James Herman Robinson (January 24, 1907 – November 6, 1972) was an African-American clergyman and humanitarian, best known as the founder of Operation Crossroads Africa (OCA), a cross-cultural exchange program considered a forerunner of the

Peace Corps The Peace Corps is an independent agency and program of the United States government that trains and deploys volunteers to provide international development assistance. It was established in March 1961 by an executive order of President John F ...

. Robinson served on the Corps' first National Advisory Council, and advised the U.S. State Department on African affairs. He also organized

Harlem Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and Central Park North on the south. The greater Ha ...

's Morningside Community Center, cofounded the African Academy of Arts and Research, and advocated independence for African nations.Robert T. Grimm, Jr.,
Notable American Philanthropists: Biographies of Giving and Volunteering
' (Greenwood Publishing, 2002), pp. 252-255.

Life

Childhood and education

Robinson was born in

Knoxville, Tennessee Knoxville is a city in and the county seat of Knox County in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States census, Knoxville's population was 190,740, making it the largest city in the East Tennessee Grand Division and the state' ...

, one of six children of Henry and Willie Belle Robinson. He spent his early childhood in "The Bottoms," a polluted slum that lay along First Creek in downtown Knoxville.James Herman Robinson, ''Road Without Turning: The Story of James H. Robinson'' (New York: Farrar, Straus and Company, 1950). Disenchanted by racism and poverty, Robinson joined a gang that skulked about the intersection of Vine and Central, in what is now the Old City. He found inspiration in his grandfather, a former slave who had fought for the Union during the Civil War, and a charismatic Baptist minister named Jim Haywood. When Robinson was about 10, his family moved to

Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

to find work in the city's war-time era factories. Following his mother's death, he lived with his grandparents for a brief period in

Youngstown, Ohio Youngstown is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio, and the largest city and county seat of Mahoning County. At the 2020 census, Youngstown had a city population of 60,068. It is a principal city of the Youngstown–Warren metropolitan area, whi ...

, before returning to Cleveland during the recession that followed World War I. In spite of his family's opposition to education, Robinson managed to finish high school and enroll in

Western Reserve University Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US * Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that i ...

. He completed two semesters before the Reverend C. Lee Jefferson of the St. Mark's Presbyterian Church offered to pay for him to train as a minister if he joined the Presbyterian Church. Robinson enrolled in Lincoln University in Oxford, Pennsylvania, in 1931. During the summer of 1933, while staying with his aunt in Knoxville, he was tasked with overseeing a small black congregation in Bearden, then a rural community on the outskirts of the city. He encouraged his congregation to vote and become more politically active, agitating Bearden's white residents, and was eventually chased out of the community by a lynch mob. Robinson graduated as the valedictorian of his class from Lincoln in 1935, and enrolled in Union Theological Seminary in New York. He was President of the 1937–1938 class at Union, with the Rev. Ralph M. Carmichael as his vice president. Both men would dedicate their lives to social justice. At Union, former

American Civil Liberties Union The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a nonprofit organization founded in 1920 "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States". T ...

chairman Harry F. Ward, a professor at the school, had a tremendous impact on Robinson, especially with his ideas regarding Social Christianity.

Humanitarianism

Following his graduation and ordination in 1938, Robinson became pastor of Harlem's Morningside Presbyterian Church, which was renamed the Church of the Master shortly afterward. That same year, he established the Morningside Community Center, and set up a cooperative store and a credit union for the local community. In 1942, Robinson established an integrated summer camp, Rabbit Hollow, on donated land in New Hampshire. He co-founded the African Academy of Arts and Research the following year. In 1951, the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions sent Robinson on a tour of Europe, the Middle East, and Asia to visit missionaries and to determine potential support for the church in those parts of the world. He made a similar tour of Africa in 1954, and suggested the church focus on practical aid for the continent, namely by sending doctors, engineers and other professionals, rather than missionaries. He discussed his travels and his plans to provide aid for Africa at the Lyman Beecher Lectures at Yale in 1955, and gained the support of noted individuals such as

William O. Douglas William Orville Douglas (October 16, 1898January 19, 1980) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, who was known for his strong progressive and civil libertarian views, and is often ci ...

and

Theodore Hesburgh Theodore Martin Hesburgh, CSC (May 25, 1917 – February 26, 2015) was a native of Syracuse, New York, who became an ordained priest of the Congregation of Holy Cross and is best known for his service as the president of the University of No ...

, as well as African leaders such as

Nnamdi Azikiwe Nnamdi Benjamin Azikiwe, (16 November 1904 – 11 May 1996), usually referred to as "Zik", was a Nigerian statesman and political leader who served as the first President of Nigeria from 1963 to 1966. Considered a driving force behind the ...

, Akiki Nyabongo, and Kingsley Mbadiwe. Robinson's efforts coalesced in 1958 with the establishment of Operation Crossroads Africa, which aimed to provide volunteer opportunities for students and professionals to help build infrastructure and improve education in impoverished African communities. The OCA built water systems, schools, clinics, and orphanages for villages, and established teacher training programs that within a few years had trained thousands of teachers. By the 1970s, over 4,000 students had served in the OCA. During the Cold War, as the United States and the Soviet Union fought one another for influence around the world, the U.S. government became concerned over the spread of communism in African nations, and sought Robinson's advice on how to deal with burgeoning African governments. Robinson warned U.S. officials not to blindly support European colonial powers over African nationalist movements, and stated that communism was a not serious threat among the African people. Robinson was eventually appointed to the State Department's Advisory Council on African Affairs. Upon the establishment of the

in 1961, President John F. Kennedy and

Sargent Shriver Robert Sargent Shriver Jr. (November 9, 1915 – January 18, 2011) was an American diplomat, politician, and activist. As the husband of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, he was part of the Kennedy family. Shriver was the driving force behind the creatio ...

, recognizing Robinson's work with OCA, sought his advice on organizing aid efforts in developing nations. Kennedy later described the OCA as the "progenitor" of the Peace Corps. Robinson served as a vice chairman of the Corps' National Advisory Council.John Coyne,
First National Advisory Council to the Peace Corps
." 23 October 2009. Retrieved: 1 February 2012. On May 5, 1964, Robinson appeared before the

House Committee on Un-American Activities The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA), popularly dubbed the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives, created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloy ...

to refute suspicions that he harbored communist sympathies. These suspicions arose primarily from Robinson's associations with certain communists in the 1940s, as well as comments he made in his 1954 book, ''Tomorrow Is Today''. Robinson denied ever being a communist, though he stated that before World War II, he had knowingly worked with communists who supported causes (such as civil rights) that he supported.House Committee on Un-American Activities, 88th Congress, 2nd Sessio
Testimony of Rev. James H. Robinson
5 May 1964, p. 1925. Retrieved: 1 February 2012. Robinson was appointed special representative to Bechuanaland (modern

Botswana Botswana (, ), officially the Republic of Botswana ( tn, Lefatshe la Botswana, label= Setswana, ), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory being the Kalaha ...

) and Basutoland (modern Lesotho) by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965, and later organized cross-cultural efforts in the Caribbean and South America. He died at St. Luke's Hospital in New York on November 6, 1972.

Bibliography

*''Road Without Turning'' (1950) *''Tomorrow Is Today'' (1954) *''Adventurous Preaching'' (1955) *''Africa At the Crossroads'' (1962)

References

External links

Operation Crossroads AfricaJames Herman Robinson Papers
–

Tulane University Tulane University, officially the Tulane University of Louisiana, is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by seven young medical doctors, it turned into a comprehensive pub ...