Yvor Stoakley Speaks at Black History Month Event, Grinnell College, 2001
Information sourced from the files of Joan Anderson, shared by Wayne Anderson, and Yvor Stoakley, entered August 2026
NOTE: After speaking at the Symposium, Yvor offered a talk about the Bahá’í Faith on campus at 7 PM, as detailed below.
Emerging Destiny and Merging Destinies: A Black History Month Symposium
Monday, February 26th, 4:15 until 5:30pm (or a little later), Grinnell College, in the South Lounge of the Forum, Parking is available in the lot behind the Forum.
SYMPOSIUM FORMAT:
Moderator: George Drake, professor of history at Grinnell College and former president of the college. George is a member of the Board of Directors of the Peace Institute and past chair of the board.
Guest Speakers:
Joseph McGill, Executive Director of the African American Historical Museum of Iowa will speak about the history of African Americans, their contributions, and incorporate the underground railroad.
TITLE: “Journey to Freedom: Iowa’s African American History”
Dr. K. Gibel Azoulay, Grinnell College Professor with an expertise in cultural anthropology will speak about contemporary life for African Americans. Dr. Azoulay will address the legacy of racial discrimination and its impact on the discourse of “diversity.”
TITLE: “The Limitations of the Discourse of Diversity and Multiculturalism”
Yvor Stoakley, a Grinnell College Alumnus and successful lawyer in the Chicago area will speak about what the future holds for African Americans in a global society.
TITLE: “African Americans in a Global Society”
Questions and Answers and an open discussion with the audience will follow.
The Symposium is sponsored by the Grinnell College Alumni Association and Student Affairs Office, the Concerned Black Students, the African American Historical Museum of Iowa, and the Iowa Peace Institute.
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An Evening Program Monday, February 26th @ 7pm
Guest Speaker: Yvor Stoakley
Topic: The Baha’i Religion
Room 305 Alumni Recitation Hall(ARH), ARH is located on Park Street between 7th and 8th Ave.
About the Speaker:
Yvor Stoakley, a practicing attorney since 1984 and a resident of Glen Ellyn, IL, is an active member of DuPage Voices for Racial Justice, has served on the national Board of Directors for the Bahá’í Justice Society for more than 10 years, and has been an active participant in the Peace and Justice Coalition (Western Suburbs), the DuPage Multicultural Alliance, and the Partnership Institute. He has also served as a trustee for the Glenside Public Library District (Glendale Heights, IL) and is a former chairman of the Junior Citizenship Scholarship Program of the Chicago Jaycees.
A native Illinoisan and a graduate of Grinnell College (’73), Mr. Stoakley lived for five years as a child in Gulfport, Mississippi during the Jim Crow era and the early days of the civil rights movement. After finishing his undergraduate education, he lived for two years in Sierra Leone (West Africa) where he taught high school English and history and served on the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of Sierra Leone. He returned to Marshalltown, Iowa in 1975 where he worked as a reporter and photographer for the Marshalltown Times-Republican. In 1977 he joined the corporate staff of Motorola, Inc. in Schaumburg, IL as Editor of their employee magazine, The Motorolan. In 1981 he left Motorola to attend Northwestern University School of Law. He has a long and abiding interest in issues of justice and human rights, particularly as they apply to the questions of race unity and the equality of men and women.
Mr. Stoakley earned his law degree (J.D.) from Northwestern University School of Law and holds a B.A. degree in Communications from Grinnell College (Grinnell, IA). As a student at Grinnell he served as an editor of the Scarlet & Black and a news director for the college radio station. He is married and has an 18-year-old son and a 13-year-old daughter.
This follow-up article appeared in the SCARLET & BLACK, the student newspaper for which he served as a reporter decades earlier, on March 2, 2001:
