Now, we take a moment to honor Betty Reid Soskin.
She was the oldest living National Park Service ranger until her passing on December 21, 2025, at the remarkable age of 104
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Retired at age 100
Surrounded by loved ones, Betty Reid Soskin’s final moments reflected the way she lived her life: full, intentional, and deeply meaningful. In a statement released Sunday morning, her family said she had “led a fully packed life and was ready to leave.”
And what a life it was.
A trailblazing civil rights activist, historian, and storyteller, Soskin spent more than a century breaking barriers and reclaiming forgotten history. She officially retired from the National Park Service in 2022 at age 100, earning the distinction of being the agency’s oldest active ranger, but her impact stretched far beyond any title.
Long before donning a ranger uniform, Soskin helped shape the future of Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park in Richmond. She worked closely with the city and the NPS to develop its management plan, ensuring that the stories of African Americans and other people of color, so often left out of WWII narratives, were finally told.
Her journey with the Park Service didn’t even begin until she was 84.
Through a grant funded by PG&E, Soskin helped uncover untold stories of Black Americans on the WWII home front, a project that led to her temporary, and later permanent, role with the NPS. Her powerful interpretive programs transformed how visitors understood America’s past, shining a long-overdue spotlight on voices history had ignored.
Fleeing the Jim Crow South
Born Betty Charbonnet was born in Detroit in 1921. She grew up in a Cajun-Creole, African American family that relocated to New Orleans and then Oakland after the devastating Great Flood of 1927. Her family’s migration followed the path of Black railroad workers who moved west seeking opportunity, and freedom from the crushing racism of the Jim Crow South.
Her memories stretched across nearly every chapter of modern American history. She remembered ferry boats crossing the Bay before bridges existed, Oakland’s airport as little more than two hangars, Amelia Earhart’s final flight, and the devastating Port Chicago explosion of 1944.
During World War II, Soskin worked as a file clerk in a segregated union hall. In 1945, she and her husband founded Reid’s Records, one of the first Black-owned music stores in the country, a cultural cornerstone that remained open for more than 70 years.
Her commitment to public service never wavered. She went on to work in local and state government, serving as a staff member to a Berkeley city council member and as a field representative for California legislators, always advocating for equity, inclusion, and truth.
