- Ralph Bunche was born in 1904 in Detroit Michigan.
- Ralph Bunche was a scholar, a diplomat, and an American statesman best remembered as the United Nations mediator who negotiated new armistice agreements with the Arab states following the establishment of the state of Israel.
- As a result of his work, he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950. He was the first person of color to receive the award.
- From the moment Bunche entered UCLA as an undergraduate, he excelled academically.
- Barred from the university’s white debating society, Bunche and his peers formed a separate group where they argued questions of world peace.
- Bunche graduated summa cum laude. He earned a Ph.D in government at Harvard.
- Bunche taught at Howard University in Washington D.C.
- During WWII he took a leave of absence from Howard to serve with the U.S. Office of Strategic Services (now known as the CIA)
- Bunche worked with the United Nations to help decolonized trust territories to be administered in teh best interests of their citizens.
- Ralph Bunche died in 1978 in Queens, New York.
Reference: Eakins Press Foundation. Image: Famous People web site