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Olive Myrtle Henderson (1877-1957) was the second African American woman dentist in the city of Chicago and the first African American woman to graduate with a degree in dentistry from Northwestern University.^[1]

Henderson was born in Chicago in 1877. As a young woman she was a patient of Ida Gray Nelson Rollins, the first African American female dentist in the United States.^[2] Ida Gray Nelson Rollins had graduated from the University of Michigan in 1890.^[3] It was Henderson's experience with Ida Gray Nelson Rollins that inspired her to become a dentist. Henderson graduated from Northwestern University in 1908.^[1] A little over a decade before Henderson graduated, Emma Ann Reynolds graduated as the first Black woman to receive a medical degree in 1895^[4]

In 1911, Henderson married Thomas Sterling Officer. Officer had been a practicing physician in Chicago since 1906. Together they had a daughter named Mercedes.^[1] In 1912 Henderson established a private practice in Chicago's South Side. She retired in 1948 after 40 active years as a dentist. She was also an active member of the National Association of Colored Women and her church St. Thomas Episcopal.^[1][2]