Pat Woodrum

Voices of Oklahoma

Three days after Pat Woodrum’s graduation from OU, she began working at the Tulsa City-County Library system as a branch librarian. Woodrum served in nearly every position until she became the executive director of the Tulsa City-County Library System in 1976, where she served for 32 years.
Pat helped establish Tulsa’s Day Center for the Homeless as an alternative to the usage of public libraries for shelter. Woodrum was appointed to the first board of the University Center of Tulsa, and was on the site selection committee and buildings committee for what is now the OSU-Tulsa campus.
After retiring from the library system, Woodrum went through the OSU Master Gardener Program and helped create the Centennial Botanical Garden in Tulsa, serving as executive director for many years.
In her oral history, Pat talks about digitizing the library system, book banning, and the botanical garden on the podcast and website VoicesOfOklahoma.com.