Robert Curvin, a civil right leader and educator, has died at his home in Newark, New Jersey, at the age of 81. He had suffered from multiple myeloma.
A native of Belleville, New Jersey, Curvin served in the U.S. Army and then enrolled at the Newark campus of Rutgers University. After graduation with a degree in biology, he was one of the founders of the Newark branch of the Congress of Racial Equality. He later received a master of social work degree from Rutgers University and earned a Ph.D. in political science at Princeton University.
Dr. Curvin served on the editorial board of The New York Times for six years and then served as director of the Ford Foundation’s Urban Poverty Program. In the academic world, he served as dean of the Milano School of Management and Urban Policy at the New School in New York City and as a senior policy fellow at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University.
Dr. Curvin was the author of Inside Newark: Decline, Rebellion and the Search for Transformation (Rutgers University Press, 2014). He was the co-author of Blackout Looting: New York City, July 13, 1977 (John Wiley & Sons, 1979).
