On January 10, 2016, mourners gathered in Little Rock, Arkansas, to commemorate the life of Dale Bumpers, one of Arkansas’s most legendary political figures.
Bumpers was born on August 12, 1925, in Charleston, Franklin County, Arkansas. He first rose to prominence in 1954, when, as an attorney in his hometown, he advised the Charleston School District to desegregate immediately after the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. Bumpers was elected governor of Arkansas in 1970 and US senator in 1974, where he served until 1999.
On this page viewers will find recordings of Bumpers’ memorial services in both Little Rock and Charleston, Arkansas. Pryor Center staff also recorded brief on-site interviews with attendees of the Little Rock memorial. Among those interviewed or featured in the videos below are President Bill Clinton, Senators Harry Reid, David Pryor, John Boozman, and Dick Durbin, as well as many others whose lives were impacted by one of Arkansas’s greatest statesmen.
#1: Formal portrait of Dale Bumpers
© Special Collections, University of Arkansas Libraries, Fayetteville
#2: Dale Bumpers, high school photo
© Pryor Center for Arkansas Oral and Visual History, University of Arkansas
#3: Dale Bumpers, 1962
© Pryor Center for Arkansas Oral and Visual History, University of Arkansas
#4: Governor Dale Bumpers at his desk
© Special Collections, University of Arkansas Libraries, Fayetteville
