Early Life and Career
Cruikshank was born in Bradner, Ohio in 1902 to Jesse and Jessie (Wright) Cruikshank. His father was a grain dealer who modeled fair business practices and taught the young Cruikshank to respect the value of the labor of the farmers and workers with whom the family did business. The family eventually moved to Texas. Cruikshank worked as a deck hand on freighters on the Great Lakes and was a member of the Seafarers Union before attending Oberlin College. He transferred to Ohio Wesleyan University, where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in economics and theology.
He married Florence Crane on August 30, 1928. They had one child, Alice.
A devout Methodist, Cruikshank entered Union Theological Seminary in 1926 and obtained a Master of Divinity degree in 1929. During his time at Union Theological Seminary, Cruikshank became acquainted with the liberal theologian Reinhold Niebuhr. Niebuhr's teachings about the social gospel as well as his deep involvement in the labor union movement (he was an outspoken critic of Henry Ford and allowed union organizers to speak from his pulpit on union issues) were highly influential in forming Cruikshank's personal beliefs and life.
After graduation, Cruikshank was ordained. He became an assistant pastor at a Methodist church in Brooklyn. He rose to become director of social services for the Brooklyn Federation of Churches. His experiences working with the poor and elderly convinced him of the need for legislation to address the problems of these groups.
Cruikshank was later transferred to a Methodist church in New Haven, Connecticut, where he continued his social work. Cruikshank worked closely with local labor unions, eventually splitting his time between pastoral work and union organizing. He became close friends with Frank Fenton, who later became the director of organizing for the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Working with the Connecticut AFL-CIO, he organized unions at a number of local businesses—even serving briefly as the business agent for a local of the UE at the Whitney Blake Company. He also became tangentially involved in the Workers' Education Bureau of America. But Cruikshank was dissatisfied with pastoral work. He saw his career as a pastor taking him away from felt that people's needs were so great that in 1936, Cruikshank moved to Washington, D.C. and took a series of government jobs. He first worked for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) as a labor relations officer. He later transferred to the FSA's Migratory Farm Labor Program, where he worked to establish several hundred camps for farm workers migrating out of the Dust Bowl—a program later made famous in John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath.
When World War II began, Cruikshank took a position in 1942 with the War Manpower Commission.
Read more about this topic: Nelson Cruikshank
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