In May 1956, Fort Hill High School of Cumberland held the first commencement exercise in Allegany County with participating African-American students following integration. Judy Leath was among the first of this group of students graduating from Fort Hill. Prior to school integration, Judy had formerly attended Carver High School.
Cleo Knippenberg, 1918 -
Cleo Knippenberg was born in Cumberland and attended Maryland Avenue Elementary, Pennsylvania Avenue Junior High, and Allegany Senior High Schools. She also attended Allegany Community College, the Concordia Lutheran Teaching College in Illinois, and is a graduate of the Barbizon School of Modeling.
Janice Keene, Evergreen Heritage Center
Mary Louise Jones, 1938 - 2007
Born in Frostburg, and upon graduating from Beall High School, Elisabeth Hitchins completed a two-year liberal arts curriculum at the Emma Willard School in New York. She then returned home to Frostburg, earned a diploma at Catherman's Business School in Cumberland and in 1926 accepted a position as secretary to the principal of the State Normal School in Frostburg, then a two-year institution for training elementary school teachers.
Iris Patricia Halmos – Health Professional and Philanthropist
The following is excerpted and edited from the Scarpelli Funeral Home of Cumberland, Maryland website, which also provided the photograph:
"Iris Patricia Halmos (1937-2020) was born in Balbriggan, Ireland and was the daughter of the late Michael and Elisabeth Eustace. She was preceded in death by her sister Geraldine Corrigan, who was killed by IRA terrorists as a young woman.
Dr. Catherine Gira served as president of Frostburg State University from 1991 to 2006, 15 years. Prior to that she served as provost of the University of Baltimore.
Ruth Franklin, 1906 - 2001
Ruth E. Franklin attended the Mechanic Street Elementary School in Cumberland and was the Class Valedictorian in the first graduation class of the Frederick Street School (for blacks) in 1923.
Upon graduation from high school Ruth was awarded a full scholarship to Morgan College, now Morgan State. The scholarship was renewable each year, but only if Ruth stayed in the upper 10% of her class. Ruth did.
Lillian Cleveland Compton, 1884 - 1973
Lillian Compton served as the first female president of Frostburg State Teachers College, now Frostburg State University, from 1945 to 1954.
Agnes Carroll, 1889 - 1992
Agnes Carroll was born in Midland and graduated from St. Joseph's in Midland. She began her teaching career in Garrett County in 1907, and then at McCoole from 1908 to 1910. At that point she taught in her hometown of Midland until 1913. This was at a time when a college education was not necessarily required to teach, and although she later undertook coursework at Johns Hopkins, Agnes taught for 43 years without a teaching certificate.