Gladwyn Murray Childs was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 minister, missionary

Missionary

A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...

 and anthropologist

Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...

.

Early life

He was born in Endeavor, Wisconsin

Endeavor, Wisconsin

Endeavor is a village in Marquette County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 440 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Endeavor is located at ....

 on 29 December 1896. He received his bachelor's degree from Pomona College

Pomona College

Pomona College is a private, residential, liberal arts college in Claremont, California. Founded in 1887 in Pomona, California by a group of Congregationalists, the college moved to Claremont in 1889 to the site of a hotel, retaining its name. The school enrolls 1,548 students.The founding member...

, a BD and MA from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York

Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York

Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York is a preeminent independent graduate school of theology, located in Manhattan between Claremont Avenue and Broadway, 120th to 122nd Streets. The seminary was founded in 1836 under the Presbyterian Church, and is affiliated with nearby Columbia...

, where he knew William Sloane Coffin

William Sloane Coffin

William Sloane Coffin, Jr. was an American liberal Christian clergyman and long-time peace activist. He was ordained in the Presbyterian church and later received ministerial standing in the United Church of Christ....

. He obtained a PhD in anthropology from Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

.

Career

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

American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions

The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions was the first American Christian foreign mission agency. It was proposed in 1810 by recent graduates of Williams College and officially chartered in 1812. In 1961 it merged with other societies to form the United Church Board for World...

 in Portuguese West Africa, especially Angola

Angola

Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...

. He was the principal of a mission school, the Currie Institute.

Later life

After retirement, he worked for the World Council of Churches

World Council of Churches

The World Council of Churches is a worldwide fellowship of 349 global, regional and sub-regional, national and local churches seeking unity, a common witness and Christian service. It is a Christian ecumenical organization that is based in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland...

 in Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon is the capital city and largest city of Portugal with a population of 545,245 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Lisbon extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of 3 million on an area of , making it the 9th most populous urban...

, 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

Umbundu

South Mbundu, or Umbundu, is a language spoken by the Southern Mbundu people - now generally referred to by the way they call themselves, Ovimbundu - in the central highlands of Angola. Umbundu is the most widespread Bantu language in Angola. About one third of Angola is represented by Ovimbundu...

 folktales.

Personal life

He married Margaret (born Marguerite) Pfaffli (5 November 1902 - January 1986) in her home town of Lausanne, Switzerland on 14 February 1925. Their daughter, Elaine Childs-Gowell (died 2006) was a noted therapist, anthropologist and author.

Publications

'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 0835732274. Published by: Oxford University Press, 1949

'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