Cort, John C. 1913-

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CORT, John C. 1913-

PERSONAL: Born December 3, 1913, in New York, NY; married Helen Haye, 1946; children: ten. Education: Harvard University, B.A. (with honors), 1935; attended Brandeis University, 1959, and Ateneo University, Manila, Philippines, 1963.


ADDRESSES: Home—1 Maolis Rd., Nahant, MA 01908.


CAREER: New York Catholic Worker, staff member, 1936-38; Labor Leader, managing editor, 1937-38, 1946-49; Newspaper Guild of Greater Boston, Boston, MA, executive secretary and business agent, 1950-62; U.S. Peace Corps, Washington, DC, associate director in the Philippines, 1962-64; Commonwealth of Massachusetts, director of Service Corps, 1964-70; Lynn Model Cities Program, Lynn, MA, director, 1970-73; Religious Socialism, publisher, 1977-88; freelance writer and historian. Worked as reporter, editor, and union organizer, between 1935 and 1950. Fordham University, lecturer, 1947; University of the Philippines, lecturer, 1962-63; lecturer at Harvard University's Medical School, 1965-66, and School of Architecture, 1967; Northeastern University, lecturer, 1965, 1974-75; Boston College, lecturer, 1966-67; Massachusetts Institute of Technology, lecturer, 1967; Boston University, instructor in human resources development, 1969; Weston School of Theology, visiting scholar, 1978-79. Association of Catholic Trade Unionists, founding member, 1937; Massachusetts Labor Council, vice president, 1959-60; Catholic Labor Guild of Boston, president, 1960; State Office of Economic Opportunity Directors, chair of Northeast Region, 1967-69; Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, founding member of Religion and Socialism Committee. National Catholic Social Action Conference, president, 1966-68; World Congress of the Lay Apostolate, Rome, Italy, U.S. delegate, 1967; Sojourner House, member of board of directors, 1987-91; volunteer at a local soup kitchen.


AWARDS, HONORS: Quadragesimo Anno Medal, Association of Catholic Trade Unionists, 1956; special citation, Catholic Press Association, 1959; Michael Harrington Lifetime Achievement Award, Boston chapter, Democratic Socialists of America, 1996.


WRITINGS:

Christian Socialism: A History, Orbis Books (Maryknoll, NY), 1988.

Dreadful Conversions: The Making of a Catholic Socialist, Fordham University Press (Bronx, NY), 2003.


Contributor to books, including Be Not Solicitous, Sheed & Ward, 1948; The Experience of Marriage, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1964; The New Catholics, Crossroads, 1987; John Courtney Murray and the American Civil Conversation, Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1992; and On Moral Business, Eerdmans (Grand Rapids, MI), 1995. Contributor of more than 300 columns, articles, and reviews to periodicals, including Boston Globe, Progressive, Nation, Commonweal, New Oxford Review, Dissent, Cross Currents, and Catholic Digest. Coeditor, Religious Socialism, 1977-88, 1998—.


BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

America, October 27, 2003, Bruce Nelson, review of Dreadful Conversions: The Making of a Catholic Socialist, p. 23.

Catholic Historical Review, January, 2004, Steve Rosswurm, review of Dreadful Conversions, p. 158.