Barack Hussein Obama Sr. (/ˈbærəkhuːˈseɪnoʊˈbɑːmə/;[8][9] born Baraka Obama, 18 June 1934[2][3] – 24 November 1982) was a Kenyan senior governmental economist and the father of Barack Obama, the 44thpresident of the United States. He is a central figure of his son's memoir, Dreams from My Father (1995). Obama married in 1954 and had two children with his first wife, Kezia. He was selected for a special program to attend college in the United States and studied at the University of Hawaii where he met Stanley Ann Dunham, whom he married in 1961 following the conception of his son, Barack. Dunham divorced Obama three years later.[10] The elder Obama later went to Harvard University for graduate school, where he earned an M.A. in economics, and returned to Kenya in 1964. He saw his son Barack once more, when his son was about 10.
In late 1964, Obama Sr. married Ruth Beatrice Baker, a Jewish-American woman he had met in Massachusetts. They had two sons together before separating in 1971 and divorcing in 1973. Obama first worked for an oil company, before beginning work as an economist with the Kenyan Ministry of Transport. He gained a promotion to senior economic analyst in the Ministry of Finance. He was among a cadre of young Kenyan men who had been educated in the West in a program supported by Tom Mboya. Obama Sr. had conflicts with Kenyan presidentJomo Kenyatta, which adversely affected his career. He was fired and blacklisted in Kenya, finding it nearly impossible to get a job. Obama Sr. was involved in three serious car accidents during his final years; he died as a result of the last one in 1982.
His father was Onyango (later Hussein) Obama (c. 1895–1979), and his mother was Habiba Akumu Nyanjango (c. 1918–2006) of Karabondi, Kenya, Onyango's second wife. They had two daughters and a son together, Barack Obama (Sr.). After Akumu separated from Onyango and left the family in 1945, her three children were raised by Onyango's third wife, Sarah Ogwel of Kogelo.[14][15]
The Times of London, relying on statements by Obama's third wife, Sarah Onyango Obama, 87, reported that in 1949, after becoming more politically active, Obama was jailed by the British for two years for suspicion of supplying military information to the Kenyan independence movement, owing to "His job as a cook to a British army officer."[17][18] According to Sarah, Obama was subjected to beatings and abuse that left him with physical scars and a loathing of the British.[17] David Maraniss' 2012 biography of President Barack Obama states that his grandfather Obama did not participate in the insurrections; nor was he ever imprisoned by the British during the uprising. He continued to be trusted by white Kenyans.[19][20]
When Obama (Sr.) was about six years old and attending a Christian missionary school, he converted from Islam to Anglicanism when strongly encouraged by the staff. He changed his name from "Baraka" to "Barack".[1] Obama (Sr.) later became an atheist, believing that religion was mere superstition.[21]
While still living near Kendu Bay, Obama (Sr.) attended Gendia Primary School. After his family moved to Siaya District, he transferred to Ng'iya Intermediate School.[11] From 1950 to 1953, he studied at Maseno National School, an exclusive Anglican boarding school in Maseno.[22] The head teacher, B.L. Bowers, described Obama in his records as "very keen, steady, trustworthy and friendly. Concentrates, reliable and out-going."[23]
In 1954 at age 20, Obama (Sr.) married Kezia Aoko[24] in a tribal ceremony in Kenya. They had two children, Malik (a.k.a. Roy) and Auma, during the early years of their marriage.[25]
College and graduate school
In 1959, the Kenyan Department of Education published Obama's monograph, entitled Otieno jarieko. Kitabu mar ariyo. 2: Yore mabeyo mag puro puothe. (English: Otieno, the wise man. Book 2: Wise ways of farming.)[26][27]
Due to his accomplishments, in 1959 Obama received a scholarship in economics through a program organized by the nationalist leader Tom Mboya. The program offered education in the West to outstanding Kenyan students.[28][29] Initial financial supporters of the program included Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poitier, Jackie Robinson, and Elizabeth Mooney Kirk, a literacy advocate who provided most of the financial support for Obama's early years in the United States.[30] Kirk and her literacy associate Helen M. Roberts of Palo Alto raised the money necessary for Obama to travel to the US.[31][32]
When Obama left for the United States, he left behind his young wife, Kezia, and their baby son Malik. Kezia was pregnant, and their daughter Auma was born while her father was in Hawaii.[33] At Obama's request, Helen Roberts committed to watching over and financially supporting the family that he had left behind, for as long as she remained in Nairobi.[34]
University of Hawaii
In 1959, Obama enrolled at the University of Hawaii at Manoa in Honolulu as the university's first African foreign student.[35] He initially lived across the street from the university at the Charles H. Atherton branch of the YMCA at 1810 University Avenue;[35] public records from 1961 indicate he later had a residence two miles southeast of the university at 625 11th Avenue in the Kaimuki neighborhood.[36]
