On June 24, 2023, at the 11th Annual Legacy Hall of Fame Ceremony, the NAACP CA/HI State Conference honored ’68 Olympians Dr. Tommie Smith, Dr. John Carlos, as well as Dr. Harry Edwards and Dr. Kenneth Hoel, co-organizers of the 1967 Olympic Project for Human Rights. More than 300 guests gathered at the Grand Sheraton Hotel in Sacramento, CA for this highly anticipated annual event.
The Legacy Hall of Fame allows the CA/HI NAACP to honor outstanding community leaders who have fought tirelessly to advance the civil rights movement and creates funding for local unit capacity building, youth leadership programs and NextGen Leadership programs and initiatives. Past honorees have included: The Honorable Gwen Moore & Posthumously The Honorable Mervyn Dymally (2013); The Honorable Willie L. Brown Jr (2014); Mayor Kevin Johnson (2015); Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (2016); Lloyd Dean, President of Dignity Health & Posthumously Marcus Foster, Superintendent of Oakland Schools (years) (2017); Ambassador Diane Watson & Congresswoman Barbara Lee (2018); Bernard Tyson, CEO Kaiser Permanente, Posthumously Ron Dellums, former United States Representative (2019); President Emeritus, Dr. Alice A. Huffman (2021); Congresswoman Maxine Waters (2022).
Founded in 1909 in response to the ongoing violence against Black people around the country, the NAACP is the largest and most pre-eminent civil rights organization in the nation. NAACP has over 2,200 units and branches across the nation, along with well over 2M activists. Its mission is to secure political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights in order to eliminate race-based discrimination and ensure the health and well-being of all persons. For more information about CA/HI NAACP visit www.cahinaacp.org