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Achievements, by Various
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Title: Tuskegee & Its People: Their Ideals and Achievements
Author: Various
Editor: Booker T. Washington
Release Date: February 15, 2009 [EBook #28087]
Language: English
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_Compliments of_
_BOOKER T. WASHINGTON_
_Principal Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute
Tuskegee Institute, Alabama_
TUSKEGEE AND ITS PEOPLE
[Illustration: BOOKER T. WASHINGTON.]
TUSKEGEE & ITS PEOPLE: THEIR IDEALS AND ACHIEVEMENTS
EDITED BY
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
NEW YORK
1906
COPYRIGHT, 1905, BY
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
_Published June, 1905_
PREFACE
In a general way the reading public is fairly well acquainted with the
work of the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, but there is
continued demand for definite information as to just what the graduates
of that institution are doing with their education.
That inquiry is partly answered by this book. The scope of the Tuskegee
Institute work is outlined by the chapters contained in Part I, while
those of Part II evidence the fact that the graduates of the school are
grappling at first-hand with the conditions that environ the masses of
the Negro people.
At the school, in addition to the regular Normal School course of
academic work, thirty-six industries are taught the young men and women.
These are: Agriculture; Basketry; Blacksmithing; Bee-keeping;
Brickmasonry; Plastering; Brick-making; Carpentry; Carriage Trimming;
Cooking; Dairying; Architectural, Freehand, and Mechanical Drawing;
Dressmaking; Electrical and Steam Engineering; Founding; Harness-making;
Housekeeping; Horticulture; Canning; Plain Sewing; Laundering;
Machinery; Mattress-making; Millinery; Nurse Training; Painting;
Sawmilling; Shoemaking; Printing; Stock-raising; Tailoring; Tinning; and
Wheelwrighting.
Since the founding of the institution, July 4, 1881, seven hundred and
forty-six graduates have gone out from the institution, while more than
six thousand others who were not able to remain and complete the
academic course, and thereby secure a diploma, have been influenced for
good by it.
The school has sought from the very beginning to make itself of
practical value to the Negro people and to the South as well. It has
taught those industries that are of the South, the occupations in which
our men and women find most ready employment, and unflinchingly has
refused to abandon its course; it has sought to influence its young men
and women to live unselfish, sacrificing lives; to put into practise the
lessons taught on every side that make for practical, helpful every-day
living.
In the main those who go out from Tuskegee Institute, (1) follow the
industry they have been taught, (2) teach in a public or private school
or teach part of the year and farm or labor the rest, (3) follow
housekeeping or other domestic service, or (4) enter a profession or the
Government service, or become merchants. Among the teachers are many who
instruct in farming or some industry; the professional men are largely
physicians, and the professional women mostly trained nurses. Dr.
Washington, the Principal of the school, makes the unqualified
statement: "After diligent investigation, I can not find a dozen former
students in idleness. They are in shop, field, schoolroom, home, or the
church. They are busy because they have placed themselves in demand by
learning to do that which the world wants done, and because they have
learned the disgrace of idleness and the sweetness of labor."
No attempt has here been made to represent all of the industries; no
attempt has especially been made to confine representation to those who
are working at manual labor. The public, or at least a part of it,
somewhat gratuitously, has reached the conclusion that Tuskegee
Institute is a "servant training school," or an employment agency. That
is a mistaken idea.
The object of the school is to train men and women who will go out and
repeat the work done here, to teach what they have learned to others,
and to leaven the whole mass of the Negro people in the South with a
desire for the knowledge and profitable operation of those industries in
which they have in so large a measure the right of way. Tuskegee
students and graduates are never urged not to take such service,
especially not to refuse in preference to idleness, but it all involves
a simple, ordinary, economic principle. Capable men and women, skilled
in the industrial arts, are like those of all races--they seek the most
profitable employment. A blacksmith, a tailor, a brickmason, a
harness-maker, or other artisan, who can find work in shops and
factories, or independently, and make thirty to seventy-five dollars a
month, and even more, will not, simply because he is black, leave those
chances to accept service in private employment for fifteen dollars per
month, and less, and board himself. No school could covenant to train
servants for an indefinite tenure; it can at best only promise to train
leaders who shall go among the masses and lift them up; to train men and
women who shall in turn reach hundreds of others.
Those who write the following chapters represent, in the main, this
class. They have written simply, with perfect frankness, have dealt with
the significant things of their lives, and have demonstrated, the
writer believes, that from humble origin black men and women may
confidently be counted upon, with proper encouragement, to win success.
The chapters are autobiographical, significantly optimistic, with just
pride in what has been done, and outlining, as did "Up from
Slavery"--which was commended as a proper model--experiences from
childhood, the school-life of the writer, and the results achieved in
the direction of putting into practise what was learned in school.
Through this symposium it is hoped that the public may learn, in the
best possible way, some of the finer results already accomplished by the
Tuskegee Institute.
E. J. S.
TUSKEGEE INSTITUTE, ALABAMA, _April 1, 1905_.
CONTENTS
PAGE
GENERAL INTRODUCTION 1
By Booker T. Washington.
