Young Kwok Lee (September 5, 1947 – January 27, 2021) was a Chinese-American activist, community organizer, photographer, journalist and the unofficial Asian American Photographer Laureate. He called himself an "ABC from NYC...yielding a camera to slay injustices against APAs." His work chronicled and explored the diversity and nuances of Asian American culture often ignored and overlooked by mainstream media and made sure Asian American history was included as a part of American history. Early life and education Lee was born on September 5, 1947, in Queens, New York City. He was the second child of Lee Yin Chuck and Jung See Lee, both of whom immigrated to the United States from China. His father had a laundry business and was a soldier in World War II; his mother worked as a seamstress. He had an older sister (Fee) and 3 younger brothers (John, James, and Richard). Lee attended Jamaica High School, before going on to study American history at Queens College in 1965. Lee taught himself photography, and borrowed cameras to practice because he was unable to afford his own. He said his work was inspired by an 1869 photo he saw in his social studies text that celebrated the completion of the transcontinental railroad at Promontory Summit, Utah. Its construction had involved thousands of Chinese workers, but the photo depicting representative laborers showed none of them. Photographic work Lee's work has documented key events in Asian American political history. His 1975 photograph of a Chinese American man being beaten by members of the New York City Police Department was featured by the New York Post. The day that the picture was published 20,000 people marched from Chinatown to City Hall protesting against police brutality. Lee also photographed the protests that took place after the 1982 murder of Vincent Chin in Michigan. Chin was a young Chinese American man living in Detroit and was killed by Ronald Ebens, a superintendent at Chrysler Motors, and his stepson. The perpetrators attacked Chin, of Chinese descent, after mistaking him for being from Japan, as Japanese companies were blamed for the loss of American auto industry jobs. Lee's title of "undisputed unofficial Asian American Photographer Laureate" was self-proclaimed, but never questioned. His photographs documented the daily lives of Asian Americans as well as various historical moments in American history. Lee said his camera was a sword to combat racial injustice, to memorialize and make