Arrell Morgan Gibson

Class of
1985
Arrell Morgan Gibson

Arrell Morgan Gibson

"It wasn’t hard to get acquainted with Arrell; busy as he was teaching and writing, he was no bookworm. He went up and down the little country lane making friends with everyone."
F. Grover Fulkerson, 1989

Biography

Dr. Arrell Morgan Gibson was born in Kansas and served in the U.S. Navy during World War II before attending the University of Oklahoma to study under the legendary historian and teacher Dr. Edward Everett Dale. Gibson began his professional career at Phillips University (now Northern Oklahoma College) in Enid as a professor and Director of Graduate Studies before he was invited to join the OU faculty in 1957.

Dr. Gibson became a leading historian and award-winning author, as well as an internationally known expert on Oklahoman, southwestern, and American Indian history. He was awarded as the George Lynn Cross Research Professor of History at the University of Oklahoma, and his book The Chickasaws placed second in the Pulitzer Prize for history in 1972. Gibson was named Oklahoma Writer of the Year in 1972 and penned other books, such as Wilderness Bonanza, The Oklahoma Story, and Oklahoma: A History of Five Centuries.

Fun fact

OU history professor Arrell Gibson’s dedication was such that he administered an oral exam to a master’s degree candidate from his hospital bed on the day he died.

Oklahoma connections

Gibson came to the University of Oklahoma in Norman as a student in 1946.

Hometown

Norman

Profession

Historian

Presenter

Born

1921

Died

1987
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