Prostate Cancer: Notable Black People Who Died From Illness
O.J. Simpson And Other Notable Black People Who Died From Prostate Cancer
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U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin testifies during a House Committee on Armed Services hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on February 29, 2024, to examine the circumstances of the failure to communicate his absence during his recent hospitalization. | Source: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI / Getty
1. Stokely Carmichael

Civil rights organizer Stokely Carmichael, who later in life became known as Kwame Ture, died of prostate cancer in 1998. He was 57.
“The cause was prostate cancer, for which Mr. Ture had been treated at the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York in the last two years,” the New York Times reported in an obituary. “He once said his cancer ”was given to me by forces of American imperialism and others who conspired with them.'”
2. Eldridge Cleaver

Writer, activist and Black Panthers leader Eldridge Cleaver died in 1998 of prostate cancer. He was 62.
3. Langston Hughes

Harlem Renaissance poet and writer Langston Hughes died in 1965 following surgery for prostate cancer. He was 65.
4. Dexter Scott King

Dexter Scott King, the youngest son of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King, died on Jan. 22, 2024, after a “valiant battle with prostate cancer,” according to representatives from the King Center. The civil rights activist and attorney was 62 years old.
5. Joe Madison

Joe Madison, the award-winning radio legend and social activist also known as “The Black Eagle” whose eponymous live morning show helped bring attention to pressing human and civil rights issues, died on Feb. 1, 2024, following a yearslong battle with prostate cancer.
Madison was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2009. It went into remission following treatment. But he announced in late 2023 that the cancer had returned.
6. Floyd Patterson

Floyd Patterson, a legendary boxer who once held the world heavyweight championship for six years and notably fought Muhammad Ali twice, died of prostate cancer and Alzheimer’s disease in 2006. He was 71.
7. Harold Pierce
Harold Pierce, who in 1950 founded the famous Harold’s Chicken Shack franchise of restaurants in Chicago that went on to have dozens of locations nationally, died in 1988. Prostate cancer was ultimately revealed to have caused his death. He was 70.
8. Sidney Poitier

Sidney Poitier, the first Black person to win an Academy Award for Best Actor, died in 2022 from prostate cancer combined with heart failure and dementia.
Poitier beat the cancer back in 1994, but it apparently returned later in life.
“I was happiest making films, writing books, and surviving prostate cancer,” Poitier said in an interview with Vanity Fair in 2007.
9. William Raspberry

William Raspberry, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who made a name for himself as one of the few Black reporters at The Washington Post beginning in the 1960s, died from prostate cancer in 2012. He was 76.
10. Earl Woods

Earl Woods, the father of golf superstar Tiger Woods, died of prostate cancer in 2006. He was 74.
“Earl Woods was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1998 and underwent radiation treatment,” the Los Angeles Times reported in an obituary. “He told reporters in September 2004 that the cancer had returned and spread throughout his body. He later revealed to close friends that the cancer had affected his brain and spine.
O.J. Simpson And Other Notable Black People Who Died From Prostate Cancer was originally published on newsone.com
