Gladwyn Murray Childs (29 December 1896 – July 1975) was an American minister, missionary and anthropologist.
Early life edit
He was born in Endeavor, Wisconsin on 29 December 1896. He received his bachelor's degree from Pomona College, a BD and MA from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York,[1] where he knew William Sloane Coffin. He obtained a PhD in anthropology from Columbia University.
Career edit
Childs was a striking man, being 6' 4" tall. Together with his wife, Margaret, he worked as a missionary from 1925 to the early 1960s for the United Church Board for World Ministries and the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions in Angola. He was the principal of a mission school, the Currie Institute in Dondi.[2] Childs spoke both Umbundu and Portuguese at the school, which was run by the Church of Christ.[1]
Later life edit
After retirement, he worked for the World Council of Churches in Lisbon, but sought to return to Angola to work on a prehistoric project. Childs also worked with his uncle, Merlin Ennis, a researcher of folk tales, on Umbundu folktales;[3] Ennis went on to publish Umbundu: folk tales from Angola in 1962.[4][5]
Personal life edit
He married Margaret (born Marguerite) Pfaffli (5 November 1902 – January 1986) in her home town of Lausanne, Switzerland on 14 February 1925. Margaret was a biologist who studied and wrote about medicinal plants in Angola.[2] The couple had three daughters.[1]
Their daughter, Elaine Childs-Gowell (died 2006) was a therapist, anthropologist and author.[6][7]
Publications edit
'The Ovimbundu of Angola' Chicago: Field Museum of Natural History, 1934.
'Umbundu Kinship and Character: Being a Description of Social Structure and Individual Development of the Ovimbundu'. ISBN 0-8357-3227-4. Published by: Oxford University Press, 1949[8]
'The Kingdom of Wambu (Huambo): A Tentative Chronology' in The Journal of African History, Vol. 5, No. 3 (1964), pp. 367–379, Published by: Cambridge University Press
His papers are held at the University of Washington Library in Seattle.[9]
References edit
- ^ a b c Newspapers.com website, Rev. Childs Visits in City, article published in the Capital Times dated February 17, 1924
- ^ a b Angola Memorial Scholarship Fund website, Gladwyn Murry Childs
- ^ Routledge website, Umbundu Kinship and Character
- ^ Google Books, Colonialism, Ethnicity and War in Angola, by Vasco Martins, page 32
- ^ Cambridge University Press website, Umbundu Folk Tales from Angola. Collected and translated by Merlin Ennis (with comparative analysis by Albert Lord)
- ^ North America Transactional Analysis Association website, Elaine Childs-Gowell, article by Cheryl Leong dated June 29, 2006
- ^ ABE Books website, Stages of Ages Rechilding Your Inner Child by Gowell Phd, Elaine Childs
- ^ ABE Books website, Childs, Gladwyn Murray
- ^ Orbis Cascade Alliance website, Gladwyn Murray Childs papers, 1882-1972