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Identifier

20032259

Description

Mary Brown Crawford, missionary, center. A woman standing between two men. The men are wearing double-breasted suits, the man on the right has a three-piece suit. Ms. Crawford is wearing a women's single breasted suit with a skirt. She was wearing a blouse with a cut-away collar and an orchid corsage, and holds a handkerchief or napkin in her hand. The man on the right has a folded handkerchief in his breast pocket. "Voice From Dark Continent Missionary Says War is Puzzling to Black Men" By James K. Thompson. Twenty-six years ago a dark-haired, gray-blue-eyed little girl came with her father, mother, younger sister and brother to Fort Worth to make her home. Twenty years passed, and, following what seem to her like a call to missionary service, she went to the Belgian Congo in Africa, the Dark Continent, and from which early purpose she never swerved. Mary Brown Crawford Tuesday morning spoke before a large audience at the First Presbyterian Church, in which she had her earlier membership, and served in the capacity of religious educational director from 1930-34. Miss Crawford is a graduate of the Arlington Heights High School, and of Texas Christian University in the class of 1930. Leaving Fort Worth in 1934, she entered the General Assembly's Training School of the Presbyterian Church, U. S., Richmond, Va., graduating in 1936. After two years as director of religious education in the Decatur, Ga., Presbyterian Church, she began the first lap of her immediate journey to Africa, through Belgium for a brief study of the French language—the language of the Belgian Congo—and on to her field of labor, June 1938. The mission field to which Miss Crawford had been assigned, under the supervision of the Presbyterian Church, U. S., comprises more than two million of the ten million people who populate the Dark Continent. 'The gospel,' she said, 'the Bible fully translated in the language of the people, the schools under Christian auspices, available to all have made undoubted impact on the life of thousands of Afrikander's.' Replying quickly and alertly to the many questions asked her, Miss Crawford made it clear that women and girls in increasing areas are 'no longer the mere chattels of men, toilers in the fields, beasts of burden. Asked with regard to the effect of the war, she replied, 'relatively little, so far as mission work is concerned; but the people themselves have great difficulty in understanding why they should be compelled to fight the Christian white man's war and kill other white men.' And then she added: 'These black men, returning from seeing what they have never seen before, having passed through experiences they nave never remotely dreamed of, may well become one of the white man's greatest postwar problems. Miss Crawford is a niece of Dr. Frank C. Brown, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Dallas. Dr. and Mrs. Brown were guests at the luncheon given at the Fort Worth Church honoring Miss Crawford, who, when asked, when she expected to return to Africa, replied, as her face lighted expectantly, "just as soon as I can."

Archival Date

1945-01-30

Collection Name

Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection

Collection Number

AR406-6-313

Original Format

Negatives, Black & White

File Format

JPG

Rights

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Names

Crawford, Mary B.

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