RIP Nelson Mandela

I lived in SA 1987-1989. I remember talking to the other kids in school about apartheid. Everyone agreed it was wrong, but they were worried that a switch to black rule would result in mass killing of whites (as had happened in Zimbabwe), so didn't know how/when apartheid could end. It amazed me that he was released from prison less than a year after we left. And not such a bad transition to full democracy given the history of SA...

two nice NPR remembrances of him. one, two