ROANOKE, Va. – A state historical marker at the corner of Gilmer Avenue and Gainesboro Road honors Edward Dudley, a Roanoke native who became the United States’ first Black ambassador and built a remarkable career as a civil-rights lawyer, diplomat, and jurist.
“It is a remarkable career, politically, diplomatically, legally, and in other ways, and to think he was from Roanoke,” said Former Roanoke Mayor and Local Historian Nelson Harris.
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Born while his mother was visiting relatives in South Boston, Dudley returned to Gainesboro as an infant and grew up in the Gainsboro section of Roanoke, attended Roanoke City Schools, and graduated from Addison High School.
Harris said Dudley was going to follow in his father’s footsteps and become a dentist. However, he changed his mind to pursue law.
After he graduated from law school, Dudley was recruited early in his career by Thurgood Marshall to work at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. Dudley focused on civil rights issues, mostly in voting and transportation.
“Much of the litigation that the NAACP brought in terms of transportation, that’s of course, back in the days when Blacks had to sit at the back of the bus. Blacks had to be put in different passenger cars for railroad transportation. So, there’s all kinds of discrimination that was going on,” said Harris.
Working with Thurgood Marshall, Dudley honed his legal skills.
“According to his son, in talking about his father, kind of honed his legal skills doing all of but learned so much from Thurgood Marshall about, you know, not just about civil rights, but had to be a really good attorney to make oral argument, to stand one’s ground even in the face of overwhelming opposition. And I think that’s why his son said about his father that that was Edward Dudley’s kind of formative years professionally and legally,” said Harris.
Dudley’s trajectory shifted from courtroom to diplomacy when President Harry S. Truman appointed him America’s emissary to Liberia in 1948. The following year, after the United States upgraded diplomatic relations with Liberia, so someone would move up the rank to ambassador if that person held the position of emissary.
Truman promoted Dudley to the rank of ambassador — making Dudley the first Black U.S. ambassador.
While working for the State Department, Dudley pushed for racial equity within the department itself, advocating for better hiring and promotion opportunities for Black employees.
“So, it was quite a ceiling there that he had to break through, but I think to his credit, he wasn’t just satisfied with the fact that he broke through that ceiling, but he wanted others to break though as well,” said Harris.
After his diplomatic service, Dudley moved to New York, where he practiced law. In the 1960s, Dudley was elected president of Manhattan’s bureau— described by the historian as akin to being what we might call a mayor here in Roanoke. Dudley was also the Democratic nominee for New York State Attorney General, becoming the first African American nominated by a major political party for a statewide office in New York, though he did not win that race.
Dudley later served as an associate justice of the New York State Supreme Court before retiring from the bench.
Harris said Dudley came back to the Roanoke area many times, primarily to visit his family but also to speak with black civic or educational organizations.
“I was always grateful when I would run across those articles where he was coming back to Roanoke to be a keynote speaker at an event to know that he didn’t forget Roanoke, but it was still a part of the fabric of his character and still wanted to make that contribution to Roanoke’s ongoing progress,” said Dudley.
Harris worked on a historical marker for Dudley, and it was unveiled in 2024.
The marker sits about three blocks from the Dudley family home in Gainsboro, which is a Virginia Historic Landmark.
The marker now stands as a local touchstone to a life that bridged small‑town roots and national impact, and as a prompt to remember that Dudley — who began life in Gainesboro — spent decades breaking barriers on behalf of others.
“To be able to do that and to have Edward Dudley’s son come down and be a part of the unveiling and to give that notoriety and help tell that remarkable story of an amazing man was very satisfying,” said Harris.