Our Board

Judy Sizemore

President & National Board Member

Judy Sizemore

Judy Sizemore is a retired History educator who also served on Congressman Bud Cramer congressional staff. Judy had the honor to serve as the founding director of Alabama’s only National Heritage Area, the Muscle Shoals National Heritage Area. Judy has a passion in sharing her love of history.
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Anita Flanagan

Vice-President & National Board Member

Anita Flanagan

Anita Flanagan, Board Member and current Secretary for the Alabama Chapter of TOTA. I have owned a small business for 27 years in Tuscumbia, Al. I have lived in Tuscumbia since I was in school. I originally am from the Big Witch Community of Cherokee, N.C. and am proud to say that I am an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of the Cherokee.
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Jeffrey Bibbee, PhD

Treasurer

Jeffrey Bibbee

Jeffrey Bibbee lives in Martin, Tennessee, and is currently Dean of the College of Arts and Humanities at the University of Tennessee at Martin. He has also been instrumental in launching "Teach the Trail," an initiative to create K-12 school interdisciplinary curriculum on Southeastern Native cultures.
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Sean Jacobson, PhD

Secretary

Sean Jacobson

Sean Jacobson was born and raised in Louisville, KY. He is currently an Assistant Professor of History at the University of North Alabama, where he teaches courses in Public History, US History, and Native American History. He is writing a monograph exploring the public history of Native American mission schools during the Removal period.
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Amber Fite-Morgan

Board Member

Amber Fite-Morgan

Amber Fite-Morgan grew up near Tahlequah, Oklahoma and is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation. She serves as General Counsel at the University of North Alabama and is a member of the Alabama Bar Association, Oklahoma Bar Association, National Association of College and University Attorneys and the Cherokee Nation Bar Association. Amber is alumna of the 2010 Cherokee Nation Remember the Removal Bike Ride and was named as NCAIED Native American 40 Under 40 in 2014.
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Deidra Suwanee Dees, EdD

Board Member

Deidra Suwanee Dees, Ed.D.

Dr. Deidra Suwanee Dees is an enrolled citizen of the Poarch Band of Creek Indians. She formerly served as the Tribal Archivist for the Poarch Creek's Office of Archives and Records Management. Dr. Dees obtained her Bachelor of Science degree at the University of South Alabama and her Master of Science degree at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. She earned her doctorate degree at Harvard, writing her dissertation on the Muscogee Education Movement which documents the turbulent sociopolitical journey that Creeks traveled in the Southeast to achieve equal access to public education in the 1920s to the 1940s. In her second job, Dr. Dees teaches in the Native American Studies Program at the University of South Alabama which was initiated by the sponsorship of the Poarch Band of Creek Indians in 2014.
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Steve Stanley

Board Member

Steve Stanley

Steve Stanley currently serves as a board member for the Alabama Trail of Tears Association. He is the mayor of Sheffield, AL.
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Seth Armstrong

Board Member

Seth Armstrong

Seth Armstrong is a graduate of the graduate history program at the University of North Alabama. He is currently the historical consultant for Native American history for the Muscle Shoals National Heritage Area, and serves on the board of directors for the Oka Kapassa Festival.
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