SOUTH AFRICAN POLITICAL ACTIVIST AND PRESIDENT
1918–

A life-long anti apartheid activist in South Africa who eventually rose to become the first democratically elected, and first black, president of South Africa, Nelson Rolihlala (meaning troublemaker) Mandela was born on July 18, 1918, into a home composed of three mud huts in the village of Mvezo. Mandela, descended from Thembu (an important people in South Africa) royal blood, was intended to become a councilor to the Thembu king and spent many of his early years in school. Suspended from Fort Hare University in 1940 for leading a student protest against bad food and facing the unwelcome prospect of an arranged marriage, Mandela and a friend fled to Johannesburg, where he soon started working in a law firm, hoping eventually to become a lawyer.

During the 1940s Mandela became active in the political struggle against apartheid, helping to organize the Youth League...