Texas State Teachers Association
Janet Cooper Collection
Files and legal papers from the court cases of Janet Cooper vs. Kingsville Independent School District. Janet Cooper sued for nonrenewal of her contract due to a teaching method she employed called the Sunshine Project. The Sunshine Project involved role playing and simulation to dramatize conversion of a radically segregated society during Reconstruction to one less segregated. Eight years of litigation resulted and the case went to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Cooper won the case, was reinstated, and received back pay, retirement pay, and lawyer fees.
Dr. James C. Jernigan Collection
The Dr. James C. Jernigan Collection consists of over 280 photographs from 1914 to his retirement from Texas A&I University (now Texas A&M University-Kingsville) in 1975. The photos, originally in four scrapbooks, illustrate his life growing up in North Texas, his quest for a higher education and his accomplishments as President of a Texas A&I University. Professional documents and correspondence during his service in World War II are included along with newspaper clippings of major events during his professional life.