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CHRIS CRUTCHER Ms. Gilbert

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BORN AND RAISED… Born in Dayton, Ohio on July 17, 1946

Raised in Cascade, Idaho, a lumber and cattle ranch town located in the central Idaho Rockies

In high school he played football, basketball and ran track, not because he was a stellar athlete, but because in a place so isolated, every able bodied male was heavily recruited.

When he wasn’t at school or practice, Crutcher often manned the pumps at the family service station, where he learned the value of hard work.  

Crutcher would often steal brother John’s secret stash of straight A book reports.

Humor and boyish charm got Crutcher through high school and into Eastern Washington State College with a solid C average and just one classic novel under his reader’s belt – To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. 

Crutcher jokes about getting awarded “Most Likely to Plagiarize” in high school.

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GETTING TO KNOW CHRIS CRUTCHER Background: his father John (also known as “Crutch”) decided to leave his career in the United States Air Force behind after piloting more than 30 successful B-17 bombing missions in World War II

He has a brother named John and sister named Candy Family moved to rural Pacific Northwest (Idaho) to run a service station and wholesale oil business with Jewel’s (Crutcher’s mom) father.  It was a setting that helped define Chris Crutcher’s human perspective and his critically acclaimed body of work

Crutcher’s mother Jewel had a soft side with a sense of humor. She loved music and had a more traditional take on the Christian faith.  But as a functional alcoholic, she also introduced her son to the disabling impact of addiction and unspoken pain.

Influences: Jean Shepherd authors in the Playboy Magazine because he overheard his father saying to his mother, “Some of the very finest contemporary American literature graces the pages of that magazine.”

Beliefs: Strongly believes in anti-censorship and human rights Is a very uncensored man himself-tells it like it is

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A FEW OTHER INTERESTING FACTS… Enjoys running, swimming, music and basketball.  

He lectures 30 to 40 times a year at schools, universities and conferences across the country and around the world.  

He has contributed articles to Voices from the Middle, Family Energy Magazine, The Signal Journal and Spokane Magazine.

He has had short stories published in seven anthologies including On the Fringe edited by Donald R. Gallo and Dirty Laundry edited by Lisa Rowe Fraustino.  He has also written an adult suspense novel, The Deep End, which iscurrently being adapted as a major motion picture, as are his novels Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, Whale Talk and The Crazy Horse Electric Game.  

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CAREER Teacher, then eventually director of a K-12 alternative school in Oakland, California, Lakeside School (a racially diverse, k-12 alternative program) in the 1970’s

Twenty (ish) years as a therapist specializing in child abuse and neglect

Wrote 13 novels and 2 collections of short stories.

He has also written what he calls an ill-advised autobiography titled King of the Mild Frontier, which was designated by “Publisher’s Weekly” as “the YA book most adults would have read if they knew it existed.”  

Earned a BA (Bachelor of Arts) in sociology and psych.

Went back to get his teaching credential and, soon after, taught in Washington State and in Northern California, where The Crazy Horse Electric Game was eventually set (one of his popular novels)

Left Lakeside in 1981 and settled in Spokane, Washington

Running Loose was already written, but he still needed a job.  So he applied for a position with the Spokane Community Health Center and Child Protection team, where he saw his therapeutic abilities take flight.

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“I have forever been intrigued by the extremes of the human condition,” he says, “the remarkable juxtaposition of the ghastly and the glorious. As Eric ‘Moby’ Calhoun tells us at the conclusion of Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, ‘Ain’t it a trip where heroes come from’.”

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AWARDS His favorites are his two Intellectual Freedom awards, one from the National Council for Teachers of English (NCTE) and the other from the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC).   

Crutcher received the ALAN Award in 1993

NCTE SLATE Intellectual Freedom Award in 1998

Five of Crutcher’s books appeared on an American Library Association (ALA) list of the 100 Best Books for Teens of the Twentieth Century (1999 to 2000). 

American Library Association’s Margaret A. Edwards Lifetime Achievement Award.  (2000)

Four of his books appeared on Booklist’s Best 100 Books of the 20th Century, compiled in 2000 – more than any other single author on the list.  

Writer Magazine’s Writers Who Make a Difference Award in 2004.

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SELECTED WORKS BY CHRIS CRUTCHER Running Loose, 1983

Stotan!, 1986

The Crazy Horse Electric Game, 1987

Chinese Handcuffs, 1989

Athletic Shorts: Six Short Stories, 1991

The Deep End, 1991

Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, 1993

Ironman, 1995

Whale Talk, 2001

King of the Mild Frontier, 2003

The Sledding Hill, 2005

Deadline, 2007.