Dick Gregory Comedic Activist

… I became a vegetarian. Before then, I didn’t even know the word. In the 1960’s you rarely saw a Black person in a health food store. But it was something I knew I had to change.”

In the late 1960s he regularly fasted in excess of 40 days at a time, to publicize world famine. For two-and-a-half years, he ate no solid food as a protest against the Vietnam War. He was still following this regime when he completed several long-distance runs – one from LA to New York – frequently accompanied by Muhammad Ali, who described Gregory as “one of the greatest Americans of modern times”.

“The first time I met Dick,” Ali said, “I knew I was good for five miles. I decided I was going to take this chump and see what he could do. We went four miles and Dick wasn’t even breathing hard. I stepped up the next mile real fast. Dick followed me, then he got faster. After that, I got into the car. Dick ran another 15 miles. I said to myself, ‘This man is crazy.’”

At legendary singer and composer John Lennon’s request, Gregory devised a diet to help him withdraw from opiates and alcohol.

“When John called me,” he says, “he told me to come to Holland, where he was ‘living in a cave’. To me, a cave was a dark place where bats hang out. His cave looked like Buckingham Palace.”

These days,, he rarely performs comedy, he’s still married for over 50 years, but he’s constantly on the road, lecturing on diet and ethics.

Dick Gregory: Comedian, Activist & Fighter For The People - Page 2  was originally published on blackdoctor.org