Photo credit: Kitsap Unitarian Universalist Fellowship
Marty Crutcher
Shirley Marty Cruther (1934 – )
Mr. Shirley Marty Crutcher was born on a farm in 1934 and was birthed by a midwife in Madison County, Kentucky. There was only one black doctor that serviced Madison County as well as a part of Richmond, Virginia. Mr. Crutcher’s father was a tobacco farmer and his mom worked as a maid, cook, field worker, mother and wife. The family worked the tobacco field; even Mr. Crutcher, at 4 years old, picked worms from the tobacco leaves.
In Madison County, as in Richmond, Jim Crow laws were strictly adhered to. The only place blacks and whites could be in the same building as groups would be the theater, with whites downstairs and blacks upstairs. There were occasions in which word would spread in the town of “a coon hunt,” which meant that whites were going to kill a black man that evening. The blacks would gather in a certain houses or church for protection. In order to show their power, white men would ride through the black area with guns drawn. The Crutcher family moved to Richmond in 1939 for better employment opportunities and due to the deterioration of Marty’s mother’s health. She died at an early age from cancer, which also took the lives of many of his family members.
In Richmond, Mr. Crutcher attended school. In the winter, he sold buckets of coal and in the summer, he sold ice remnants from the ice factory. He picked and sold berries, grew and sold watermelons. At the age of ll he raised pigs for the family to be sold. He washed windows, cut grass, shined shoes ·and delivered papers. From the age of 13 to 18, he worked in a pool hall, and as a drug store runner delivering prescriptions and performing janitorial duties. In1952 he decided to leave Richmond and take a job at another drug store that promised better wages. The owner failed to pay him for 3 months. When young Mr} Crutcher demanded his wages, he was told by the boss, “I do not have to pay you, because you are a Negro.” Mr. Crutcher was arrested for fighting and given a choice between going to jail or the military; he enlisted in the US. Navy in 1955 and was given a job as a steward. The military was integrated by President Truman in 1948 and many menial positions were only held by blacks. Mr. Crutcher attended College at night and advanced to become a submariner. Mr. Crutcher retired as a Senior Chief from the Navy after 24 years. He worked in civil service with the Coast Guard and later at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard as a rigger and supervisor in the nuclear department. In 1986, he became the first of two African Americans (the other being Al Colvin) elected to the Bremerton City Council, where he chaired the parks and cable television commissions. The civic positions he held included 20 years PSNS Usher and President of Usher Council, Vice President of Sinclair Baptist Church Ushers, lifetime member of the NAACP, serving as vice president and chairman of the Legal and Housing Committee, Blacks in Government – Submariner Association, 50th Year Submariner Association, Community Action program, and secretary of the Kitsap NABVETS. Currently he leads a Bible study group at Sinclair Baptist Church.
Written by: Roosevelt Smith, Guest Columnist, Bremerton Sun, Feb. 2020