Reverend Jesse Jackson’s work and activism spans decades, from joining the front lines of the civil rights movement to helping negotiate the release of American prisoners overseas.
Rainbow PUSH Coalition announced Friday that Jackson will step down as president of the group, a merger of two organizations he founded and whose national headquarters are at 930 E. 50th.
The civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2017.
The announcement will come at the annual Rainbow PUSH national convention, where Vice President Kamala Harris will address the civil rights organization on Sunday.
Here are some highlights from Jackson’s decades-long career in civil rights, social justice, politics and humanitarian work:
1941
Jesse Louis Burns was born on October 8, 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina. He took his stepfather’s surname in 1957.
1959-60
Jackson attends the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He later moved to the North Carolina Agricultural & Technical College.
1963
During the summer of 1963, Jackson became one of the “Greenville Eight,” a group of black students protesting at the whites-only public library in Greenville.
When they refuse to leave after being asked, the group is arrested for “disorderly conduct”.
1964
After graduating from North Carolina A&T, he enrolled at Chicago Theological Seminary, but dropped out before earning a degree.
Jesse Jackson (far right) joins Al Raby, the Rev. Martin Luther King and Ed Berry at the Civil Rights Summit in Chicago in 1966.
Chicago Sun-Times file photo
1965
Jackson goes to Selma, Alabama to march with the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. after “Bloody Sunday,” when Alabama Highway Patrol troopers attacked civil rights protesters outside Selma.
Soon after, he began working for King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. sitting in August 1966 with James Bevel, Jesse Jackson, Al Raby and others at Greater Mount Hope Baptist Church in Chicago.
1966
Jackson becomes the head of the Chicago chapter of the Leadership Conference’s Operation Breadbasket, a national effort dedicated to improving the employment opportunities of black Americans by opposing discriminatory hiring practices.
Jackson was also one of the leaders of King’s open housing marches in Chicago that year.
1967
Jackson became national director of Operation Breadbasket, serving from 1967 to 1971.
Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. he meets with other civil rights leaders on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 3, 1968, a day before he was assassinated at approximately the same location. From left are Hosea Williams, Jesse Jackson, King and Ralph Abernathy.
1968
Jackson is in Memphis, Tennessee, with King when the civil rights leader is assassinated on April 4, 1968. King had gone to Memphis to support striking garbage workers.
Later that year, Jackson becomes an ordained Baptist minister.
1971
Jackson resigns from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and forms Operation PUSH (People United to Save Humanity, later changed to “Serve Humanity.”) in Chicago.
The objectives of operation PUSH they were economic empowerment and the expansion of educational, business and employment opportunities for the disadvantaged and people of color.
The Reverend Jesse Jackson speaks to a crowd outside Chicago Police Department headquarters in August 1977 protesting a racist comment by a Chicago police officer.
1972
During the Democratic convention in Miami, Jackson and Chicago Ald. William Singer ousts Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley’s delegate slate.
1975
Jackson founded Push Excel (for Excellence Inc.) to support students striving for excellence in education while helping them with job placement.
The Reverend Jesse Jackson attends the funeral and burial of Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad in Chicago in February 1975.
Randy B. Leffingwell/Sun-Times
1983
Jackson enters the race for the 1984 Democratic presidential nomination.
He eventually garners more than 3 million votes during the primaries, finishing third in the race for the nomination behind Senator Gary Hart and former Vice President Walter Mondale, who becomes the nominee.
Jesse Jackson receives a memorial gift from Mayor Harold Washington in January 1984 after returning to Chicago from freeing a captured Navy aviator in Syria. Jackson was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination at the time.
1984
Jackson founds the National Rainbow Coalition, which grew out of his presidential campaign that year. The organization sought civil rights and equal employment and educational opportunities for black people, women and the LGBTQ community.
1988
Jackson runs for president again. He wins the Michigan primary, but Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis eventually wins the nomination.
1991
After meeting with Saddam Hussein, Jackson helps negotiate the release of foreign nationals held in Kuwait.
1996
Jackson returns to Operation PUSH and the Rainbow Coalition and merges the two groups.
Reverend Jesse Jackson and former President Bill Clinton speak at the 2001 PUSH Annual Convention in Chicago.
1997
President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright appointed Jackson as Special Envoy of the President and Secretary of State for the Promotion of Democracy in Africa.
1999
During the Kosovo war, Jackson goes to Yugoslavia to negotiate the release of three American prisoners of war serving in a peacekeeping unit. The soldiers had been captured on the border with Macedonia.
Reverend Jesse Jackson (second from right) leads a prayer with Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic (second from left), Yugoslav Foreign Minister Zivadin Jovanovic (left) and US Rep. Rod Blagojevich, Democrat. in Belgrade on May 1, 1999.
2000
President Bill Clinton awards Jackson the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America’s highest civilian honor.
2012
Jackson calls for the release of two Americans serving prison terms for treason in Gambia.
2017
Jackson announces that he has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.
Doctor Kiran Chekka injects the Reverend Jesse Jackson with the COVID-19 vaccine in the parking lot of Roseland Community Hospital on January 8, 2021.
2021
Jackson is publicly vaccinated against the COVID-19 vaccine in an effort to help build the black community’s confidence in the vaccine.
