Honors and Awards

• Henrietta Mays Smith, professor emerita at the school of Library and Information Science at the University of South Florida in Tampa, received the Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Practitioner Award for Lifetime Achievement from the American Library Association.

Dr. Smith is a graduate of Hunter College. She holds a master’s degree in library science from Columbia University and a Ph.D. from the University of Miami.

• Mary Frances Early, who in 1962 was the first African American to earn a degree at the University of Georgia, received the President’s Fulfilling the Dream Award from University of Georgia president Michael F. Adams.

Early taught in the Atlanta public school system for 37 years. Later she was an adjunct professor at Spelman College and Morehouse College and chaired the department of music at Clark Atlanta University. She retired in 2005.

• Victor LaValle, an assistant professor at Columbia University, received the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence from the Baton Rouge Area Foundation. He was honored for his novel, Big Machine.

LaValle is a graduate of Cornell University and holds a master of fine arts degree from Columbia University.

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