Photo exhibit in Young Library focuses on women around the world

A photo from the "Diversity of Lifestyles" exhibit

By Gail Hairston

The extraordinary photography of Ethelee Davidson Baxter will be on exhibit in the first floor atrium of the University of Kentucky William T. Young Library through April 22, 2016. The theme of Baxter’s exhibit is “Diversity of Lifestyles: Women Around the World.”

Baxter, who was named to the UK College of Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame in 2014, found a second career in photography after many years presiding in a courtroom. Her work can be viewed at http://www.leebaxterphotography.com/index.html#.VusiJ_krLhd.

“Travel has always been my passion, especially travel to remote and unusual destinations. Since my retirement, I have enjoyed my travels through my camera lens,” said Baxter, who has traveled extensively on seven continents.

Ethelee "Lee" Baxter

She is most interested in “capturing images of vanishing cultures and documenting remote corners of the globe and the cultures that inhabit them.

“In this exhibit, I hope people will enjoy the images of fascinating women whom I have encountered in my travels around the world, living their unique and diverse lifestyles,” said Baxter.

Baxter was born in Jackson, Kentucky, in 1939, and raised in Lexington. She graduated from Lafayette High School in 1957 and was inducted into the first class of the Lafayette High School Hall of Fame in 1989. She graduated from UK in 1961 with a bachelor’s degree in English, speech and drama.  While at UK, she was a Wildcat cheerleader, president of the Blue Marlins synchronized swimming team, and a member of the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority.

For the seven years following graduation from UK, Baxter taught English in junior and senior high schools, as well as junior college, in San Diego, California; New Haven, Connecticut; and Bethesda, Maryland. In 1970, Baxter and her family moved to San Francisco, where she received her Juris Doctor degree from Golden Gate University School of Law in 1974 and a Master of Laws in 2009.

She practiced law in San Francisco until 1982 when she was appointed commissioner to the San Francisco Superior Court. Five years later, Baxter was appointed by Gov. George Deukmejian to the San Francisco Municipal Court, and in 1992 Gov. Pete Wilson appointed her to the San Francisco Superior Court, where she presided over the Family Law and the Criminal Felony Trial departments.

Currently, she sits on the Board of Trustees of Golden Gate University, where she established the Baxter Fellowship in Trial Advocacy at Golden Gate School of Law in 2000. She also chairs the Law School Dean’s Advisory Council. She is on the Board of Trustees of Smuin Ballet in San Francisco and is on the boards of directors of the George Adamson/Tony Fitzjohn Preservation Trust based in Kenya as well as the African Environmental Film Foundation in Tanzania.

She was married for 48 years to UK alumnus and Hall of Fame inductee the late Dr. John D. Baxter. She has two daughters and two grandsons.

And she remains, in her own words, “to this day and forever” an avid UK fan.

Reprinted with permission from UKNow.