» Office of Gift Planning » Browse the story library

Movements for peace and justice have always taken firm root in Oberlin soil. Now, students who work on peace-organizing projects will be able to apply for summer support from an endowed fund. They'll have ample inspiration for their work in the life of the fund's namesake, Marion Block Anderson '54.

Marion Anderson speaking at a 1974 press conference

A short, slender woman, Anderson spent nearly 45 years working as a lobbyist, peace activist, and political organizer, and she packed quite a punch – nonviolent, of course. One of her boldest moves involved a detour on her way to a Washington, D.C., protest against the Vietnam War in 1970.

"I thought to myself, 'I didn't come here just to go on one more march. I've been on a million marches. I came here to see the Joint Chiefs of Staff,'" Anderson wrote in her essay in the 1998 book Friends & the Vietnam War.

So she directed her cab driver to take her to the Pentagon, where she entered the building, asked guards for directions, found the room where the Joint Chiefs were meeting, and distributed antiwar leaflets to the stunned military brass assembled there. Then she walked out, got back in her cab, and went to the march.

"She made it a point of pride to look like someone anyone in America could relate to," says Dave Anderson '92, who initiated the fund in honor of his mother. "The way she put it was that she looked like any general's wife. That's how she pulled it off. This always strikes me. At Oberlin, if you're a political radical, you probably dress the part. Mom actually did the opposite."

During her life, Anderson's tireless work for peace received national media attention from such outlets as The Washington Post, USA Today, the Associated Press, National Public Radio, and The New York Times, as well as papers in her home state of Michigan.

Upon her death last December, former U.S. Senator and presidential candidate George McGovern called her "a little dynamo, a true stalwart for peace." Anderson had worked as director of grassroots fund raising in Michigan during McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign.

Anderson began her life's work while at Oberlin, where she worked with the Consolidated Relief Drive. To raise funds for the drive, Anderson and a friend delivered Gibson's donuts and coffee to sleepy students each Sunday; profits were donated to various local charities.

During her Oberlin years, Anderson also became a Quaker. Her Quaker ideology, and having a young son in the late 1950s, when nuclear war seemed an imminent possibility, were strong fuel for her convictions. But son Dave says a pre-college trip to Europe may also have been a major influence.

Anderson on a trip in Italy.

"My grandparents took Mom and her sister to Europe right after World War II, before Europe was considered safe for tourists. They wanted them to see what war does to a culture. Mom always said she became political while at Oberlin, when she started attending Quaker meetings. But my theory is that seeing the devastation in Europe is probably what politicized her the most," he says.

Marion Anderson grew up in Scarsdale, New York. Her father, Richard Block, was a world–renowned biochemist, and her mother, Peggy Strasser, was a remedial reading specialist. Anderson began her career in activism shortly after graduating from Oberlin in 1954 with a major in history and minors in art history and political science. An early member and organizer of the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy (SANE), she testified before the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy in 1958. Early in her career, she also worked for the Friends Committee on National Legislation as a congressional lobbyist.

Anderson's unconventional career choice probably didn't surprise their parents, says Diane "Dee" Block Montie '56, Anderson's sister. "At some point in the middle of her college career, Marion became so impressed with Mahatma Gandhi that she wanted to give away her money and go to India," she says. "My parents were probably relieved that she decided to stay in the country."

When the Vietnam War began, Anderson devoted her energies to opposing that military action, and when the war ended, she turned her intellect to advocating for the conversion of defense spending to civilian use. As legislative director of the Public Interest Research Group of Michigan, she wrote a number of highly influential reports, including The Empty Pork Barrel, in which she used government data to argue that military spending hurts, rather than enhances, the nation's economy.

In 1979 she founded Employment Research Associates, a nonprofit consulting firm based in Lansing, Michigan, that specialized in analyzing the impact of government policies on the economy. The firm published its own reports detailing the negative impact of military spending, as well as reports on behalf of such groups as the U.S. Conference of Mayors, SANE, and the Citizen/Labor Energy Coalition.

Throughout her career, she also worked on several Democratic presidential campaigns, including those of Adlai Stevenson, John F. Kennedy, George McGovern, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton.

Although Anderson would sometimes become frustrated with the various organizations for which she worked, she never became frustrated with the work itself, says Montie.

"She loved her work. She designed her own career and went with it," Montie says.

Dave Anderson began organizing the $100,000 endowed fund before his mother's death; he wanted her to know about the fund and its purpose. The fund was built with significant contributions from two of Marion Anderson's sons, Dave Anderson and Richard Krebser, and from her sister, Diane Block Montie, as well as gifts made in honor of Marion Anderson from nearly 50 other alumni and family friends.

Grants from the fund will be awarded to students regardless of their financial need and will support students' summer work in peace-organizing activities.

"We're very open–minded about the kinds of projects that the fund will support," says Montie.

Dave Anderson agrees. "It was important to us that the grants not be need-based. This fund is about encouraging the best young peace activists. We want to encourage students regardless of their background. Any kid at Oberlin can get this award," he says.

"I think Mom always felt a little bit sad that her life's work and her achievements had never been recognized on a broader level," he continues. "She spent her whole life sacrificing, doing good and trying to effect peaceful change in the world.

"It was important to us to establish the fund before she died, so she'd know we had this knowledge of her life and work, and that it would continue. It's her legacy in a place she loved."