Court for the Northern District of Georgia. At 35 years of age, she was either the youngest judge or the next to the youngest judge appointed to a position like hers. Judge Evans’ son was two years old when she was sworn in and she later had a daughter while serving on the Northern District Court. She was either the first or second female judge to have a child while serving on the federal bench. Judge Evans served as Chief Judge from 1999 to 2006.
Marvin Herman Shoob( N. D. Ga. – 1979-1991 Active Service)
Judge Shoob was born in 1923, in Walterboro, SC. Shoob was Jewish and served in the United States Army during World War II, from 1942 to 1945, becoming a Sergeant. He received a Juris Doctor from the University of Georgia School of Law in 1948. He was in private practice in Atlanta, Georgia from 1948 to 1979 until he was nominated to the Northern District of Georgia Court by President Carter in 1979. During his judgeship, he helped Georgia deal with the large number of Cuban refugees who came to America and ended up in Georgia. He asked the Atlanta Bar Association for volunteers to take cases of those refugees; many of the refugees were held in the federal penitentiary in Atlanta. Numerous Atlanta Bar members volunteered.
George Ernest Tidwell( N. D. Ga. – 1979-1999 Active Service)
Judge Tidwell was born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1931. Tidwell graduated from the Henry W. Grady High School( now Midtown High) in Atlanta and then received a Bachelor of Laws from Emory University School of Law in 1954. He was in private practice in Atlanta from 1954 to 1966. He was a legal aide to the House Floor Leader of the Georgia General Assembly from 1964 to 1966. He was an associate general counsel of the State Bar of Georgia from 1965 to 1966. He was an executive assistant attorney general of the State of Georgia from 1966 to 1968. He was a judge of the Civil Court of Fulton County, Georgia from 1968 to 1971. He was a judge of the Superior Court for the Atlanta Judicial Circuit from 1971 to 1979. Carter served as Governor of Georgia when Tidwell became a Superior Court Judge.
Tidwell was nominated by President Jimmy Carter and confirmed by the Senate in 1979 to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. He served as Chief Judge from 1996 to 1999. He assumed senior status on October 8, 1999, serving in that status until his death on August 4, 2011, in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, while on a family reunion vacation. Tidwell was a resident of Atlanta for his entire life and is interred in Atlanta.
Robert L. Vining Jr.( N. D. Ga. – 1979-1996 Active Service)
Judge Vining was born March 30, 1931, in Chatsworth, GA. He was a U. S. Air Force sergeant from 1951until 1959. He graduated from the University of Georgia with both a B. A. and a J. D. from the University of Georgia in 1959. He was in private practice in Dalton, Georgia from 1958-1969. He was the Solicitor General in the Conasauga Judicial Circuit, Georgia from 1963-1968. He became the Judge of the Superior Court of Georgia, Conasauga Judicial Circuit form 1969-1979.
Judge Vining became the judge for the U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia when he was nominated by President Jimmy Carter and confirmed by the Senate in 1979. He served as chief judge from 1995-1996. He was in senior status from 1996 until he died in 2022.
Horace Taliaferro Ward( N. D. Ga. – 1979-1993 Active Service)
Horace Ward was born in 1929 in LaGrange, Georgia. He received an A. B. from Morehouse College in 1949 and a Master of Arts from Atlanta University( now Clark Atlanta University) in 1950. He was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. He was an Instructor at Arkansas AM & N College from 1959-1951 and an instructor at Alabama State College from 1951-1953 and from 1955-1956. Ward was a U. S. Army corporal from 1953-1955. He graduated from Northwestern University School of Law with a J. D. in 1959. He stayed in Chicago and became a Claims authorizer in the U. S. Social Security Administration from 1959-1960.
In 1974, Governor Jimmy Carter appointed Judge Ward on the Fulton County [ Georgia ] Civil Court making him the first African American judge in Georgia.
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