Oleta Lawanda Crain (September 8, 1913 – November 7, 2007)[1] was an African-American military officer, federal civil servant, and advocate for black women's rights and desegregation.

In 1964 she began working for the United States Department of Labor in Washington, D.C., becoming regional administrator of its Women's Bureau in Denver, Colorado, in 1984.

[1][5] She decided to move to Colorado to find better-paying work and in 1942 obtained a job at the Denver Ordnance Plant cleaning toilets.

[1] When Crain would take her African-American company to the swimming pool for their weekly exercises, they were usually informed that "the schedule had been changed".

[10] When she was accused of being a communist by her superior officer, Crain underwent months of investigations and emerged with a top-secret security clearance.

[6] She also supervised conferences on "child care, health benefits, job training, working conditions, and earnings ratios".

[12] The U.S. Department of Labor posthumously cited her contribution during Black History Month in 2018, whose theme was "African Americans in Times of War".

[1] Crain donated her collection of documents and memorabilia from her service in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps and the United States Air Force during the 1940s to the Blair-Caldwell African American Research Library in Denver.

The $2,000 scholarship is awarded to female high-school seniors from Missouri, Oklahoma, and California who plan to study in a historically black college.