Legendary anti-war and civil rights activist and historian Howard Zinn died yesterday of a heart attack aged 87. Best known for his million-selling A People’s History of the United States which told the history of the US from a left-wing perspective. He came from a working class background in Brooklyn and was a fighter pilot during the war. His experience fighting in World War 2 had a huge influence on his view of war.

He was a strong proponent of civil rights in the US, being fired from his professorship at Spelman College for siding with students over their dispute about the college’s empahsis for producing “ladies” whereas students were more likely to be at the forefront of civil rights activism. He was remembered by children’s rights activist Maria Edelman Wright as an influence on her when he accompanied her to anti-segregation sit-ins. Zinn was also at the forefront of the anti-Vietnam war movement in the US and wrote one of the first books calling for the US to withdraw. He also opposed the Iraq war in 2003 and supports anti-war movements within the military arguing that this is the only way that the Iraq war will end.

The Zinn Education Project, a foundation set up to promote teaching A People’s History of the United States in schools in the US said

“His incredible energy, wit, knowledge, political analysis, vision, and dedication had us convinced that he would outlive us all. At 87, he continued to inform and inspire in his presentations across the country, radio interviews, essays, and film making. As we reflect on Howard Zinn’s life and the work we need to carry on, we turn to the closing words in his autobiography, You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train. Howard Zinn wrote:

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.

“What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.

“And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.”

Howard Zinn, in honor of the marvelous victory of your life, we will act in defiance of all that is bad around us and attempt to spin the world towards justice.