Roger Demosthenes O'Kelly - A Most Remarkable Lawyer

Written By Christina Moffett

Here's a sneak peek into my research process: I usually get a handle on the basics of the person's life story through Wikipedia, then go to Google for the detailed information and primary sources (meaning accounts written about them during their lifetime). This post did not go that way. The Wikipedia article is very short and poorly researched, and unfortunately I could not find many articles online that provided more information. Luckily, they did cite a couple primary sources, so I got to spend time going through old newspapers and census records, which I actually find quite fun!

Roger, 1927

Roger Demosthenes (deh-MOSS-theh-neez, named for the Ancient Greek orator) O'Kelly was born in Raleigh, North Carolina on October 25, 1880.  All of the following information I pieced together from census records. He was born to Joanna and Charles O'Kelly (both born enslaved in South Carolina). His mother married his stepfather, Charles Cardwell, in 1892. She had three other children after Roger with her first husband: William (1885), John, and Charles (1887). With her second husband, she had a daughter, Gladys (1894). In a 1927 article, it reported that, "O'Kelly's ancestors were highly intelligent and respected members of the negro race. His grandfather, John O'Kelly, was for many years the proprietor of a large livery establishment in Raleigh and he is nearly related to negro people of pronounced thrift, intelligence, and character." Is this actually true? I have not found any evidence either way.

At the age of nine, Roger became severely ill with scarlet fever (sound familiar?). He initially became blind but did recover his vision (he later lost vision in his left eye following a football injury). He remembered, "the terror and horrible mental effect of supposing that I would never see again." Over the next year, he lost his hearing and ability to speak. He said decades later that, "I wished to be happy again and play like other children and though I did not complain I was rebellious...For about a year, I suppose it was, I was just hard of hearing and though I was treated by specialists the treatment did not avail. I became stone deaf..." Roger was still able to feel sound vibrations and always enjoyed singing along to hymns in church. 

The young boy was "practically mute" and could "speak only to utter brief exclamations." Roger later said in an interview: "I have not completely lost my speech as you will observe; but it is a tedious process and I have practically abandoned it because I have forgotten how to pronounce some words and my active vocabulary of course has not increased." He referred to himself as a "deaf-mute" instead of using the term "dumb" to describe his lack of verbal speech. In 1927 he explained: "...I am always provoked when some one [sic] - though thoughtlessly - refers to me as 'the dummy.' All deaf-mutes regard 'dummy' as a term of ridicule and they resent reference to them as 'dummy.'"

Following his illness, Roger was enrolled in the North Carolina School for Colored Deaf and Blind in Raleigh. This school, first established in 1869, was the first American school to educate Black blind and deaf students. Initially the War Department rented a building from the American Missionary Society for the first class of 21 deaf and 7 blind students in the Colored Department. Teachers from the North Carolina Institution for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind provided instruction. The state legislature approved a new building in 1929. This school continued to run successfully, even being reported in 1945 as a "leader in the education of the Negro blind and deaf." Finally, in 1963, deaf and blind students in North Carolina were allowed to enroll in any state school, regardless of race. Four years later, the Colored Department began an exchange of students with Governor Morehead School, formerly the school for white deaf and blind students. Full integration was achieved in 1977.

The plaque at the former Colored Department building

During the time that Roger was being educated, the way of educating deaf students focused on oralism, which relied on lip-reading and verbal speech instead of using American Sign Language. This is a controversial system since it forbade the often-preferred sign language of the Deaf community and negatively impacted Deaf culture in America. Luckily, Roger was instead instructed in using manual signs. He had strong opinions about oralism: "It is a humbug and a mockery. It can never create a soul and universal medium of communication for the deaf! I have no patience with the sham. It disgusts and provokes me." He referred to sign language as "the only natural and feasible and sensible medium of communication (besides writing) which God has provided or which man has conceived for the deaf."

Roger communicated with hearing people through writing on a notepad he carried. Later he was also able to use a typewriter. He was described as "reading with lightning rapidity" and able to type replies with "the embodiment of hair-trigger mentality and restless, dynamic energy." Roger also said as an older adult, "My almost sole dependence now, when not conversing with deaf-mutes, is pencil and pad: they carried me through Shaw and Yale and they have carried me through many important business deals. One can write with much more care and deliberation than he can speak. Did you ever think of it? A pencil puts one on his guard. Spoken words are easily forgotten, written words stay and are remembered."

Roger desired to continue his education. He first applied to Gallaudet University, a college especially for deaf students, as he applied for college in 1897, but failed the examination (other sources claimed he was actually denied due to his race). He then applied to a preparatory school called Kendall Green in the same D.C. area as Gallaudet, but was denied (also reported as due to his race). He then applied to New York Institution for the Deaf and Blind but could not afford the tuition. Roger became greatly discouraged that would "never rise above mediocrity." He was determined to earn enough money to attend Yale University, where another deaf-mute man, Dr. Samuel Porter, had graduated in 1829 before becoming a Professor Emeritus at Gallaudet. As of 1900, Roger was still listed as a pupil at "The Deaf, Dumb, and Blind Institution: Colored Department."

