OAKLAND POST -- Standing Tall: Willie Long and The Mare Island Original 21ers, a new book by Jake Sloan, is an inspiring, sometimes firsthand account of historic events in the civil rights movement that took place at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard in the San Francisco Bay Area during the 1960s.
In this educational book, Sloan recounts his role as one of the Mare Island Original 21ers, an activist group of 25 African American men working at the huge shipyard at the time, eight of whom, including Sloan, lived in Richmond.
Sloan is the founder and president of Davillier-Sloan Inc., one of the leading labor management consulting firms in California, and he has been dedicated to protecting the rights of workers in the construction industry for more than 50 years. He holds a master’s degree in History from San Francisco State University. Sloan was recently honored with a special speaking engagement at the 2018 Global Hero Round Table, often called the “TED Talks of Heroism,” at the Marines Memorial in San Francisco.