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JAMAICAN-BORN Chicago resident, Ephraim Martin, it would seem, doesn't know how to stop making progress.From a previous life as a copy boy - the equivalent of a messenger - in a Jamaican newsroom, to an enterprising freelance photographer, it's time to call him Dr Ephraim Martin, PhD in business administration."It's a wonderful feeling after mentoring hundreds of students in various degree programmes through our Martin's International Foundation over the last 40 years, to receive my doctorate," the ultra modest Martin told the Jamaica Observer.The beneficiaries of his largesse include now elected political officials, doctors, lawyers, bankers, chartered accountants, and of course, promoters, producers and entertainers in various music genres.The 65-year-old Martin, a native of St Thomas, Jamaica, who is best known as founder of the International Reggae and World and Music Awards, received his doctorate from the Tulsa, Oklahoma-based Larry Love University (LLU), an affiliate of World Wide Entertainment LLC.As icing on the cake, Dr Martin was invited to be one of the speakers at the recent commencement exercise of the university where he made a stirring speech in which he recalled the racist killing of George Floyd by a white policeman in Minneapolis."George Floyd did not die in vain! God works in a mysterious way! Floyd died, so that others would live, that historic changes would come, that police brutality could be better exposed, and that the days of systemic racism, primarily against black and brown people, can be numbered," he said to applause.Dr Martin joined the editorial department of the Gleaner newspaper in the late 1970s, taking new copies by hand from station to station in a newsroom that knew nothing of the computerised operations of today.An affable personality with a generous laughter, he rose from that humble beginning when he bought a used professional camera, taught himself photography and proceeded to capture some of the most compelling pictures for the pages of the newspaper.In 1980, at the height of his career, he emigrated to Chicago, Illinois, where he founded the Chicago Music Awards, believing that Jamaica's reggae was severely under-promoted internationally and could be "a voice for the voiceless peoples of the world".Under his Martin's International company, he launched the International Reggae Music Awards soon after, later expanding it to the International Reggae and World Music Awards, with special emphasis on Caribbean and African music genres.He has also hosted July 4th and Labour Day cultural festivals in Chicago, and championed popular political causes, including an end to South African apartheid; the work of Jamaican National Hero Marcus Garvey; civil rights leader Dr Martin Luther King Jr and late South African hero Nelson Mandela. He campaigned hard for the election of the first black US President Barack Obama.Asked which of his achievements he was proudest of, Dr Martin said: "Nothing can champion my achievement of delivering the social justice we won for Chicago's founding father, Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable, after more than 240 years of denial of this black man from the Caribbean."Under the banner of the Black Heroes Matter (BHM) Coalition which he co-founded with his wife, retired Justice Shelvin L M Hall of the Illinois Appellate Court, Dr Martin led a campaign that renamed the iconic Lake Shore Drive, as the Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable Lake Shore Drive.A black man from the Caribbean island of Haiti, Dusable in 1779, established the first trading post in a place now known as Chicago and the third largest city in the United States. But because he was black, he was denied what white founders got - street names, monuments and city holidays, Dr Martin said.In the wake of George Floyd's murder, the BLM, supported by 80 organisations and city ordinance sponsors Aldermen David Moore and Sophia King, launched the campaign which led to the renaming of the street in his honour on June 25, 2021, with the unveiling and installation of the official signs on October 21.Lake Shore Drive is on the so-called gold coast near the 'Magnificent Mile' where billionaires and multi-millionaires live and shop and they were strongly opposed to the name change. Initially, Mayor Lori Lightfoot fought the proposal but later embraced it and offered millions of dollars to carry out projects honouring DuSable.Taking their cue from Chicago, at least two other areas of the US - Brooklyn, New York and South Florida - have announced they would name cities after DuSable."To all the graduates and attendees this evening, I beseech you to take deeper interest in history, especially, the history of black people, in this country and everywhere, globally. The story cannot be told unless you search for it," Dr Martin said at his graduation ceremony."As you learn more about your history, culture and spiritually, please share the same with your kids, grandchildren, and others."As Marcus Mosiah Garvey said: 'A nation without the knowledge of its history, culture and religion is like a tree without roots..."I urge you to seek a social issue that you deeply care about, and to fight for that change until victory is won! In the words of Dr Martin Luther King: 'Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter'."On hand to see Dr Martin receive his doctorate were his wife Justice Hall and daughter Dana Martin.