Born and raised in Los Angeles, his family’s roots in California go back to the first years of the 20th century. He was educated entirely in public schools, and earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in history from Hunter College of the City University of New York and his Ph.D. in American history from Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. He is the author of three books, most recently The Wilmington Ten: Violence, Injustice, and the Rise of Black Politics in the 1970s (UNC Press, 2016). He is delighted to have this affiliation with NCGrowth.