PART I
THE SCHOOL AND ITS PURPOSES
I.--PRESENT ACHIEVEMENTS AND GOVERNING IDEALS 19
By Emmett J. Scott, Mr. Washington's Executive Secretary.
II.--RESOURCES AND MATERIAL EQUIPMENT 35
By Warren Logan, Treasurer of the School.
III.--THE ACADEMIC AIMS 56
By Roscoe C. Bruce, Director of the Academic Department.
IV.--WHAT GIRLS ARE TAUGHT, AND HOW 68
By Mrs. Booker T. Washington, Director of Industries for Girls.
V.--HAMPTON INSTITUTE'S RELATION TO TUSKEGEE 87
By Robert R. Moton.
PART II
AUTOBIOGRAPHIES BY GRADUATES OF THE SCHOOL
I.--A COLLEGE PRESIDENT'S STORY 101
By Isaac Fisher, of Pine Bluff, Arkansas.
II.--A SCHOOL PRINCIPAL'S STORY 111
By William H. Holtzclaw, of Utica, Mississippi.
III.--A LAWYER'S STORY 141
By George W. Lovejoy, of Mobile, Alabama.
IV.--A SCHOOL TREASURER'S STORY 152
By Martin A. Menafee, of Denmark, South Carolina.
V.--THE STORY OF A FARMER 164
By Frank Reid, of Dawkins, Alabama.
VI.--THE STORY OF A CARPENTER 173
By Gabriel B. Miller, of Fort Valley, Georgia.
VII.--COTTON-GROWING IN AFRICA 184
By John W. Robinson, of Lome, Togo, West Africa.
VIII.--THE STORY OF A TEACHER OF COOKING 200
By Mary L. Dotson, of Tuskegee Institute, Alabama.
IX.--A WOMAN'S WORK 211
By Cornelia Bowen, of Waugh (Mt. Meigs), Alabama.
X.--UPLIFTING OF THE SUBMERGED MASSES 224
By W. J. Edwards, of Snow Hill, Alabama.
XI.--A DAIRYMAN'S STORY 253
By Lewis A. Smith, of Rockford, Illinois.
XII.--THE STORY OF A WHEELWRIGHT 264
By Edward Lomax, of Tuskegee Institute, Alabama.
XIII.--THE STORY OF A BLACKSMITH 276
By Jubie B. Bragg, of Tallahassee, Florida.
XIV.--A DRUGGIST'S STORY 285
By David L. Johnston, of Birmingham, Alabama.
XV.--THE STORY OF A SUPERVISOR OF MECHANICAL INDUSTRIES 299
By James M. Canty, of Institute P. O., West Virginia.
XVI.--A NEGRO COMMUNITY BUILDER 317
By Russell C. Calhoun, of Eatonville, Florida.
XVII.--THE EVOLUTION OF A SHOEMAKER 338
By Charles L. Marshall, of Cambria, Virginia.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON _Frontispiece_
EMMETT J. SCOTT 20
Mr. Washington's Executive Secretary.
THE COLLIS P. HUNTINGTON MEMORIAL BUILDING 26
WARREN LOGAN 36
Treasurer of the School
THE OFFICE BUILDING IN PROCESS OF ERECTION 50
Student carpenters shown at work.
ROSCOE C. BRUCE 56
Director of the Academic Department.
A PORTION OF THE SCHOOL GROUNDS 64
ANOTHER PORTION OF THE SCHOOL GROUNDS 66
MRS. BOOKER T. WASHINGTON 68
Director of Industries for Girls.
A CLASS IN MILLINERY 76
THE EXECUTIVE COUNCIL 94
Standing, left to right: P. C. Parks, Superintendent of Farm;
George W. Carver, Director, Agricultural Department; J. N. Calloway,
Land Extension; John H. Palmer, Registrar; Charles H. Gibson,
Resident Auditor; Edgar J. Penney, Chaplain.
Seated, left to right: Lloyd G. Wheeler, Business Agent; Robert R.
Taylor, Director of Mechanical Industries; John H. Washington,
General Superintendent of Industries; Warren Logan, Treasurer; Booker
T. Washington, Principal; Miss Jane E. Clark, Dean of Woman's
Department; Mrs. Booker T. Washington, Director of Industries for
Girls; and Emmett J. Scott, Secretary to the Principal.
The Director of the Academic Department, Roscoe C. Bruce, and the
Commandant of Cadets, Major J. B. Ramsey, also members of the
Executive Council, were absent when photograph was taken.
THE CARNEGIE LIBRARY BUILDING 108
MORNING AT THE BARNS ON THE SCHOOL FARM 122
Teams of horses and cattle ready to start for the day's work.
STUDENTS PRUNING PEACH-TREES 146
A SILO ON THE FARM 166
Students filling it with fodder corn, steam-power being used.
A MODEL DINING-ROOM 208
From the department where table-service is taught.
THE CULTURE OF BEES 220
Students at work in the apiary.
IN THE DAIRY 254
Students using separators.
STUDENTS AT WORK IN THE HARNESS SHOP 270
AT THE HOSPITAL 294
A corner in the boys' ward.
IN THE TIN SHOP 300
STUDENTS CANNING FRUIT 308
STARTING A NEW BUILDING 314
Student masons laying the foundation in brick.
