The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1941-04-10
Charles Sickle
By SPENCER MILLER, JR.
Director of the Workers Education
Bureau

CndrleS OCelZle is no more. he VINO
for forty years was one of the most
earnest and eloquent interpreters of
the ideals of labor has set out on the
Great Adventure which men call
death.
But the spirit of such a man can
never die. "There's something in man
that lives forever" wrote this philos-
|opher of labor in his last message to
the labor press. He will live in the
memory of countless workers to whom
he has become the embodiment of a
life of consecreated service to his fel-
lows. AS President Green said of
him: "I was truly sorry when learn
ed of the death of DR.. Stelzle. His
sudden passing will be a shock to all
his friends and those who knew him
in our great labor movement. He was
held in high regard and high esteem
by the officers and members of the
American Federation Of Labor"
Charles Stelzle was a man of many
gifts; he used them all. He early
learned how to transform adversely
into triumph; how to overcome the
forces of darkness with the light that
never fails. His life story is another
of those romances which could have
its setting only in America. Born
seventy years ago in dire poverty in
the restricted area in an East Side
tenement in lower New York, he rose
10 ha hn it,fi IN of {c nd
leaders of thought and opinion
throughout America. Denied formal
education beyond his eleventh year
because of the needs of his family, he
became one of the best informed men
by dint of hard work and study.
Limited in his early youth to develop
his native skill he became a master
craftsman as machinist and was
later offered the foremanship in R..
Hoe & Company, where he had be-
gun as an apprentice boy.
Distressed by the lack of appreci-
alton by the Church of the problem of
labor, Charles Stelzle studied for the
ministry and was ordained a Presby-
terian minister. Nor was that all. IN
der his leadership Labor Temple was
founded in the heart Of New York's
East Side, to witness to the workers
the relevance of the Christian ethic
to every problem in human relations.
In the fullness of his manhood it
could be said Of him that nothing
that was human was alien to his con-
cern. The record of his accomplish
ment could have been the proud boast
of half dozen men. Founder of the
Labor Temple and it's first director.
Organizer of the Labor Department
of the Presbyterian Church. Inaug-
urator of Labor Sunday. Director of
Relief and Emergency Measures in
the City of New York. Chairman of
countless Arbitration Boards for set
Ting industrial disputes. Director Of
social surveys in living conditions of
workers in hundreds Of American
cities. Director of the Good Neighbor
League. Militant interpreter of the
Social Gospel of Jesus. Lecturer and
Public Relations Counsellor. Fraternal
delegate to the American Federation
of Labor for twenty years. Special
writer for religious, Negro, and la
Dor press, speaking weekly to over
ten millions of his fellow citizens.
In recognition of his varied and
devoted services to his fellow men,
Cumberland University awarded him
the degree of Doctor of Laws. But no
honor in his lifetime brought him
deeper and more abiding satisfaction
than the gold veterans badge he re-
ceived from his Eureka Machinist
Lodge No. 434 in Brooklyn for his
thirty-fve years of continuous men,
bership in the international Associa-
tion of MachiniSts, of which he was
proud and loyal member. For it was
as a worllingman that he first caught
the vision of service to mankind; it
was master craftsman that he looked
down the corridors of time to that
Carpenter Of Nazareth Master
Craftsman and Master of Men. TO His
service DR.. Stelzle devoted his voice,
his pen-his whole life
At the gravesde as his mortal re-
mains were being laid away amid the
snow-covered hills of Westchester
county, |, as a friend of many years,
read Charles Stelzle's last written
words: "If a man die shall he live
again? No-because he shall never
die. There's something in man that
lives forever"
This was fitting epitah for this