About Heather Gray

By Heather Gray

January 7, 2020

Justice Initiative

Preface

Brief Biographical Information

Introduction

 

I, Heather Gray, am an activist, journalist and media specialist. I am the founder and editor of the "Justice Initiative" and I am the radio producer, along with co-producer Ernest Dunkley, of the "Just Peace" program on the WRFG-FM (89.3FM) community radio station in Atlanta, Georgia. I hold a Bachelor's Degree in Anthropology from Emory University and Georgia State University and a Master's Degree in Sociology from Georgia State University.

 

Heather in Australia 1970s

I have been involved in regional, national and international organizing work, research, advocacy and peace and justice issues since the 1960's. 

In October 1967, I participated in the 'March Against the Pentagon' in Washington DC in opposition to the Vietnam War. (Interestingly, my next encounter with the Pentagon was in September 2011 when the planes hit the World Trade Center in New York . I was in Washington DC at the time and in a cab I drove by to witness the damage done by a plane that flew into the Pentagon, which was also a part of that September 11 aggression plan.)

In April 1968, I assisted in the funeral for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. by driving for the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) to transport those coming into Atlanta for the funeral. This included Ralph Bunch, who was representing the United Nations at the funeral, and Allard Lowenstein, who was a civil rights activist attorney from New York.  I also marched in the King funeral procession.  

In the latter part of 1968, I moved to Australia to marry an Australian (who had been an exchange student in Atlanta). I was also thinking I was getting away the excessive violence and racism in America only to begin marching against the Vietnam War in Australia, as well as advocating for immigrant and aboriginal rights. While ultimately living in Singapore in the early 1970s (due to my husband's work), I visited Vietnam during the war. 

	Heather with guitar (1980s)

I came back to Atlanta in the mid-1970s. In the photo on the right is me with my guitar in the 1980s. I used to sing in coffee shops in Atlanta in the 1960s.

 

In the 1980's, I was also engaged in numerous research projects both at Emory University and Georgia State University in Atlanta, Georgia on health and immigration issues. One of the patients I became friends with, during this research work, was a Black veteran of the Vietnam War who was on dialysis. His kidney failure was due to his exposure to Monsanto's toxic 'Agent Orange' used in Vietnam.

In the 1980s, I served as the director of the Non-Violent Social Change Program for Coretta Scott King at Atlanta's King Center, in which I was also engaged in research on non-violent social change. Below, I am pictured with renowned civil rights activist John Lewis on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama in the 1980s. This is also along with youth who were participating in and learning about the civil rights movement in the King Center's Non-Violent Program. Here John Lewis is explaining to us, at the very spot where it occurred, of what happened in the violence against him by the Alabama State Troopers on Selma's Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965. That dreadful incident became appropriately known as "Bloody Sunday."

Heather with John Lewis in Selma 1980s

In 1987, I was the southeast regional coordinator for the National Africa Peace Committee . The position called for extensive organizing in 7 southeast states to place 30 speakers for engagements to share information about U.S. policies in Africa.

In 1989, I was a consultant for the United Church of Christ of the Philippines to research issues relevant to low-income agriculture and land issues and to participate in fact-finding missions to investigate the summary executions of Filipino activists and civilians by US supported paramilitary groups.

Heather (lft) in the Cordillera in the Philippines with Filipino women activists (1989)

I served as Director of Communications for the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/ Land Assistance Fund (Federation/LAF) from 1991 to 2013. The Federation is the largest organization in the United States working with Black farmers and the rural poor across the southern US with offices in five states. The primary focus of the Federation/ LAF's work is

	Heather & Tandi Gcabashe and others in Johannesburg (1994) during the first democratic elections in South Africa

saving Black owned land  and empowerment through cooperative economic development.   

Much of my work focused on assisting  farmers in filing their claims in the Pigford Class Action Lawsuit, which was filed by Black farmers against the US Department of Agriculture in 1998 because of discrimination against them in receiving loans and other services.

 

 

I also served as an international election observer in the first democratic elections in South Africa in 1994 under the auspices of the 'Lawyers Committee For Civil Rights Under Law' in Washington, DC. 

In 1995, I joined women in the southern US region, led by Shirley Sherrod, to attend the 'UN World Conference on Women' in Beijing, China.

 

I am presently on the board of WRFG-Atlanta 89.3FM, where I also served as president of the board in the early 2000s, and I was recently elected to serve on the board of the Pacifica Foundation; I also served on the American Forum in Georgia (a media entity throughout the US that initiated articles/editorials for print media and radio on issues relevant to community concerns).