By John Johnston
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Civil rights pioneer Dorothy I. Height and the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights will receive the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center's 2003 top awards honoring significant contributions to freedom and human rights.

Ethel Kennedy, widow of Robert F. Kennedy, will accept the 2003 International Freedom Conductor Award for the RFK center at an Oct. 4 black-tie gala at the Albert B. Sabin Cincinnati Convention Center.

Height, chairwoman and president emeritus of the National Council of Negro Women in Washington, D.C., also will attend. She was in town last weekend for the 15th Midwest Regional Black Family Reunion, which she founded.

Rosa Parks received the first Freedom Conductor Award in 1998; South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu was honored in 2000.

"It's time to emphasize the diversity of being a freedom conductor," said Ed Rigaud, president of the Freedom Center, whose $110 million facility is under way on the riverfront. "As we move towards opening next year, we felt it was time to expand the number of heroes that we honor."

The RFK center investigates and publishes reports on human rights conditions around the world while supporting the work of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award laureates. To date, 31 laureates have been honored for standing up to government oppression in the nonviolent pursuit of human rights

Height, who is 91, said she was humbled by the honor, named for the "conductors" who helped escaping slaves reach freedom in the years before the Civil War.

"It means a lot to me to be, in a sense, connected to my history," she said. "We all draw strength from our own history and knowing what people have done to bring us where we are."

"She personifies the Freedom Center - her life, her contributions, her leadership," said Nathaniel Jones, who chaired the Freedom Conductor selection committee. Jones is co-chairman of the Freedom Center and a retired U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals judge.

E-mail jjohnston@enquirer.com