Food Rebel George Schuyler Part 2
Journalist George Schuyler meeting Vice President Richard M. Nixon, who was running for re-election, during a political campaign stop at the Hotel Theresa, in Harlem, New York, in 1956. Journalist and New York State Republican Party Committee member Julius J. Adams is in the background. Courtesy of The New York Public Library
By 1931, Young Negroes Cooperative (YNCL) had some 400 members. He was born in Rhode Island but raised in Syracuse, New York. Around WWI he spent a horrible stint in the military as a officer. He served time in a military prison for deserting his command after a life changing run in with a racist. Schuyler returned to civilian life where Marcus Garvey’s UNIA and later left of center organizations like the The International Workers of the World influenced his ideology. Schuyler recruited activist Ella Baker as an assistant national director for the YNCL. However due to a lack of sustained financial support, the YNCL went defunct in 1932. Two dedicates later Schuyler had became disillusioned with Garveyism and black socialist. For the remainder of his career he championed conservative views as a writer. More on Baker as a food rebel tomorrow.