GIRLS GARDENING 344
TUSKEGEE AND ITS PEOPLE
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
BY BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
Institutions, like individuals, are properly judged by their ideals,
their methods, and their achievements in the production of men and women
who are to do the world's work.
One school is better than another in proportion as its system touches
the more pressing needs of the people it aims to serve, and provides the
more speedily and satisfactorily the elements that bring to them
honorable and enduring success in the struggle of life. Education of
some kind is the first essential of the young man, or young woman, who
would lay the foundation of a career. The choice of the school to which
one will go and the calling he will adopt must be influenced in a very
large measure by his environments, trend of ambition, natural capacity,
possible opportunities in the proposed calling, and the means at his
command.
In the past twenty-four years thousands of the youth of this and other
lands have elected to come to the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial
Institute to secure what they deem the training that would offer them
the widest range of usefulness in the activities open to the masses of
the Negro people. Their hopes, fears, strength, weaknesses, struggles,
and triumphs can not fail to be of absorbing interest to the great body
of American people, more particularly to the student of educational
theories and their attendant results.
When an institution has, like Tuskegee Institute, reached that stage in
its development that its system of instruction has aroused very general
discussion, and has given to the world of varied industry an army of
workers, numbering not less than 6,000, there is a natural curiosity on
the part of the public to learn all that is possible of such an
institution, and of the personality and methods of those administering
its affairs. They wish to ascertain the actual truth concerning its
resources and equipment; they want figures detailing the degree of
pecuniary productiveness and moral efficiency attained by those who have
received the prescribed training; and they are eager to hear the whole
story from the lips of both the instructors and the instructed as to how
the recorded results have been accomplished.
In several volumes already published, bearing upon Tuskegee Institute
and what it stands for, an endeavor has been made to present a truthful
account of the Principal's early strivings and life-work; an honest
attempt has been made to analyze and impress the basic principles upon
which Tuskegee Institute was founded. It has been the aim to write a
history of individual yearnings for the light of knowledge that would
stir the inner consciousness of the humblest of the race and arouse him
to the vast possibilities that lie in the wake of solid character,
intelligent industry, and material acquisition. He has tried, with all
earnestness, to hold up the future of the American Negro in its most
attractive aspect, and to emphasize the virile philosophy that there is
a positive dignity in working with the hands, when that labor is
fortified by a developed brain and a consecrated heart.
Though much has been said of the spirit and purpose of this center of
social and economic uplift in the famed Black Belt of the South, there
is still a wide-spread demand for a more specific recital of what is
being done here, by whom, under what conditions, and the concrete
evidences of the benefits that are growing out of the thrift, industry,
right thinking, and right living taught by our faculty.
In response to this insistent call, Mr. Emmett J. Scott, Executive
Secretary of the Tuskegee Institute, presents to the public a further
contribution, Tuskegee and Its People: Their Ideals and Achievements,
with authentic accompanying autobiographies of a number of typical
students of the school.
To this work Mr. Scott brings a peculiar fitness, unequaled by any other
person who might have been chosen to perform it. He is closely knit to
the Southland and her great masses by the common sympathy of nativity
and the mutuality of hopes. The South has always been his home, but he
has traveled so extensively and mingled so freely that he has acquired
most ample breadth of vision as regards men and things.
For many years now Mr. Scott has served the school with rare fidelity
and zeal, and has been to the Principal not only a loyal assistant in
every phase of his manifold and frequently trying duties, but has proved
a valuable personal friend and counselor in matters of the most
delicate nature, exhibiting in emergencies a quality of judgment and
diplomatic calmness seldom found in men of even riper maturity and more
extended experience.
As I stated in one of my books published several years ago, as far as
one individual can fill the place of another, Mr. Scott has acted in the
Principal's stead, seeing with the Principal's eyes and hearing with the
Principal's ears, counting no sacrifice too great to be made for
Tuskegee's well-being. He is in perfect accord with the fundamental
principles and practical policies through the persistent adherence to
which Tuskegee Institute has won its conspicuous place in the
educational world.
The volume here presented has been edited by Mr. Scott with the utmost
care, he preferring to have the contributors understate rather than
overstate the results that have come from the labors of Tuskegee and its
people. It has been the Principal's pleasure and privilege to examine
and critically review the manuscript after its completion, and the
volume is so praiseworthy that it is given his cordial approval. The
task of editing he had expected to perform has been so well done that it
has only been necessary to review the manuscript after its preparation
for the publishers, and to forego the strict editorial revisioning
planned. The book is an accurate portrait of the Tuskegee of to-day, and
reasonably forecasts the hopes for the institution of to-morrow. It
tells with forceful directness and graphic precision the formative work
that is being done for this generation, and supplies a fulcrum upon
which there may justly rest a prophecy of greater things for the
generations that are to follow.
A Tuskegee book, whatever its primary motive, is invariably expected to
deal broadly with the entire problem of the Negro and his relationships
of every kind. It must be more than a mere flesh-and-blood narrative,
descriptive of the material progress of the men and women the Institute
has produced and is producing. It must be a book free from ostentatious
pretension, breathing the atmosphere of the life of the earnest people
it describes. It must, of course, exhibit not only the achievements, but
also the ideals, the possibilities of the Tuskegee trained man and
woman. This, I feel, is adequately done in this volume.
