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Richard (Dick) L. McKnight was born in Enid on May 31, 1936. He attended Enid Schools where he attained the Eagle Scout award and graduated in 1954 from Enid High School as Student Body President. He then attended the University of Oklahoma where he was one of the ten (10) outstanding freshmen, was a member of Phi Delta Theta, Pe-et, Phi Beta Kappa and other fraternities, and graduated in 1958 when he was president of the OU Student Senate. McKnight then entered the U.S. Army for two years where he served in Army Intelligence and was honorably discharged as a First Lieutenant.
McKnight then entered the OU College of Law in 1960 and graduated in 1963 being awarded The Order of the Coif. He then returned to Enid where he served two years as an Assistant County Attorney, and then joined the McKnight, Gasaway & McKnight law firm where he practiced law for the next 36 years. During that time he served as President of the Garfield County Bar Association, the Oklahoma Board of Governors and served on numerous committees being elected as Chairman of the Oklahoma Judicial Nominating Commission, where he served for three years, and was President of the Oklahoma Bar Foundation in 1989. He was elected as a Fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel in 1982.
He was active in the First United Methodist church serving as chairman of the Church Council and Board of Trustees, and was Chancellor of the Oklahoma United Methodist Foundation for three years. He also was president of the downtown AMBUCS, and he has been a member of Rotary for over 50 years. For the last 15 years of McKnight’s law practice he was Of Counsel with Gungoll, Jackson, Box & Devoll, when he retired at 80 years of age.
During McKnight’s early years as a lawyer he was active in the Enid Chamber of Commerce and was president in 1976. He was awarded the Outstanding Citizen of the Year of the Enid Chamber in 2014 as well as a Walk of Fame recipient, and was a finalist for Pillar of the Plains in 2015. He was also the Campaign chairman of the United Way and served on many boards in Enid such as the Boy Scouts where he was awarded the Silver Beaver award as well as the North Star award, the YMCA, and the Cherokee Strip Heritage Center where he was co-chairman of the fund raising committee to raise the $10,000,000 to build the Center where he still serves a half a day a week as a volunteer docent. He was appointed as the Honorary Vice Wing Commander of the 71st FTW at Vance Air Force Base and served as such during 2015.
McKnight is married to Lavonn McKnight and they have three children, Mike, Meg and Doug, five grandchildren and four great grandchildren, as of 9/1/2016.