Carol Nickle was born and raised in Greensboro, North Carolina. She graduated high school in 1960, the same year as the Greensboro sit-in took place. Nickle attended Duke University before moving to Kingsport, Tennessee, where she got involved in the League of Women’s Voters and worked on an open housing ordinance designed to stop racial discrimination against African Americans. Nickle went to law school at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, where she was one of eleven women. She describes the activities of women law students and her interest in gender equity and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. After law school Nickle began working in the area of employment discrimination. She discusses the overlapping gender and racial issues of the 1970s.