Dallas human rights icon Ernest McMillan has died. He was 81.
Family members, friends and activists remember him as a leader, teacher and healer who brought people together.
His niece Anyika McMillan-Herod, founder of Soul Rep Theater, said her uncle "led with love.”
"He saw everybody, he made everyone feel seen and like they belonged,” McMillan-Herod said. “He really was a beautiful human being. And really lived and dedicated his life to ensure that there was equity and justice and goodness and fairness in this world for everyone.”
His family legacy is ingrained in Dallas history.
McMillan was born in 1944 and died on Friday, the same day as the unveiling of the historical marker honoring his grandfather, Dr. Walter McMillan, in Uptown Dallas, formerly Freedman’s Town. In the 1920s his grandfather founded the first Black hospital in Dallas, called McMillan Sanitarium.
Ernest McMillan was raised in Freedman’s Town in the State/Thomas neighborhood. The son of a pastor, and the only son among four children, he got involved in civil rights as a young man, registering voters.
He would go on to run the Dallas chapter of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, where he served as Chairman of the Dallas Chapter. He was also involved with the National Black United Front and the United League of Mississippi.
He published two book with Dallas-based Deep Vellum Books titled “Kneeling” and “Standing.”
In a 2014 KERA documentary titled “Freedom Summer,” McMillan talked about being a young civil rights worker in the 1960s. As a student at Morehouse College in Atlanta, he traveled the South to register African Americans to vote. He had lost a close friend to violence and spent time in prison for demonstrating at a neighborhood grocery store.
In the documentary he described himself as “young, wild, naive” at that time.
“I thought I was gonna make a big impact on the world and things were gonna change real fast,” McMillan said. “And I'd be a part of that prayer fire sweeping the land. And so, I didn't really think about the dangers per se.”
McMillan was a person who knew no strangers and treated everyone with kindness and dignity, his niece said, despite the pain he often experienced fighting for civil rights.
"There's many opportunities to rage against, you know, injustice and equity and evil when you experience it, and he experienced all of that,” McMillan Herod said. “But I think he was able to ground himself. His faith, I think, really grounded him.”
He embraced spiritual ideas and wisdoms from his African ancestry as well as Indigenous ancestry she said.
McMillan enjoyed learning and sharing with others, said Judah Agbonkhina, a community organizer, actor and filmmaker.
“When he would message me, it was always like uplifting stuff,” Agbonkhina said. “It wasn't necessarily community stuff. It was uplifting stuff, like, you, know, uplifting my spirit and me uplifting his spirit.”
In recent years, McMillan mentored Agbonkhina and encouraged him to have community conversations.
Agbonkhina recalled a conversation during Juneteenth weekend in 2024 that included a group of multidisciplinary artists and activists. The panel was McMillan’s idea and he led the conversation.
“He was really just trying to share the knowledge and pass it on,” Agbonkhina said. “His thing is, ‘I have this knowledge and you need to receive it, the community needs to receive it and they need to put it into action because it's crucial.’”
McMillan, who moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico, several years ago, had become ill in recent months. He spent his last weeks in Dallas with family and friends and had one last community conversation.
Agbonkhina was there.
“It was a very powerful meeting, and I understand the gravity of it now. At the time I don't think any of us understood the gravity of it,” Agbonkhina said. “He wanted to know the work that we were doing in the community. He wanted to know where we were in our journeys, what were we doing as a Dallas community to be better and to be more effective.”
McMillan-Herod said one of uncle's favorite songs was John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme," which she called "fitting." She said McMillan's work and legacy will continue to live through the community work of others.
"If you were anyone who ever received a nugget of wisdom from him or an encouragement from him,” she said, “just know that, do it, do the work, shine your light, shine your light and do the work."
Priscilla Rice is KERA’s communities reporter. Got a tip? Email her at price@kera.org.
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