Grace Lee Boggs, a longtime civil rights activist, died Monday at her home in Detroit. She was 100. Her trustees said she died "as she lived, surrounded by books, politics, people, and ideas."
Boggs and her husband founded Detroit Summer, which gives kids the opportunity to participate in projects that revitalize Detroit neighborhoods, and the James and Grace Lee Boggs Center to Nurture Community Leadership. "As the child of Chinese immigrants and as a woman, Grace learned early on that the world needed changing, and she overcame barriers to do just that," President Obama said Monday. "She understood the power of community organizing at its core — the importance of bringing about change and getting people involved to shape their own destiny."
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The author of several books, including The Next American Revolution — Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First Century, she was the subject of a 2014 documentary by filmmaker Grace Lee, which aired on PBS stations across the United States. "I love that she was a woman of action and reflection, someone who learned from the past but would not get stuck in it," Lee told NBC News.
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