Longtime C.R. community activist Trent dies

 

By Steve Gravells

 

CEDAR RAPIDS- Luther Trent, a community activist who made his mark on his southeast Cedar Rapids neighborhood, died Tuesday, two weeks before his 90th birthday.

 

“He really worked for the poor people,” Flossie Wright said.  “He didn’t want you to stay in poverty- he wanted you to do better.”

 

Born in the small town of Tracy on the Marion-Mahaska county line, Trent was the only black in his 1934 high school graduating class.

 

“Lots of things I go to I might be the only black, but it doesn’t bother me,” Trent told The Gazette in 1998.  “I don’t look at color.  I don’t look at age.  I look at the cause.  We’re all here for the same reason.”

 

Trent became more active after retiring from Penick & Ford, now Penford Products, in 1975.  He was elected president that year of the local NAACP chapter and helped revive it.

 

As factories closed and vacant houses were demolished in his Oak Hill-Jackson neighborhood, Trent became active in housing issues and was a longtime officer in the Oak Hill Neighborhood Association, landing grants to renovate parks and playgrounds.  He was a board member for the Midwest Assistance Program, a Minnesota group that helps cities with water, sewage and waste disposal projects.

 

Wright and her family cared for Trent for the past 2 1/2 years.  Trent’s grandchildren visited recently from Michigan and Memphis, and his brother, Henry Trent, came from Washington, D.C.

 

“His mind was sharp up until he dies,” she said.

 

In 1998, the Hawkeye Area Community Action Program created the Luther Trent Award, given annually to a family that moves up and out of poverty.

 

Friends may call from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. today at Cedar Memorial Funeral Home.  A private graveside service will follow.