#HUEY P. NEWTON CELEBRITY BLACK PANTHERS FREE#

Huey Newton’s pursuit of knowledge soon led him to Merritt College, where he earned an Associate of Arts degree in 1966. He taught himself to read by listening to vinyl records of actor Vincent Price reciting great poetry and connected the sounds to the words in text form. But somehow, his high school teachers and counselors’ lack of faith actually motivated him to prove them wrong. Huey Newton’s “urge to inquire” had nearly been killed in his youth. This ‘accomplishment’ was, in reality, an indictment against the school, as Newton could not even read. In his autobiography, Revolutionary Suicide, Newton wrote about how going through Oakland’s public school system had made him feel “uncomfortable and ashamed of being black.” He stated: “I did not have one teacher who taught me anything relevant to my own life or experience…All they did was try to rob me of the sense of my own uniqueness and worth, and in the process nearly killed my urge to inquire.”ĭespite his crimes and disillusion with his schooling, he managed to graduate from Oakland Technical High School in 1959. Newton’s later pursuits in and passion for formal education perhaps suggests how he had much academic potential but the public school system had failed him. He often skipped school and was arrested a number of times for various criminal offences, including gun possession and vandalism. Newton showed early signs of a rebellious streak that would later inform his activism. Their move occurred during the early part of the Second Great Migration (1940-1970), in which African-Americans left the South en masse. The frequent violence and lynchings that had long plagued the area soon pushed the family to move to Oakland, California. Newton became paranoid and that his personality changed years ago when he became a target of the F.B.I., whose agents tried to infiltrate and disrupt the Black Panthers.The youngest of seven children, Huey Newton was born in Monroe, Louisiana, to Armelia Johnson and Walter Newton. ''I saw a very sweet side, a humane side, a dignified side, a man who was theoretically in favor of a better world.''īut Mr. Garry said he never saw a violent side to Newton. Newton as the founder of ''the renaissance of the black liberation movement.'' Newton's lawyer for many years and who defended him in the case of the slain Oakland officer, hailed Dr. Newton as a man she had seen recently in the neighborhood, which is two blocks from the west Oakland subway station and is marked by abandoned buildings and rundown homes with broken windows.Ĭharles Garry, who was Dr. DePalm's sister, Audrey, said she recognized news photographs of Dr. The Black Panthers were a thing to identify with along with Malcolm X and Martin Luther King.'' This area is where he came up.''įred DePalm, who was awakened by the shooting this morning, said: ''To us, Huey Newton was a hero.

One man, who spoke on the condition that he not be identified, said: ''He knew everybody down here.

#HUEY P. NEWTON CELEBRITY BLACK PANTHERS FREE#

Newton was killed said he began his work with the Black Panthers in the same area, working with churches to serve free breakfasts to youngsters.

Police investigators said today that there was no evidence that his killing was related to drugs. Newton continued to face numerous legal charges, served time in jail and fought to rehabilitate himself from alcohol and drug abuse. Newton and the Black Panthers were accused of being controlled by the Communist Party and were investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. After his conviction in 1967 in the death of an Oakland police officer, radicals and many college students took up the rallying cry ''Free Huey.'' At the same time, Dr. Newton, who founded the Black Panther Party with Bobby Seale, became one of the most charismatic symbols of black anger in the late 1960's. Mike Sims said there were no suspects and no apparent motive.ĭr. At a news conference this afternoon, Lieut.

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