Christopher Sower was born June 1, 1912 in Manistee, Michigan. He completed high school in Spencer, Ohio in 1929. He received a Bachelor of Education at Ashland College in Ashland, Ohio and received graduate degrees from Ohio State University: M.A. in Social Administration (1936) and Ph.D. (1948).

In between completing his two graduate degrees, Sower worked as a rural sociologist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and worked for the American Red Cross in Great Britain, Europe, and Washington, D.C. during the World War II years. His duties included working in employment services and directing youth programs. Sower was hired at Michigan State College (now Michigan State University) as an Assistant Professor starting in 1946, while he was still working toward his doctorate. His major responsibility at that time was research and teaching sociology and anthropology classes. In 1949, he was appointed associate professor of sociology and anthropology and was appointed full professor in 1956.

Sower received a Fulbright Research Scholarship in 1955-1956 researching the development issues in the country of Ceylon (Sri Lanka). In 1963 he continued this research by serving on a United Nations Technical Assistance Mission to Ceylon. In addition to his overseas research, he was prolific in publishing about national, state, local, and community organizations and their structure (private and public). He studied and published works concerning teen-age behavior and drinking, rural development, the structure and nature of Land-Grant Institutions, industrial, agricultural, and religious organizations, highway studies, urban development and blight, and centralized knowledge centers. He retired as professor emeritus in 1982 from Michigan State University. He remained active in his field of study after retirement and his last book was Formula for Change, published in 1994. Christopher Sower passed away on May 30, 2007.