A Quick Biography
For the last sixteen years or so, Dudley Crawford has been pretending to be a retired minister of the Presbyterian Church USA. Some of the people of the West End Presbyterian Church thought he had retired long before that, but he just looked dead tired because he had served that congregation for 22 years, bringing it from a little church in the wildwood with less than a hundred members to a wild church in those same woods of nearly 600 congregants and active participants hailing from all over the map geographically, theologically and politically.
Born of natural causes in Canton, Mississippi nearly 80 years ago, he grew up a hardcore catechism kid in the reformed tradition. He has a BA degree from Millsaps College in Jackson, MS. and a degree from Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond. After serving two churches in Mississippi from 1968 to 1975, he became Director of Admissions at St. Andrews Presbyterian College in Laurinburg. He moved to West End in 1983. In the late 1970's he also served as an adjunct professor of preaching in the Doctor of Ministry program at Columbia Theological Seminary.
He and his wife, Peggy, have lived in Seven Lakes for nearly four decades. They have 4 children and 5 grandkids who affectionately refer to Dudley as Big Daddy, a name to which he has aspired most of his life so far.