Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Puerto Ricans--Personal narratives; Spanish language--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community...
Eldelmira Cruz is from San Lorenzo, Puerto Rico. She migrated to the Chicago Lincoln Park neighborhood in 1969 and lived right by the People’s Church. Her memories of her early days in Chicago include the work the Young Lords were doing as they...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Puerto Ricans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Puerto Ricans--New York...
William “Ninja” Ruiz is the brother of Mildred Ruiz-Sapp of Universes and they grew up in New York City on the Lower East Side. He earned his BA in Theatre at Bard College where he also studied poetry. Today he makes his home in Santurce,...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago
John Boelter was one of the Chicago Teachers Union members on strike in September 1968 at Waller
High School, known today by its new name, Lincoln Park High. Today he is a Professor of Biology at
Chicago State University. In 1968, a prominent Young...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago
Felícitas Nuñez lives in Bermuda Dunes, California. She and Delia Ravelo are co-founders of Teatro de Las Chicanas. The concept began when women of Movimiento Estudíantil Chicano de Aztlán (MEChA) brought their mothers to a university setting....
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago
María Romero first joined the Young Lords on Wilton and Grace Streets. She was recruited by then Angie
Lind-Rizzo (later Angie Adorno) and the other Young Lord women members. It was 1973 and the Young
Lords were emerging from two long years of...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago
Helen Shiller, a Jewish American born in 1947 in Long Island, New York. Her father had immigrated to the United States from Latvia and her mother from Belarus. She moved to Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood in 1972, living on N. Malden Street....
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago
A resident of Chicago’s Roger’s Park neighborhood, Mike James was the first leader of Rising Up Angry, a white, working-class group formed in the late 1960s and early 1970s that sought to organize residents of Lakeview/Uptown and offer a range...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago
John “Oppress” Preston was a leading member of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party (BPP). His role within the party was to set up and distribute the BPP newspaper throughout the state of Illinois. Though the BPP started in Oakland,...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Rural-urban migration--Illinois--Chicago;...
Hy Thurman arrived in Chicago when he was seventeen years old from a small farming town in eastern Tennessee. Mr. Thurman co-founded the Young Patriots. In 1969, the Young Patriots became part of the original Rainbow Coalition, along with the Young...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Chicago (Ill.)--Politics and...
Jack Hart was a primary assistant to Walter “Slim” Coleman during the Jiménez for Alderman Campaign of 1975. He continues to live and work in Chicago’s 46th Ward, primarily in the Uptown Community. In the 1970s, Hart was a member of the...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Mexican Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Students--Civil rights
Omar López was Minister of Information for the Young Lords. He was born in Mexico and first came to Chicago in 1958, settling in the Humboldt Park Neighborhood where he has lived ever since. He first met some Young Lords in Lincoln Park when they...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Mexican Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Students--Civil rights
Omar López was Minister of Information for the Young Lords. He was born in Mexico and first came to Chicago in 1958, settling in the Humboldt Park Neighborhood where he has lived ever since. He first met some Young Lords in Lincoln Park when they...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); Mexican Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Mexican...
Antonio López grew up in the Logan Square Neighborhood of Chicago and heard about the Young Lords early in life, as his parents are activists. Mr. López is also active in various projects and community organizations. He is of Mexican descent and...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Police-community...
David (pronounced "Daveed") Lemieux joined the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party in the spring of 1969. At age 16, he was the second youngest member of that Chapter. He was a "rank and file" member and functioned in all BPP activities...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Hampton, Fred, 1948-1969;...
Billy Dunbar is a member of the Chicago Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense
(BPP). He is from the south side of Chicago. He keeps up with all the political events related to the BPP
and the Rainbow Coalition, including the...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Hampton, Fred, 1948-1969;...
Iberia Hampton is the mother of murdered Illinois Black Panther Party Chairman Fred Hampton, as well as Dee and Bill Hampton. Throughout her life she has been active within her church and the community. Along with Bill Hampton and the board, Mrs....
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Hampton, Fred, 1948-1969;...
Bill Hampton is a former Chicago public school teacher and the brother of Fred Hampton, Deputy Chairman of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party who was murdered by a special police squad in an early morning raid on December 4, 1969. Bill...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Hampton, Fred, 1948-1969;...
Billy “Che” Brooks is Deputy Minister of Education of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (BPP) and Director of YouthLAB@1521 through the Better Boys Foundation. In 1969, Mr. Brooks was very close to Chairman Fred Hampton who was the main...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Black Panther Party....
Wanda Ross grew up in Chicago, the granddaughter of migrants from the southern United States. Shortly after she began college, she started attending political education classes taught by “Teach” of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense...
Young Lords (Organization); Puerto Ricans--United States; Civil Rights--United States--History; Lincoln Park (Chicago, Ill.); African Americans--Personal narratives; Social justice; Community activists--Illinois--Chicago; Black Panther Party....
Melvin Lewis was born in Chicago but today lives in Fayetteville, North Carolina. His parents live in
Maywood, Illinois. This is the same town where Fred Hampton of the Black Panther Party (BPP) grew up.
It is also where, at Maywood’s City Hall,...
