Skip to content Skip to footer

Fallen Heroes of 2014

Hundreds of social justice advocates and organizers passed away in 2014.

Truthout Logo

Truthout’s December fundraiser is our most important of the year and will determine the scale of work we will be able to do in 2026. Please support us with a tax-deductible donation today.

Hundreds of social justice advocates and organizers passed away in 2014, leaving their work behind as their legacy, but often also leaving an irreplaceable hole in their movements.

In this week’s edition of Making Contact you’ll hear about the life and work of social justice leaders, many who spent their entire lives fighting for racial and economic justice, and though they’ve passed away they inspire us to do our work today.

Black Liberation activists like Chokwe Lumumba, Darby Tillis freed from wrongful conviction and imprisonment, Yuri Kochiyama anti-imperialist supporter for political prisoners, and young George Carter who was a “rethinker” of schools in New Orleans.

On today’s edition of Making Contact we honor and revisit the lives of just a few of those fallen heroes who passed away this year.

Featuring:

  • Chokwe Lumumba, former mayor of Jackson MS
  • Morgan Powell, Bronx River Sankofa founder
  • Charity Hicks, Detroit People’s Water Board co-founder
  • Darby Tillis, death penalty opponent
  • Yuri Kochiyama, civil rights activist
  • Ted Gullickson, San Francisco Tenants Union director
  • George Carter; Kids Rethink New Orleans Schools participant
  • Leslie Feinberg, author of Stone Butch Blues
  • Eddie Ellis, prison reform advocate
  • Mark Naison, Fordham University African-American history professor
  • Lila Cabbil, Rosa Parks Institute president emeritus
  • Diane Fujino, author of Heartbeat of Struggle, the revolutionary life of Yuri Kochiyama
  • Taiyo Na, author
  • Randy Shaw, Tenderloin Housing Clinic executive director
  • Qasim Davis, Kids Rethink New Orleans Schools project manager
  • Perry Cobb, Darby Tillis’ co-defendant
  • Dr. Divine Pryor, executive Director of the center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions
Our most important fundraising appeal of the year

December is the most critical time of year for Truthout, because our nonprofit news is funded almost entirely by individual donations from readers like you. So before you navigate away, we ask that you take just a second to support Truthout with a tax-deductible donation.

This year is a little different. We are up against a far-reaching, wide-scale attack on press freedom coming from the Trump administration. 2025 was a year of frightening censorship, news industry corporate consolidation, and worsening financial conditions for progressive nonprofits across the board.

We can only resist Trump’s agenda by cultivating a strong base of support. The right-wing mediasphere is funded comfortably by billionaire owners and venture capitalist philanthropists. At Truthout, we have you.

We’ve set an ambitious target for our year-end campaign — a goal of $225,000 to keep up our fight against authoritarianism in 2026. Please take a meaningful action in this fight: make a one-time or monthly donation to Truthout before December 31. If you have the means, please dig deep.