The publication is reproduced in full below:
HONORING THE LIFE AND LEGACY OF DR. TIMUEL BLACK
______
HON. BOBBY L. RUSH
of illinois
in the house of representatives
Thursday, October 21, 2021
Mr. RUSH. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor and celebrate the life and legacy of an extraordinary man and international icon: civil rights activist and educator, Dr. Timuel Dixon Black, Jr.
Timuel Black was born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1918. His father was a sharecropper, and his grandparents were formerly enslaved. Black's parents moved to Chicago when he was an infant as part of the Great Migration of Black Americans moving North, seeking a better life.
Black grew up in Bronzeville, in the densely populated ``Black Belt'' where African Americans were confined due to Chicago's discriminatory housing laws. Black attended Burke Elementary School and DuSable High School, and was drafted into the Army in 1943, where he fought on D-Day and in the Battle of the Bulge. Black visited the Buchenwald concentration camp shortly after it was liberated and later said that the atrocities he saw there motivated him to dedicate his life towards peace and justice for all people.
Upon returning home to Chicago, Black attended Roosevelt University, where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in sociology, and continued his education at the University of Chicago, earning masters degrees in both sociology and history. Black spent several years teaching high school in Chicago, Illinois and Gary, Indiana before becoming a professor at Loop College, which was later renamed Harold Washington College.
In 1955, Black saw Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. deliver a riveting sermon on television. He was so impressed that he immediately traveled to Alabama to meet Dr. King. That initial meeting would lead Professor Black to help build support networks for Dr. King while Dr. King commuted between Chicago and Alabama. In 1960, A. Philip Randolph enlisted Black to run the Chicago division of the Negro American Labor Council, an advocacy organization that would go on to organize the landmark March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Black helped organize the ``freedom trains'' that took thousands of Chicagoans to the event. More than 4,000 Chicagoans ended up attending the March on Washington. Over the course of his life, Black worked to mobilize African American voters and increase African American representation in Illinois politics. Black ran for office a number of times and consistently agitated against Chicago's machine politics. In 1963, Black ran for alderman as part of a coalition of independent Black candidates running against ``Silent Six'' machine incumbents, notably saying that it was time to ``end plantation politics.''
In 1982, Black suggested to his childhood friend, Illinois U.S. Representative Harold Washington, that he should consider running for Mayor of Chicago. In the fight to combat rising poverty, inadequate housing, and unemployment in Chicago's African American and Latino communities, Black spearheaded an effort to support Washington's campaign by registering 263,000 new voters and raising more than $1 million. In 1983, thanks in large part to Black's efforts, Harold Washington became Chicago's first Black mayor. In 1987, soon after Washington's death in office, Black led a successful advocacy campaign to rename Loop College in Washington's honor.
A renowned author and historian, Black wrote an acclaimed oral history on the migration of Black Americans to Chicago from the South, titled ``Bridges of Memory.'' Later, in 2019, he published a memoir titled ``Sacred Ground: The Chicago Streets of Timuel Black.'' For nearly his entire life, Timuel Black made the South Side of Chicago his home and Bronzeville his open classroom, where he taught and mentored future educators, community activists, and business and political leaders.
Madam Speaker, Timuel Black spent every day of his 102 years on this earth pouring his best into others.
As an educator, an activist, a civil rights leader, a confidante, an elder, and a sage, Tim gave his all to all of us.
He was at the center--the beating heart--of the Black community, the Chicago community, the national community, and the international community. Black's contributions were felt in countless historic events: Nelson Mandela's election as President of South Africa, Harold Washington's election as Mayor of Chicago, Barack Obama's election as the first Black President of the United States, Jesse Jackson's campaign for President, and Carol Moseley Braun's election as the first Black woman in the U.S. Senate, among others.
His loss is deeply felt in Chicago, in this Nation, and indeed across the entire world. My thoughts and prayers are with Tim's wife and family, and with all who loved and were impacted by this truly great man.
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SOURCE: Congressional Record Vol. 167, No. 185
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