Joseph Ellwanger
Joseph Ellwanger | |
---|---|
Ellwanger in 2011 | |
Personal details | |
Born | (1934-02-18) February 18, 1934 (age 90) Selma, Alabama, U.S. |
Spouse | Joyce |
Residence(s) | Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S. |
Alma mater | Concordia Seminary |
Occupation | Pastor, Civil Rights Activist |
Awards include the Human Rights Award from the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute | |
Joseph W. Ellwanger Jr. (born February 18, 1934) is a Lutheran pastor, author, and civil rights activist. He was a key figure in the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham, Alabama, and the only white religious leader included in strategy meetings with Martin Luther King Jr.[1]
Early life and education
Born in 1934, Ellwanger spent part of his childhood in Selma, Alabama, where his father was a pastor and president of Alabama Lutheran Academy and College. Ellwanger graduated from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri.[2]
Career
From 1958 to 1967, Ellwanger served as pastor of the African-American church, St. Paul Lutheran, in Birmingham. During that time, Ellwanger became colleagues with Martin Luther King Jr.
Ellwanger answered the call of King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to recruit students and clergy to join the movement in Selma to take part in the march for voting rights from Selma to the state capital of Montgomery. Ellwanger took part in mass meetings, involving himself and members of his congregation in Civil Rights activities, and ultimately took a leadership role in community organizing. Ellwanger helped Martin Luther King Jr. and others plan the Birmingham demonstrations and helped organize the Saturday, March 6, 1965, march in Selma to support voting rights.[3]
Ellwanger was the only white minister in Birmingham who took such an active role in supporting equal rights for African Americans.[4] Ellwanger spoke at the funeral for one of the four girls killed in the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in September, 1963, where Dr. King delivered the eulogy.[5]
King included Ellwanger in a group of 15 pastors who met with Governor George Wallace. Ellwanger also met with President Lyndon B. Johnson to voice support for the Voting Rights Act of 1965.[6]
In 1967, Ellwanger left for Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he served as pastor of Cross Lutheran Church until 2001.[7] In 1969, Ellwanger worked with the Black Panther Party to expand the free breakfast program in Milwaukee.[8] In 1970, Ellwanger founded the prison ministry "Project RETURN," with the mission of aiding and rehabilitating citizens returning from incarceration.[9] After retiring from Cross Lutheran, Ellwanger spent a decade as a grassroots organizer for WISDOM, a statewide coalition of social justice groups in Wisconsin. Ellwanger founded WISDOM's statewide Reform Our Communities (ROC) Campaign to reform Wisconsin's criminal justice system.
In 2008, Ellwanger was named as the recipient of the Fred L. Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award. It is the highest honor bestowed on an individual by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute.[10]
Ellwanger was a recipient of the 2016 Social Innovation Prize from Interfaith Older Adult Programs. The award included $10,000 to continue his work to end mass incarceration in Wisconsin.[11]
Books
Ellwanger has been a subject in a number of books, including King: A Biography by David Levering Lewis, Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965 by Juan Williams, Kids in Birmingham 1963, and On the Road to Freedom: A Guided Tour of the Civil Rights Trail by Charles E. Cobb Jr.
- Ellwanger, Joseph (2014). Strength for the Struggle: Insights from the Civil Rights Movement and Urban Ministry. HenschelHAUS Publishing. ISBN 978-1-595-98296-4.
References
- ^ "Joseph Ellwanger: "Strength for the Struggle" - WBHM 90.3". June 13, 2014.
- ^ mulvennk (November 3, 2014). "Joseph Ellwanger "Strength for the Struggle"" – via YouTube.
- ^ "Ellwanger, Joseph". crdl.usg.edu.
- ^ Gray, Jeremy (November 14, 2008) "Birmingham institute to honor the Rev. Ellwanger for early civil rights support." Birmingham News
- ^ Heinen, Tom (January 17, 2004) "Bombing revealed the danger of silence." Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
- ^ Talks at Google (August 10, 2016). "Rev. Joseph Ellwanger: "Strength for the Struggle" - Talks At Google" – via YouTube.
{{cite web}}
:|last=
has generic name (help) - ^ "Cross Lutheran Church :: Pastor Emeritus Joseph Ellwanger". crosslutheranmilwaukee.org.
