Sue Eakin

Myrtle Sue Lyles Eakin, known as Sue Eakin (December 7, 1918 – September 17, 2009), was an American historian, a professor, and a journalist from Bunkie, Louisiana. She specialized in Louisiana history, particularly the Southern plantation system. Eakin is best known for documenting, annotating, and reviving interest in the 1853 book Twelve Years a Slave, a slave narrative by Solomon Northup, a free man from New York who was kidnapped and sold into slavery in 1841. In 2013, a popular film version of Twelve Years a Slave, a Golden Globe Award nominee, was released. Directed by Steve McQueen and written by John Ridley, the picture stars Chiwetel Ejiofor as Solomon Northup. Much of the photography was taken in the summer of 2012 in the New Orleans area. Twelve Years a Slave won the 2013 Academy Award for Best Picture. In his acceptance speech for the honor, director McQueen thanked Eakin: "I'd like to thank this amazing historian, Sue Eakin, whose life — she gave her life's work to preserving Solomon’s book." Eakin discovered Northup's narrative when she was twelve years of age and again when in college; in time, she pushed the project to fruition after many years of work.