Carlton Benjamin Goodlett (July 23, 1914 – January 25, 1997) was an American physician, newspaper publisher,[1] political power broker,[2] and civil rights leader in San Francisco, California.

[2] Returning to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1945, he opened a medical practice to serve the burgeoning new black community drawn by the war industries.

As president of the local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) from 1947–49,[5] he protested The City's discrimination against hiring blacks for its public transportation system, demanded improvements in public housing, and exposed the exclusion of blacks and Jews from draft boards in San Francisco.

[2] In 1948 he became co-owner of The Reporter,[1] a community weekly edited by his old friend Thomas C. Fleming, which then absorbed its competitor, The Sun, to become The Sun-Reporter.

By the late 1950s, through a constant barrage of speeches before community groups and the growing influence of his newspaper, Goodlett had become one of the city's most prominent black leaders.

[7] Using his combined newspapers to become a political force in San Francisco, Goodlett cultivated friendships with leading black entertainers, artists and politicians, including W.E.B.

[5] Goodlett was also a businessman who developed town houses, open to all San Franciscans, on Steiner Street and Geary Boulevard.

He was frequently and sharply critical of his Democratic friends, such as President John F. Kennedy and Governor Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, for not moving fast enough on civil rights and other causes.

[9] Goodlett was arrested in 1968 while supporting a strike by San Francisco State University students who demanded a Black studies department.

[12] Along with Martin Luther King Jr., Goodlett was one of the first prominent African Americans to publicly oppose the war in Vietnam.

[12] Like many well-known San Franciscans, Goodlett's reputation was tarnished somewhat by his close association with the Reverend Jim Jones of the Peoples Temple.

"[7] When he became incapacitated from Parkinson's disease, he continued dictating or writing many of the paper's editorials, holding political meetings in the office, and guiding the direction of his newspapers.