Early Life and Family
Washington, the great-grandson of an American slave, was born in Dawson, Georgia and raised in Jamestown, New York. He graduated with a bachelor's degree from Howard University and his law degree from Howard University School of Law. He was a member of Omega Psi Phi fraternity.
After graduating from Howard in 1948, Washington was hired as a supervisor for D.C.'s Alley Dwelling Authority. He worked for the authority until a 1961 appointment by John F. Kennedy as the Executive Director of the National Capital Housing Authority, the housing department of the then-Federally controlled District of Columbia. In 1966 he took the same position in the administration of New York City mayor John Lindsay.
His first wife, Bennetta Bullock, died in 1991. By this marriage he had one daughter, sociologist Bennetta Jules-Rosette. In 1994 he married Mary Burke.
Read more about this topic: Walter Washington
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or family:
“For the writer, there is nothing quite like having someone say that he or she understands, that you have reached them and affected them with what you have written. It is the feeling early humans must have experienced when the firelight first overcame the darkness of the cave. It is the communal cooking pot, the Street, all over again. It is our need to know we are not alone.”
—Virginia Hamilton (b. 1936)
“I set forth a humble and inglorious life; that does not matter. You can tie up all moral philosophy with a common and private life just as well as with a life of richer stuff. Each man bears the entire form of man’s estate.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
“The family story tells, and it was told true,
of my great-grandfather who begat eight
genius children and bought twelve almost new
grand pianos. He left a considerable estate
when he died.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)