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“Alpha men don’t follow footprints; we make the path.”
-Alpha Brother (unknown)
Quincy Jones
American record producer, composer, arranger, record executive, conductor, trumpeter, film and television producer and bandleader. During his seven-decade career, he received dozens of accolades, including 28 Grammy Awards, a Primetime Emmy Award, and a Tony Award as well as nominations for seven Academy Awards and four Golden Globe Awards.
Martin Luther King Jr.
Civil rights activist and Baptist minister who was a leader of the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. He advanced civil rights for people of color in the United States through the use of nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of legalized discrimination, which most commonly affected African Americans.
Lionel Richie
Singer, songwriter, musician, record producer, and television personality. He rose to fame in the 1970s as a songwriter and the co-lead singer of the Motown group Commodores; writing and recording the hit singles "Easy", "Sail On", "Three Times a Lady", and "Still" with the group before his departure.
Keenon Ivory Wayans
Actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He is a member of the Wayans family of entertainers. Wayans first came to prominence as the host and creator of the 1990–1994 Fox sketch comedy series In Living Color. He has produced, directed or written several films, starting with Hollywood Shuffle, which he cowrote, in 1987. Most of his films have included him and one or more of his siblings in the cast.
Jesse Owens
Track and field athlete who made history at the 1936 Olympic Games by winning four gold medals, setting Olympic records in each event. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest athletes in track and field history.
Frederick Douglass
Social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. He was the most important leader of the movement for African-American civil rights in the 19th century.
Duke Ellington
Jazz pianist, composer, and leader of his eponymous jazz orchestra from 1924 through the rest of his life. Ralph J. Gleason called him "America's most important composer.
Donny Hathaway
Soul singer, keyboardist, songwriter, backing vocalist, and arranger who Rolling Stone described as a "soul legend". His most popular songs include "The Ghetto", "This Christmas", "Someday We'll All Be Free", and "Little Ghetto Boy". He has been inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame and won one Grammy Award from four nominations. Hathaway was also posthumously honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019.
Andrew Young
Politician, diplomat, and activist. Beginning his career as a pastor, Young was an early leader in the civil rights movement, serving as executive director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and as a close confidant to Martin Luther King Jr. A member of the Democratic Party, Young later became active in politics, serving as a U.S. Congressman from Georgia, United States Ambassador to the United Nations in the Carter Administration, and 55th Mayor of Atlanta. He was the first African American elected to Congress from Georgia since Reconstruction, as well as one of the first two African Americans elected to Congress from the former Confederacy since Reconstruction. Since leaving office, Young has founded or served in many organizations working on issues of public policy and political lobbying.
Adam Clayton Powell Jr.
Baptist pastor and politician who represented the Harlem neighborhood of New York City in the United States House of Representatives from 1945 until 1971. He was the first African American to be elected to Congress from New York, as well as the first from any state in the Northeast.[2] Re-elected for nearly three decades, Powell became a powerful national politician of the Democratic Party, and served as a national spokesman on civil rights and social issues. He also urged United States presidents to support emerging nations in Africa and Asia as they gained independence after colonialism.
Dick Gregory
Comedian, actor, writer, activist and social critic. Gregory became popular among the African-American communities in the southern United States with his "no-holds-barred" sets, poking fun at the bigotry and racism in the United States. In 1961 he became a staple in the comedy clubs, appeared on television, and released comedy record albums.
Stuart Scott
Sportscaster and anchor on ESPN, including on SportsCenter. Known for his hip-hop style and use of catchphrases, Scott was also a regular for the network in its National Basketball Association (NBA) and National Football League (NFL) coverage. Scott was honored at the ESPY Awards in 2014 with the Jimmy V Award for his fight against cancer.
W.E.B. Du Bois
Sociologist, writer, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist. He completed graduate work at Harvard University, where he was the first African American to earn a doctorate. Du Bois rose to national prominence as a leader of the Niagara Movement, a group of black civil rights activists seeking equal rights.
Hill Harper
Actor and political candidate, who is known for his roles as Dr. Sheldon Hawkes in CSI: NY, Agent Spelman Boyle in Limitless, and Dr. Marcus Andrews in The Good Doctor. Harper was a candidate in the Democratic Primary in the 2024 United States Senate election in Michigan to fill the seat of retiring incumbent, Senator Debbie Stabenow.
Thurgood Marshall
Civil rights lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. He was the Supreme Court's first African-American justice. Before his judicial service, he was an attorney who fought for civil rights, leading the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Marshall was a prominent figure in the movement to end racial segregation in American public schools. He won 29 of the 32 civil rights cases he argued before the Supreme Court, culminating in the Court's landmark 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which rejected the separate but equal doctrine and held segregation in public education to be unconstitutional. President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed Marshall to the Supreme Court in 1967. A staunch liberal, he frequently dissented as the Court became increasingly conservative.
Raphael Warnock
Politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.
John H. Johns
Business executive and publisher. He was the founder in 1942 of the Johnson Publishing Company, headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Johnson's company, with its creation of Ebony (1945) and Jet (1951) magazines, was among the most influential African-American business in media in the second half of the twentieth century, peaking at 9 million subscribers.
Robert F. Smith
Businessman. He is the founder, chairman, and CEO of private equity firm Vista Equity Partners.[1][2] Globally, Smith is among theThe World's Billionaires with a net worth exceeding US$10.6 billion as of 2025.
An Alpha Phi Alpha member’s greatest interest is outside himself.
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