Dorothy Sunrise Lorentino, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

Dorothy Sunrise Lorentino

Comanche educator

Date of Birth: 07-May-1909

Place of Birth: Comanche County, Oklahoma, United States

Date of Death: 04-Aug-2005

Profession: teacher

Nationality: United States

Zodiac Sign: Taurus

Dorothy Sunrise Lorentino (May 7, 1909 – August 4, 2005) was a Comanche teacher from Oklahoma.
As a child, she won a landmark education judgement against the Cache Consolidated School District of Comanche County, Oklahoma for Native American children to attend public schools rather than government mandated Bureau of Indian Affairs Schools.
It was a precursor case to both the Alice Piper v.
Pine School District (1924) which allowed Native American children to attend school in California and Brown v.
Board of Education (1954), which decided separate schooling based on race was unconstitutional.
Language from her judgement was incorporated into the Indian Citizenship Act (1924).
Having won the right to attend public school, she went on to earn credentials as a special education teacher and taught for over forty years.
In 1997, she was the first Native American and the first Oklahoman to be inducted into the National Teachers Hall of Fame.