In 1960, Obama met Stanley Ann Dunham in a basic Russian language course at the University of Hawaii and they started dating.[35] After becoming pregnant, Dunham dropped out of the University of Hawaii after the fall 1960 semester, while Obama continued his education.[37] Obama married Dunham in Wailuku on the Hawaiian island of Maui on 2 February 1961, despite parental opposition from both families.[38][39][37][40] He eventually told Dunham about his previous marriage in Kenya, but said he was divorced—which she found out years later was not true.[35]
Obama Sr. continued his education at the University of Hawaii and in 1961–1962 lived one mile east of the university in the St. Louis Heights neighborhood.[42][43] He graduated from the University of Hawaii after three years with a B.A. in economics[44] and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.[45] He left Hawaii in June 1962.[46][35]
Harvard University
Obama Sr. was offered a scholarship to study in New York City,[47] but declined it.[39] In September 1962, after a tour of mainland U.S. universities, Obama Sr. traveled to Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he began a graduate fellowship in economics at Harvard University. He rented an apartment in a rooming house near Central Square in Cambridge.[29][48] Meanwhile, Dunham and their son returned to Honolulu in the latter half of 1962.[41] In January 1964, Dunham filed for divorce in Honolulu which was not contested by Obama;[37][49] they were divorced on 20 March 1964, whereupon Ann Dunham was granted sole custody of their son.[25][10]
Obama returned to Kenya in 1964 after graduating from Harvard.[55] Baker followed him, and they married 24 December 1964.[56] They had two sons together, Mark Okoth Obama in 1965 and David Opiyo Obama in 1968.[57] Baker and Obama separated in 1971,[58][59] and divorced in 1973.[46][29] Baker subsequently married a Tanzanian man named Ndesandjo and took his surname, as did her sons Mark and David. Mark said in 2009 that Obama had been abusive to him, his late brother David, and their mother.[25][53][54]
In Kenya, Obama Sr. reconnected with his first wife Kezia. She had two sons after his return: Abo (b. 1968) and Bernard (b. 1970), believed to be his children.[25] Barack Obama, in his memoir Dreams from My Father (1995), said that his father's family had questioned whether Abo and Bernard are Barack Sr.'s biological sons.[60]
Economics career
Obama first worked as a government economist for an oil company in Kenya.[61] In 1965, Obama published a paper entitled "Problems Facing Our Socialism" in the East Africa Journal, harshly criticizing the blueprint for national planning, "African Socialism and Its Applicability to Planning in Kenya", developed by Tom Mboya's Ministry of Economic Planning and Development. Obama considered the document to be not adequately socialist and African.[62][63] Obama served as an economist in the Kenyan Ministry of Transport. Later he was promoted to senior economist in the Kenyan Ministry of Finance.[64]
In 1970, Obama was in a serious automobile accident, and was hospitalized for nearly a year. In December 1971, he traveled to Hawaii for a month.[65] There he visited with his ex-wife Ann Dunham and American son Barack II, who was nearly 10. The visit was the last time the boy saw his father.[39] During his trip, Obama took his son to his first jazz concert, a performance by the pianist Dave Brubeck.[66]
His son recalled Obama giving him his first basketball:
I only remember my father for one month my whole life, when I was 10. And it wasn't until much later in life that I realized, like, he gave me my first basketball and it was shortly thereafter that I became this basketball fanatic. And he took me to my first jazz concert and it was sort of shortly thereafter that I became really interested in jazz and music. So what it makes you realize how much of an impact [even if it's only a month] that they have on you. But I think probably the most important thing was his absence I think contributed to me really wanting to be a good dad, you know? Because I think not having him there made me say to myself, "You know what? I want to make sure my girls feel like they've got somebody they can rely on."[67]
According to Barack II's memoir, Obama's continuing conflict with Kenyan presidentJomo Kenyatta destroyed his career.[68] He came under suspicion after Tom Mboya was assassinated in 1969, as he had been a protege of the ruler. Kenyatta fired Obama, who was blacklisted in Kenya and found it impossible to get work. By the time Obama visited his son in Hawaii in 1971, he had a bad leg from the 1970 accident.[69]
Obama later lost both legs in a second serious automobile accident, and subsequently lost his job. His life deteriorated as he struggled with poverty and drinking. During his final decade, he never recovered his former social or economic standing. His friend Philip Ochieng, a journalist of the Kenya newspaper Daily Nation, has described Obama's difficult personality and drinking problems.[citation needed] In 1982, Obama had a relationship with Jael Otinyo and with her fathered his last son, named George Obama. George was raised by his mother, who later remarried; his stepfather cared for him as well.[25] Six months after George's birth, Obama died in a car crash in Nairobi. He was interred in his native village of Nyang'oma Kogelo, Siaya District.[15][23] His funeral was attended by ministers Robert Ouko, Peter Oloo-Aringo, and other prominent political figures.[11]
Publications
Otieno jarieko (Otieno, the Wise Man: A Series of Readers to Follow the Luo Adult Literacy Primer) (in Luo). Nairobi: East African Literature Bureau, Eagle Press. 1959. OCLC694566336.
