On March 25, 1970, Dr. Robert Flennaugh (b. 1938) becomes the first African American to serve on the University of Washington Board of Regents when Washington Governor Daniel J. Evans (b. 1925) appoints him. Flennaugh, a Seattle dentist, is also the youngest person so far to sit on the board, which governs an institution with 33,000 students.
Dr. Flennaugh, whose term expired in 1977, served on the board as vice president and as president. In 1976, Governor Dixy Lee Ray (1914-1994) nominated him for another six-year term, but he was one of 100 persons whose appointments were not acted upon by the state senate.
Sources:
Walt Crowley, Rites of Passage: A Memoir of the Sixties in Seattle, (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995), 170; Board Member Index Card, Robert L. Flennaugh, 1970-1977, (Board of Regents Office, University of Washington, Seattle).
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