Lily Golden the Black American Russian Activist

When I first ran into her in the halls of Chicago State University located at 95^th Street and King Drive in Chicago, I knew there was something very special about her. Her presence was electrifying yet warm. I only wish I had befriended her to tapped into her reservoir of knowledge.

Dr. Lily Golden studied at the prestigious Moscow State University, earning the Russian equivalent of a Ph.D. in African-American History. She later worked at the African Institute of the Soviet Academy of Sciences and the Institute of African Studies and eventually became its director. In 1988 she moved to United State and in 1993 became a distinguished scholar in residence at Chicago State University where she remained until 2002.

Golden was born in July 1934 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan to the union of Oliver Golden and Bertha Bialek. Golden's father, Oliver, was an African-American communist and an agronomy expert who specialized in cotton growing. He was educated at the Tuskegee University and was a student of the renowned professor of agronomy, George Washington Carter. Her mother, Bertha, also a communist was the youngest daughter of a New York-based Jewish family of Polish origin.

Please see Connecting People of African descent, Africans and Blacks in the diaspora for the rest of this story.