^ abJacobs (2011), p. 26: Her brother Baraka, as she [Hawa Auma] recalls, converted to Christianity when he was about six years old and changed his name to the more Christian-sounding Barack because the Christian missionaries at the early schools that he attended insisted that he do so.
^ abcMaraniss (2012), p. 65: He had been born inside the euphorbia hedges of the K'obama homestead on 18 June 1934.
^ abcLiberties (2012), p. 202: The age of the father is questionable since most of the documents Barack Hussein Obama filled out during his United States student visa was 18 June 1934; however, Obama II's book Dreams of My Father states his birth date was 18 June 1936. Check out Immigration and Naturalization Service records, and those documents also indicate the birth date to be 18 June 1934, thereby making Obama Sr. twenty-seven at the birth of Obama II instead of the annotated twenty-five on the birth certificate.
^Fornek, Scott; Good, Greg (9 September 2007). "The Obama family tree"(PDF). Chicago Sun-Times. pp. 2B–3B. Retrieved 22 March 2008.
^Sally H. Jacobs. The Other Barack. PublicAffairs. 2011. Excerpt at NPR.org Retrieved 16 September 2011. Quote: "The Old Man had also been called Barack, but his was a working man's name, with the emphasis on the first syllable."
^David Maraniss BARACK OBAMA The Story Simon & Schuster
^Obama, Barack (16 October 2006). "My spiritual journey". Time. Archived from the original on 22 January 2013. Retrieved 5 March 2008. My father was almost entirely absent from my childhood, having been divorced from my mother when I was 2 years old; in any event, although my father had been raised a Muslim, by the time he met my mother he was a confirmed atheist, thinking religion to be so much superstition.
^ abcdJacobs, Sally (21 September 2008). "A father's charm, absence". Boston Globe. p. 1A. Retrieved 14 August 2009. ... Pake Zane, 66, who attended the University of Hawaii with Obama and had not publicly discussed their 1974 conversation until now. Zane was astonished at the transformation in his once vibrant friend, who had been divorced by his third wife a year before.
^ abcRipley, Amanda (9 April 2008). "The story of Barack Obama's mother". Time. Archived from the original on 12 April 2008. Retrieved 10 April 2008. (online) Ripley, Amanda (21 April 2008). "A mother's story". Time. Vol. 171, no. 16. pp. 36–40, 42. ("Raising Obama" cover story) (print)
^ abcMeacham, Jon (23 August 2008). "On his own". Newsweek. Archived from the original on 23 July 2010. Retrieved 27 July 2010. (online) Meacham, Jon (1 September 2008). "On his own". Newsweek. 152 (9): 26–36. ("Special Democratic Convention issue") (print)
^ abSalsberg, Bob (29 April 2011). "Files suggest elder Obama forced to leave Harvard". The Arizona Republic. Associated Press. Retrieved 1 May 2011. President Barack Obama's father was forced to leave Harvard University before completing his PhD in economics because the school was concerned about his personal life and finances, according to newly public immigration records.
^Griffin, John (22 June 1962). "First UH African graduate gives view on E-W Center". The Honolulu Advertiser. An off-campus resident himself (St. Louis Heights) Obama thinks it's a mistake to have the East-West students in dormitories.
^Brannon, Johnny (10 February 2007). "Hawai'i's imperfect melting pot a big influence on young Obama". The Honolulu Advertiser. p. 1A. Retrieved 21 January 2011. The elder Obama lived first at the Atherton YMCA on University Avenue and later moved to St. Louis Heights.
^ abcSanders, Edmund (17 July 2008). "So alike and yet so different". Los Angeles Times. p. A1. Archived from the original on 11 February 2009. Retrieved 24 February 2009. Obama's worsening drinking binges strained his career and marriage. "He would pass out on the doorstep," said Leo Odera Omolo, a former drinking buddy and friend of the family. "Ruth would complain he's getting out of hand." The couple divorced in the early 1970s.
^"Kenya student wins fellowship". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. 20 June 1962. p. 7. A 1962 graduate, he leaves next week for a tour of Mainland universities before entering Harvard in the fall.
^Merida, Kevin (14 December 2007). "The ghost of a father". The Washington Post. p. A12. Retrieved 21 January 2011.
^Obama (1995, 2004), p. 126: [Ann Dunham]: "Later, when he came to visit us in Hawaii that time, he wanted us to come live with him. But I was still married to Lolo then, and his third wife had just left him, and I just didn't think ..."
^Obama (1995, 2004), p. 216: [Auma Obama]: "She left when I was twelve or thirteen, after the Old Man had had a serious car accident. He had been drinking, I think, and the Old Man was in the hospital, almost a year, and Roy and I lived on our own. When the Old Man finally got out of the hospital, that's when he went to visit you and your mum in Hawaii."
^Cohen, David William (2004). The risks of knowledge : investigations into the death of the Hon. Minister John Robert Ouko in Kenya, 1990. Ohio University Press. p. 182.
