MU| F e a t u r e s
I
n the Marion, Ala., childhood of Jean
Childs ’54 Young, African-Americans
drank from separate drinking fountains,
used separate restrooms, watched
movies from the balcony, and weren’t
allowed to eat their ice cream inside the
drugstore. Only five were registered to vote.
The corrosive effects of that early
discrimination steeled Jean’s resolve to work for
change, join her husband Andrew Young in the
civil rights movement, and advocate for human
rights and children’s welfare. To honor her,
Manchester is building the Jean Childs Young
Intercultural Center to celebrate the diversity
and inclusion that was denied her in the Jim
Crow South.
Jean Childs was born on July 1, 1933, the
youngest of five children. Her father operated
a grocery and candy store in Marion and her
mother taught in a one-room segregated school.
As a child, Jean dreamed of becoming a lawyer
or doctor, but she opted for teaching because it
was something she could do in the South.
She and her older sisters, Norma Childs ’48
dePaur and Cora Childs ’51 Moore, as well
as Coretta Scott King, attended Lincoln High
School in Marion, operated by the American
Missionary Association. The Childs family
supported the efforts of Lincoln staff member
Frances Smith ’39 Thomas, (story on
Page 44) who encouraged the three sisters
to head north and enroll at her alma mater,
Manchester College.
As a Manchester student, Jean participated in
the Women’s Athletic Association, Student
Ministers, the International Club and the Skate
Club. As a junior, she was elected May Queen.
In the summer of 1952 Jean met Andrew
while he was a summer pastor at the First
Congregational Church in Marion. He had
meals with Jean’s parents and was intrigued
when he picked up her Bible and noticed
she had underlined many of his own
favorite passages.
They began dating, and the summer before her
senior year Jean went to Europe with Andrew
and Norma and participated in a Brethren
Volunteer Service work camp.
In June 1954, shortly after her graduation, Jean
married Andrew, who would become a close
friend and colleague of Dr. Martin Luther King
Jr. Andrew was at King’s side when he spoke
at Manchester on Feb. 1, 1968, and when King
was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968.
Beginning in 1972, Andrew served three terms
in Congress and was U.N. ambassador during
the Carter Administration before serving two
terms as Atlanta’s mayor.
Jean’s life was no less remarkable but, unlike
her high-profile husband, she worked quietly
and behind the scenes.
She earned her master’s degree at Queens
College, N.Y., and taught school in Connecticut
and Georgia. She authored “Bridging the Gap,”
a preschool manual for parents. She was the
United States chair for the International Year
of the Child and was active in the League of
Women Voters, the Coalition of Black Women
in Atlanta, the YWCA, NAACP, Red Cross and
the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
in 1980. The mother of four – Andrea, Paula,
Lisa and Bo – she died of cancer in 1994 at
the age of 61.
“I’d like to think that my part in the civil
rights movement made some difference in
the quality of lives, maybe diminished some
misery and injustice,” she told Margaret
McManus, special to The Cleveland Plain Dealer,
in a story published on July 30, 1978. “I don’t
want to feel I’ve lived in vain, without any
purpose. I want to count for something.”
And count she did through the many lives she
touched.
In President Dave McFadden’s copy of
Andrew Young’s book, An Easy Burden: The
Civil Rights Movement and the Transformation of
America, Andrew wrote, “Much of this story
is the result of Jean’s study at Manchester.
I doubt that it could have happened if I’d
married anyone else.”
By Melinda Lantz ’81
Throughout the civil rights movement,
volunteers enjoyed the Youngs’ hospitality and
Jean’s home-cooked meals. She was active in
the movement, too, participating in the 1961
lunch counter boycott in Atlanta, the 1963
March on Washington, the 1964 marches in
St. Augustine, Fla., the 1965 march from
Selma to Montgomery, and the Poor People’s
Campaign in 1968.
As an educator and children’s advocate,
she established the Atlanta Task Force on
Education, served as the co-founder of the
Atlanta-Fulton Commission on Children
and Youth, and helped develop Atlanta
Metropolitan College.
Jean Childs ’54 Young (left) gets a kiss from
her husband, Andrew Young, in May 1980
when she was Commencement speaker and
received an honorary doctorate from her
alma mater. Above, Jean as Manchester’s
May Queen in the early 1950s.
Jean served on the MU Board of Trustees in
the 1970s, and received an honorary doctorate
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