ATKINSON, Henry A(very) 1877-1960

PERSONAL:

Born August 26, 1877, in Merced, CA; died January 24, 1960, in Baltimore, MD; son of Thomas Albion (a Methodist minister) and Sarah Jane (Yeargin) Atkinson; married Grace Olin, 1901 (died, 1954); married Marjorie Jefferson Weber, April 12, 1955. Education: Pacific Methodist College, A.B., 1897; also attended Garrett Biblical Institute (now Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary).

CAREER:

Ordained Congregational minister, 1902; pastor of Congregational churches in Albion, IL, 1902-04, Springfield, OH, 1904-08, and Atlanta, GA, 1908-11; National Council of Congregational Churches, secretary of Department of Church and Labor (later known as Social Service Commission), Boston, MA, 1911-18; National Commission on the Churches and the Moral Aims of the War, director, 1918; Church Peace Union, general secretary, 1918-55. World Alliance for Promoting International Friendship through the Churches, general secretary, beginning 1918; Universal Christian Conference on Life and Work, general secretary, 1920-32; World Council of Churches, founding member, 1948; Council against Intolerance in America, cochair, c. 1940-56; Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League, chair of advisory board, 1944-56. Atlanta Theological Seminary, teacher of sociology. Also worked as preacher in California and chaplain of a labor organization in Ohio. Consultant to U.S. Department of State; supporter of Zionism and the partition of Palestine.

WRITINGS:

(With Frank E. Jenkins, Smith Baker, and others) Anglo-Saxon Congregationalism in the South, Franklin-Turner (Atlanta, GA), 1908.

The Churches and the People's Play, introduction by Washington Gladden, Pilgrim Press (Boston, MA), 1915.

Men and Things, Missionary Education Movement of the United States and Canada (New York, NY), 1918.

Prelude to Peace: A Realistic View of International Relations, Harper (New York, NY), 1937.

Theodore Marburg: The Man and His Work, 1951.

Also editor of pamphlets.

Papers are collected at Columbia University, in Church Peace Union, Council on Religion and International Affairs collection.*