Rest In Power: Notable Black Folks Who We’ve Lost In 2022

1. William Poogie Hart

William “Poogie” Hart, the Grammy Award-winning lead singer and songwriter of the R&B group The Delfonics, has passed away. He was 77.

According to TMZ, Hart had complained of trouble breathing, and he was taken to Temple University Hospital on Thursday (July 14), where he died due to complications from surgery.

The Delfonics were founded in Philadelphia in the ’60s with Hart and his brother Wilbert alongside Randy Cain, Ritchie Daniels and Thom Bell. The Sound of Philadelphia, otherwise known as T.S.O.P, became a hallmark of soul music in the ’60s and ’70s and the Delfonics were one of the forefathers with hit singles such as “La-La Means I Love You,” “Hey! Love,” “Didn’t I (Blow Your Mind This Time),” and “Ready or Not Here I Come (Can’t Hide From Love).”

Landing on Kenneth Gamble & Leon Huff’s Philadelphia International Records label in the ’70s, the group was a label powerhouse alongside noted singers and legends, including The O’Jays, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, Teddy Pendergrass, MFSB, The Stylistics, Patti LaBelle and Lou Rawls.

The group would win a Grammy in 1971 for “Didn’t I” for Best Performance By A Duo Or Group, Vocal Or Instrumental and would later become the backbone for several ’90s hits, including The Fugees’ “Ready Or Not” and Missy Elliott’s “Sock It To Me.”

After the original band split in 1975, former members created smaller groups to keep the sound and spirit alive. The Delfonics scored twelve top-20 hits on the Billboard R&B singles charts.

2. Traci Braxton

3. Dwayne Haskins

Former Washington quarterback Dwayne Haskins has died after being stuck by a car in South Florida on Saturday Morning (April 9th). The news was First reported by ESPN Insider Adam Schefter and confirmed by his agent, Cedric Saunders. Haskins was in Florida training with Steelers Quarterbacks, Running backs and Wide Receivers for the upcoming 2022 season.

4. André Leon Talley

André Leon Talley quickly gained his fame and notoriety as the creative director of Vogue as he worked alongside Vogue’s editor-in-chief, Anna Wintour.

As reported by TMZ, Vogue’s former creative director had been in the hospital battling unknown illnesses. Sources say that Talley passed away Tuesday at a hospital in New York.

André was a key component to the vision and overall aesthetic of Vogue in the ’80s and ’90s. He climbed the ladder in the ranks of Vogue’s magazine, becoming the news director from 1983-87 and then in ’88, ascended to Vogue’s creative director.

Talley was also an influential fashion journalist who worked at Women’s Wear Daily and Vogue and was a regular in the front row of fashion shows in New York and Europe. Standing at 6-feet-6 inches tall with a loud personality, bold looks, and originality at its finest, you could not miss, André Leon Talley.

In a 2013 Vanity Fair spread titled “The Eyeful Tower,” Talley was described as “perhaps the industry’s most important link to the past.”

5. Ronnie Spector

Ronnie Spector, the pop music singer who rose to fame in the 1960s as part of the girl group the Ronnettes, died Wednesday at the age of 78. The Associated Press reported that Spector’s death came after a battle with cancer. 

Born Veronica Bennett, the New York City native who was raised in Harlem began performing with her older sister, Estelle Bennett, and their cousin Nedra Talley, as the Ronettes in the early 1960s. They were officially discovered after winning the renowned amateur night talent competition at the world-famous Apollo Theater. 

After signing to the record label of music producer Phil Spector — who would later marry Ronnie Spector — the Ronettes turned the world performing the likes of “Be My Baby” and “Walking in the Rain,” two of the group’s signature hit songs. 

According to Biography.com: 

“… the Ronettes cultivated an image modeled on the streetwise women of their Spanish Harlem roots. Spector in particular is now known as “the original bad girl of rock n’ roll”—she and her band mates wore dark mascara and short skirts, which pushed the envelope at that time.” 

Ronnie ultimately went solo in 1964 and enjoyed a career that spanned through 2017, when the Ronettes released their first single in decades. 

She and Phil Spector married in 1968, after which the couple adopted three children. Phil Spector would ultimately die in prison as a convicted murder following their divorce. 

Far Out Magazine recalled the tumultuous relationship the couple had. 

“Phil Spector was the definition of abusive. From the get-go, owing to jealousy and other questionable elements of his ideation, he turned Ronnie into a shadow of her former self. Over the course of their marriage, Phil Spector became as controlling and psychologically dominant as was possible. He turned his 23-room mansion into a maximum-security prison. It boasted chain-link fences, barbed wire and intercoms in every room, making it nigh on impossible for Ronnie to leave. Her husband had come to embody Orwell’s Big Brother.” 

In 1998, the Ronettes sued Phil Spector claiming he owed them more than $10 million in unpaid royalties. 

