Chuck Stone awarded Pulitzer Prize citation

Charles Sumner “Chuck” Stone Jr., former journalism professor at UNC, was awarded a special citation from the Pulitzer Prizes on May 5, 2025, for his groundbreaking work as a journalist covering the Civil Rights Movement, his pioneering role as the first Black columnist at the Philadelphia Daily News and for co-founding the National Association of Black Journalists 50 years ago.

Stone became the Walter Spearman Professor at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1991 after a varied and distinguished career spanning many sectors. At Carolina, he taught censorship and magazine writing and won multiple teaching excellence awards.

Stone received six honorary doctorates and multiple awards and citations including Lindback Foundation Excellence in Teaching, Undergraduate Excellence in Teaching, Distinguished Service in Journalism Award, National Association of Black Journalists Lifetime Achievement Award and the Free Spirit Award from The Freedom Forum.

Stone was born in St. Louis, Mo., on July 21, 1924. Raised in Hartford, Conn., he graduated from Hartford High in 1942. In 1943, Stone received U.S. Air Corps flight/navigator training in Tuskegee, Ala., during WWII.  

He attended Wesleyan College where he majored in political science and economics and graduated in 1948. In 1951, he earned a master’s degree in sociology at the University of Chicago. He attended the University of Connecticut Law School for one year from 1954-1955. 

Stone then became an overseas representative for Cooperative for America Relief to Everywhere (CARE) in India, Egypt and Gaza in 1956. Upon his return in 1958, he joined the New York Age, first as a reporter and then as its editor. 

From 1960 to 1963, he was editor and White House correspondent for the Washington Afro-American where he applied diligent pressure towards the Kennedy administration to move forward with their Civil Rights agenda. Stone briefly became the editor-in-chief of the Chicago Daily Defender in 1963, but he was fired in 1964 for refusing to decrease his continued criticisms on the powerful Chicago mayor. 

Stone then became special assistant to U.S. Rep. Adam Clayton Powell Jr. when Powell was chairman of the U.S. House Education and Labor Committee. Rep. Powell would become a major influence on his life.  

After working with Powell, Stone embarked on a new career — writing. He edited a collection of Powell’s sermons titled “Keep the Faith, Baby,” followed by a book on a collection of Stone’s past columns while at the Age and Defender titled “Tell It Like It Is.” He next wrote “Black Political Power in America,” followed by the novel “King Strut,” which was based on a fictionalized character’s rise and fall similar to Adam Clayton Powell’s. Stone was a contributing author to “Through Different Eyes,” “Contemporary Black Thought: The Best of the Black Scholar,” “The Black Scholar,” “We’ll Take It From Here, Sarge” by Garry Trudeau and the D.H. Lawrence Review. 

In 1970, he became director of minority affairs at the Educational Testing Service (ETS) charged with the mission to investigate why minority students on average scored lower whites in Standard Aptitude Tests (SATs). He resigned citing institutional racism and apathy. He went on to help found the FairTest, the National Center for Fair and Open Testing. 

In 1972, the Philadelphia Daily News recruited Stone as their first black columnist. Over the next 19 years, he became an outspoken political and social critic. He denounced discrimination, racism, police brutality and ignorance. In addition, he provided commentary on local television and radio. 

Due to his focus on police brutality and the criminal justice system, he developed a reputation among criminal suspects as a safe person to whom to surrender as fugitives. More than 75 wanted suspects turned themselves into Stone. In 1981, he risked his life to help successfully release six hostages held at Pennsylvania’s Graterford Prison. 

While still at the Daily News, Stone began his career in education as a visiting lecturer at Bryn Mawr College’s Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research. In 1982, he was a fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. In 1985, he became a professor of English at University of Delaware, where he also taught journalism. 

Stone retired from UNC in 2005. The UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media established the Chuck Stone Program in 2007 to honor Stone’s legacy at the school. The program welcomes students from a broad range of backgrounds, perspectives, and lived experiences for a week of classroom study, real-world reporting, newsroom practice and mentorship from professional experts. 

Stone passed away in 2014 at the age of 89.