Leon Van Dyke

Civil rights activist Leon Van Dyke was born on March 30, 1934 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Isabel Van Dyke and Glen Roy Marks. He received his B.A. degree in sociology in 1971 and his M.A. degree in education in 1973 from the State University of New York at Albany.

After serving in the U.S. Army in the 1950s Van Dyke moved to Albany, New York in 1960, where he shined shoes and waited tables while trying to secure a construction job for the South Mall project. In 1966, he picketed the Albany union hall to protest employment discrimination, which grew into a civil rights organization known as The Brothers, who organized boycotts of local stores, police station sit-ins, and rent strikes. The group included Van Dyke, Gordon Van Ness, Pete Jones, Sam McDowell, Earl Thorpe, and Robert Gene Dobbs, who ran a lunch program for children, a clinic for pregnant women, and held public events that featured black leaders like Stokely Carmichael and Eldridge Cleaver. In 1967, Van Dyke worked as a campaign manager for Samuel McDowell and Robert Gene Dobbs. The Brothers advocated for improvements in sanitation and early childhood education, as well as the establishment of the Whitney M. Young Jr. Health Center in 1971. Van Dyke also co-edited The Brothers’ biweekly newspaper, The Albany Liberator, until the group disbanded in 1971. Van Dyke went on to work in the civil rights division of the New York State Department of Education, as a research associate for the Black and Hispanic Legislative Caucus, as well as a school administrator.

Van Dyke’s contributions to civil rights in Albany have been featured in numerous articles, including in the Times Union newspaper, William Kennedy’s 1983 book O Albany!, and the 2014 documentary and the 2022 exhibit at the Albany Public Library, titled The Brothers: The Forgotten Struggle for Civil Rights.

Van Dyke lives in Albany, New York with his wife, Zen Van Dyke. He has three children, Kahina Van Dyke, Mhelco Van Dyke, and Lucy Van Dyke.

Leon Van Dyke was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on August 22, 2022.