Kuwasi Balagoon
1965
As a young man, Lakelander Donald Weems was so moved by the racism he experienced while in the United States Army, he developed a new way of looking at his role in the world. Weems took the name Kuwasi Balagoon, which in Yoruban means “son of the warrior god born on Sunday.” The name mirrors the way in which he saw himself: as a solider in the army for Black liberation. Balagoon was a leader in the Black Panther Party and an internationally published poet and essayist. (Courtesy of Diane Weems Ligon.)
