The northeast corner of West 166th Street and Broadway is being co-named Carlos Cooks Way after the Black Nationalist leader.
Cooks was born in the Dominican Republic on June 23, 1913. He moved to New York in 1929 and was introduced to Marcus Garvey’s Black Nationalist fraternal organizations, the Universal Negro Improvement Association, and African Communities League, by his uncle and father.
At age 19, Cooks was officially recognized by Garvey and became a vital member of the movement. In 1941, he launched the African Nationalist Pioneer Movement. His goal was to make it “an educational, inspirational, instructive, constructive and expansive society…composed of people desirous of bringing about a progressive, dignified, cultural, fraternal and racial confraternity among the African peoples of the world.”
Cook died in Harlem in 1966.