Bobby Hutton (1950-1968)

Bobby Hutton Rests. Henry Taylor, 2008

Bobby Hutton, the first recruit of the Black Panther Party (then the Black Panther Part for Self Defense), was killed by Oakland police on this day in 1968. He was days away from his 18th birthday. Hutton's murder galvanized the black power movement and threw the Black Panthers into the national spotlight.

Hutton was born in Jeferson Country, Arkansa, and moved to Oakland with his family under threat from the Ku Klux Klan. He joined the Panthers at 16 after meeting Bobby Seale and Huey Newton at the North Oakland Neighborhood Anti-Poverty Center. Hutton was one of several Panthers to march on the state capital building to protest the Mulford Act.