Reagon, Cordell Hull, 1943-1996

Cordell Hull Reagon (February 22, 1943 – November 12, 1996) was an American singer and activist. He was the founding member of The Freedom Singers of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), a leader of the Albany Movement and a Freedom Rider during the Civil Rights Movement.Reagon was born in Nashville, Tennessee, and was named for Cordell Hull, the Secretary of State under President Franklin D. Roosevelt Reagon was 16 years of age in 1959 when he emerged as a leader of the civil rights movement in Albany, Georgia. In 1962, at the encouragement of friend Pete Seeger, Reagon founded The Freedom Singers, a quartet of two men and two women who sang gospel-style freedom songs to rouse support for the civil rights movement. Reagon's two marriages—to Bernice Johnson Reagon of Albany, Georgia, and to Merble Harrington Reagon of New York, New York, ended in divorce. One of his children is Toshi Reagon; one of his sisters is Meryle Joy Reagon.

Cordell Hull Reagon, whose powerful tenor voice spread the message of the civil rights movement throughout the United States and Canada in the 1960's as a member of the Freedom Singers of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, was found dead on Nov. 12 in his apartment in Berkeley, Calif. He was 53.

The Berkeley police said Mr. Reagon was a homicide victim.

Mr. Reagon was 16 in 1959 when he emerged as a leader of the civil rights movement in Albany, Ga. James Forman, who became the executive secretary of S.N.C.C., called him ''the baby of the movement.''