Created by Philomene A. Gates

Born March 19, 1918, Philomene Asher Gates grew up in Orlando (FL). Since her family could no longer afford the tuition to the Cathedral School for girls, a private Episcopal boarding/day school, she enrolled at the age of 12-1/2 in the Orlando Senior Public High School. From 1934 to 1938, when she received her B.S. degree, she attended Florida State College for Women (FSCW, now Florida State University).

In a chapter of her autobiography A Soft Rebel Yell: From Grits to Gotham (Gridiron, 2001), Gates described her four years at FSCW, where she studied accounting and participated in student organizations, such as the Cotillion Club, and sororities, such as the Pi Beta Phi sorority. She noted that on weekends, she visited Gainesville (FL) with college friends, and recalled three inspirational professors from FSCW: Sadie Young, who taught money, banking, and economics; William Rogers, who taught romantic poetry; and College of Arts and Sciences Dean William Dodd, who taught Chaucer and Shakespeare.

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