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Eugene Hickman Sr.
*The birth of Eugene Hickman Sr. is celebrated on this date in 1928. He was a Black Pharmacist and educator.
From Louisiana, Hickman excelled in his pre-collegiate education in the segregated public schools of Louisiana and Texas. After a tour of duty in the United States Army, he enrolled in Texas Southern University. He completed a four-year program, becoming a member of the first graduating class of the university's new School of Pharmacy in 1952.
In a historic break from the tradition of racial segregation at the University of Texas, the College of Pharmacy admitted Hickman as one of two Blacks to its graduate program. Shortly after receiving his master's degree, Hickman became the first Black to receive a doctorate in pharmacy. He joined the faculty at Texas in 1959.
In four decades, Hickman helped change that scene. As an integral component of the pharmacy program at Texas Southern University, Hickman was committed to helping the school become a producer of more African American pharmacists. Hickman's services have been recognized through numerous awards and citations but perhaps best by the crowds of pharmacists, dentists, physicians, and faculty members who have been former students. Over the years, he procured funds to support the pharmacy program at Texas Southern.
A model for faculty and teachers alike, Hickman has contributed greatly to the development of the academic program in pharmacy at his school and consequently to the evolution of pharmacy practice and higher education everywhere. Hickman Ph.D., the first African American to receive a Ph.D. in pharmacy at the University of Iowa, has been a major force in the production of African American pharmacists in the U.S. Texas Southern University, where he taught full-time from 1959 to 1998, has produced 33 percent of the nation's African American pharmacists.
A teacher and extraordinary mentor, Hickman, who inspired a new generation of pharmacists and other medical professionals, died on June 29, 2018.