George Wiley

A photograph in which Johnnie Tillmon is on the left, and George Wiley (a founder of the National Welfare Rights Organization) is on the right.
George Wiley is on the right, and welfare activist Johnnie Tillmon is on the left.

George Alvin Wiley (26 February 1931 – 8 August 1973) was an American chemist and civil rights leader.

Wiley earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Rhode Island in 1953; received a doctorate in organic chemistry from Cornell University in 1957; fulfilled a six-month ROTC obligation as a first lieutenant in the United States Army at Fort Lee, Virginia; and subsequently accepted a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of California, Los Angeles. Wiley taught for two years at the University of California, Berkeley, whereupon he took a teaching position at Syracuse University in 1960. That same year, he founded the Syracuse chapter of Congress of Racial Equality. He later was a founder of the National Welfare Rights Organization.[1]

He was named on the master list of Nixon political opponents.

In August 1973, Wiley was reported missing and presumed drowned while sailing in Chesapeake Bay.[1] The George Wiley Award for Exceptional Performance in Organic Chemistry for students at the university of Syracuse is named in his honor.

Wiley was married and had a son and a daughter. His daughter is the civil rights activist Maya Wiley.[2]

Further reading

  • Carolyn P. DuBose: Champion of Welfare Rights. Ebony, April 1970, pp. 31-40 (excerpt (Google Books)
  • Nick Kotz and Mary Lynn Kotz, A Passion for Equality: George Wiley and the Movement (New York: W.W. Norton, 1977). ISBN 0-393-07517-6

Notes

  1. 1 2 Dr. George Wiley Feared Drowned; Civil Rights Leader, 42, Who Headed Welfare Group, Is Sought Off Maryland. New York Times. August, 10, 1973.
  2. ↑ "Maya Wiley's push for civil rights". Politico. July 21, 2014.
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