Sandra K. Roberts

Sandra Roberts, B.A. ’64, was born July 21, 1942, in Mount Pleasant, Texas, and died peacefully at her home in Lufkin, Texas, on April 20.

A trailblazer from the start, Roberts was the first in her family to graduate from college, earning her degree from Baylor in 1964 as co-valedictorian with summa cum laude honors and membership in Alpha Chi.

After briefly teaching mathematics at South Garland High School in the Dallas area, Roberts worked at Texas Instruments as a systems analyst, where she held a government clearance helping design programs to map the ocean floor during the Cold War. She moved to Lufkin in July 1970 and worked for the City of Lufkin to computerize the city’s water department.

Roberts embarked on a second career at the age of 36 when she, with two young kids in tow, moved to Dallas in 1978 to attend law school at Southern Methodist University at a time when few women pursued a law degree. Roberts graduated from law school in December 1980 and returned to Lufkin to become the first female attorney in Lufkin to set up a private legal practice. Having a strong mathematics background, she intended to pursue trust and estate law, but Roberts quickly found that women sought her out to represent them in divorce and custody cases. Roberts became an expert in family law and earned nicknames such as the “Dragon Lady” and the “Bulldog” for her fierce defense of her clients. In 1986, she became one of the first in the area to become board-certified in Family Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization, and she was named a Texas Super Lawyer beginning in 2004 and continuing for almost a decade. Roberts was very proud to have helped pave the way for female attorneys in the East Texas area. One of her proudest moments was when her daughter joined her law firm in 2001, making them the first mother-daughter law firm in the area. They continued to practice law together for 20 years until Roberts’ reluctant retirement.  

Roberts was an avid sports fan and a devoted lifelong Baylor fan. If the Bears were playing, she was watching, and she was proud to label herself a true fan who always supported the Bears, win or lose.