Tuskegee and Its People possesses ideals in thought, morals, and
action--and they are lofty. In these respects the symposium will not
prove a disappointment. This instinct for the ideal, however, lies not
in idly sighing for it, but is born of an abiding belief that worth is
intrinsic, and that applied common sense, practical knowledge, constancy
of effort, and mechanical skill will make a place for the patient
striver far more secure than the artificial niche into which some one
may thrust him. The masses who are most helpfully reached by the
Tuskegee Institute are coming to realize that education in its truest
sense is no longer to be regarded as an emotional impulse, a fetish made
up of loosely joined information, to be worshiped for its mere
possession, but as a practical means to a definite end. They are being
taught that mind-training is the logical helpmeet of hand-training, and
that both, supplemented and sweetened by heart-training, make the
high-souled, useful, productive, patriotic, law-loving, public-spirited
citizen, of whom any nation might well be proud. The outcome of such
education will be that, instead of the downtrodden child of ignorance,
shiftlessness, and moral weakness, we shall generate the thoroughly
rounded man of prudence, foresight, responsibility, and financial
independence. He will cease to be the gullible victim of the sharper who
plays upon vanity, credulity, and superstition, and learn to value only
that which is real and substantial. It is of the highest importance to
the Negro, who must make his way amid disadvantages and embarrassments
of the severest character, that he be made aware of the vast difference
between working and being worked. In carrying this inspiring message and
impressing these fundamental truths, the new Tuskegee book renders a
splendid service.
Industrial training will be more potent for good to the race when its
relation to the other phases of essential education is more clearly
understood. There is afloat no end of discussion as to what is the
"proper kind of education for the Negro," and much of it is hurtful to
the cause it is designed to promote. The danger, at present, that most
seriously threatens the success of industrial training, is the
ill-advised insistence in certain quarters that this form of education
should be offered to the exclusion of all other branches of knowledge.
If the idea becomes fixed in the minds of the people that industrial
education means class education, that it should be offered the Negro
because he is a Negro, and that the Negro should be confined to this
sort of education, then I fear serious injury will be done the cause of
hand-training. It should be understood rather that at such institutions
as Hampton Institute and Tuskegee Institute, industrial education is not
emphasized because colored people are to receive it, but because the
ripest educational thought of the world approves it; because the
undeveloped material resources of the South make it peculiarly important
for both races; and because it should be given in a large measure to any
race, regardless of color, which is in the same stage of development as
the Negro.
On the other hand, no one understanding the real needs of the race would
advocate that industrial education should be given to every Negro to the
exclusion of the professions and other branches of learning. It is
evident that a race so largely segregated as the Negro is, must have an
increasing number of its own professional men and women. There is, then,
a place and an increasing need for the Negro college as well as for the
industrial institute, and the two classes of schools should, and as a
matter of fact do, cooperate in the common purpose of elevating the
masses. There is nothing in hand-training to suggest that it is a
class-training. The best educational authorities in the world are
indorsing it as an essential feature in the education of both races,
and especially so when a very large proportion of the people in question
are compelled by dint of circumstances to earn their living in
manufactures and agricultural and mechanical pursuits in general. It so
happens that the bulk of our people are permanently to remain in the
South, and conditions beyond their control have attached them to the
soil; for a long time the status of the majority of them is likely to be
that of laborers. To make hard conditions easier, to raise common labor
from drudgery to dignity, and to adopt systems of training that will
meet the needs of the greatest number and prepare them for the better
things that intelligent effort will surely bring, form a task to which
the wisest of the race are addressing themselves with an eager
enthusiasm which refuses to be chilled by adverse criticism.
Tuskegee emphasizes industrial training for the Negro, not with the
thought that the Negro should be confined to industrialism, the plow, or
the hoe, but because the undeveloped material resources of the South
offer at this time a field peculiarly advantageous to the worker skilled
in agriculture and the industries, and here are found the Negro's most
inviting opportunities for taking on the rudimentary elements that
ultimately make for a permanently progressive civilization.
The Tuskegee Idea is that correct education begins at the bottom, and
expands naturally as the necessities of the people expand. As the race
grows in knowledge, experience, culture, taste, and wealth, its wants
are bound to become more and more diverse; and to satisfy these wants
there will be gradually developed within our own ranks--as has already
been true of the whites--a constantly increasing variety of professional
and business men and women. Their places in the economic world will be
assured and their prosperity guaranteed in proportion to the merit
displayed by them in their several callings, for about them will have
been established the solid bulwark of an industrial mass to which they
may safely look for support. The esthetic demands will be met as the
capacity of the race to procure them is enlarged through the processes
of sane intellectual advancement. In this cumulative way there will be
erected by the Negro, and for the Negro, a complete and indestructible
civilization that will be respected by all whose respect is worth the
having. There should be no limit placed upon the development of any
individual because of color, and let it be understood that no one kind
of training can safely be prescribed for any entire race. Care should be
taken that racial education be not one-sided for lack of adaptation to
personal fitness, nor unwieldy through sheer top-heaviness. Education,
to fulfil its mission for any people anywhere, should be symmetrical and
sensible.
