Don Freeman has dedicated his life to the liberation of oppressed people, especially people of African descent living in America.

Freeman grew up in Outhwaite Homes and moved to Glenville in 1953 at the age of 14. He attended Glenville High School for his senior year, which was the last year there was a Jewish Valedictorian. Education has always been valuable to him. So much so that he walked 45 minutes to Case Western University for class. . 

After college, Freeman taught English at now demolished Kanard Junior High in the Cleveland City School District for four years, now known as the Cleveland Metropolitan School District.  

He was let go for his political views and his association with Malcolm X and the Revolutionary Action Movement.

It didn’t matter that he was an excellent teacher,  “They also alleged that I was teaching black supremacy in my classes in terms of me teaching African American and African history in my classes which was considered sumbersive at the time in terms of deviating from the standard curriculum in the Cleveland City School District and throughout the United States at that point.”

After losing his job, Freeman was motivated to continue the fight for black liberation. In the summer of 1962, he met with another civil rights activist named Max Stanford Junior in Philadelphia. Together, they created the Revolutionary Action Committee, RAM, in the booth of an H&H restaurant. 

Following the organization’s launch in 1963, they established a publication called Black America. The publication became a platform for Freeman to publish work about African Americans’ struggle for liberation in the US. His writing helped solidify African Americans’ coalition with the anti imperialist struggles in other countries, which showed readers the international fight against the oppression of all people of color throughout the world. 

Freeman also founded the Afro American Institute in 1962, which was an affiliate of RAM. This was the first secular black nationalist organization in Cleveland since the Universal Negro Improvement Association founded by Marcus Garvey in 1914. His focus was to teach African and African American history, and continue the work of RAM. 

Since then Freeman has continued to write about major issues that affect African American locally and internationally in Vibrations, a magazine he founded with his late wife Norma.

Freeman has never let go of his mission, and has continued to fight against oppression in Cleveland. Today, he is an advocate for education reform with the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, and calls for community members and parents to do the same.