By Dannie Gore

Edward Wilmot Blyden is considered the father of Pan-Africanism.

When he was rejected from theological college in the United States because of his race, he emigrated to Liberia, where he eventually served as Secretary of State from 1864-66. From 1871 to 1873 Blyden lived in Freetown, Sierra Leone, where he edited Negro, the first explicitly Pan-African journal in West Africa. He also led two important expeditions to Fouta Djallon in the interior.

In 1885 he was an unsuccessful candidate for the Liberian presidency. He was later the Liberian ambassador to Britain and France, and still later served as president of Liberia College.