A mastery of the industries taught at Tuskegee presupposes and requires
no small degree of academic study, for competency in agriculture calls
for considerable knowledge of chemistry, and no mechanical pursuit can
be followed satisfactorily without some acquaintance with the "three
R's." Likewise, the individual of liberal academic or college
preparation possesses a stronger equipment for constructive work who has
trained his hands to supplement his brain.
After all, the final test of the value of any system of education is
found in the record of its actual achievements. In Tuskegee and Its
People heads of the several departments have not only given a succinct
account of the history, resources, and current labors of the school, but
deal most happily with the governing ideals behind the institution, and
vindicate its claim to the approval of the world's thinkers and moving
forces. Besides treating rather elaborately the structural efficiency
of the work of the teachers, the editor has not neglected to emphasize
the spiritual and ethical virtues that spread over a wider range of
influence here and among our people throughout the Southland than those
familiar with the purely academic phases have adequately understood.
Tuskegee's germ principle is to be found in its unboasted ideals, in the
things that of necessity can not be listed in catalogue or report,
rather than in its buildings, shops, farms, and what not. The school
dwells upon the saving power of land, and learning, and skill, and a
bank-account--not as finalities in themselves, but as tangible witnesses
to the Negro's capacity to compete with others.
Perhaps the newest and most refreshing feature of the book is its vivid
pen-portraits of the young men and women who have gone out of Tuskegee
carrying into diversified lives the principles and precepts imbibed from
their parent school. The pictures are drawn by the originals themselves,
and they illustrate by honorable achievement the wholesome and
evangelizing influence of Tuskegee's preachments, and the far-reaching
effect of placing before them as teachers the highest example of what
the Negro of morals and manners may become. They tell their story at
first-hand, modestly and sincerely, and the foundations of inspiring
lives, laid in the Christian virtues and conscientious service of their
fellow men, foster a firm belief that the school is doing a work that
will live.
These types of Tuskegee's graduates, picked out at random from hundreds
of equal scholarship and ability, represent distinctive channels of
activity, including the president of a leading college, principals and
teachers of thriving schools, a lawyer, a tinner, a school treasurer,
farmers, cotton-growers, master builders and contractors, a dairyman,
and a blacksmith. No element contributing to the racial uplift is
overlooked. The scenes of their labors are scattered over a vast area,
showing convincingly the diffusive character as well as the rich harvest
garnered through the Tuskegee Idea. These rough-hewn sketches of a
sturdy pioneer band in staking out a larger life and a wider horizon for
later generations are worthy of the most careful perusal.
The immeasurable advancement of the Negro, manifested in character,
courage, and cash, vitalized by valiant service to the republic in
education, commerce, and religion, and crowned by an enlightened,
vigorously efficient, sensibly ambitious, and law-abiding citizenship,
is "confirmation strong as proofs of Holy Writ" that the gospel of
industry, as exemplified by Tuskegee and its helpers, has exerted a
leavening influence upon civilization wherever it has been brought
within the reach of those who are struggling toward the heights. Under
this new dispensation of mind, morals, and muscle, with the best whites
and best blacks in sympathetic cooperation, and justice meaning the same
to the weak as to the strong, the South will no longer be vexed by a
"race problem." Peace and prosperity for all will come with the strength
to rise above the baser self. Civic righteousness is the South's
speediest thoroughfare to economic greatness.
A book that opens the inner chambers of a people's heart, and sheds a
light that may guide the footsteps of both races along the upward way,
should meet with a hearty welcome at the hands of all lovers of
mankind.
_PART I_
_THE SCHOOL AND ITS PURPOSES_
I
PRESENT ACHIEVEMENTS AND GOVERNING IDEALS
BY EMMETT J. SCOTT
So much has been said about Tuskegee Institute as a training-school in
which to prepare young colored men and women for earning a living in the
world of trade and business, that the ideals and spirit behind all this
training are to a very large extent lost sight of.
Tuskegee, with its hundreds of acres of farm-land under intelligent
cultivation, with its ever-increasing number of well-appointed buildings
and its equipment, and the many things on the grounds included in the
name of handicrafts, is always in the public eye, and continually
appeals to the interest of those who are deeply concerned in the
well-being and progress of the Negro people.
Yet behind all of these more tangible manifestations of work, skill, and
achievement, there is an unseen, persistent groping after the higher
ideals of life and living. No one can remain long on the grounds as an
intelligent observer of all that is to be here seen and felt, without
recognizing that the things that are not written in the catalogue and
not a part of the daily program of activities are real, vital, and of
far-reaching importance.
Principal Booker T. Washington and the men and women who have helped him
to build Tuskegee Institute are constantly looking beyond the present to
a future filled with the evidences of a better living for all those who
have felt the transforming spirit of the hidden forces at work.
How the perspective widens and deepens! Far, far beyond the confines of
the Tuskegee Institute community the light of this new life is seen and
felt and has its salutary effect. The stagnant life of centuries has
awakened, and is casting off its bonds. A new term, "intelligent
thrift," has come into its possession. Wherever this term has gone and
taken root, there has gone with it the thought that unless the idea make
for character, as well as for more cotton or corn, it is not of much
value.
