Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., preacher, civil rights activist, and national politician, was born to Mattie and Adam Clayton Powell, Sr. in New Haven, Connecticut, on November 29, 1908.
Young Powell grew up in New York City, New York since his father, a Baptist preacher, became pastor of the historic Abyssinian Baptist Church in midtown Manhattan in 1908, shortly after Powell was born.
During the 1920s, the church and the Powell family relocated uptown to Harlem.
Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. was educated in the New York City school system.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in 1930 from Colgate University and then a master’s in religious education from Columbia University in 1932.