Family, friends gather to honor trailblazer Colin Powell
By ROBERT BURNS and MATTHEW LEE
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — Colin L. Powell, the widely praised soldier-diplomat who died of complications from COVID-19 last month, is being remembered at a funeral service at the Washington National Cathedral. Powell’s achievements serve as a model for minorities in public and private life. A Vietnam combat veteran, he rose to become the first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the first Black secretary of state. Powell had been vaccinated against the coronavirus, but his family said his immune system had been compromised by multiple myeloma, a blood cancer for which he had been undergoing treatment.