Juanita Gaston

Dr. Gaston earned a B.S. in Business Administration in 1970 from Alabama State University and an M.A. and PH.D. degrees in Geography in 1973 and 1977, respectively, from Michigan State University. For 24 years, Dr. Gaston taught and conducted research at Florida A&M University (FAMU), with a focus on the urban, social and historical geography of the Southeast United States. In the 1980’s Gaston served as a member of the Commission of Geography and Afro America (COGMA) program which sought to address the status of Black Americans in geography. She also served as the Director of the FAMU Census Information Center from 2000-2014. From 2013 until her retirement, she taught genealogy workshops, where she followed her passion of helping others discover their roots, especially African Americans. Dr. Gaston is the former President of the Tallahassee African American Genealogical Society, Inc. Dr. Gaston was the subject of a book chapter titled Teachers and Their Times: Thelma Glass and Juanita Gaston was published in the book The Role of the South in the Making of American Geography: Centennial of the AAG, 2004.