lawyer, judge, Solicitor General of the United States, and law professor, was born in Des Moines, Iowa, the second of four children of Lucretia Harper McCree, a former schoolteacher, and Wade Hampton McCree Sr., a pharmacist, drugstore proprietor, and, later, federal narcotics inspector. Both parents were college graduates who highly valued education. Their example and expectations profoundly affected McCree who, throughout his career in public service and law, was deeply interested in education and involved in expanding educational opportunities for African Americans.
The senior McCree's pharmacy, established in 1914, was the first African American–owned drug store in Iowa. By 1924 however following the postwar downturn of Iowa s agricultural economy McCree s father had given up the business He applied for and was the first African American to be appointed to a position as a U S Narcotics Inspector That career took ...
