Albert J. Dunmore

Inducted 1994

editor, Michigan Chronicle

Al Dunmore spent decades fighting discrimination and words were his weapons,” said the nomination statement about the late managing editor of the Michigan Chronicle. Born in 1915, second oldest of ten children, Mr. Dunmore graduated from Hampton Institute with a degree in journalism and education. He took a road less traveled throughout his life. He never searched for an escape that would have provided an easier passage. After more than 20 years at the Pittsburgh Courier, Mr. Dunmore moved to the Michigan Chronicle in 1961 where he joined Longworth Quinn, his Hampton classmate and the first black journalist inducted into the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame. Together they became powerful and inspirational leaders in African-American journalism. Mr. Dunmore joined the Chrysler Corporation in 1968 as a specialist in urban affairs, but, forever the journalist, he returned to the Chronicle in 1988 as an editorial consultant. He contributed more to the city than just his journalistic talents. He always encouraged racial unification in Detroit and in 1988 helped plan the National Urban League Conference in the city. He died a year later in 1989.

Along the journalistic journey that led him to Detroit, he exposed racism in the Philadelphia Police Department, investigated segregation in the Armed Forces during World War II and escaped threats by Ku Klux Klan for reporting civil rights abuse in the South. He won an honor of distinction for a series of articles on the United States Supreme Court ruling to desegregate schools. “Black journalists would do well to try growing into the journalistic clothes that Al Dunmore wore,” said Danton Wilson, former executive editor of the Michigan Chronicle.