'...The history chairman noticed the reference to [a Sally] Hemings book on [Thelma Wills] Foote’s curriculum vitae and searched online sources because he didn’t recognize the publisher.

The chairman had been asked to nominate history professors to serve on a committee to review Foote’s potential tenure as a full professor. Tenured professors at OU are required to have written at least two scholarly books.'

[Here's the book cover; go to Amazon and decide if this is a scholarly book. Its publisher, Malibu Press, appears to offer only this book.]

'In a cover letter to the university, Foote said she coauthored the Hemings book with television actress Tina Andrews.

But university officials found only a five-paragraph introduction by Foote, with Andrews, a former Days of Our Lives star, credited as the sole author.

Ogles wrote to Foote, asking for a clarification of her role. She responded that her contributions had been substantial but unacknowledged, which she described as common practice in the film and television industry.

The book, Sally Hemings: An American Scandal: The Struggle to Tell the Controversial True Story, was later made into a CBS mini-series. Ogles tried to reach Andrews through her agent to verify Foote’s role but was unsuccessful.

"She may very well have been a behind-the-scenes consultant and editor, but she should have told us so instead of leading us to believe she was a co-author," Ogles said.

Foote, who most recently worked at the University of Southern Denmark and now lives in Rome, couldn’t be reached for comment last night.

In an e-mail to Ogles, she wrote, "My reasoning in listing myself as co-author within my CV and letter of introduction is that my scholarly work done for the book publication merits that distinction."

She later told the student newspaper The Post: "It may turn out that things don’t work out. You know how people are; they tend to seize on people’s mistakes and make the worst of them."

Hours later, she sent Ogles a one-sentence e-mail message withdrawing her acceptance of the job offer.

Despite Foote’s strong qualifications, Ogles said he would have likely rescinded the offer if he hadn’t heard from her first.

Stung by a plagiarism scandal in its engineering school, the university has created an academic honors council and stressed the importance of ethics... '