He worked for a few years doing odd jobs, such as stable hand, teacher, or hackman (carding wool to make linen) before eventually attending Shaw University. This was an historically black university founded on December 1, 1865 (the second-oldest of this group of colleges and universities). Their law school had opened in 1888 and graduated 57 students between then and its closing in 1916. It was the only black law school to offer a course in legal shorthand; the reasoning was that, if discrimination prevented their graduates from becoming lawyers, then they could at least work in a law firm as an office assistant or in a clerical position.

Initially, Roger was first licensed to practice law by the North Carolina Supreme Court in 1908 (though did not practice until 1920) after taking a special course in English at Shaw. He was the first (and only, during his lifetime) Black deaf lawyer in the United States. He was only one of three deaf lawyers total. After being licensed, he went back to Shaw for a Bachelor of Law course, finishing in 1909. He was still determined to attend Yale, so began working for the T.A. Gillespie Company constructing the Catskill Aqueduct from the Catskill mountains to New York City. He lived in shanties, slept on bunks filled with straw, and did his own cooking. The workers were paid every Saturday and could go to a village store to stock up on provisions. On one such trip, Roger was attacked by a mugger and, thanks to his football playing days, fended him off. His one good eye, however, was so injured it caused him to need to stay at the New York Eye, Ear, Nose, and Throat hospital for two months. 

Roger was admitted to the senior law class of 150 students at Yale in 1910. It was a very supportive environment for Roger. Though expensive, he was able to find employment in firing furnaces, shoveling snow, cleaning windows, mowing lawns, and washing dishes to pay for tuition. He was able to keep up with lectures thanks to classmates who wrote down the lectures verbatim. Exams were all conducted in writing, so he had no trouble with those. During the summer of 1911, Roger worked in the tunnels under New York City; during this job a scratch on his leg became infected and he needed to stay at the Metropolitan hospital on Blackwell Island to recover.  Roger graduated with a Bachelor of Laws degree (L.L.B.) in 1912. He had passed the final examination on the third attempt, becoming the second deaf student to graduate from Yale in its 250-year history (as reported in a 1962 Shaw Alumni Bulletin). 

Roger during his Yale years

After graduating from Yale, he took a job with the McKenize-Mann company in Montreal, Quebec, Canada to work on the Mount Royal Tunnel, sleeping in hotel lobbies or at the YMCA at night. During this job, he became ill with double pneumonia while working during the Canadian winter. Roger later said that if he "were not a lawyer I had rather work on those great public jobs as a common laborer than any thing [sic] else. It's a happy, care-free life. The friendship I made during the hardships and thrilling experiences while with the Gillespie company have been enduring." 

Roger eventually chose to return to his hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina. Roger made this decision knowing full well he was returning to intense segregation and discrimination. This was the era of the Jim Crow laws, designed to separate Black from white in every possible way (e.g. public parks, drinking fountains, restaurant seating, schools, etc.). About the time Roger moved back home, the Ku Klux Klan was on the rise once more, thanks in part to the popular 1915 silent film Birth of a Nation (it even holds the distinction of being the first movie shown in the White House). This incredibly racist film depicted Black men as stupid and sexually aggressive, while the KKK were the heroes protecting white women and maintaining white supremacy. Historians, such as John Hope Franklin, believe that, if not for this film, "the Klan might not have been reborn." 

Even knowing this, Roger apparently had no desire to live anywhere else. He later said in a 1927 article, "I much prefer to live in the south. The north has never appealed to me." This interview was with and article written by a white man, which is important to remember. A full page of a six-page interview is devoted to Roger's alleged views that he preferred living in the South because every Black man could be a business owner and that no whites troubled them since the races were largely separated. He apparently did not desire "inter-racial social equality" with the "white race" since he thought "that social equality should be entirely a moral and mental acquirement and not an inheritance." Roger also apparently did not see a "race problem" and that the South "is teaching, dignifying and elevating negro racial instincts." He reported that the "negro merely wishes political, commercial and intellectual equality. He has always had commercial and intellectual equality when he earned or deserved them...The talk of social equality between the white and black races disgusts every intelligent negro. When we refer to political equality for the negro man in the south we refer to a thing of his stormy past, when the negro emerged coincidentally from bondage into full citizenship. Full political equality for the negro in the south will come again in the future and that future will be for him and for all far more peaceful and glorious than has ever been in the past." All of this may have been a fabrication of the article's author. Or it may have been what Roger actually said during the interview. Whatever the case may be, it is important to realize that all of this was presented as his public view in a time and location where it was incredibly important for him to maintain good standing with the white citizens of Raleigh.

Roger did have to register for the draft during World War I but was not called up due to "lost one eye and deaf." He was employed at this time y Harris Granite Company. After the war, he began teaching at the same school that had originally educated him: the North Carolina School for Colored Deaf and Blind. He taught there from 1918-1919. At this time, the use of oralism in deaf schools encouraged them to hire hearing instructors instead of deaf ones. By the time Roger was teaching, only about 20% of deaf educators were employed in America. Black deaf adults were even more at a disadvantage: they rarely graduated from deaf institutions at all and rarely found jobs as teachers. Roger only taught for one year before moving on.

