BATON ROUGE — The first female president of the Southern University student government died Wednesday.

Roena I. Wilford, who made history in 1970 when she was elected as the student body's first female president, later became a professor at the university teaching physics.

“Ms. Wilford’s impact on Southern University, the Baton Rouge community, and beyond is immeasurable,” Southern University Chancellor John K. Pierre said Thursday. “Her leadership, service, and dedication to uplifting others have left an indelible mark on our institution and all who had the privilege of knowing her.”

Wilford's historic election happened amid the broader women's liberation movement.

"It was surprising to Roena Wilford that her feminism caused many at Southern University to discount her as a presidential candidate during spring elections," The Advocate wrote at the time.

She was 20 at the time of the election and told The Advocate that "people in the city tend to forget there is another major college here," referencing LSU as the more well-funded, predominantly white LSU. With the civil rights movement only a decade in the past, Wilford and others still had to continue the fight to beat back segregation in the Deep South.

"It's almost like the community ignores the fact that Southern exists," she told The Advocate.

Creating a path for others to succeed and thrive was in Wilford's blood. In 1956, when she was only six years old, Wilford's father Louis Wilford joined the school desegregation case of Davis v. East Baton Rouge Parish School Board was filed, initiating a long legal battle to desegregate the East Baton Rouge Parish school system following the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision.

"'Do you want to go to the school with the other kids?' her father asked. To Roena Wilford, it was a question of 'sticking our necks out' for a better education," Southern said in a statement.

Wilford was also the vice president of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority and later became one of the earliest organizers of the Greater Baton Rouge Pan-Hellenic Council in 1988.

At the end of a piece about her election in the paper, Wilford said that she "feels a commitment to go into the community and work," a sentiment reflected in her contributions outside of Baton Rouge collegiate life.

Wilford volunteered with the Girl Scouts Louisiana as a troop leader and site organizer, as well as teaching Sunday school at Mount Carmel Baptist Church of Baton Rouge.