CRISFIELD — In April 1938, six hundred predominantly African-American women crab pickers struck packinghouses in Crisfield. They were protesting wage reductions and asked owners to recognize their union, The United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing and Allied Workers of America, CIO.

Strikers held strategy sessions at Shiloh United Methodist Church at 109 N. Fourth Street. They were met with mob violence, including the home invasion of a strike leader and the burning of the car of a union organizer.

Crab pickers held firm. On May 10, packinghouse owners restored pay cuts and recognized the cannery union.

“Many Crisfield residents know nothing of the heroism of the women who struck in 1938,” says the Rev. Emanuel Johnson, pastor of Shiloh UMC. “We need to learn the lessons of their struggle and faith. The crab pickers’ strike, says Rev. Johnson, took place at “the intersection of the fight for labor rights and civil rights. The African-American women leading the strike represented white crab pickers, too,” he said. And their courageous struggle for a union and decent treatment went back to 1931, the same year a 23-year-old African-American man, Matthew Williams, was lynched and set ablaze in Salisbury.

Rev. Johnson is working with a local group, The Holy Pickers Union Center — which includes active and retired crab pickers — to convince the Maryland Department of Planning to erect a marker adjacent to Shiloh United Methodist Church. State funding for historic road markers has lapsed. The Holy Pickers are sending letters to local political leaders asking for them to endorse the road marker campaign and urge the state to fund the program.

Dozens of historians, members of organized labor and community organizations have sent letters to the state endorsing the marker.

“The 1938 Crab Pickers strike was such an important event on the Eastern Shore that it need not be lost to history but remembered and honored by both the residents and visitors of Crisfield,” Rev. Johnson wrote in his letter to political leaders.

In a May 6 letter to the Maryland Historical Trust, Crisfield Mayor Barry Dize wrote: “Crisfield, renowned Seafood Capital of the World, is widely known for our delicious hard crabs and seafood but without crab pickers, predominantly African-American women, this heritage would not exist.” Calling on the state to erect the road marker, Mr. Dize stated: “We encourage your favorable consideration in funding this most worthwhile cause.”

The proposed marker’s inscription reads: “On April 6, 1938, 600 crab pickers, predominantly African-American women, struck Crisfield’s packinghouses, protesting wage cuts and demanding union recognition. Strikers met at Shiloh United Methodist Church. On April 21, a mob broke into the homes of two strike committee members and burned a union organizer’s vehicle. On May 10, packing companies recognized the Cannery Workers Union. Unions in the local seafood industry remained active in Crisfield until 1990.”

The Holy Pickers are part of the United Covenant Union (UCU), a union of clergy, low-wage workers, and food insecure families. The UCU is conducting oral histories of crab picker families under a grant from Maryland Humanities.

On May 17 Holy Pickers demonstrated their craft and discussed the history of crab pickers’ struggles with young residents at It Takes A Village, Crisfield’s after-school and summer youth program. And they are producing a local newsletter, “The Pickers’ Post.”

Retired crab picker Milkie Brown, 84, a member of The Holy Pickers Union Center, hadn’t heard about the 1938 strike until recently, but found that her mother-in-law, Nora Brown, and sister-in-law, Louise Brown, both strikers, were featured on the front page of the Baltimore Afro-American during the conflict.

“I loved my job picking crabs,” said Ms. Brown, who arrived in Crisfield from Fairmount at age 17. “We sang and prayed on the job,” said Ms. Brown, who shucked oysters, too, providing nearly year-round employment. Ms. Brown said she is proud of the work she and her husband performed in the seafood industry and proud of members of her family who fought for a better life.

Joyce Fitchett, a member of St. Paul’s AME church in Crisfield, recalls working in packing houses as a child, cracking claws aside her mother. “We’d hide when the state labor inspectors came around,” she said. Now retired, Ms. Fitchett went to work at Eastern Correctional Institution to earn a pension and health care insurance. But she still picks crabs part-time.

“It’s important for young folks to know how hard we worked and how hard the women before us fought against being mistreated,” she said. Fitchett and other members of the Holy Pickers were featured in a recent article and video produced by the Baltimore Sun.

The Holy Pickers encourage residents to support the request for a historical road marker by contacting Gregory Brown at gregory.brown@maryland.gov or by writing to: Gregory Brown c/o The Maryland Historical Trust Roadside Marker Program, Department of Planning, 100 Community Place, Crownsville, Md. 21032. Copies of letters and e-mails should be e-mailed to Rev. Johnson at eljohn0323@aol.com or sent to him at Shiloh United Methodist Church at 109 N. 4th St., Crisfield, Md. 21817.

For more details, to volunteer or to participate in the oral history project, call Rev. Johnson at 410-968-0181.