The New York Times reported at the time: 

“The plaintiffs claim that after recording 28 songs with Mr. Spector, they were paid a pittance in the early 1960’s, and that Mr. Spector has wrongly deprived them of millions, not only from the sale of their records but also from the licensing of their hit songs in commercials and television shows like ”Moonlighting,” and in films like ”Dirty Dancing” and ”Goodfellas.”” 

6. Harvard Law School Professor Lani Guinier

Civil rights lawyer, legal scholar and professor Lani Guinier, whose nomination to serve as the head of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division in President Bill Clinton’s administration was derailed thanks to Republican opposition based on the topic of race, has died at the age of 71. 

She died following complications from Alzheimer’s disease, the Washington Post reported, a citing family member. 

Guinier broke a number of racial barriers in both academia and the legal profession with her work at Ivy League colleges, including Harvard Law School, where she became the first Black woman to be granted tenure. 

On Friday, Harvard Law School Dean John Manning eulogized Guinier in a message to faculty and staff sharing the news of her death. 

“Her scholarship changed our understanding of democracy — of why and how the voices of the historically underrepresented must be heard and what it takes to have a meaningful right to vote. It also transformed our understanding of the educational system and what we must do to create opportunities for all members of our diverse society to learn, grow, and thrive in school and beyond,” Manning wrote in part. 

Despite all of Guinier’s amazing accomplishments in life — including but certainly not limited to being a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University as well as being assistant counsel at the NAACP LDF and serving as special assistant to Assistant Attorney General Drew S. Days in President Jimmy Carter’s administration — she will likely be most remembered for her controversial nomination to serve in the Department of Justice decades later. 

After Clinton nominated Guinier for Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights in 1993, Republicans pounced because of her views on race and racial discrimination. As an explainer in The Atlantic pointed out, critical race theory became a part of public discourse during the confirmation hearing. Clinton was consequently accused of not fighting hard enough, or at all, for Guinier’s nomination and ultimately withdrew it. 

A Wall Street Journal op-ed writer went so low as to call Guinier “Clinton’s Quota Queen,” which was just a few racist inches away from calling her a “welfare queen.” 

Guinier, a leading legal mind in the area of alternative voting rights, ending up taking a bullet for the Democratic team. She didn’t protest (too loudly) about the smear job done on her by Republican hatchet men. But she did have some choice words during an NAACP conference following the nomination debacle. 

“I endured the personal humiliation of being vilified as a madwoman with strange hair — you know what that means — a strange name and strange ideas, ideas like democracy, freedom and fairness that mean all people must be equally represented in our political process,” Guinier said at the time. “But lest any of you feel sorry for me, according to press reports the president still loves me. He just won’t give me a job.”

7. James Mtume

Grammy award-winning musician James Mtume reportedly passed away on Sunday, Jan 9 just six days after his 76th birthday. Born James Forman, he was a renowned musician, songwriter, and producer.  

A Philadelphia native, Mtume was exposed to musical greatness from birth as the son of Jazz saxophonist Jimmy Health and stepson of James “Hen Gates” Forman a pianist for Charlie Parker. His love of jazz would continue in his own career joining Miles Davis’ band from 1971-1975 as a percussionist. During that time Mtume recorded three acoustic jazz compositions. 

He later took his eclectic jazz sound, experimenting with digital sounds to create a jazz/R&B/funk blend called “Sophistafunk.” Mtume reached new heights with his self-titled group, recording on the Epic Label from 1978 to 1986.

Their hit single “Juicy Fruit” would go on to become a widely sampled song in the world of Hip Hop. In a 2018 interview with NBC News, Mtume shared that allowing the song to be sampled for “Juicy” by Biggie introduced a new generation to the classic.

He also wrote hit singles for artists like Teddy Pendergrass, Phyllis Hyman, Mary J. Blige and K-Ci & JoJo. Working with guitarist Reggie Lucas, Mtume co-wrote the classic “The Closer I Get to You” sung by Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway. 

“Never Knew Love Like This,” which Mtume wrote for songstress Stephanie Mills, won a Grammy for Best R&B song. 

8. Singer Jessie D. (Jessie Lee Daniels) of The Force MD’s

Singer Jessie D. (Jessie Lee Daniels) of The Force MD’s passed away at 57

9. Calvin Simon

On January 6, P-Funk members Bootsie Collins and George Clinton confirmed the death of one their own. One of P-Funk’s original vocalists, Calvin Simon, has died at age 79. Bootsie and George took to social media to announce their friend’s passing.

10. Sidney Poitier

Oscar-winning actor Sir Sidney Poitier has died. An icon of black cinema, Poitier was also an activist, director, and ambassador to his native home of The Bahamas. His death was confirmed by Bahamian Minister of Foreign Affairs Fred Mitchell. He was 94 years old.

11. Max Julien

Max Julien, star of “The Mack,” passed away at the age of 88. 

12. Jessie Lee Daniels

Jessie Lee Daniels Of The Force MD’s Dies At 57