The Tuskegee Idea always asks one question, and that is, "What are you?"
and not, "What have you?" The man who does not rise superior to his
possessions does not measure up to the Tuskegee idea of manhood.
[Illustration: EMMETT J. SCOTT.
Mr. Washington's Executive Secretary.]
In other words, character-building is the Alpha and Omega of all that
Tuskegee stands for. From the moment the new student comes on the
grounds until he leaves, he is appealed to in ways innumerable to regard
life as more than bread or meat, as more than mere mental equipment.
Cleanliness, decorum, promptness, truthfulness--these are old-fashioned
virtues, and are more properly taught in the home, but in Tuskegee they
mean everything. Tuskegee not only acts as a teacher, but assumes the
rôle of parent, and lays emphasis on the importance of these virtues
every moment of the time from the entrance of the student until
Commencement Day. The "cleanliness that is next to godliness" is one of
the Tuskegee ideals, and a student can scarcely commit a more serious
misdemeanor than to appear slovenly, either in dress or manners. The
facilities and requirements for bathing are quite as complete and
exacting as the equipments in the laboratories and recitation-rooms. The
result is that Tuskegee has the reputation of being one of the most
cleanly and sanitary institutions in the South.
As for good manners, Lord Chesterfield himself would scarcely ask more
than is insisted upon by Tuskegee precision. A man must first be
conscious of being a gentleman before he can be recognized as such by
others, and a girl's good manners are only outward evidences of her
individual worth and passport to respectful treatment. Tuskegee
Institute, then, insists upon these things because they make for
character, and are a part of the ideals toward which all training tends.
But how are all these things taught and enforced? The first requisite,
of course, is the character of the teachers and instructors themselves,
the men and women who are the embodiment of the ideals that Tuskegee
Institute stands for. While it can not be claimed that the best teachers
in the South are all at Tuskegee, it can be said that no other school
has so large a number of colored men and women who have had the
advantage of the highest industrial and intellectual, moral and
religious training. The teaching force is made up largely of graduates
from nearly every first-class educational institution in America. These
teachers have been carefully sought out and brought to Tuskegee, not
only for their teaching ability, but that the students may have the
benefit of the best examples before them of what the highest culture can
do for men and women of their own race. For the majority of our students
the perspective of life is narrow: many of them have never lived out of
the community in which they were born. That was their only world; their
ideals of life were shaped by their mean and narrow environments. They
have learned to believe, and act accordingly, that the best people are
all of one complexion, and the worst and poorest people are all of
another complexion. There is no such thing as creating a sentiment of
race pride in such people unless they have set before them living
examples of their own race in whom they can feel a sense of pride.
It is scarcely too much to say that one of the best things about the
Tuskegee Institute is that it wins our young men and women from mean and
sordid environment and brings them in contact with teachers whose minds,
hearts, and lives have been enlarged and graced by the highest learning
in the best educational institutions of the country. The school teaches
no more important lesson than that of cultivating a sense of pride and
respect for colored men and women who deserve it because of their
character, education, and achievements.
Pride of race, though not so written in the courses of study, is as much
a part of Tuskegee's work as agriculture, brick-making, millinery, or
any other trade, and quite as important. This may be called sentiment,
but it makes for race development quite as much as any of the material
things taught in the class-room or shop. To borrow a line from George
Eliot:
"Because our race has no great memories,
I will so live, it shall remember me
For deeds of such divine beneficence
As rivers have, that teach men what is good
By blessing them--
And make their name, now but a badge of scorn,
A glorious banner floating in their midst,
Stirring the air they breathe with impulses
Of generous pride, exalting fellowship
Until it soars to magnanimity."
That self-respect demands race pride; that virtue is its own reward;
that character is the greatest thing in human life, are taught and
emphasized in other ways also. Dr. Washington has succeeded, to a
remarkable degree, in developing the Tuskegee Institute by insisting
that this institution must have nothing less than the best within and
without it, everywhere. What is not best is only temporary. Those who
have done most for the school have been made to feel that the character
of the work done here and the ideals striven for are deserving of the
best. The idea that "anything is good enough for a Negro school" has
never been allowed to have any part or exert any effect in Tuskegee's
expansion.
For example, when Mr. Carnegie donated the money for a library for
Tuskegee, a building was erected of classic outline--a noble structure
of artistic symmetry and beauty that must appeal to every one who has
any appreciation of architectural beauty. The Collis P. Huntington
Memorial Building, just completed, a gift of Mrs. C. P. Huntington, used
for the academic classes of the school, would be a credit and delight to
any municipality. There is everything about the exterior and interior
that must awaken a sense of pride in every pupil who enters its portals.
Its facilities are sensible and unostentatious, yet they meet every
requirement of the department. What is true of the new Academic Building
is likewise true of the various dormitories for girls and boys. The
cleanliness and the sanitation to be found at Tuskegee are in delightful
contrast to the poor environment to which many of the students have been
accustomed; especially is this contrast heightened when these same
students have, under competent direction, installed the plants which
yield these comforts. Thus it is that in dormitory, recitation-room,
shop, dining-hall, library, chapel, and landscape, the idea that only
the best is worth having and striving for is emphasized as an
object-lesson and principle with such insistence that it becomes an
actual part of a student's training and life.
