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Judge L. Clifford Davis

 

 

 

The Honorable L. Clifford Davis was born in Wilton, Arkansas in 1925, to Mr. Augustus Davis and Dora Duckett Davis.  He was the last of seven children. 

 

He grew up in Wilton and graduated from Dunbar High School in Little Rock and received his B.A. in Business Administration from Philander Smith College in 1945, also in Little Rock, Arkansas.

He had one year of graduate study in Economics at Atlanta University in Georgia, and received his law degree from Howard University in Washington D.C. in 1949.

He practiced law in Arkansas until 1952 when he relocated to Waco, Texas, to teach at Paul Quinn College until 1954.  He worked with the late Justice Thurgood Marshall on the landmark case, "Brown vs. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas."

He relocated again, in 1954 to Fort Worth, where he continued to practice law.  He was appointed a Criminal District Judge in 1983, and served until 1989 as the Judge of Criminal District Court Number 2.  He continued to serve by assignment as a visiting judge until 2004 when he retired as a Senior District Judge.  He currently serves as “of counsel” with the law firm of Johnson, Vaughn, & Heiskell.

He is married to Ethel R. Davis, a retired Fort Worth school teacher, and has two adult daughters.  He has actively participated in a wide variety of organizations in our community and has always strived to make Fort Worth a better place for all citizens. 

He was a pioneer in the integration process of the public schools in Mansfield and Fort Worth, and in the general community.  He is best known for opening the first African-American law office in Texas, as well as organizing the Fort Worth Black Bar Association.

“I am very proud of the fact that there is a school bearing my name, because education is such an important element in a society,” he said.