Fallen Heroes

In loving memory of the many strugglers for peace & justice, now departed, who inspire our work today

 

Monterey Bay Neighbors

Bill Belton (1917-2000). Trade unionist, singer & story-teller, community activist.

Ester Bradley-Delgado (1948-2001). Affordable housing & hunger activist.

Terry Brickley (1932-2003). Disabled rights activist, artist & psychotherapist.

Margaret Cheap (1951-2001). Founding figure (at 21) in early 1970s of Santa Cruz progressivism; leader nationwide in community development finance.

Colleen Crosby (1950-2006). Busineswoman & pioneer in Fair Trade Coffee movement.

Max Greenberg (1919 -2002). Community & universal health rights activist.

Lucy Haessler (1904-1988). Labor journalist, peace & justice activist.

Gordon Haskell (1917-2002). Peace & justice activist, inveterate Democrat.

Bill Hinchliffe (1918-1993). Library activist & "people's bibliographer."

Edna Kimbro (1948-2005). Historic preservationist.

Georgiana Bruce Kirby (1818-1887). Pioneer feminist, abolitionist & Santa Cruz educator.

Thurbie Markoe (1934-2004). Teacher, trade unionist & environmentalist.

Cat Munson-Ring (1971-2004). Nurse-midwife & domestic violence counsellor.

Victor Perera (1934-2003). Novelist, teacher & investigative journalist.

Doug Rand (1954-2000). Non-violent activist & community organizer.

Robert L. Renfro (1919-2003). Teacher, pastor, & restorer of community.

Maggie Reynolds (1923-2001). Non-violent activist & community organizer.

Alice Santana (1927-2002). Environmental & community empowerment activist, restauranteur.

Elliot Wax (1912-2003). Trade union organizer, labor lawyer & community activist.

Jane Yokoyama (1947-2004). Immigrant rights activist & SC city councilwoman.

 

Fellow Californians

Harry Bridges (1901-1990). Organizer & long-time leader of Longshoremen's Union (ILWU).

Cesar Chávez (1927-1993). Mexican American farm labor trade unionist & peace activist.

Ernesto Galarza (1905-1984). Mexican American scholar, author & community activist.

Ernestina García (1929-2005). Mexican American founder of Confederación de la Raza Unida.

Dorothea Lange (1895-1965). Documentary photographer of the poor.

Harvey Milk (1931-1978). Grassroots gay rights activist, community leader & San Francisco County Supervisor, assassinated in 1978.

Jessica Mitford (1917-1996). Bay Area radical activist & investigative journalist.

George Mizo (1945-2002). Vietnam veteran & anti-war activist.

William J. O'Donnell (1930-2003). Berkeley CA Catholic priest & human rights activist, jailed dozens of times for civil disobedience.

Linus Pauling (1901-1974). Nobel Peace Prize 1964, for work on world disarmament.

Marla Ruzicka (1977-2005). Humanitarian aid activist killed by car bomb in Iraq.

Upton Sinclair (1878-1968). Socialist novelist & CA gubernatorial candidate in 1934.

 

Fellow Americans

(Portraits & brief bios of many of these heroes may be seen at Maine artist Rob Shetterly's
Americans Who Tell the Truth).

Jane Addams (1860-1935). Pioneer social worker, women's suffragist & founder of Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF).

Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906). Women's suffrage, abolition & temperance leader.

Ella Baker (1903-1986). African American human rights organizer.

Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955). African American educator.

Ernest Bromley (1912-1997). Lifelong peace & civil rights activist, pioneer "freedom rider."

Rachel Carson (1907-1964). Naturalist & author, pioneer of environmental defense movement.

Shirley Chisholm (1924-2005). First African American woman elected to US Congress, 1968-82; candidate for President, 1972.

Septima Clark (1898-1987). African American educator & leader in Civil Rights movement.

Clarence S. Darrow (1857-1938). Criminal lawyer & humanitarian; defended Eugene Debs, Big Bill Haywood, John Thomas Scopes & Scottsboro Boys.

Jim Corbett (1934-2001). Founder of Sanctuary Movement helping Central American refugees.

Rachel Corrie (1979-2003). Middle East peace activist killed by Israeli Army bulldozer levelling Palestinian homes.

Dorothy Day (1897-1980). Founder of the Catholic Worker movement.

Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926). Trade union organizer & Socialist candidate for presidency.

W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963). African American sociologist, novelist, editor, educator & founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

Albert Einstein (1879-1955). Nobel prize-winning theoretical physicist & Socialist humanitarian.

Emma Goldman (1869-1940). Anarchist and pioneer feminist.

Martha Griffiths (1912-2003). Michigan Congresswoman (1955-75), led fight for Equal Rights Amendment to Constitution, passed overwhelmingly by Congress but unratified by 15 states.

Ernest Gruening (1887-1974). Journalist, historian, editor, public servant. As Senator from Alaska, voted against Tonkin Gulf Resolution that precipitated Vietnam War.

Fanny Lou Hamer (1917-1977). Leader of Civil Rights Movement & Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party.

