Jocie

Jocelyn Dan Wurzburg grew up in Memphis going to Vollentine, Snowden, Central, then Rhodes College where she received her B.A. in Sociology/Anthropology; J.D. from University of Memphis. A fifth generation Memphian, married with three children, she thought her life was set - until the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King in 1968 shattered her belief system. That was a transformative event that raised her consciousness to racism and its role in society. She founded the local Panel of American Women that year to address prejudice and celebrate differences. She started the Concerned Women of Memphis and Shelby County, credited with averting a second sanitation workers' strike a year after Dr. King's death. Jocelyn jumped into civil rights, women's rights, and social justice activities serving on the Social Action Commission of Reform Judaism. President Gerald Ford appointed her to the International Women's Year Commission, and she served Governor Winfield Dunn on the Tennessee Human Rights Commission, where she wrote Tennessee's first anti-discrimination law in employment, public accommodations, and housing. At age 35, Jocie went to law school hoping to be more effective in her "causes." After four divorce trials, she pursued mediation as a saner process, becoming Memphis' first professional mediator. She founded the Mediation Association of Tennessee despite resistance to mediation by the bench and bar. She helped start the Association for Women Attorneys and chaired the Family Law and the ADR sections of the Memphis Bar Association. Devoted to jazz, she founded the Jazz Society of Memphis, feeling music could bring people together.