Julius Lester

Julius Lester (1939–2018) was an American author, educator, and civil rights activist born in St. Louis, Missouri, and raised in Kansas City, Kansas, and Nashville, Tennessee. He earned a B.A. in English from Fisk University in 1960 and taught for 32 years at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Lester wrote across children’s fiction, nonfiction, poetry, autobiography, and history, and his work often focused on African American culture, slavery, folklore, and civil rights. His books include To Be a Slave, which received a Newbery Honor, and John Henry (1994), a retelling illustrated by Jerry Pinkney.