Born in 1862 in
Mansfield, Cross attended
Natchaug School in
Willimantic. He graduated from
Yale College with a B.A. in 1885 and served as principal of
Staples High School in
Westport for a short time before returning to Yale as a graduate student, earning a PhD in English literature in 1889. Cross spent several years as a high school principal and schoolteacher at Staples High School in Westport before being offered a job as a professor of English at Yale in 1894. Over the next 36 years, he taught at Yale, became editor of the Yale Review,
Sterling Professor of English in 1922, and Dean of the
Yale Graduate School from 1916 to 1930. On July 17, 1889, he was married to Helen Baldwin Avery, and they had four children; Wilbur Lucius Cross, Jr., Avery Cross, Elizabeth Cross, and Arthur Cross. Cross became a well-known
literary critic. Along with
C. F. Tucker Brooke, Cross was the editor of the Yale
Shakespeare; he also edited the
Yale Review for almost 30 years. He wrote several books, including
Life and Times of Laurence Sterne (1909) and
The History of Henry Fielding (1918), and several books on the English novel. After retiring from Yale, Cross was elected governor of
Connecticut as a
Democrat in 1930 and served as Governor for four two-year terms, from January 7, 1931, to January 4, 1939. He was a Delegate to the Democratic National Convention from Connecticut in 1936. He was defeated in 1938 in his attempt to gain re-election for a fifth term. He is credited with passage of several items of reform legislation during his tenure of governor, which included measures related to the abolition of
child labor, and instituted a minimum wage rate. Also there was legislation that authorized governmental reorganization, and improved factory laws. He also endorsed legislation that authorized funding for the rebuilding of the Connecticut State College, which included the construction of the first campus library, named the Cross Library. During his tenure, eugenicist Harry H. Laughlin served on a commission proposing radical
eugenic policies; these policies were never implemented. Cross was elected to the
American Philosophical Society in 1934. After retiring from public service, he continued to stay active in his writing and research projects. ==Death and legacy==