The New York Times carried an obituary today for Nancy Maynard Hicks, making clear that she lived an extraordinary life. As the Times wrote, she was the first black woman to be a reporter at The New York Times and with her husband (the late Robert Maynard) bought and published The Oakland Tribune, still the only major metropolitan daily to have been owned by African-Americans.Â
Omitted from the obit (though included by the Washington Post) was the fact that she returned to school later in life and received a law degree from Stanford in 1987. She was my classmate, a friend to all and well-known and widely-respected for her work even to that point. I join those who mourn her passing.