Historical Contributions Experience of Elders

You might think that America has run out of founding fathers, but Oscar Cross is proof to the contrary. His name isn't as familiar as those of Washington and Jefferson, but he's famous to the people of Paducah, Kentucky. Oscar Cross was born in South Fulton, Tennessse, August 10, 1906.

The legacy of Cross is the Boys Club that bears his name there. In March [1988], at the age of 81, he retired as the Club's executive director. Cross founded the Club in 1953, in a basement storeroom of the local courthouse where kids put together model airplanes and played checkers. He was already a regular there, as the area's first black juvenile officer and as courthouse janitor.

Cross began his first volunteer work with kids three years before he founded the Club. His first thoughts had not been about an organization. "I didn't have a Boys Club on my mind at all," Cross said of this first volunteer work. I just started working with a bunch of kids."

Once a Club was established, however, it took time to find a permanent home. Cross and other volunteers worked hard to raise funds. At one point, they earned money by collecting and selling bricks from buildings that were being torn down or renovated. The Club finally purchased the meeting hall and gymnasium that is its home today.

At a time when segregation was the rule throughout the South, the Paducah Club led the way to change. The organization had an integrated Board of Directors in 1955, a full decade before civil rights legislation received national attention in Congress.

Mr. Cross was one of only two individuals to serve as the Executive Director of the now Boys & Girls Club of Paducah. For the first 30 years of his career, he held the position on a volunteer basis - without pay! He was later convinced by the Board to accept a salary of $100 per month. In an effort to fairly compensate him for his work, the Board increased his salary prior to his retirement in 1988. He subsequently refused further payments, turning the Board's retirement compensation into two annual scholarships given to youths in the program.

Said Arthur Boykin former president of the Paducah Club, "In our community, the name of Oscar Cross is synonymous with the Boys Club. They're inseparable. The Club was as important to him as his family."

Cross has been the subject of considerable local attention. In 1975, city officials honored Cross with the title "Duke of Paducah," declaring that his work brought added... qualities of love and goodness to the youth of our area." Cross was also the recipient of the Kentucky Education Association's award for civil and human rights in education. Boys & Girls Clubs of America presented him with a Bronze Keystone to mark 25 years of service in 1981.

Cross was appreciative, but the honors were secondary to his real mission in life. "There never was anything in my mind about awards," he said. "I just wanted to help kids." "The time has come," he observed, "I just want to thank the people of Paducah for being so nice. That's all. I couldn't have come this far without the Lord's help and without the support of these wonderful people."