The Tribune

BAHAMIAN Garth Reeves Sr, owner of The Miami Times and a noted civil rights activist in South Florida, has died at age 100.

“Mr Reeves led a remarkable life promoting equality and civil rights as a veteran, journalist, community activist, and owner of The Miami Times,” said Francis Suarez, mayor of Miami, in a press release. “We will continue to rejoice over his life marked by his many incredible accomplishments and the profound impact he made to drive our community forward as a more inclusive and equitable place for all.”

Mr Reeves’ father, Henry E.S. Reeves, a master printer from Nassau, moved to Miami in 1919 when Garth was four months old. Garth was born in Nassau on February 12, 1919.

Henry Reeves, founded the Times on September 1, 1923. He passed it on to his son when he died in 1970. Garth Reeves served in the US Army in World War II, and began to fight for racial integration upon his return to South Florida as a young man.

“Garth Reeves and his father used the newspaper to champion social justice and demand dignity for Miami’s black populations,” said Russell Motley, editor-in-chief of MIA Media Group.

The Miami Herald described him as “a political crusader who published the dominant black-owned paper in Miami-Dade, the oldest and largest black-owned newspaper in the Southeastern United States” who used “his position to galvanize African Americans to make their interests felt at the polls.”

Reeves celebrated his 100th birthday this year at a City of Miami Commission meeting in February.