C. Bette Wimbish

C. Bette Wimbish was born Carrie Elizabeth Davis in Perry, Florida, to Ola Mae and Tom Davis. Her mother was a housekeeper; her father, Tom, had alcoholism and left soon after his daughter's birth. Discouraged but determined, Wimbish began working towards a degree at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical College for Negroes, which is now known as Florida A&M. She began her career as a physical education teacher, while her husband pursued studies in medicine at Meharry Medical College in Nashville. The young couple suffered discrimination and harassment as a result of their civil rights efforts. They attempted to build a house in Tampa in a predominantly white area on 22nd street in 1948. In moving to this area, they hoped to find a suitable place to raise their daughter; however, the house burned to the ground the night before the family moved in. The cause of the fire was never discovered although it is commonly believed to have been the result of an attack by the Ku Klux Klan. Subsequently, the family moved to St. Petersburg, in 1953. Dr. Ralph Wimbish set up a medical office on 16th Street near the current Tropicana Field. Later in her life, she changed her ambitions from pursuing a medical career to a new passion for law. She applied to Stetson Law School but was turned down due to the controversies arising from her early civil rights battles. She then applied to Florida A&M's law school and graduated in just two years. She passed the bar exam in the upper third but still had difficulties finding work due to widespread discrimination in the South. ==Political activism==

When Ralph Wimbish was elected branch president of the Saint Petersburg NAACP in 1959, the couple became involved in the desegregation of schools. Six years after the Brown Decision, St. Petersburg students were still attending racially separate schools. Instead of complying to desegregate the schools, the Pinellas County Board of Public Instruction built new segregated schools that were supposed to reinforce the idea of "separate but equal". However, the county rejected black applicants to these new all-white institutions. The decision to run was particularly fueled by the district's solution to the overcrowding of black high schools - not integration, but rather the creation of a new black high school in a small area of South Saint Petersburg. As a result, Governor LeRoy Collins encouraged biracial committees to find solutions. the Riders made several trips to the home of Dr. and Mrs. Wimbish for rest and recreation. They rode on segregated buses of the city of Saint Petersburg without incident unlike their experiences in Alabama and Mississippi. ==Life after law school==

At the age of 45, Bette's husband Ralph died from a heart attack during her last two weeks of law school at Florida A&M. She ran unsuccessful campaigns for the state Senate and Congress centering her ideas around environmental crisis and drug education. ==Death and legacy==

Wimbish died on November 30, 2009, at the age of 85. She was a celebrated member of the community. She was a member of numerous organizations including: the Florida Bar Association, the Florida Government Bar Association, American Bar Association, and the National Bar Association, National Council of Negro Women, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and National Urban League. She was recognized in ''Who's Who Among Black Americans, Who's Who in American Politics, Florida Women of Distinction, and Outstanding Women of Florida''. ==References==