Cornelius "Cornbread" Givens facts for kids

Cornelius "Cornbread" Givens (1931–2008) was an important leader in the civil rights movement. He also worked hard to create special businesses called cooperatives that helped people. He is known for being the first African American person to run for mayor of a big city in the United States, Jersey City, New Jersey.

Early Life and Family

Cornelius Givens was born in Jersey City in 1931. When he was a teenager, from age 15 to 18, he served in the South Pacific. In 1952, he married Alma Montgomery. They had two children, Kevin and Pamela. In the early 1960s, Givens owned his own business that remodeled homes.

Working for Change

Starting in Politics

In 1961, Givens started his political journey. He joined the New Frontier Political Democratic Club. This club worked to help African American people run for political jobs. By 1963, Givens was the club's president. He promised that an African American person would run for mayor of Jersey City soon.

In 1965, Cornelius Givens himself ran for mayor of Jersey City. He wanted to create new factories run by African Americans. He also wanted history books to show more about African American contributions. His plans included money to fix up neighborhoods and build housing cooperatives. He also wanted to control how much rent people had to pay. He finished sixth out of seven candidates in the election.

Fighting Poverty

Cornelius Givens spent his life helping poor people create their own organizations. He once said that when he was 13, he was so tired of poverty that he cried. He promised himself that the next generation would not suffer as he did.

Starting in 1964, he worked for an organization called CAN DO. This group trained teenage boys in construction skills. Later, he started his own groups: Poverty Organization of Rehabilitation (POOR) and Grass Rooters Interested in Poverty Elimination (GRIPE).

The Poor People's Campaign

Givens became a leader in the Poor People's Campaign. This was a big effort to bring attention to poverty in America. The mayor of New York, John Lindsey, chose Givens to lead the campaign in New York.

During a part of the campaign called Resurrection City, Givens and others decided that poor people needed their own "embassy" in Washington, D.C. This "Poor People's Embassy" would represent them. From this embassy, Givens started the Poor People’s Development Foundation (PPDF). This foundation aimed to help poor communities create cooperatives.

Helping Communities with Cooperatives

From 1969, Givens was the president of PPDF. The board included important activists like Reies Tijerina, Tillie Walker, and Mark Comfort. By 1971, PPDF was helping to set up farm cooperatives in the South. They also worked to connect these farms to people in the North who wanted to buy their food.

These farm cooperatives were very important. After the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed, some Southern farmers who registered to vote were unfairly kicked off their farms. Givens and PPDF helped these farmers form cooperatives. They connected these Southern farmer cooperatives with food cooperatives, farmers' markets, and health food stores in places like Newark, New Jersey, and New York City. PPDF members even drove food from the farms up to the cities to be sold.

Cooperatives in Washington, D.C.

When Marion Barry became mayor of Washington, D.C., Givens moved there. In 1980, Mayor Barry made Givens the head of his new Commission on Cooperative Economic Development. The goal was to make Washington, D.C., a model city for cooperative development.

Givens believed that cooperatives could help people with low and moderate incomes gain economic and political power. He imagined a system where each community would have:

• Producer cooperatives, which create jobs.
• Consumer cooperatives, where people buy goods together.
• Credit unions, which are like banks run by their members.
• Low-income housing cooperatives, where people share ownership of their homes.
• A community cooperative, funded by profits from the other cooperatives. This would help create social programs like schools and hospitals.

He saw these cooperatives as working together to build stronger communities. He also believed that national support was needed, like from the National Cooperative Bank, which he helped create.

Later Life and Legacy

In 1985, Cornelius Givens shared information about some improper financial dealings by a D.C. government employee named Ivanhoe Donaldson. Donaldson was later found guilty of misusing funds. Givens himself was never accused of any wrongdoing.

Givens spent the rest of his life promoting cooperatives. D.C. Mayor Sharon Pratt Dixon helped him establish the Center for Cooperatives at the University of the District of Columbia. He passed away in 2008.