Black Panther Party :: Huey P. Newton

In the late 1960s and early 70s posters of the morose Panther Partys co-founder, Huey P. Newton were plastered on walls of college dorm rooms across the country. Wearing a black beret and a leather jacket, sitting on a wicker chair, a spear in angiotensin-converting enzyme hand and a rifle in the other, the poster depicted Huey Newton as a symbol of his generations anger and courage in the face of racism and classism. He is the man whose intellectual talent and community leadership abilities helped to found the Black Panther Party (BPP). Newton played an instrumental role in refocusing civil rights activists to the problems of urban Black communities. He overly tapped the rage and frustration of urban Blacks in order to address social injustice. However, the FBIs significant fear of the Partys aggressive actions would not only mount the party apart but also perpetuated false information regarding the Panthers programs and accomplishments.In recent years, historians have devoted much attention of the early 1960s, to Malcolm X and Martin Luther fairy and have ignored the Black Panthers. The Panthers and Huey P. Newtons leadership of the Party are as significant to the Black freedom struggle as more widely know leaders of the Civil Rights Movement. A typical American history high school textbook not only neglects to mention Huey Newton but also disregards the existence of the Black Panthers altogether. Hueys experiences growing up were central in his conception of the Black Panthers. Unlike King and many other civil rights leaders who were unearthly Southerners, from middle class and well-educated families, Huey P. Newton was a working class man from a poor urban black neighborhood. Born February 17, 1942, in oak tree Grove Louisiana, Huey moved to Oakland, California when he was just two years old. During childhood, his baby face, light complexion, medium height, squeaky voice and his name Huey, forced him to make how to fight early on in life. Hueys rema rkable quick wit and strength earned him the respect of his peers and the reputation of being a tough goofball (Seale 40). Upon his enrollment at Merrit College Hueys academic achievements quickly began to surpass other students, while at the same time he was still able to relate to those he grew up with on the streets of Oakland. Autobiographer, Hugh Pearson in Shadow of the Panther reports that Huey remained comfortable on the street corners with young Negro men who drank wine all dayand fought one another - young men whom most college-bound Negroes shied away from (Pearson 115).