Othello Caleb Cross (1938–2022)

Othello Caleb Cross was a biology teacher and football coach in Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) who, in a mid-career life change, became a lawyer and an influential advocate for civil rights.

Othello Caleb Cross was born on March 17, 1938, in the family home in Cleveland, Mississippi. One of eighteen children born to K. P. Cross and Henrietta Lyles Cross, he grew up in poverty, but he worked hard and was a standout student and athlete. After graduating from Cleveland Colored Consolidated High School in 1957, he went to Arkansas, Mechanical and Normal College, now the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff (UAPB), on a football scholarship.

While in college, he quarterbacked for the Arkansas AM&N football team and majored in biology, thinking about attending medical school. He was also active in the Gamma Sigma Chapter of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity Inc. He graduated in 1961 and, the following year, married Celestine Tyus, whom he had met at AM&N. The couple would have one son.

Following graduation, Cross took a job at Townsend Park High School in Pine Bluff, where he taught biology and coached the football team, leading the team to a record of sixty-nine wins, seven losses, and two ties, as well as four state AA Championships. He was known for his upbeat attitude and determination, telling his teams that losses were only temporary setbacks on the path to discovering ways to win.

In the late 1960s, after the segregated Townsend Park High School integrated into the Dollarway School District, Cross became the assistant coach at Dollarway High School. He held that position into the early 1970s, but when he was passed over for the head coaching job upon the retirement of his boss, and the position was given to a seemingly less qualified white candidate, Cross sued. He ultimately won the case, but the experience in the courtroom, especially his lack of understanding of the legal language and procedures, inspired a desire to study and ultimately practice law. Consequently, with his settlement from the case, he resigned his teaching job, and at the age of thirty-five, he enrolled at the University of Arkansas School of Law, earning his JD degree in 1978.

While in law school, he became friends with fellow students Jesse Kearney and Gene McKissic, with whom he would later establish a law firm. Too, Cross became friends with two of his professors, Bill and Hillary Clinton. Hillary, who was interested in educational reform, was particularly interested in Cross’s teaching experiences.

Upon being admitted to the state bar in 1979, Cross secured a job with the Arkansas State Claims Commission, where he dealt with claims against the State of Arkansas, its agencies, and its institutions. After a short time there, he entered private practice, joining with his law school friends to establish the firm Cross, Kearney and McKissic, where he engaged in both criminal and civil case defense work.

In 1999, he took on his career-defining case, representing Black farmers in Pigford v. Glickman, a federal class-action lawsuit against the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). The suit alleged that the USDA had racially discriminated against Black farmers in its distribution of farm loans and assistance from 1981 to 1996.

During the trial, the court discovered that not only were Black farmers denied loans and benefits, but their white counterparts received preferential treatment in the same process. Too, Black farmers were often humiliated and degraded by department officials, and when complaints were filed, they were all but ignored. In formal testimony, the Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman admitted that the agency had not acted in good faith. The case was ultimately settled in 2010 when President Barack Obama signed the Claims Resolution Act of 2010 into law. The legislation provided $1.25 billion in funding for successful claimants.

While Cross sometimes spoke of retiring, he never did. His longtime commitment to his fraternity as well as his support for all HBCUs was recognized in 2008 when the Arkansas House of Representatives presented him with a citation recognizing fifty years with his beloved Kappa Alpha Psi (KAΨ) fraternity.

Cross died on June 2, 2022, and is buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Cemetery in Pine Bluff.

For additional information:
Barnard, Ninfa O. “Othello Cross Led Landmark Civil Rights Victory for Black Farmers.” Pine Bluff Commercial, October 24, 2022. https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2022/oct/24/othello-cross-led-landmark-civil-rights-victory/ (accessed May 1, 2026).

McCray, Michael. “One Kool Kappa Coach: Remembering Othello Cross, Attorney at Law.” Delta Informer, June 9, 2022. https://arkansasdeltainformer.com/one-kool-kappa-coach-remembering-othello-cross-attorney-at-law/ (accessed May 1, 2026).

“Obituary, Attorney Othello Caleb Cross.” Brown Funeral Home, Pine Bluff, June 2022. https://www.brownfuneralhomeandmortuary.com/obituary/othello-cross (accessed May 1, 2026).

William H. Pruden III
Raleigh, North Carolina