African American Genealogy - a Personal Journey

Local resident Aaron Mair shares his experience researching his African American family ancestry. This four-decades-long exploration ultimately led to an extended family reunion in South Carolina. Read more about the reunion: https://www.sentinelprogress.com/news/8042/a-bittersweet-homecoming.

Dr. (Hon) Aaron Mair is a retired New York State public health epidemiological-spatial analyst and environmentalist. He was the 57th national president of the Sierra Club and received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from the State University of New York at Binghamton for his international climate work. He is the Adirondack Council’s Wilderness Campaign Director and currently lives in Schenectady, New York, where he works for the Adirondack Council.

Mair has been doing genealogy, genetic genealogy, and African Caribbean family history research for over 50 years, specializing in Southern Great Migration and post-World War I Caribbean migration.

Notable Sierra Club roles and milestones:
- Elected president of the Sierra Club on May 16, 2015; the organization's first African-American president.
- Life member of the Sierra Club since 1999.
- National Environmental Justice and Community Partnerships Chair, 2010–present.
- National Diversity Council, 2008–2010.
- Atlantic Chapter: Environmental Justice 2003–2004; Chapter Chair 2002–2003.
- Hudson Mohawk Group: International Human Rights/Environment 2003–present; Environmental Justice 2002–2008; Wilderness, Water Quality/Habitats 2006–2011.

Education and training: He graduated from Binghamton University with a Bachelor of Arts in History and Sociology and a certificate in Southwest Asia and North Africa Studies. He trained at Rhode Island's Naval Education and Training Center, attended The American University in Cairo, and participated in Binghamton University's Political Science Doctoral Program before leaving to begin State service in 1988.

Community and environmental work: In 1995, Mair founded the Arbor Hill Environmental Justice Corporation (the organization was a member of the White House Council on Environmental Quality from 1998 to 2000). He also founded, served as a board member of, and lectured at the W. Haywood Burns Environmental Education Center in Albany. In 1999 he was a member of Friends of Clean Hudson. In 2000 he received an EPA Environmental Quality Award for cleanup of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) on the Hudson River and served as a board member of the New York League of Conservation Voters that year.