Paul Kendrick

Paul Kendrick (born 1983) is an American author of popular history, political organizer, and Democratic candidate for Illinois State Legislature.

Early life and education Kendrick obtained a bachelor's and a master's degree from the Columbian College of Arts and Sciences at George Washington University (GW).

During his time at GW, Kendrick served as President of the college's National Association for the Advancement of Colored People chapter and also as a Presidential Administrative Fellow.

Professional career Kendrick’s professional career has included work in education, public policy, and political organizing. Early in his career, he worked in college access and student success initiatives including for the Harlem Children's Zone's College Success Program.

Following work on the 2012 Obama presidential campaign, Kendrick served as a special assistant to Secretary Arne Duncan at the United States Department of Education, and later re-joined the Obama Administration in the Office of Presidential Personnel.

Following his work in the Obama Administration, Kendrick worked on the gubernatorial campaign of JB Pritzker and then became executive director of Rust Belt Rising, an organization focused on training Democratic candidates in the Midwest and voter turnout. During his tenure, the organization reported registering more than 130,000 voters.

Writing and historical work With his father, Stephen Kendrick, Kendrick has co-authored three works of popular history. The first, Sarah's Long Walk: The Free Blacks of Boston and How Their Struggle for Equality Changed America, describes the legal case, Roberts v. Boston, brought on behalf of Sarah Roberts, a black child who was not allowed to attend any of the five "whites-only" schools she passed on her daily walks to school, and the effect this had on the effort to desegregate Boston schools in the 1840s. The case led to the Separate but equal justification for segregation. The book was named among the best non-fiction of 2005 by the Christian Science Monitor.

The duo's next book, Douglass and Lincoln: How a Revolutionary Black Leader and a Reluctant Liberator Struggled to End Slavery and Save the Union, concentrated on the meetings of President Lincoln and Frederick Douglass between 1863 and 1865, and how their conversations impacted the outcome of the Civil War.

Their third book, Nine Days: The Race to Save Martin Luther King Jr.'s Life and Win the 1960 Election, is about Martin Luther King, Jr.'s imprisonment in the days leading up to the 1960 presidential election.

Personal and family life Kendrick resides in Chicago with his wife, Kori Schulman, and their two daughters.

Publications Sarah's Long Walk: The Free Blacks of Boston and How Their Struggle for Equality Changed America by Paul Kendrick & Stephen Kendrick. Beacon Press: Boston (2004). Douglass and Lincoln: How a Revolutionary Black Leader and a Reluctant Liberator Struggled to End Slavery and Save the Union by Paul Kendrick & Stephen Kendrick. Walker & Company: New York (2007). Nine Days: The Race to Save Martin Luther King Jr.'s Life and Win the 1960 Election by Paul Kendrick & Stephen Kendrick. Farrar, Straus and Giroux: New York (2021).