Samuel Frederick Yette

Samuel Frederick Yette was the twelfth child of thirteen children born to Cora Lee Rector Yette and Frank Mack Yette. Samuel was born on July 2, 1929, in Harriman, Tennessee. He died peacefully on January 21, 2011, in Laurel, MD, after battling Alzheimer’s Disease. Early in his life, Samuel accepted Jesus Christ as his personal savior, and counted on the Lord’s strength to support him through the struggles and joys of life. Samuel grew up during the days of racial segregation, but his intellect, fortitude and family pride enabled him to excel in school, and eventually attend Morristown College for one year, and then Tennessee State University, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in English, in 1951. While at TSU, Samuel founded the college newspaper, The Meter, which still reports the news today. He also was initiated into his beloved Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., in 1949. After college, Samuel joined the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War, and served from 1951 to 1953. After leaving the Air Force, Samuel taught high school, and coached high school football and basketball in Rockwood and Chattanooga, TN, before embarking upon a career in journalism. In 1956, Samuel enrolled in the University of Indiana, where he earned a master’s degree in journalism in 1959. Samuel’s first journalistic milestone occurred in 1956, when he teamed with legendary photojournalist Gordon Parks to write a four-part series on civil rights in the South for LIFE Magazine. Samuel became a reporter for the Afro-American Newspapers in Baltimore and Washington, -- where he covered the civil rights movement -- and an associate editor of Ebony Magazine, from 1957 to 1959. Family was paramount to Samuel. While attending a dance at Knoxville College in Tennessee, he met Sadie Lee Walton, the love of his life whom he married in 1958. Samuel and Sadie had two sons, Frederick and Michael. Tragically, in 1983, Sadie lost her life after a drunk driver hit their car as she and Samuel were driving to a Christmas party. Samuel’s career included positions as the director of information for Tuskegee Institute (now University)(1959-62); first black reporter for the Dayton Journal Herald newspaper (1962); press liaison and then executive secretary of the Peace Corps (1963-1964); special assistant for civil rights to the director of the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity (1964-67); first black Washington correspondent for Newsweek Magazine (1968-71); and Professor of Journalism at Howard University (1972-86). While at Newsweek, Samuel also appeared on several television news programs, including Face the Nation and Meet the Press, where he was one of the reporters who questioned the guests. Unbeknownst to Newsweek, Samuel worked tirelessly through many nights after work to write his book, The Choice: The Issue of Black Survival in America, which was released in 1971. The Choice dared to allege that various federal government programs were aimed at re-enslaving, perhaps even wiping out, black Americans. To say the least, the book was controversial and Newsweek fired Samuel. Always a fighter, he sued Newsweek and won before the EEOC, but lost in the courts when the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear his case. Nevertheless, the book won awards and became a text book in 50 universities around the country, including Howard University and Chicago University. A decade after the book was released, Samuel formed his own publishing company, Cottage Books, Inc., so that he could republish The Choice himself. Samuel also published a second book, Washington and Two Marches, 1963 and 1983. Samuel was an adviser to Jesse Jackson in his 1984 Presidential campaign, and a photographer in Jackson’s 1988 Presidential bid. Over the years, Samuel continued to write syndicated editorials and columns which appeared in newspapers such as the Richmond Free Press, the Tennessee Tribune and the Afro-American Newspapers. Samuel was well-traveled; he visited the U.S.S.R., Africa, the Middle East, and China, the latter as part of a press delegation led by his friend and renowned journalist, Carl T. Rowan. Wherever Samuel went, he was always carrying a camera around his neck. Samuel is survived by his son, Frederick and his wife, Alesha Matthews Yette, of Washington, D.C.; his son Michael, of Forestville, MD; his adoring granddaughters, Maya, who is attending Harvard Law School, and Laila, who is attending UNC-Greensboro; his sisters, Johnnie Jones, of Louisville, KY, Marie Reynolds, of Oak Ridge, TN; Lyda McKeldin, of Chattanooga, TN; Alma Ruth Wright, of Conyers, GA, Imogene Gibson, of Miami Beach, FL; one brother, Emmett Yette, of Knoxville, TN; a sister in law, Doris Brown, of Chicago, IL; two brothers in law, Isiah Walton, of Indianapolis, IN, and Eddie Walton, of Eutaw, AL; and a host of other relatives and friends.

Tributes

Samuel Frederick Yette

July 2, 1929 - January 21, 2011