Glenn M. Anderson

Inducted: 1996

Glenn Anderson, former president of the Cooperative League of the USA (now the National Cooperative Business Association), demonstrated statesmanship, personal commitment, and leadership throughout his career with cooperatives. He was a teacher and an innovator whose cooperative vision embraced the future.

Anderson was instrumental in effecting the consolidation of the Wisconsin Association of Cooperatives and the Wisconsin Council of Agricultural Cooperatives, and served as the first executive secretary of the resulting organization, the Wisconsin Federation of Cooperatives. He provided outstanding leadership and vision to this new organization for nine years. His influence was felt throughout Wisconsin through this work, his innovative Co-op Month activities, and his efforts as a founding member of the Group Health Cooperative of Madison.

As CLUSA's president, he implemented a number of national and international conferences to further cooperatives, and helped build the National Consumer Cooperative Bank. Always an advocate for co-op education, he helped start the Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives, a unit within the University of Wisconsin. In addition, he wrote a number of educational books on cooperatives, and was the first president of the Association of Cooperative Educators. He was an eloquent speaker who preached the value of cooperatives throughout the country.