Racial-Rights, Gender-Rights
Activist Dr. Dorothy Height Passes
SPECIAL TRIBUTE
Dr. Dorothy Irene Height, 98, the revered matriarch of the civil-rights movement who fought for racial justice and gender equality for more than 60 years, died of natural causes. She led the National Council
of Negro Women, a 4-million-member advocacy organization, from 1957 to
1988. Her work as an activist began in the 1930s, when she was appointed to
deal with the outcome of the Harlem riot, and she continued her struggle for
school desegregation, voting rights, employment opportunities and public accommodations for Blacks and women for decades. In 1963, she stood
on the platform with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when he delivered his “I
Have a Dream” speech and attended the White House ceremony to witness President John F. Kennedy signing the Equal Pay Act. President Barack
Obama referred to Height as “the godmother of the civil-rights movement”
who witnessed “every [civil-rights] march and milestone along the way.”
For more on Height’s remarkable life,
go to
www.DiversityInc.com/height
Read more about the notable
achievements of Hooks at
www.DiversityInc.com/hooks
Mourning Legendary Civil-Rights
Leader Dr. Benjamin Hooks
Former NAACP executive director and vocal civil-rights activist Dr. Benjamin Hooks, 85, died after a long illness. Hooks became head of the NAACP in 1977, taking over a group that was $1 million in debt
and had shrunk to 200,000 members from nearly a half-million in the 1950s
and ’60s. Upon his departure in 1992, the group’s importance and membership had grown by several hundred thousand. Hooks’ professional life,
which broke numerous racial barriers, was rich and varied. A Baptist minister who headed churches in two different cities at the same time, he was
also a businessman, lawyer and judge—the first Black person to be appointed to the bench in Tennessee. In addition, he was the first Black person to
be appointed to the Federal Communications Commission. In 2007, Hooks
was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his work in civil rights.
Iconic Cherokee Leader
Wilma Mankiller Dies
Wilma Mankiller, the first woman to head a major American Indian tribe as former chief principal of the Cherokee Nation, died at age 64 after battling pancreatic cancer. During Mankiller’s tenure
(1985–1995), she co-chaired a national conference between tribal leaders
and government Cabinet members that helped form the U.S. Department of
Justice’s Office of Indian Justice. She also developed health clinics, established an $11-million Jobs Corp center and provided services for children.
She was one of DiversityInc’s Women We Love in 2008. Donations in her
honor can be made to One Fire Development Corp., a nonprofit committed
to advancing American Indian communities, at www.onefinedevelopment.
org. Tax-deductible donations can also be made at www.wilmamankiller.
com.
Find out about Mankiller’s other accomplishments and read her full interview ith DiversityInc at
www.DiversityInc.com/wilmamankiller
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