Anita Hill was born July 30, 1956 in Lone Tree, Oklahoma. She received a bachelor's degree in psychology from Oklahoma State University in 1977 and her Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 1980. She began her law career as an associate with a Washington, D.C. law firm. In 1981, she became an attorney-advisor to Clarence Thomas, then the assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights. When Thomas became chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 1982, Hill followed and served as his assistant. In 1991, President George H. W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas, then a federal circuit judge, to the U.S. Supreme Court. After Senate confirmation hearings were initially completed with little opposition, a report of an interview of Hill by the FBI was leaked to the press. She became a national figure in 1991 when she accused U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment during her tenure. Hill's accusation resulted in her testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. During her questioning, a number of senators accused her of lying and raised doubts about her sanity. Thomas later denied the allegations, accusing the committee of a “high-tech lynching.” Although other women reportedly could have supported Hill’s testimony, they were never called by the committee. In the end, Thomas was narrowly confirmed, 52–48. In addition, the manner in which the all-male Senate Judiciary Committee questioned Hill during her testimony is said to have inspired the record number of women who ran for office and were elected to Congress in 1992, the "Year of the Woman." She became a visiting scholar at Brandeis University, eventually rising to university professor (2015). In addition to numerous articles, Hill wrote the autobiography Speaking Truth to Power (1997) as well as Reimagining Equality: Stories of Gender, Race, and Finding Home (2011) and Believing: Our Thirty-Year Journey to End Gender Violence (2021).