New York lost a prominent community leader, scholar, and civil rights activist this week. Alice Green, who grew up in the Adirondacks, spent much of her life advocating for incarcerated people across New York. She founded the Center for Law and Justice in Albany, in 1985, and then worked for New York State under Governor Mario Cuomo.
She made her first run for elected office in 1998 when she ran for Lieutenant Governor on the Green Party ticket. She also ran for Mayor in the City of Albany, in 2005.
Green grew up in the small hamlet of Witherbee, in Essex County. She wrote a memoir last year about growing up black in the Adirondacks.
Green had in recent years been using her voice to share more of the black history that scholars have been uncovering in the Adirondacks.
She was featured in our latest Mountain Lake PBS documentary, Adirondacks For All, on the efforts to bring more of that history to life, and to help increase diversity in the Adirondack Park. Alice Green died on August 20th, in Albany. She was 84 years old.