Patty Gasso, Joy Harjo, Leon Russell and more named to 2022 Oklahoma Hall of Fame class

University of Oklahoma softball coach Patty Gasso, trailblazing U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo and the late Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Leon Russell are among the luminaries who will be inducted this year into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame.

The Oklahoma Hall of Fame's 95th class was revealed Thursday at a luncheon at the hall's home, the Gaylord-Pickens Museum, where dozens of past inductees gathered to salute the new honorees.

"Being inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame is Oklahoma's highest honor," President and CEO Shannon L. Rich said in a statement. "The recognition of our state's greatest asset — our people — is the foundation upon which our organization was created."

Who is included in the 2022 class?

The 2022 inductee class also includes Bob Blackburn, recently retired longtime director of the Oklahoma Historical Society; Chester "Chet" Cadieux III, chairman and CEO of Tulsa's QuikTrip Corp.; and F. Roger Hardesty, a Tulsa-based real estate developer, builder and aviation enthusiast who founded the Hardesty Company and Hardesty Family Foundation.

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“As a historian, I realize that all of us stand on the shoulders of Oklahomans who have been recognized by the Oklahoma Hall of Fame since 1927,” Blackburn said in a statement. “I am humbled to be associated with those outstanding leaders who have overcome challenges and seized opportunities that have shaped our shared communities.”

Also to be inducted are Poteau native Sue Ann Arnall, a former oil and gas executive who founded the Arnall Family Foundation in 2015, and Oklahoma City native and OU graduate Pamela McCauley, the first African American woman in the state to earn a doctorate degree in engineering and current associate dean of Academic Programs, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the Wilson College of Textiles at North Carolina State University.

“Being selected for induction into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame is one of the greatest honors of my life. This goes beyond traditional career recognition and feels like an affirming, warm embrace from a revered family member," McCauley said in a statement.

What's next for the 2022 Hall of Fame honorees?

The class of 2022 will join the 722 honorees who have been inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame since 1928. The induction ceremony typically takes place in November.

Along with their formal induction, the 2022 honorees will be recognized in November with the unveiling of their portraits at the Oklahoma Hall of Fame. Their biographies, photos and videos will be accessible through interactive exhibits at the Gaylord-Pickens Museum.

For some of the honorees, it won't be their first hall of fame induction. OU’s Gasso is a member of the National Fastpitch Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Her Sooners have won five national championships and are contenders again this year.

"Even though I was born and raised in California, I’ve spent 28 years of my life dedicated to the University of Oklahoma and this state. It has become my life’s work. I’m thankful to the people for taking me in and making Oklahoma home for me and my family,” Gasso said in a statement.

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The first Native American, as well as the first Oklahoman, to serve as U.S. Poet Laureate, Harjo last year was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame and National Native American Hall of Fame and named an Oklahoma Cultural Treasure. The Muscogee writer and musician recently wrapped her rare third term as U.S. Poet Laureate and began her six-year appointment as the inaugural artist in residence at the new Bob Dylan Center in her hometown of Tulsa.

"It doesn't always happen that way, that you can come home. I'm known out in the world, and a lot of people were surprised when I moved back to Oklahoma (in 2011), because I've been everywhere," Harjo told The Oklahoman in 2021.

"But I felt like that at the root of the materials that make up the physical presence and this physical life of me owe a lot to being here and being from here."

A member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Songwriters Hall of Fame and Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame, Russell played on the albums of an impressive list of stars, including the Beach Boys, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and more. Known as "The Master of Space and Time," the Lawton native’s first solo album had Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr and George Harrison playing backup, and his 1970 hit “A Song for You” has been recorded by more than 100 musicians, from Amy Winehouse and Michael Buble to Ray Charles and Whitney Houston.

Although Russell died Nov. 13, 2016, at age 74, his legacy lives on at Tulsa's storied Church Studio, which reopened this year after five years of renovations.

"Leon bought this (church) in 1972 and turned it into a recording studio and home office to Shelter Records. Probably the most famous artist to be discovered here was Tom Petty, but anyone who was anyone in the music industry descended upon Tulsa during that time period," Church Studio owner Teresa Knox told The Oklahoman. "Eric Clapton, Kansas, Stevie Wonder, Bob Marley, Bob Dylan, the list goes on ... and that was a really magical time in Tulsa's history. And I think Leon really was at the center of it."

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Patty Gasso, Joy Harjo, Leon Russell named to Oklahoma Hall of Fame