William McClendon

William McClendon (1915–1996) was an American journalist, newspaper editor, educator, activist, jazz musician, and prominent member of Portland's civil rights community. He was born in 1915 in Atlanta, Georgia. He died at the age of 81 in 1996 in Portland, Oregon. McClendon felt the newspaper's goal was to "fight social and economic evils detrimental to the Negro people and other minorities" The bimonthly newspaper became a key mouthpiece for the local civil rights coalition and black community. In 1945, McClendon changed the name again to The Observer, and this paper operated until 1950.

Jazz McClendon was an accomplished jazz pianist and in 1949, bought and began managing a jazz club on Williams Avenue called the Savoy, renaming it McClendon's Rhythm Room. He ran the club until the mid-1950s. McClendon's contribution to the Portland jazz scene is memorialized annually by the Bill McClendon Award for Excellence in Jazz given by the Portland Jazz Festival.

Activism He continued to be involved in civil rights activism. He taught social sciences at Reed College and Portland State University, where he helped found the Black Studies program, and was a member of the Portland NAACP, was the advisory editor of the Black Scholar Press, and was the deputy director of affirmative action under Oregon Governor Vic Atiyeh. He published Straight Ahead: Essays on the Struggles of Blacks in America in 1995.