Claudia Jones: Google Doodle celebrates founder of Britain’s first major black newspaper

Activist is also credited with paving way for Notting Hill Carnival

On this day in 2008, Jones was officially recognised with a Great British Stamp for her pioneering activism (Getty)

Claudia Jones, who founded Britain’s first major black newspaper, is being celebrated today with her very own Google Doodle. 

The Trinidad-born journalist, activist and feminist founded and served as editor-in-chief for the West Indian Gazette and Afro-Asian Caribbean News in Brixton, in 1958, with the aim of unifying the world’s black community in the fight against racial discrimination. 

Jones, who was born Claudia Vera Cumberbatch on 21 February 1915 in Port of Spain, in Trinidad and Tobago, relentlessly championed issues such as civil rights, gender equality, and decolonisation through her journalism, community organisation and renowned public speaking. 

When Jones was 8-years-old, she moved to New York’s City’s Harlem neighbourhood. It was here that she discovered her passion for writing and politics: she contributed to and led a variety of communist publications as a young adult, and she spent much of her adulthood as an active member of the Communist Party USA. 

After a string of imprisonments, due to her controversial political activity in the US, Jones was deported to the UK in 1955. Upon arrival to London, she set about campaigning for the injustices faced by the city’s West Indian community. 

Once Jones had successfully set up the Gazette, she launched Britain’s first-ever Caribbean carnival, in 1959, to encourage the western world to celebrate black people’s heritage and culture. The move earned her a reputation for being the “Mother of Notting Hill Carnival” as many believe Jones’ festival was the precursor to the still-hugely popular, annual celebration.

For this, and her crucial work that fought for the liberation of black women all around the world from the discrimination they faced at the hands of classism, racism and sexism, Jones was officially honoured with a Great British Stamp in the “Women of Distinction” series on this day in 2008 - which is what the Google Doodle seeks to commemorate.