Dorothy Height, leading 1960s civil rights activist

WASHINGTON - Dorothy Height, the leading female voice of the 1960s civil rights movement and a participant in historic marches with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and others, died yesterday. She was 98.

Height, whose activism on behalf of women and minorities dated to the New Deal, led the National Council of Negro Women for 40 years. She continued actively speaking out into her 90s, often getting rousing ovations at events around Washington, where she was immediately recognized by the bright, colorful hats she almost always wore.

She died at Howard University Hospital, where she had been in serious condition for weeks.

In a statement, President Barack Obama called her "the godmother of the civil rights movement" and a hero to Americans.

It was the second death of a major civil rights figure within a week. Benjamin L. Hooks, the former longtime head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, died Thursday in Memphis at 85.

Height, as a teenager, marched in Times Square shouting, "Stop the lynching!" In the 1950s and '60s, she was the leading woman helping King and other activists orchestrate the movement, often reminding the men heading it not to underestimate their women counterparts.

Height became president of the National Council of Negro Women in 1957 and held the post until 1997, when she was 85. She remained chairwoman of the group.

She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1994 from President Bill Clinton.

The late activist C. DeLores Tucker once called Height an icon to all African-American women. "I call Rosa Parks the mother of the civil rights movement," Tucker said in 1997. "Dorothy Height is the queen."