Damu Smith

Smith has said that this experience developed in him a great sensitivity to the plight of low-income communities, and played a central role in shaping his views as an adult and as an activist.

As a high school student, Smith had the chance to attend some of the Black Solidarity Day rallies in Cairo, Illinois, where he listened to speeches by Amiri Baraka, Nina Simone, and Jesse Jackson, and toured black neighborhoods where white supremacists had sprayed houses with gunfire, a sight that changed his life.

As a freshman at St. John's University in Minnesota, and president of the Organization of Afro-American Students, Smith led a protest and takeover of the school’s administrative offices to demand a Black studies program.

[2] In 1973, Smith moved to Washington D.C., where he began the next chapter in his lifelong mission of advocating for social justice in the United States and abroad.

Additionally, Smith focused his energy and attention on broad-based efforts to expose gun violence and police brutality, and was also active in peace and nuclear weapons freeze campaigns, working as the Associate Director of the Washington Office of the American Friends Service Committee.

Smith on March 12, 2003 at the Black Voices for Peace die-in event in front of The Washington Post building in Washington, D.C.
Smith on Columbus Day 2002 at the Witness for Peace picket line near the White House .
Smith and his daughter in 2003 before the 40th Anniversary of the March of Washington .