James Dent Walker (9 June 1928 - 6 October 1993) of Washington, DC was founder and president of the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society (National), which grew to 23 chapters across the United States by 1999. He served in a variety of posts in the National Genealogical Society and was elected a Fellow there in 1978. He also founded and was president of the District of Columbia Genealogical Society. In 1994, The Federation of Genealogical Societies established the James Dent Walker Memorial Lecture in his honor. Tony Burroughs at Richmond, Virginia was named the first lecturer that year.
Walker worked for thirty years as a genealogist and executive at the National Archives and Records Administration, and was Assistant Director of the Institute of Genealogical Research at American University. He had an extensive knowledge of military and pension records from the period of American Revolutionary War to the American Civil War. In May 1999, he was elected to the National Genealogy Hall of Fame.