 5 process, which now is Skyline Elementary. But at the time, it was developed on a lot of theories by Bruno, Piaget and other learning experts. Our school board at that time decided to try that adventure. I was on the team with other teachers who, that year, decided to try to write the curriculum for that new school. And it was our then- superintendent of schools who encouraged me through that process. We were trying to select materials and I became a little upset, you might say, in the way that the state mandated to us that we use only one textbook in a classroom with 30 to 40 children, assuming that everyone was a very visual learner, and I knew that wasn’t true. And I thought that’s a real hardship on a child that’s not a visual learner to give him a book and say, “Read,” when that wasn’t his best avenue of learning. When I expressed my concerns to the superintendent, he said, “Well why don’t you just go down to the legislature with me sometime and let’s appear in front of one of the committees on education and maybe you could offer some testimony.” And that’s what I did, first time I was ever there. It was long before I ever ran for public office or even thought I wanted to run for office. But I remember walking in that huge Capitol and it was actually the second time I had been in that Capitol. The first time is when I was a sixth grader and I went with my sixth grade class and I was very much in awe, I thought it was a beautiful building. But that second time I went I was teaching school. When I went into that committee and I listened to some of the questions that were being asked of me, and the responses I would give and then still wanting (Laughs) some information or thinking they needed more information and making some decisions I thought, “I believe I could do this.
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