- ^ "Comrades: A Local History of the Black Panther Party" Judson L. Jeffries, Indiana University Press, December 25, 2007
- ^ Phil Brooks (March 5, 2013). "Origins: by Joe & Joyce" – via YouTube.
- ^ Garrison, Greg (November 1, 2008) "Rev. Joseph Ellwanger to receive Shuttlesworth leadership award." Birmingham News
- ^ "Interfaith Announces 2016 Winner of the $10,000 Social Innovation Prize in Wisconsin - Interfaith Older Adult Programs". October 17, 2016.
External links
- Author's web site for Strength for the Struggle
- Eyes on the Prize interview with Joseph Ellwanger, 1985-11-13, American Archive of Public Broadcasting
- v
- t
- e
(timeline)
groups
- Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights
- Atlanta Student Movement
- Black Panther Party
- Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
- Congress of Racial Equality (CORE)
- Committee for Freedom Now
- Committee on Appeal for Human Rights
- Council for United Civil Rights Leadership
- Council of Federated Organizations
- Dallas County Voters League
- Deacons for Defense and Justice
- Georgia Council on Human Relations
- Highlander Folk School
- Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights
- Lowndes County Freedom Organization
- Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party
- Montgomery Improvement Association
- NAACP
- Nashville Student Movement
- Nation of Islam
- Northern Student Movement
- National Council of Negro Women
- National Urban League
- Operation Breadbasket
- Regional Council of Negro Leadership
- Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)
- Southern Regional Council
- Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
- The Freedom Singers
- United Auto Workers (UAW)
- Wednesdays in Mississippi
- Women's Political Council
- Ralph Abernathy
- Victoria Gray Adams
- Zev Aelony
- Mathew Ahmann
- Muhammad Ali
- William G. Anderson
- Gwendolyn Armstrong
- Arnold Aronson
- Ella Baker
- James Baldwin
- Marion Barry
- Daisy Bates
- Harry Belafonte
- James Bevel
- Claude Black
- Gloria Blackwell
- Randolph Blackwell
- Unita Blackwell
- Ezell Blair Jr.
- Joanne Bland
- Julian Bond
- Joseph E. Boone
- William Holmes Borders
- Amelia Boynton
- Bruce Boynton
- Raylawni Branch
- Stanley Branche
- Ruby Bridges
- Aurelia Browder
- H. Rap Brown
- Ralph Bunche
- Guy Carawan
- Stokely Carmichael
- Johnnie Carr
- James Chaney
- J. L. Chestnut
- Shirley Chisholm
- Colia Lafayette Clark
- Ramsey Clark
- Septima Clark
- Xernona Clayton
- Eldridge Cleaver
- Kathleen Cleaver
- Charles E. Cobb Jr.
- Annie Lee Cooper
- Dorothy Cotton
- Claudette Colvin
- Vernon Dahmer
- Jonathan Daniels
- Abraham Lincoln Davis
- Angela Davis
- Joseph DeLaine
- Dave Dennis
- Annie Devine
- Patricia Stephens Due
- Joseph Ellwanger
- Charles Evers
- Medgar Evers
- Myrlie Evers-Williams
- Chuck Fager
- James Farmer
- Walter Fauntroy
- James Forman
- Marie Foster
- Golden Frinks
- Andrew Goodman
- Robert Graetz
- Fred Gray
- Jack Greenberg
- Dick Gregory
- Lawrence Guyot
- Prathia Hall
- Fannie Lou Hamer
- Fred Hampton
- William E. Harbour
- Vincent Harding
- Dorothy Height
- Audrey Faye Hendricks
- Lola Hendricks
- Aaron Henry
- Oliver Hill
- Donald L. Hollowell
- James Hood
- Myles Horton
- Zilphia Horton
- T. R. M. Howard
- Ruby Hurley
- Cecil Ivory
- Jesse Jackson
- Jimmie Lee Jackson
- Richie Jean Jackson
- T. J. Jemison
- Esau Jenkins
- Barbara Rose Johns
- Vernon Johns
- Frank Minis Johnson
- Clarence Jones
- J. Charles Jones
- Matthew Jones
- Vernon Jordan
- Tom Kahn
- Clyde Kennard
- A. D. King
- C.B. King
- Coretta Scott King
- Martin Luther King Jr.
