Frances Rosser Brown

(1899 - 1996)

Profession: Civic Leader

Hometown: Muskogee

Inducted: 1973

Frances Rosser Brown brightened her community as a civic, cultural, and religious leader. Born in Oklahoma, her story begins in a humble log house in Cameron, Sugarloaf County, Indian Territory. Her family moved to Muskogee where she graduated from Central High School. As a child she participated in various student activities and clubs, foreshadowing her future pursuits. After graduating, she attended the University of Oklahoma for one year and served as the president of Pi Beta Phi women's fraternity.

While on her collegiate journey, she contracted tuberculosis; at the time the disease killed one in every seven people in the world. She spent ten years between sanitoriums in Oklahoma, Arizona, Colorado, and Texas before deemed cured in El Paso. After recovering, she returned home to serve others.

She became an editor at The Phoenix for three years, a president of the Women of Grace Episcopal Church, and a national historian for the Pi Beta Phi fraternity. Her most outstanding accomplishment lives within the Five Civilized Tribes Museum in Muskogee. Her leadership opened the museum's doors in 1966 and developed it into a rich depository of culture, still open to the public today. Although not of Native descent herself, her dedication as a historian reflected her mission to extend credit to the First Americans who occupied the land before her.