TROY, N.Y. (NEWS10) — Bobby Seale, a co-founder of the Black Panthers, will be visiting Hudson Valley Community College (HVCC) on Thursday, February 9, at 6 p.m. The public is welcome to attend and come see Seale talk at the Bulmer Telecommunications Center Auditorium at the Troy campus.
Seale will sit down with Ainsley Thomas, HVCC’s chief diversity officer, to talk about the evolution of resistance to racism in America since the founding of the Black Panthers up through today. He is the author of “Seize the Time: The Story of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newtown.” Seale and Newton met in 1962 at a protest, became friends, and formed the Black Panthers in 1966, later renamed the Black Panther Party.
Seale also gained notoriety as one of the Chicago Seven who were protesters arrested during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968. They were tried for conspiracy to start a riot, for which Seale served a four-year jail sentence. Following his jail sentence, he renounced violence and focused on improving black neighborhoods and advancing other social causes.
Seale’s interview at HVCC will be the third annual event in the Martin Luther King Jr. Speaker Series for Black History Month.