- Martin Luther King Sr.
- Bernard Lafayette
- James Lawson
- Bernard Lee
- Sanford R. Leigh
- Jim Letherer
- Stanley Levison
- John Lewis
- Viola Liuzzo
- Z. Alexander Looby
- Joseph Lowery
- Clara Luper
- Danny Lyon
- Malcolm X
- Mae Mallory
- Vivian Malone
- Bob Mants
- Thurgood Marshall
- Benjamin Mays
- Franklin McCain
- Charles McDew
- Ralph McGill
- Floyd McKissick
- Joseph McNeil
- James Meredith
- William Ming
- Jack Minnis
- Amzie Moore
- Cecil B. Moore
- Douglas E. Moore
- Harriette Moore
- Harry T. Moore
- Queen Mother Moore
- William Lewis Moore
- Irene Morgan
- Bob Moses
- William Moyer
- Elijah Muhammad
- Diane Nash
- Charles Neblett
- Huey P. Newton
- Edgar Nixon
- Jack O'Dell
- James Orange
- Rosa Parks
- James Peck
- Charles Person
- Homer Plessy
- Adam Clayton Powell Jr.
- Fay Bellamy Powell
- Rodney N. Powell
- Al Raby
- Lincoln Ragsdale
- A. Philip Randolph
- George Raymond
- George Raymond Jr.
- Bernice Johnson Reagon
- Cordell Reagon
- James Reeb
- Frederick D. Reese
- Walter Reuther
- Gloria Richardson
- David Richmond
- Bernice Robinson
- Jo Ann Robinson
- Angela Russell
- Bayard Rustin
- Bernie Sanders
- Michael Schwerner
- Bobby Seale
- Cleveland Sellers
- Charles Sherrod
- Alexander D. Shimkin
- Fred Shuttlesworth
- Modjeska Monteith Simkins
- Glenn E. Smiley
- A. Maceo Smith
- Kelly Miller Smith
- Mary Louise Smith
- Maxine Smith
- Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson
- Charles Kenzie Steele
- Hank Thomas
- Dorothy Tillman
- A. P. Tureaud
- Hartman Turnbow
- Albert Turner
- C. T. Vivian
- Wyatt Tee Walker
- Hollis Watkins
- Walter Francis White
- Roy Wilkins
- Hosea Williams
- Kale Williams
- Robert F. Williams
- Andrew Young
- Whitney Young
- Sammy Younge Jr.
- Bob Zellner
- James Zwerg
songs
- "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me 'Round"
- "If You Miss Me at the Back of the Bus"
- "Kumbaya"
- "Keep Your Eyes on the Prize"
- "Oh, Freedom"
- "This Little Light of Mine"
- "We Shall Not Be Moved"
- "We Shall Overcome"
- "Woke Up This Morning (With My Mind Stayed On Freedom)"
- Jim Crow laws
- Lynching in the United States
- Plessy v. Ferguson
- Buchanan v. Warley
- Hocutt v. Wilson
- Sweatt v. Painter
- Hernandez v. Texas
- Loving v. Virginia
- African-American women in the movement
- Jews in the civil rights movement
- Fifth Circuit Four
- 16th Street Baptist Church
- Kelly Ingram Park
- A.G. Gaston Motel
- Bethel Baptist Church
- Brown Chapel
- Dexter Avenue Baptist Church
- Holt Street Baptist Church
- Edmund Pettus Bridge
- March on Washington Movement
- African-American churches attacked
- List of lynching victims in the United States
- Freedom Schools
- Freedom songs
- Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam
- "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence"
- Voter Education Project
- 1960s counterculture
- African American founding fathers of the United States
- Eyes on the Prize
- In popular culture
- Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
- Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument
- Civil Rights Memorial
- Civil Rights Movement Archive
- Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument
- Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument
- Freedom Rides Museum
- Freedom Riders National Monument
- King Center for Nonviolent Social Change
- Martin Luther King Jr. Day
- Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial
- Mississippi Civil Rights Museum
- National Civil Rights Museum
- National Voting Rights Museum
- St. Augustine Foot Soldiers Monument
historians