Baltimore, Maryland (May 6, 1922- July 15, 2021) age 99 yrs

Gloria Richardson Dandridge, born Gloria St. Clair Hayes was a civil rights activist best known as the leader of the Cambridge movement, a civil rights action in the early 1960s in Cambridge, Maryland. Richardson’s contribution laid the groundwork for African Americans as female politicians, feminists, and people of the LGBTQ community. Richardson and other women including Rosa Parks, Diane Nash, Merlie Evers, and Mrs. Herbert Nash were honored in the March on Washington in 1963 but were excluded from speaking. In 1964, Richardson and Malcom X cofounded ACT, a national organization created to fight for Black Liberation.   Gloria Richardson said: “A first-class citizen does not beg for freedom. A first-class citizen does not plead to the white power-structure to give him something that the whites have no power to give or take away. Human rights are human rights, not white rights.” Richardson moved to New York City, where she worked locally in Harlem on civil rights and economic development. When asked how she would like to be remembered, Richardson replied, “I guess I would like for them to say I was true to my belief in Black people as a race.”