The student at Tuskegee is constantly being trained to look up and
forward. He learns how the idea of beauty can be actualized in home and
social life; how faithful performance of every duty means nobility of
character; how the value of achievement is determined by the motive
behind it. But besides these, the one aim, thought, or anxiety around
which all others revolve is the high honorableness of all kinds of work
intelligently done.
In a section where those who work with their hands are marked off by the
inexorable line of caste from those who work with their brains or not at
all, this idea of making intelligent work more honorable than
intelligent idleness is of constructive value in race development. The
problem that the Tuskegee Institute is helping to solve is not only that
the colored people shall do their proportionate share of the work, but
that they shall do it in such a way that the benefits will remain with
those who do the work. Who can measure the transforming effect and
influence when it can be said that the "best mechanics" and the "best
agriculturists" in the South are Negroes? Certainly, if such a time ever
comes, there will be no such painful thing as a race problem, as Negroes
now see it and feel it.
[Illustration: THE COLLIS P. HUNTINGTON MEMORIAL BUILDING.]
This is one of Tuskegee's largest ideals; not that Tuskegee alone can
bring about a "consummation so devoutly to be wished," but it is
ambitious to be a potent factor in all the tendencies that make for such
a condition of life in the heart of the South. So important is this aim
and idea of Tuskegee, that it allows no criticism to affect, interfere,
or obscure its vision. Tuskegee says to the world that it is determined
not only to be a school, but an agent of civilization, a missionary for
a better life, that shall stand for a kindlier relationship between the
races.
The school enthusiastically seeks to live up to the ideal of its
Principal, that education in the broadest and truest sense is designed
to influence individuals to help others; is designed, first, last, and
all the time, to transform and energize individuals into life-giving
agencies for the uplift of their fellows. Principal Washington's whole
educational creed, accepted by Tuskegee Institute teachers and students
alike, was recently declared in one of his familiar Sunday-evening
"talks" to the students of the institution. Said he:
"Education in the broadest and truest sense will make an individual seek
to help all people, regardless of race, regardless of color, regardless
of condition. And you will find that the person who is most truly
educated is the one who is going to be kindest, and is going to act in
the gentlest manner toward persons who are unfortunate, toward the race
or the individual that is most despised. The highly educated person is
the one who is most considerate of those individuals who are less
fortunate. I hope when you go out from here and meet persons who are
afflicted by poverty, whether of mind or body, or persons who are
unfortunate in any way, that you will show your education by being just
as kind and considerate toward those persons as it is possible for you
to be. That is the way to test a person with education. You may see
ignorant persons, who perhaps think themselves educated, going about the
street, and when they meet an individual who is unfortunate--lame, or
with a defect of body, mind, or speech--are inclined to laugh at and
make sport of that individual. But the highly educated person, the one
who is really cultivated, is gentle and sympathetic to every one.
Education is meant to make us absolutely honest in dealing with our
fellows. I do not care how much arithmetic we have, or how many cities
we can locate; it is all useless unless we have an education that makes
us absolutely honest. Education is meant to make us give satisfaction,
and to get satisfaction out of giving it. It is meant to make us get
happiness out of service for our fellows. And until we get to the point
where we can get happiness and supreme satisfaction out of helping our
fellows, we are not truly educated.... Education is meant to make us
appreciate the things that are beautiful in nature. A person is never
educated until he is able to go into the swamps and woods and see
something that is beautiful in the trees and shrubs there--is able to
see something beautiful in the grass and flowers that surround him--is,
in short, able to see something beautiful, elevating, and inspiring in
everything that God has created. Not only should education enable us to
see beauty in these objects which God has put about us, but it is meant
to influence us to bring beautiful objects about us. I hope that each
one of you, after you graduate, will surround himself at home with what
is beautiful, inspiring, and elevating. I do not believe that any
person is educated so long as he lives in a dirty, miserable shanty. I
do not believe that any person is educated until he has learned to want
to live in a clean room made attractive with pictures and books, and
with such surroundings as are elevating. In a word, I wish to say again
that education is meant to give us that culture, that refinement, that
taste, which will make us deal truthfully and sympathetically with our
fellow men, and will make us see what is beautiful, elevating, and
inspiring in what God has created. I want you to bear in mind that your
text-books, with all their contents, are not an end, but a means to an
end--a means to help us get the highest, the best, the purest, and the
most beautiful things out of life."
The Tuskegee trained boy or girl has set before him every hour in the
day, and every day in the year, the substantial educational ideals here
set forth. Books, valuable as they are, and nowhere more thoroughly
reckoned as such than here, are only a means to an end: this is the
gospel preached by the Tuskegee teacher. Life is the great, the eternal
thing; the serving of one's fellows, the ministering unto the needy of a
groping, developing people--this is the thing not forgotten, but ever
constantly enforced by precept and by example.
