Looking back to the year that was 2005, “Remembered Lives” devotes its first column of the New Year to a more expanded list of notables left behind. Of course, any such undertaking is enormously unwieldy and yet unpredictable. Our sincerest pardon for any significant omissions. RS
Obie Benson – Member of the Four Tops
Lamont Bentley – Actor (Hakeem on Moesha)
Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown – Bluesman
Oscar Brown, Jr. – Musician, Songwriter, Playwright
R.L. Burnside – Mississippi Bluesman
Shirley Chisholm – Congresswoman
Kenneth Clark – Psychologist, Educator, New York State Board of Regents
Donn Clendenon – Mets M.V.P., 1969
Johnnie L. Cochran, Jr. – Attorney
Lyn Collins – Singer
Sonji Clay – First wife of Muhammad Ali
Ossie Davis –Actor, Humanitarian
Ray Davis – A Parliament-Funkadelic, founding member
Tyrone Davis – Soul Singer
Edward Dudley— Former Manhattan Borough President and Judge
Sadie Feddoes – Columnist, for New York Amsterdam News
Ibrahim Ferrer – Cuban singer, “Buena Vista Social Club”
Arthur Fletcher – Presidential Advisor to Richard Nixon
Shirley Horn – Pianist, Jazz Legend
Willie Hutch – R&B Singer, Composer
John H. Johnson – Founder, Johnson Publishing Company Ebony and Jet
Johnnie Johnson – Pianist, (Played with Chuck Berry, R&B Pioneer)
Vivian Malone Jones – University of Alabama, a first to integrate
Constance Baker Motley – Civil Rights Lawyer, First Black woman Federal Judge
Milton Obote – Two-time President of Uganda
Rosa Parks – Civil Rights Activist
Brock Peters – Actor
John Procope – (Businessman, Publisher of the Amsterdam News)
Richard Pryor – Comedian, Actor
Eugene Record – Lead Singer, Chi-Lites
Nipsey Russell – Comedian, Actor
Bobby Short – Cabaret Singer
Jimmy Smith- Jazz Musician, “King of the Hammond B3 Organ”
C. Delores Tucker – Founder, National Congress of Black Women
Luther Vandross –(Singer, Songwriter)
Stanley Tookie Williams – Author, Reformed Founder of Crips
August Wilson – (Pulitzer Prizewinning playwright)
Ronald Winans – Gospel Singer
Bruce Wright – Famed New York Judge