Joanne Grant

Joanne Grant (March 30, 1930 – January 9, 2005) was an African-American journalist and Communist activist. She was a reporter for the National Guardian, where she covered the American Civil Rights Movement in the American South in the 1960s. She was the author of three books about the era and the director of a documentary about Ella Baker. Her 1968 book, Black Protest, is "required reading" for African-American studies classes.[2]

Joanne Grant
Born(1930-03-30)March 30, 1930
Utica, New York, U.S.A.
DiedJanuary 9, 2005(2005-01-09) (aged 74)
Manhattan, New York City, U.S.A.
Alma materSyracuse University
Occupation(s)Journalist, activist
Political partyCommunist Party USA[1]
SpouseVictor Rabinowitz
Children1 son, 1 daughter
RelativesLouis M. Rabinowitz (father-in-law)

Early life

Joanne Grant was born on March 30, 1930, in Utica, New York.[3][2][4] Her father was white and her mother was mixed race.[3] As a result, she was light-skinned.[3][4]

Grant graduated from Syracuse University, with a bachelor's degree in journalism.[3][2][4]

Career

Grant began her career in public relations in New York City.[3] Meanwhile, she attended the 6th World Festival of Youth and Students in Moscow, Soviet Union in 1957, alongside 140 other Americans.[3] She also visited China alongside 56 other Americans, even though US citizens were not allowed to visit the communist nation at the time.[3] She also visited India, Africa and Cuba.[3] Upon her return to New York City, she served as an assistant to civil rights leader W. E. B. Du Bois.[3] On February 3, 1960, she was named before the House Un-American Activities Committee as a member of the Communist Party USA.[1]

Grant became a reporter for the National Guardian, a radical leftist newspaper, in the 1960s.[3][2][4] She covered the American Civil Rights Movement, and she wrote about her encounters with blacks in small towns across Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia.[3] She wrote about lynching in the American South.[3] Meanwhile, she became a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.[3][2]

Grant served as the news director of WBAI, a left-wing radio station, in 1965.[3] She wrote, directed and produced Fundi: The Story of Ella Baker, a documentary about civil rights leader Ella Baker, in 1981.[3][2] Actor Harry Belafonte was the narrator; the film was shown on PBS and at the London Film Festival.[3][2]

Grant was the author of three books about the Civil Rights Movement. The first book, Black Protest, was published in 1968.[2] According to The Los Angeles Times, it was "required reading in many African American history classes" by 2005.[2] Her second book, Confrontation on Campus, was published in 1969. It was about the Columbia University protests of 1968.[2] Her third book, Ella Baker: Freedom Bound, was a biography of Ella Baker.[2]

Personal life and death

Grant married Victor Rabinowitz,[3][4] the son of businessman and philanthropist Louis M. Rabinowitz. They had a son, Mark, and a daughter, Abby.[3]

Grant died on January 9, 2005, in Manhattan, New York City.[3][4] She was 74 years old.[3][2] Her papers are held at the Columbia University Library.[5]

Works
  • Black Protest: History, Documents, And Analysis 1619 To The Present. Greenwich, Connecticut: Fawcett Publications. 1968. OCLC 424043.
  • Confrontation on Campus: The Columbia Pattern for the New Protest. New York: New American Library. 1969. OCLC 32244.
  • Ella Baker: Freedom Bound. New York: Wiley & Sons. 1998. ISBN 9780585270197. OCLC 45728915.

References
  1. Gosse, Van (1993). Where the Boys are: Cuba, Cold War America and the Making of a New Left. New York: Verso. p. 145. ISBN 9780860914167. OCLC 29748741. In this case, the main factional opponents from the Trotskyist point of view were Victor Rabinowitz, a well-known leftwing lawyer with the firm Boudin and Rabinowitz, and a young activist named Joanne Grant, then a staff writer for the National Guardian, who on 3 February 1960, had been named as a member of the Harlem Youth section of the CPUSA before the House Un-American Activities Committee.
  2. "Joanne Grant, 74; Chronicled the Early Civil Rights Movement". The Los Angeles Times. January 16, 2005. Retrieved August 30, 2016.
  3. Simon, John J. (January 26, 2005). "Joanne Grant". The Guardian. Retrieved August 30, 2016.
  4. Bayot, Jennifer (January 15, 2005). "Joanne Grant, 74; Documented Grassroots Efforts on Civil Rights". The New York Times. Retrieved August 30, 2016.
  5. "Joanne Grant research files, 1963-1968". Columbia University Libraries Archival Section. Columbia University. Retrieved August 30, 2016.
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