William B. Bryant, 94; 1st Black Chief Judge of District Court in D.C.

William B. Bryant, 94, the first black man to be chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, died of natural causes Sunday in Washington.

On Friday President Bush signed legislation naming the district’s new courthouse annex in Bryant’s honor. Bryant, who couldn’t get hired as a lawyer because of his race in the late 1940s, served as chief judge from 1977 to 1981. In 1982, he took senior, or semiretired, status but unlike his colleagues, never reduced his caseload.

Bryant was born in Wetumpka, Ala., and moved to the nation’s capital with his family when he was 1 year old. He graduated from the city’s Howard University and its law school and later served in the Army during World War II, rising to lieutenant colonel.

Despite his legal education, Bryant could find work only as an elevator operator before becoming a research assistant to Nobel Prize winner Ralph Bunche for a landmark study of race problems in the U.S. He became one of the first black assistant U.S. attorneys for the District of Columbia in 1951, returning to private practice in 1954.

Bryant also taught for many years at Howard University Law School.