Roger's draft card, 1918

In 1920, he began his own law practice called "O'Kelly Legal Services" serving the Black community in Raleigh and Granite Quarry, North Carolina. He provided "legal services relating to domestic relations, real estate, corporations, and abstracts of title." A few examples of his clients were the Mechanics' and Farmers Bank, the Eagle Insurance Company, and the Progressive Real Estate company. An article reported that Roger "does a lucrative business among his own race and has business connections with prominent white lawyers and men of affairs." 

Also in 1920, on February 25, Roger finally wed. He was 39 and his new wife was 19. The Yale Alumni Weekly reported the wedding in its alumni updates section in the May 7th newsletter (Vol. 29, No. 33): "The marriage of Goldie Euzelia, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Hezekiah Weaver, and Roger D. O'Kelly took place recently. They are living in Salisbury, N. C." The couple had no children. It appears that this marriage did not last and ended in divorce. In the 1920 census, they are listed as living together as husband and wife. By the 1930 census, however, Roger was living in his mother's Raleigh home with her and her five boarders. His marital status was listed as "single." On that same census, Goldie was living at home with her mother and brother; she was also listed as "single." She later moved to Virginia and worked as a dressmaker, getting remarried in 1945 then again in North Carolina in 1950.

Charles, Roger's stepfather, died in 1924 in South Carolina. He bequeathed $600 (over $9,000 in 2021 USD) to his wife, Joanna. His daughter, Gladys, received $500 and his two living stepsons, Roger and Charlie, received $100 each (Roger's brother William had died in 1908). The household furniture was divided among the three of them. Roger's mother, Joanna, died in 1931; her $200 was bequeathed to her remaining two living children, Roger and Gladys (Charlie had died in 1928).

Roger continued to practice law for over thirty years, being listed as a lawyer in a Raleigh city directory through 1959. Per his own report, he was never interested in judicial or political careers. He did, however, do some journalism work for newspapers such as The Chicago Defender and The Carolina Times. He was profiled in the March 1927 (Vol. 39, No. 6) issue of The Silent Worker, a newspaper serving the American deaf community from 1888-1929. He was interviewed by Joseph Lacy Sewell, a former clerk for the North Carolina Supreme Court. Most of the quotes for this post came from this article. In it, he was described as follows: "Not so renowned a lawyer is this man O'Kelly but a most remarkable man is this lawyer O'Kelly." Another article about him from The Messenger of Wadesboro, North Carolina in its May 20, 1909 issue, wrote, "That brave determination in this deaf and dumb negro youth, with only one eye and his success, should be told as an incentive to the highest endeavor to young men endowed with every faculty and advantage." He was even nominated for a Carnegie Hero Medal, though did not win.

In 1959, Roger fell seriously ill and moved in with his sister, Mrs. U. G. Teele (his sister Gladys), in Georgetown, South Carolina. He died three years later on July 11, 1962 at the age of 81. The cause of death was listed as "cardio-renal-vascular disease." He was buried in Mount Hope Cemetery. His death was reported in publications such as the Shaw University Bulletin from October 1962 (Vol. 32, No. 2). His sister, Gladys, lived in Georgetown until 1984, dying there at the age of 91. 

While I have been unable to find Roger's writings - which has been disappointing considering he wrote so prolifically to communicate with and work in the hearing world - I do have a quote that is an exemplar of his work ethic and drive - "I've got one good eye yet and I'll make it anyhow."

Most sincerely,

Christina
 
 

Works Consulted

American Printing House for the Blind, Inc. (2021). North Carolina Institution for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind, Colored Department (Raleigh). Museum of the American Printing House for the Blind. https://sites.aph.org/museum/programs/colored-schools/north-carolina/.

Black Deaf-Mute Lawyer in the United State. My Deaf Blog. (2018, October 5). https://www.mydeaf.blog/2018/10/05/black-deaf-mute-lawyer-in-the-united-state/.

Burch, S., & Joyner, H. (2007). Unspeakable: The story of Junius Wilson. University of North Carolina Press.

Gallaudet University. (2017, March 22). O'Kelly, Roger Demosthenes. Gallaudet University Library Guide to Deaf Biographies and Index to Deaf Periodicals. https://liblists.wrlc.org/biographies/52870.

Gallaudet University. (n.d.). North Carolina. Black ASL Project. http://blackaslproject.gallaudet.edu/Sites/North_Carolina.html#2.

Governor Morehead School. (2021). About GMS. Governor Morehead School. https://www.governormorehead.net/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=1550434&type=d&pREC_ID=1676638.

Shaw University. (1962). Shaw University Bulletin: Alumni Number with Founder's Day Announcements.

Wiltz, T. (2015). "It can't just be the righteous few.". Yale Alumni Magazine. https://yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/4199-cornell-brooks.

Yale University. (1919). The Yale Alumni Weekly (Vol. 29).

 

Last Updated: 21 Sept. 2023

Christina Moffett
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