R.D. Rucker: A Nice BAD Guy at the University of Arkansas, and Much More

R.D. (arm raised), Nov. 1969

R.D. Rucker was a leader of BAD, the Black Americans for Democracy, a student group at the University of Arkansas in the late ‘60 and early ‘70s.  This group was formed in the late 1960s to promote the interest of African-American students on the University of Arkansas campus. While the University had been integrated for several years, the number of black students on campus was still quite small, and grievances had accumulated.

Those years were a time of activism on most campuses, the University of Arkansas included. With the Vietnam War, the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, and urban violence, increasing numbers of students were motivated to try to bring about change.  

R.D. was one of those students. When recalling the 1969-70 Dixie controversy at the University of Arkansas (see the previous post), R.D. quickly came to mind.  BAD played the key role in the anti-Dixie effort, and R.D. was among the most active in its effort to stop the band from playing Dixie.

A young African-American, who some people think was brilliant, R.D. was a small guy with an easy manner. He also had an outsized assertiveness that made him stand out in public meetings. Friendly with a disarming smile and great energy, R.D. was one of BAD’s most aggressively visible advocates.  He sometimes used radical rhetoric that would surprise those of us who otherwise enjoyed his company.  

Speaking to Students

Among his other activities, R.D. ran for Student Association secretary in spring 1970, mainly to have a forum to speak his views to fellow students. Predictably, he did not win the election. However, he did have a chance to talk to groups of students throughout the campus.

Dr. Gordon Morgan, University of Arkansas faculty member, was clearly impressed by R.D.  Morgan, a sociologist, wrote about the racial situation at UA in the 60s and 70s. In his book, The Edge of Campus: A Journal of Black Experience at the University of Arkansas (University of Arkansas Press, 1990), Morgan had a section called, “The Legend of R.D. Rucker.”  He wrote:

Rucker was a honey-colored kid with frizzy sandy hair.  He had a slight build and was about 5’ 7” tall.  His winning smile, disarming manners and obvious intelligence took most people by storm.

The “legend” begins with this story:

Nobody knows much about the background of this young black man who came to Fayetteville in about 1968.  He didn’t know anything about the University of Arkansas when he came.  He said he was hitching a ride somewhere, anywhere, and the chicken truck he got a ride on stopped at Fayetteville.  Having no bags or personal belongings, he got off and found his way to the campus.  After wandering around for a few days, he decided to enroll...

This account of R.D.’s arrival does not square with the story told by George McGill (owner of the McGill Insurance Agency in Forth Smith) as part of his University of Arkansas-Ft. Smith commencement address on December 18, 2008. He said in his speech:

[When McGill went to Fayetteville to enroll in college, he] gave a ride to fellow freshman R.D. Rucker, who showed pride as he held an acceptance letter to the university. McGill saw the student struggle to make it, having only two changes of clothing and riding a bicycle through rain, sleet and snow for three years. McGill said Rucker went on to earn a Ph.D. in philosophy and a law degree, becoming a writer, professor and assistant attorney general for the state of Texas. He said he shared Rucker’s story because he wanted the UA Fort Smith graduates to hold their diplomas with the same pride that Rucker had held his acceptance letter that day.

Both McGill and Morgan agreed that Rucker was poor.  According to Morgan:

During the three years Rucker was at the University, he claims he never had an address. He said he lived in a drainpipe for some time and sorority girls allowed him to sleep in their attics during very bad weather... (p. 177)

It is not known how Rucker survived financially. He never had enough to pay his bills and he frowned upon taking financial aid on grounds that it placed one in financial and psychological debt to the capitalists. (p. 177)

Also, both McGill and Morgan believed that Rucker was very intelligent.  Wrote Morgan:

What Rucker majored in is uncertain.  He studied anything he had a mind to, often showing up in science and mathematics classes to challenge  instructors in their own fields.  He didn’t have to be enrolled in a class to issue a challenge. He could cause a young instructor to turn gray with his penetrating questions and unarguable logic.  Mature teachers frequently turned over their lecterns to Rucker until the hour was finished. (p. 177)

Finally, Morgan summed up the Rucker legend like this:

The campus loved and feared R.D. Rucker, and he feared no one. He often  challenged the opinions of the highest ranking officials at the University. He would talk coldly about blowing up the Pentagon or Old Main as calmly as one might discuss the Pythagorean theorem. No public meeting was safe from disruption, for he would challenge any speaker on any point, regardless of the speaker’s status. (p. 178)

For all the remarks against the militant R.D. Rucker, no one who knew him ever accused him of being impolite. He was always gracious and generous.  His insights were always food for thought. (p. 178)

I don’t know how much of this legend is true. The part about accidentally finding himself on the UA campus most likely is not. While some of it squares with what I remember about R.D., other elements seem implausible. For example, a picture in the 1970 Razorback Yearbook shows that R.D. lived at least for a while in Hotz Hall. And, though he may have been “anti-capitalist,” a picture in the 1969 Razorback Yearbook showed that he was a member of the UA Young Republicans (YR) that year. (Of course, a YR membership then had a wholly different meaning than being a YR today. In 1969, the Republicans in Arkansas were the party of racial moderation and political change. In 1966, the Democratic candidate for governor had been Jim Johnson, a long-time segregationist. In 1968, his wife had come in second in the Democratic gubernatorial primary. It is not surprising that a politically active African-American would be attracted to the party more inclined to espouse equal rights.)

