Entry Category: Local - Starting with O

Willie Oates was a renowned civic activist in Arkansas throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Whether through her fundraising efforts for charities and nonprofit organizations or her service in the Arkansas General Assembly, she had a substantive impact on her state and its citizens—and it was all achieved in a colorful style that was characterized by the flamboyant hats that became her trademark. Will Etta (Willie) Long was born on January 14, 1918, in Arkansas City, Kansas, to Harry L. Long and Roberta Fern Jordan Long. Harry Long, a pharmacist, was mayor of Arkansas City for several years. Willie Long arrived at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County) in 1938, earning her bachelor’s degree in …

Williamson S. Oldham was a lawyer and politician who was born and reared in Tennessee. He was elected twice to the Arkansas House of Representatives and once to the Arkansas Supreme Court, but subsequent failed efforts to get elected to the U.S. Congress from Arkansas convinced him that Texas was a more promising venue for a political career. The results in the Lone Star State were similar—small victories but ultimate frustrations in his ambition to go to the national Congress. He was a major figure, and frequent critic, however, in the congress of the Confederacy, and after the war he wrote a memoir that detailed the rise and fall of the Confederacy. Williamson Simpson Oldham was born on June 19, …

Betty Overbey was a representative from Lamar (Johnson County) for District 69 in the Eighty-eighth, Eighty-ninth, and Ninetieth Arkansas General Assemblies, serving from 2011 to 2016.   Betty Warren was born on January 9, 1946, in Salus (Johnson County) to Paden Patric Warren, who was a logger, and Nola Jewel Tilton Christian Warren, who worked in the home. Warren received her early education in the Oark (Johnson County) public schools, graduating from Oark High School in 1963.   Betty Warren married George Overbey Jr., and they had three children. She became an active member of the First United Methodist Church in Lamar, where she served on the Finance Committee and as a Stephen Minister. She was a member the Lamar chapter of Order of the Eastern Star of Arkansas and of PEO, an organization that provides scholarships to help women further their education. For thirty-five years, she was an Arkansas State Revenue Agent for …