Utrice Leid

Who is Utrice Leid?

Utrice C. Leid is a Trinidadian American civil rights activist and journalist. She was the managing editor of The City Sun and general manager of New York radio station WBAI. In 2004, The Miami Herald wrote that she "prides herself on never working in the mainstream media during her 34 years of journalism".

Leid was born in Princes Town, Trinidad, the seventh child of Claude and Gertrude Leid. When she was 18, Leid came to the United States and attended Adelphi University. She returned to Trinidad and Tobago, where she spent nine months investigating the aftermath of an unsuccessful coup d'état. Leid's research was cut short when the government seized her notes. She decided to move back to the United States.

Leid worked as a receptionist at the New York Amsterdam News for six months, and in 1977 she and Andrew W. Cooper, a columnist at the newspaper, left to establish the Trans-Urban News Service. TUNS trained minority journalists and produced reporting that was relevant to their communities. The Public Relations Society of America gave TUNS its top award in 1979 for its multi-part series on racial tensions between blacks and Jews in Crown Heights.