Former Boston NAACP president Jack E. Robinson dead at 79

Jack E. Robinson, a former Boston NAACP president and longtime Republican activist, died Dec. 2. He was 79.

Robinson died of congestive heart failure at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, his son Jack E. Robinson Jr. said.

He served three terms as president of the Boston chapter of the NAACP during the turbulent 1970s, when a federal judge ordered school busing to desegregate the city’s schools.

Robinson was an active Republican who supported the presidential candidacies of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Robinson was also an active businessman in Boston.

Born in Jackson, Miss., Robinson moved north with his parents and graduated in 1945 from Roxbury Memorial High School, where he won a city scholastic tennis championship. His love of tennis led him to help found the Sportsmen’s Tennis Club in Dorchester, and he spent his final years as the owner of the Martha’s Vineyard Resort & Racquet Club in Oak Bluffs.

Robinson served in the Army during the Korean War. Jack E. Robinson Jr. said he met and became friendly with Martin Luther King Jr. while both were students at Boston University.

Robinson is survived by his wife, Claudette; daughters Sarah, Jacqueline Bonner and Sandra Niles; sons Timothy Niles, David and Jack; and eight grandchildren.

(Associated Press)