Louis E. Martin
| Louis E. Martin | |
|---|---|
| White House Advisor | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | November 18, 1912 Shelbyville, TN, U.S. |
| Died | January 6, 1997 (aged 84) |
| Political party | Democratic |
Louis Emanuel Martin Jr. (November 18, 1912 – January 6, 1997) was a renowned American journalist, newspaper publisher, civil rights activist and advisor to three Presidents of the United States. Through his pioneering political activism during the civil rights era, he came to be known as the “Godfather of Black Politics.”
Born in Shelbyville, Tennessee, to Dr. Louis E. Martin Sr. and Willa Martin, Louis Jr. grew up in Savannah, Georgia. His father, a physician of Afro-Cuban ancestry, was a graduate of Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee. It was there that he met and married the former Willa Hill of nearby Shelbyville. Louis Jr. was their only son.
Dr. Martin moved his family to Savannah when Louis Jr. was four years old, largely because the climate of southeast Georgia reminded him of the sub-tropical climate of his native Santiago, Cuba. It was in Savannah that Louis Jr. later met and married the former Gertrude Scott, his wife of 60 years.
After first attending Fisk University, Martin went on to graduate from the University of Michigan in 1934, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism. Following college, Martin traveled to his father's native Cuba, spending two years there as a freelance writer based in Havana. Returning to the United States in 1936, he was hired as a reporter with the Chicago Defender, a major black newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois.
After just six months in Chicago he was asked to return to Michigan to help launch a new black newspaper, the Michigan Chronicle, serving as its first editor and publisher. Martin remained at the Chronicle for eleven years.
Louis Martin was a founder of the National Newspaper Publishers Association, a group of black newspaper publishers. He was also (in 1970) a founder of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a research organization in Washington, D.C. providing technical support for black officeholders and scholars throughout the country; serving as its first chairman for eight years.
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