Civil Rights Leader, Educator, and former Georgia Politician, Julian Bond was born January 14, 1940 in Nashville, Tennessee. Son of Julia Louise Washington Bond and Horace Mann Bond. Julian began his career as an activist and civil rights leader in a setting that served as a crucible for much of the political energy and creativity that propelled the Civil Rights Movement in the early 1960's: (The Southern college campus). While studying at Morehouse College in 1960, Bond helped formed The Committee on Appeal for Human Rights (COAHR), a group inspired by the student-led Greensboro sit-ins. While working with (COAHR), Bond organized similar protests against segregated businesses and public buildings in the Atlanta area. In April, 1960, (COAHR) and other student groups met in Raleigh, North Carolina to form the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) as an alternative to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

In 1965 the proportion rural Georgia Legislature was reapportioned under court order, Bond ran for one of the newly created seats in the Georgia House of Representatives. Bond won both the primary and the general election by wide margins and was poised to join five other victorious freshman as the first African Americans to enter the House since 1907.

In 1968 at the Democratic National Convention, Bond's activities at the Convention dramatized the plight of African Americans trying to achieve effective political representation in the South. Following the convention, Bond embarked on a career of extensive public speaking while continuing to serve in the Georgia House.

In 1975 Bond was elected to the Georgia Senate, where he served until 1986, when he gave up his seat to run for the U.S. Congress in Georgia's fifth district. Following this defeat Bond moved away from representative politics and began teaching the history and politics of the Civil Rights Movement at several Universities while continuing to speak out on political and social issues.

In addition to his work as a public servant Bond has helped found or has served on the boards of numerous Civil Rights and Peace organizations, including the Southern Poverty Law Center, The Voter Education Project, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), for which he served as National Director and President of the Atlanta Branch.