Monday Milestones: Grace Lee Boggs

 

Grace Lee Boggs (1915-  )

Grace Lee Boggs was born Providence, Rhode Island in 1915 of Chinese immigrant parents. She received her Bachelor of Arts Degree from Barnard College in 1935 and her Doctorate of Philosophy from Brywn Mawr College in 1940. Dr. Boggs has been an activist in the Labor Movement, Civil Rights Movement, Black Power Movement, Asian American Movement, Women's Movement, and Environmental Movement for over sixty years.

In 1953, Dr. Grace Lee moved to Detroit and married James Boggs, an African-American writer, strategist, and labor movement activist. They worked together building grassroots projects for over forty years until Mr. Boggs' death in July 1993. Their book, Revolution and Evolution in the Twentieth Century, was published in 1974. Her autobiography is titled Living for Change. It was published in 1998 and is still currently used in university classes on social movements and about Detroit Michigan.

 In 1992, along with her husband and fellow activist Shea Howell, Dr. Boggs founded "Detroit Summer", a youth program incorporating intergenerational and interracial programs to help to rebuild and redefine her adopted hometown of Detroit Michigan.

Dr. Grace Lee Boggs is still active with many grassroots groups and campaigns in Detroit, and writes a weekly coumn for the Michigan Citizen newspaper.