New York Times, The (NY) - September 20, 1984

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Deceased Name: TED LAMB, 57, LAWYER, DIES LED LITTLE ROCK INTEGRATION

Ted Lamb, a lawyer and former advertising executive who fought successfully for public school integration while he was a member of the Little Rock, Ark., school board in the desegregation crisis of the late 1950's, died of pancreatic cancer Sept. 6 at his home in Alexander, Ark. He was 57 years old.

Mr. Lamb, a longtime civil rights advocate, led the movement to reopen Little Rock's schools in 1959 over the opposition of Gov. Orval E. Faubus, who had closed the schools the previous year to thwart court-ordered desegregation. Mr. Lamb's advertising agency had managed Governor Faubus's election campaign in 1956 but supported his Democratic primary opponent two years later.

Mr. Lamb was elected to the school board in 1958 as a moderate member on the issue of integration. But he led like- minded members in the movement that enabled the schools to reopen in August 1959 after a Federal court found Governor Faubus's school-closing order unconstitutional.

When segregationists opposed the opening on the ground that an epidemic of polio might recur if students were brought together, Mr. Lamb promptly consulted Dr. Jonas Salk, developer of the Salk vaccine. Dr. Salk responded with a telegram that discounted the threat.

Mr. Lamb, who left the school board in 1964, was chairman of the Arkansas Advisory Committee to the United States Civil Rights Commission in 1965- 66 and later chairman of the Founding Committee of the American Civil Liberties Union in Arkansas.

Leaving advertising, Mr. Lamb received a law degree from the University of Arkansas in 1967. He began as a specialist in labor law and for several years was general counsel for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in Arkansas, Oklahoma and East Texas. He was practicing law in Little Rock at the time of his death.

Born Theodore L. Lamb in Detroit, he was reared in Arkansas. After serving as a linguist in the Army Counterintelligence Corps in Japan and the Far East in the years immediately after World War II, he graduated from Yale University in 1950. He trained for a business career with the General Electric Company before establishing his advertising agency in Little Rock in 1952.

Mr. Lamb is survived by his wife, Deanna; two sons, Theodore of Little Rock and Timothy of Alexander; two daughters, Melissa Shannon of Little Rock and Beverly Frazier of Hot Springs, Ark.; a stepson, Guilford Dudley, and a stepdaughter, Leslie Dudley, both of Alexander, and four grandchildren.

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New York Times, The (NY)
Date: September 20, 1984
Author: WALTER H. WAGGONER
Edition: Late City Final Edition
Page: 22
Record Number: 1984-09-20-215174
Copyright 1984, The New York Times Company