James Bell Biography
James Bell was born in New Orleans. His father, who worked for Bethlehem Steele, relocated the family to Bremerton, WA in 1942. James attended Meany Junior High School and graduated from Franklin High School in 1962. Much of James Bell’s philosophy comes from his belief that “Theory without practice is meaningless and practice without theory is blind.” This quote is from one he names as the greatest African, Kwame Nkrumh.
James graduated from Eastern Washington University in 1971, majoring in African History. As the President of the Black Student Union at Eastern Washington he helped to form a black student union. This evolved into the Black Education Program at Eastern Washington State. The program is still in place today.
Accomplishments
- United States Air Force from 1962 - 1968
- President and founder of the Northwest Chapter of Blacks in Government in Mount Vernon, Wa from 1991 - 1998
- President of the International Association of Workforce Professionals for the Employment Security Department
- In private business, Importing and Exporting from African , Asia and Latin American - New World Imports an Exports
- Board member of Blacks in Science of Washington, 1990 - 1998; Blacks in Science founded the Ron McNair Program at the Pacific Science center. Dr. Millie Russell headed the program. Every year students from Washington State experienced a weekend of high intensity exploration in the levels of science. The program is still in place today.
- Retired as Program Coordinator for the State of Washington
James is married with two children, one is a medical doctor at University of Illinois and one is a student at Seattle Community College.