In the 1975-76 yearbook, The Sphinx , there is a special section which includes seven photographs and the following statement:

The idea was to give special recognition to some of the more outstanding members of the faculty rather than treating all of them merely as pictures to be lined up in a row, and to do this from the point of view of the student, emphasizing the things we will remember about them.

Written under my photograph is:

Captain Marlene L. O'Bryant is one of the first two women, and the very first Black to be employed on the permanent faculty of The Citadel. (Marlene's note- Previously, women and African-Americans, including me, had taught in adjunct or military-assigned ROTC positions.) This in itself makes her a noteworthy addition to the Education Department. She has yet to teach any classes to cadets or day students, but then there aren't any women who come to classes -- YET!

My first year, my female comrade and I (both with Ph.D. degrees [I received Masters from The Citadel-1972]) taught only Graduate students - women AND men- working on Masters and Educational Specialist (30 hours above the Masters) degrees. We were not allowed to teach in the Corps of Cadets - boys who had recently left High School. Logic stepped in my second year and along with that came THE UNIFORM and the salutes.

Twenty years later, on August 12, 1995, after Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Justice Antonin Scalia (U.S. Supreme Court) refused The Citadel's request for a ruling to keep her out, Shannon Faulkner, accompanied by her parents and federal marshals, became the first female cadet in the school's 152-year history. One week later, she resigned citing emotional and psychological abuse and physical exhaustion. Her court battle of two and a half years began when she was accepted in 1993 after gender references were deleted from her high school transcript.