She may have spent four years on the OCW campus as a student, but Kathryn Elizabeth
Duncan Empie has spent a lifetime in service to the institution. She graduated from
Oklahoma College for Women in 1942 with a degree in speech. Much of her life since
then has been devoted to helping USAO become the outstanding university it is today.
Her service included serving two terms on USAO's Board of Regents, serving as chairman
of that board for two years as well as serving as vice chairman and secretary. Besides
being an avid supporter of USAO, Empie also devoted much of her time to civic and
community affairs. She has a member of the First Christian Church in Oklahoma City,
serving on the administrative board, as a Deaconess, and as youth group teacher. She
was the first chairman of the Jewel Box Theatre Board of Directors, served on the
YMCA's Board of Directors and helped establish a Children's Theatre with the Mummer
Theatre and the Oklahoma Theatre Center. She was a director of the Oklahoma Museum
of Art and a board member of the Donna Nigh Foundation for the Mentally Retarded.
While an active OCW student, she acted in several OCW drama productions and played
theatre stock at the Little Theatre of the Rockies in Greeley, Colo. After graduation
from OCW, she was employed as a stewardess for American Airlines for two years, serving
a year as an instructor in its Stewardess School in New York City. In 1967, she earned
a master's degree in Communications Disorders from the University of Oklahoma Medical
Center. She was granted a Certificate of Clinical Competency in Speech and Language
Pathology by the American Speech and Hearing Association in 1969 and taught speech
therapy in the Oklahoma City school system for two years, followed by private practice
and volunteer work with Cerebral Palsy patients.