Likely the stories about his financial difficulties are partially factual. He was the tenth child of Kirk and Demora Rucker, born in Swifton, Arkansas. His parents were not rich, and thus likely lacked the resources to pay for all of his college studies. (Family information is from the Newport Independent, February 13, 2004, "Black History Month Tribute to R.D. Rucker: a man who made a difference", available for purchase through the newspaper archive). However, his obituary (see below) stated that he received a scholarship to attend the University of Arkansas.

Thinking back about R.D. and his legend, I decided to try to find out what had happened to him after he finished his three years at UA and left with a B.A. in history in the early 70s?

I found no information about his life for a few years after he left UA, but according to internet sources, he studied history at Columbia University from 1976 to 1978, then did post-graduate study in Moscow with an IREX fellowship. Based on his research at Columbia and in Moscow, he wrote an article that was published in the Journal of East European Thought (vol. 19, no. 3, 1979) titled "Abram Moiseevic Deborin: Weltanschauung and role in the development of Soviet philosophy." 

After he returned, he was a student at the University of Iowa, earning a Ph.D. in history in 1981. His dissertation was titled, The Making of the Russian Revolution: Revolutionaries, Workers and the Marxian Theory of Revolution.  

Following that, he studied law at the University of Texas, getting his law degree in 1985. With that degree, R.D. first worked as an assistant attorney general for a brief time, then was assistant district attorney in Waco and, afterward, a public defender in Wichita Falls. He moved to Dallas in 1988 and was a defense attorney there until his death. In the 1990s, he was three times an unsuccessful candidate for different judicial posts in Dallas and lost all three races.

R.D. self-published six books, which are still available through Amazon.  They are:

Abraham Lincoln’s Social and Political Thought,

Drugs, Drug Addiction, and Drug Dealing: The Origin and Nature of, and the Solution To, the American Drug Problem,

Eros and the Sexual Revolution,

Jesus Christ and the Origin of Christianity,

Marriage, Love, and the Family: An Investigation into the Role of the Black Woman in the African-American Family, and

Sweet Land of Liberty: A Poetical Journey Through America, 1996- 1998.

The fact that these books were self-published indicates that he or they likely were outside the mainstream of academic discourse. In the context of his 1998 candidacy for a judgeship in Dallas, the Dallas Observer savaged Rucker and his books, ridiculing his theories about the origin and nature of addictions and crime. The author of the nasty article called him a man “whose writings reveal him as one of the most sexist and racist candidates to come along in Dallas County, which has a long and not-so-distinguished history of putting such men in black robes.” 

On the other hand, a friend wrote on his blog that R.D. “was the smartest guy I have ever known and had a heart filled with compassion.” (The link no longer works.)

R.D. Marching in MLK Parade, 1969

R.D. was listed in the 2003 Who’s Who in America and the 11th edition of Who’s Who in American Law (2000-2001).

Sadly, R.D. died too young on August 13, 2003 at the age of 53.  No doubt until that day, he was still making life interesting for those around him.  

The following is his obituary, published in the Newport Independent:

DR. R.D. RUCKER

Newport Independent (AR) - Wednesday, August 20, 2003

Dr. R.D. Rucker, 53, died Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2003 at his home in Dallas, Texas. he was born on Jan. 14, 1950 in Newport, the son of Curtis Kirk and Demore Rucker.

Dr. Rucker started his education at W,F. Branch High School in Newport.

Upon graduation, in 1968, he. was awarded the Win Rockefeller scholarship, for the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.

He continued his education at the University of Iowa, University of Moscow, Russia, Columbia University, and the University of Texas Law School. He held B.A., M.A., Ph.D., and J.D. Degrees.

Dr. Rucker was a former prosecutor, public defender, Assistant Texas Attorney General, and college professor of Russian history. He also was a guest lecturer and author of six books.

Dr. Rucker is survived by two sisters, Evelinea "Diane" Cunningham, and Polly Sanders-Peterson (Ray), all of Denver, Colo.; four brothers, Kirk Rucker of San Francisco, Calif., Curtis Rucker of Chicago, Ill., Willie Rucker of Newport, and Lucky Time Rucker of Minneapolis, Minn.; numerous nieces and nephews; and a sister-in-law, Dorothy Mae Williams Rucker of Newport.

Dr. Rucker was preceded in death by his parents; two sisters, Isabella Rucker and Elvett (Elva) Rucker Alcorn; and three brothers David, Therry and Raymond Rucker.

Funeral services will be held at 11 a.m. Thursday at Fairmont Cemetery Mortuary Chapel in Denver, Colo.

Memorial may be made to the American Cancer Society.

Arrangements by Fairmont Cemetery Mortuary Chapel in Denver, Colo.