Odessa Pettway Thornton
Lovingly known as “Dr. T”
16 September 1934 — 6 January 2023 · aged 88
Spelman College chemistry professor who sent two hundred women into medicine and science
Atlanta, United States Born in Selma, Alabama Resting at South-View Cemetery, Atlanta, GeorgiaAbout Odessa
In September 1951, a seventeen-year-old from Selma, Alabama, boarded a train for Washington, D.C., with one trunk, a scholarship letter from Howard University and her mother's instruction to “show your work.” Odessa Pettway took the advice literally for the next seventy years.
She earned her bachelor's degree in chemistry at Howard in 1955 and a doctorate at the University of Chicago in 1960, one of very few Black women in her cohort, remembered by her lab partners as the one who never lost a notebook, a pipette or an argument. In 1962 she joined the faculty of Spelman College in Atlanta, and she did not leave for forty years.
At Spelman, Dr. T, as her students called her, taught general and organic chemistry, chaired the department for twelve years, and quietly built one of the country's strongest pipelines of Black women into medicine and the sciences. She had a red pen she called “the truth,” a habit of grading lab reports on the bus, and a rule that nobody left her office hungry: there was always pound cake in the bottom drawer. As a young instructor during the Atlanta movement of the early sixties she kept sandwiches and bail money in the same desk. More than two hundred of her former students became physicians, pharmacists and PhDs, and she knew every one of their birthdays.
At home in Collier Heights she was a different kind of professor, hosting Sunday dinner for any student far from home, singing alto at Mount Calvary Baptist Church for fifty-seven years, and completing the Sunday crossword in pen. She married Dr. Leroy Thornton, a dentist, in 1963, and they were partners for forty-six years until his death in 2009.
Dr. Thornton died peacefully at home in Atlanta on 6 January 2023, aged eighty-eight. She is survived by her daughter Camille, her son Leroy Jr., her sister Beulah, and the many “academic daughters” who still telephone on her birthday.
“Show your work. In the lab and in life, nobody believes an answer without the steps.”
- Faith
- Baptist
- Place of birth
- Selma, Alabama
- Resting place
- South-View Cemetery, Atlanta, Georgia
- Passed away
- 6 January 2023, Atlanta
Homegoing Celebration
Sunday, 15 January 2023 at 09:00 UTC
Add to calendarLife journey
B.S. in Chemistry
Howard University1951 – 1955 · Washington, D.C.
Graduated magna cum laude and was the first in her family to attend college.
Ph.D. in Chemistry
University of Chicago1955 – 1960 · Chicago
Studied reaction kinetics in a cohort with very few women and fewer Black scholars.
Professor of Chemistry
Spelman College1962 – 2002 · Atlanta
Forty years of general and organic chemistry, with the red pen always at hand.
Married Dr. Leroy Thornton
1963 – 2009 · Atlanta
Forty-six years of marriage, Sunday dinners and shared crosswords.
Chair, Department of Chemistry
Spelman College1978 – 1990 · Atlanta
Doubled the number of chemistry majors and sent most of them to graduate or medical school.
Outstanding Teaching Award
Spelman College1991 · Atlanta
Chosen by a student vote that, she said, she had not campaigned for.
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Family & connections
Odessa is survived by
- Camille Thornton-Reed· Daughter
- Leroy Thornton Jr.· Son
- Beulah Pettway Dukes· Sister
- Dr. Danielle Hargrove· Friend
Tributes & memories
6 people have shared a memory of Odessa.
Knew Odessa? Share a memory with the family and everyone who loved them.
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Lab assistant, Spelman class of 2004
She once found a decimal error in a lab report I'd turned in at 2 a.m. and returned it covered in red with one word: “Better.” I have never been prouder of a grade. Thank you for believing the work could always be better, and so could I.
- DM
Former student from Accra
I arrived in Atlanta at nineteen, with no family within five thousand miles. Dr. Thornton fed me every Sunday for four years and wrote the recommendation that got me into my doctoral program. I now run a research lab at the University of Ghana, and I keep a red pen on my desk.
- RM
Pastor, Mount Calvary Baptist Church
Sister Thornton taught our youth Sunday school with a periodic table taped to the chalkboard and a cake in her bag. She said the God who made the elements surely loved a well-balanced equation. I believe she is balancing something wonderful right now.
- YP
Church friend and choir sister
Fifty-seven years in the alto section at Mount Calvary and not one wrong note that I can remember, except the time she laughed in the middle of the anthem because the pastor's hat fell off. We are going to sing for you, Odessa, and we will get it right.
- PG
Colleague in the chemistry department
For twenty years I shared a hallway with Odessa Thornton. She had the highest standards and the softest heart of anyone I have known. A student who cried in her office left with a plan, a snack and a firm instruction to come back Thursday.
- DH
Former student, now a pediatrician
I walked into Dr. T's office in 1998 certain I would fail organic chemistry. She handed me a slice of pound cake and a practice exam and said, “We'll start with the cake.” I am a pediatrician today. Every white coat I put on, I hear her voice: show your work.
