Jim Drake (labor organizer)

James Lynn Drake (December 25, 1937 – September 3, 2001) was an American minister, labor organizer, and community leader. A longtime associate of César Chávez, Drake helped organize the early United Farm Workers (UFW) movement and later played a central role in grassroots campaigns for workers' rights, housing, and education across the United States.^[1][2]

Jim Drake was born on December 25, 1937, in Jefferson, Ohio. He spent much of his early childhood in Oklahoma before his family moved to Thermal, California, a small farmworker town in the Coachella Valley. His father taught migrant children, and his mother managed the school cafeteria. Drake studied philosophy at Occidental College and later graduated from Union Theological Seminary in 1962. An ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, Drake initially planned to serve as a pastor for the National Park Service before choosing a path of social activism.^[1]

In 1962, Drake joined the California Migrant Ministry, an ecumenical organization representing various Christian denominations. That same year, he was assigned to observe and assist César Chávez in organizing agricultural laborers. Initially expected to work with Chávez for only three months, Drake stayed on for 16 years, becoming one of Chávez's top aides.^[1][3][4]

Drake served as Chávez's administrative assistant, directed the union's first cooperative, and helped conceive and lead the UFW's early boycotts. In 1965, during the Delano grape strike, he played a key role in the successful national boycott of Schenley Industries. He later led the national boycott of table grapes, which culminated in union contracts across the industry in 1970. Drake oversaw organizing campaigns in California, Texas, Arizona, and New York, all while remaining on the payroll of the California Migrant Ministry.^[1][3][4]

In a 1968 speech, Chavez said that "The priests of the California Migrant Ministry, Chris Hartmire and Jim Drake, have been with us from the beginning. They took losses in their church because of the Migrant Ministry and the suffering they accepted was for the migrants and for justice. It was from them that we learned the importance of the support of the church in our struggle."^[5]

Though a committed advocate of nonviolence, Drake often encountered hostility. He endured physical intimidation, including partial hearing loss caused by a Teamster blowing a bullhorn into his ear. He also stood down armed growers and once had his mustache nearly ripped out by border vigilantes.^[6]

In 1978, Drake left the UFW and moved to Mississippi, where he founded the Mississippi Pulpwood Cutters Association, the state's first interracial organization of woodcutters. The association won improvements in lumber measurement standards, formed a cooperative to reduce equipment costs, and created a credit union for member access to loans.^[1][2]

In 1983, he joined the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF), a national network of faith-based and community organizing groups.^[7] His first major initiative was with the Valley Interfaith Organization in Texas' Rio Grande Valley, where he helped secure water and sewer services for residents in unincorporated colonias.^[2][3][8]

In 1987, Drake organized South Bronx Churches, a coalition of over 40 congregations in New York City. The group led efforts that resulted in the construction of over 800 units of Nehemiah housing, improvements to local subway stations, and the founding of the Bronx Leadership Academy public high school.^{[1][6][2][9][10]}

In 1994, he co-founded the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization, through which he supported housing initiatives, education reform, and immigrant civil rights advocacy. Under his leadership, the organization raised over $5 million in private funds to match public commitments.^[1][6][2][7]

Drake was married five times. He died of lung cancer on September 3, 2001—Labor Day—at the age of 63, at Brookshire Medical Center in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. At the time of his death, he lived in Manhattan and Spencertown, New York. He was survived by his wife, Miriam Rabban, and four children.^[1][2]

Drake's archival papers are held at the Walter P. Reuther Library at Wayne State University.^[11]