James Osby Goodwin was one of eight siblings who grew up next door to Tulsa’s St. Monica Catholic Church. His father purchased a 150-acre farm in the community of Alsuma at East 51st Street and South Mingo Road. Nearby railroad tracks separated whites and blacks. At 9 years old, Goodwin became an amputee when he lost his right arm in a horseback riding accident that involved a train on the Katy Railroad.

Jim Goodwin is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and the University of Tulsa college of law. As a lawyer he successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court and Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals for the constitutionality of local statutes regarding freedom of speech and he was co-counsel in the matter of reparation for victims of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.

Jim is the publisher of The Oklahoma Eagle, Oklahoma’s longest-running Black-owned newspaper. The paper is a successor to the Tulsa Star newspaper, which was burned down in the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.

Jim served on the Tulsa City-County Board of Health for over fifty years, and the Tulsa Health District’s East Regional Health Center was named for him in 2018.