Ned Cobb

Ned Cobb (also known as Nate Shaw) (1885-1973) was a tenant farmer born in Tallapoosa County in Alabama. He joined the Sharecroppers' Union (SCU) in 1931, which was founded the same year.

Cobb was the fourth of more than twenty children of a father who had been a slave. (The children had at least three mothers and some were illegitimate.) The father had been emotionally and physically scarred by his experiences, and responded to his emotional and financial frustrations by beating and berating his wives, children, and others he loved.

Ned left his father's house to begin sharecropping on his own at the age of 19; he married and began a family about the same time.

Realizing that the men needed help, he joined the Alabama Sharecroppers' Union in 1931 to fight for justice for black people and against exploitation. Cobb was a hard worker and was not going to let the white dominant race run his life; he continued to fight against unfair treatment of tenant farmers by starting a tenant farmers union. Cobb continued to climb the ladder of success from wage labor to sharecropper. He was finally able to own his own crops and land. He focused on growing cotton.

In 1931 when the Communist Party arrived in Alabama, Cobb was profoundly impressed because he was aware that the party was defending the Scottsboro Boys, nine young black men accused of raping two white women.

In December 1932, a sheriff tried to take the home and livestock of one of Cobb's friends. Cobb defended his friend and in turn was involved in a shootout in which he was wounded and arrested. Cobb was sentenced to thirteen years in jail. Cobb was offered parole if he would agree to give up his farm and relocate to Birmingham. Instead, he served his full sentence and after release in 1945 returned to his farm.

The fluctuating cotton market before and after the Great Depression led to extremely hard times for southern sharecroppers and cotton farmers. Many were increasingly victimized by white landowners who sought to recoup their own monetary losses by seizing the property of their tenant farmers.

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