Michael Harrington (1928-1989). Influential author & leader of Democratic Socialist movement.

Myles Horton (1905-1990). Founded Highlander Folk School, training-center for civil rights activists.

Mary Harris "Mother" Jones (1830-1930). Trade unionist & radical agitator.

Ivan Illich (1918 -2002). Radical Catholic priest, social critic & theorist.

Helen Keller (1880-1968). Leading Socialist & humanist.

Eppie Friedman Lederer (1918-2002). Advice columnist "Ann Landers," advocate of peace, gun control & reproductive choice.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968). Principal leader of Civil Rights Movement in 1960s.

Maggie Kuhn (1905-1995). Founder of Gray Panthers.

Aldo Leopold (1887-1948). Founder of wildlife ecology, articulator of the "land ethic."

Ben Linder (1959-1987). American mechanical engineer at work on village hydroelectric plant in Nicaragua, killed by US-sponsored Contra terrorists on 8/28/87.

Judd Marmor (1910-2003). Psychoanalyst who persuaded American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from list of "clinical disorders" in 1974.

Maurice McCracken (1905-1997). Peace, homeless rights & racial justice activist in Cincinnati, jailed dozens of times for acts of civil disobedience.

Patsy Mink (1928-2002). Congresswoman from Hawaii, steady opponent of capital punishment & Vietnam war, & defender of equal opportunity, public education, & both civil & reproductive rights.

A.J. Muste (1885-1967). Christian Socialist, pacifist & trade unionist; founder of Fellowship of Reconciliation.

Scott Nearing & Helen Nearing (1883-1983, 1904-1995). Socialists, pioneers in simple living & Back to the Land movement.

Gaylord Nelson (1916-2005). Environmentalist WI governor & senator, founder of Earth Day.

Thomas Paine (1731-1814). Eloquent advocate of democracy in struggle for American independence.

Fred Rogers (1928-2003). Kindly teacher & TV minister to a generation of American children.

Joseph Rotblat (1908-2005). British anti-nuclear activist & Nobel Peace Prize winner.

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962). "First lady" 1932-45, diplomat & humanitarian.

Bayard Rustin (1912-1987). Pioneer peace, civil rights & gay rights activist.

Edward Said (1936-2003). Valiant & influential critic of US policy toward Palestine & Islamic world.

Margaret Sanger (1883-1966). Founder of world-wide family planning movement.

Karen Silkwood (1946-1974). Trade unionist & whistle-blower on nuclear power industry.

Benjamin Spock (1903-1998). Pediatrician, author & peace activist.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902). Feminist social reformer.

I.F. Stone (1907-1989). Independent journalist.

Sojourner Truth (1797-1883). African American abolitionist leader.

Harriet Tubman (1820-1913). African American abolitionist, conductor of "underground railroad."

Edith Van Horn (1919-1997). Trade unionist & feminist leader.

James Weinstein (1926-2005). Radical journalist.

Ida B. Wells (1862-1931). African American anti-lynching crusader & civil rights activist.

Paul Wellstone (1944-2002). US Senator from Minnesota, strong & steady voice for justice & peace.

Malcolm X (1925-1965). African American freedom fighter.

 

Sisters and Brothers from Afar

Anil Agarwal (1947-2002). Indian environmentalist leader & thinker.

Nils Bohlen (1920-2002). Swedish inventor of life-saving 3-point automobile seat belt .

Dietrich Bonnhoefer (1906 -1945). German pacifist pastor executed for plotting against Hitler.

Helder Camara (1909-1999). Brazilian Bishop of Recife & nonviolent struggler for justice.

Lázaro Cárdenas (1895-1970). Mexican president who consolidated land redistribution & nationalized petroleum industry.

Josue de Castro (1908-1973). Brazilian pioneer in study of world hunger.

Danilo Dolci (1924-1997). Italian social worker & peace activist.

Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948). Nonviolent leader in struggle for Indian independence.

Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937). Italian socialist agitator & Marxist theoretician.

Rosa Luxemburg (1871-1919). Polish Jewish socialist leader, revolutionary theorist, & martyr.

Sérgio Mendez Arceo (1907 -1992). Mexican Bishop of Cuernavaca, leading practitioner & advocate of liberation theology.

Sergio Vieira de Mello (1948-2003). Brazilian UN peacemaker & human rights advocate.

Maria Elena Moyano (1958-1992). Martyred Peruvian community & women's rights activist.

Munir Said Thalib (?-2004). Indonesian human rights activist.

Digna Ochoa (1964-2001). Mexican human rights activist.

Oscar Arnulfo Romero (1917-1980). Martyred Salvadoran archbishop & peace activist.

Ken Saro-Wiwa (1941-1996). Martyred Nigerian Ogoni leader in struggle vs. Shell Oil.

Walter Sisulu (1912-2003). ANC leader & behind-the-scenes strategist of South African freedom.

Ibu Sulami (1926-2002). Indonesian feminist & human rights activist.

Rabindranath Tagore (1864-1941). Bengali poet, novelist and humanitarian.

Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910). Russian novelist & Christian anarchist thinker.