Dick Gregory

Comedian, Social Activist. Born Richard Claxton Gregory, he became well known during the 1960s for a "biting" type of comedy that attacked racial prejudice and gave a comedic voice to the American Civil Rights Movement. He grew up poor and had to work to support his family. He became interested in sports in high school and received an athletic scholarship from Southern Illinois University in 1951. He left college in 1953 to join the United States Army, where he would perform comedy routines during military shows. After a brief return to Southern Illinois in 1955, he tried to break through the national comedy circuit in Chicago. His break came in 1961 when a "one-nighter" at the Chicago Playboy Club turned into a six-week stint that earned him a profile in Time magazine and a television appearance on “The Jack Paar Show". In his subsequent appearances on television, in nightclubs, and on the concert stage, he made poverty, segregation, and racial discrimination his comedy targets. Active in the Civil Rights Movement, he participated in numerous demonstrations and was arrested for civil disobedience several times and in 1963, was jailed in Birmingham, Alabama. His activism spurred him to run for mayor of Chicago in 1966 and for the presidency of the United States in 1968. In the 1970s, he turned away from comedy and became focused on political issues that he felt was important. During this time, he also became interested in nutrition and began a successful business venture with his nutritional product, the "Bahamian Diet", around which he built Dick Gregory Health Enterprises, Inc. Through his company, he targeted the lower life expectancy of black Americans, which he attributed to poor nutrition and drug and alcohol abuse. He also authored several books and became a motivational speaker during the later part of his career. He made a brief comeback to the comedy circuit during the mid 1990s. He passed away of heart failure.