The academic paper recounted the university’s decision that same year to name a dormitory after former Texas law professor William Stewart Simkins, who helped found the Ku Klux Klan in Florida following the Civil War. Russell’s work prompted calls for the renaming of the dorm, which culminated with a proposal Friday by University President William Powers Jr. to change the name from Simkins Residence Hall to Creekside Dormitory.
“I like to say that most academic writing drops into the sea like a pebble,” said Russell on Monday after penning an opinion piece for the popular Huffington Post Web site on the dorm controversy. “Is renaming a dorm really a big deal? Not in itself. What I wanted to provoke was a bigger conversation about race, history and the law.”