The many old and time-worn frame buildings are being replaced by finely
built and imposing brick and stone structures; the tallow dip and
antiquated oil-lamp and gas-jet, as illuminators, have paled before the
more brilliant white light of electricity, installed by Tuskegee
students and operated by them. Patience and faith!--these are Tuskegee's
watchwords and her standard virtues. What can not be accomplished to-day
will certainly be accomplished to-morrow.
So, in its larger outlook and household anxieties, Tuskegee Institute
teachers are confident that the things taught and enforced by example
and precept will justify their efforts in helping to make a dependent
people independent, a distracted people confident, and an humble people
to thrill with pride in itself and in its best men and women. Thus it is
that Tuskegee Institute has never been satisfied with being merely a
school, concerned wholly with its recitations and training in shop and
field. Every student who carries a diploma from these grounds is urged
not to hang that diploma on the wall as an ornament, as an evidence of
individual superiority, but to make it mean something constructive and
life-giving to every one in the community where he must live and work.
The young men and women who are trained for mission work in foreign
countries are not more carefully trained in the spirit of consecration
than are these young men and women trained at Tuskegee for the work of
creating better economic and social conditions among their own people.
It is not necessary to state here what has already been accomplished in
many parts of the South by Tuskegee graduates. The selected examples set
forth in this book are evidence enough. It is sufficient to say that the
Tuskegee Institute is determined to become more and more a distinctive
influence among the regenerative agencies that are gradually bringing
order out of chaos, and justice, peace, and happiness out of the
wretched disorders of a painful past. It is easy to trace the influence
of such well-established institutions as Harvard and Yale in the
progressive life of the American people. The sons of Harvard and Yale
almost dominate civilization in America. In another sense, it is
possible for Tuskegee to have a like influence in the many things that
must be accomplished in the South, before love and justice shall
supplant race prejudice and race antagonism.
This reaching out helpfully in all directions where help is needed is
the distinguishing feature of Tuskegee. This race-loving spirit gives it
a largeness of view and purpose that saves both its teachers and pupils
from being narrow and self-centered. Take from Tuskegee all this "vision
splendid," and it will at once shrink into common-place insignificance.
"Set your ideals high," says the distinguished man who here is Principal
as he was founder, "and in your efforts to reach them you become strong
for greater things." It is but truth to say that no institution in all
the land, whether for white or black education, stands for higher and
more generous ideals.
Unless the young man who goes away from Tuskegee as blacksmith,
carpenter, printer, or as any other mechanic, is something more than
these, he has been incapable of perceiving and taking in the ideals that
go with these accomplishments. He has been taught over and over again to
"hitch his wagon to the stars," and if he fail to do so, the fault is in
himself, and not in Tuskegee.
As between a poor doctor and a poor carpenter, there is but scant
choice. They are both failures and to be avoided. Honor in one is as
precious as in the other. Honor and efficiency--these, therefore, are
the ideal test of every son and daughter that passes out of these
grounds into the larger world of work and responsibility.
What a terrible task it has been and still is to teach the lessons of
the upward spirit: "God's in His heaven, all's well with the world."
Hope is strength and discouragement is weakness. Everything that is
false and unjust and wrong is transitory. Those who are brave enough to
solve problems shall be more honored of mankind than those who create
problems which they make no effort to solve.
There can be no liberty without intelligence, no independence without
industry, and no power for man, and no charm for woman, without
character.
These are some of the ideals toward which all our teaching leads;
without these there would be no Tuskegee; with them, as its very life
and spirit and inspiration, Tuskegee shall lead into more ways of peace,
happiness, and power than we of this generation have yet dreamed of, or
realized.
II
RESOURCES AND MATERIAL EQUIPMENT
BY WARREN LOGAN
When the Alabama Legislature in 1881 passed an act to establish a Normal
School for colored people at Tuskegee and appropriated for it $2,000
yearly, it made no provision whatever for land or buildings; these were
left to be provided for by the people who were to be benefited by the
school. Here was almost a case of being required to make bricks without
straw. But as matters have turned out, this neglect was the best thing
that could have happened to the school. First it gave opportunity for
the employment of those splendid qualities of pluck, self-help, and
perseverance which have distinguished Mr. Washington so preeminently in
the building of Tuskegee. Moreover, the State has contributed nothing to
the school in the way of land or buildings; it has not sought to control
the property of the institution, leaving it free to be managed by the
Board of Trustees.
The school was opened on the 4th of July, 1881, in an old church
building in the town of Tuskegee, which lies nearly two miles from the
present school-grounds. Later in the same year the growth of the school
made it necessary to obtain additional room, which was found in a
dilapidated shanty standing near the church and which had been used as
the village schoolhouse since the war. These buildings were in such bad
condition that when it rained it was necessary for the teacher and
students to use umbrellas in order to protect themselves from the
elements while recitations were being conducted.
Students who came from a distance boarded in families in the town, where
the conditions of living were very much like those in their own homes,
and these were far below proper standards. Mr. Washington, understanding
the great need for colored people to be trained in correct ways of
living as well as to be educated in books, determined to secure a
permanent location for the school, with buildings in which the students
might live under the care and influence of teachers day and night,
during the whole period of their connection with the school.
[Illustration: WARREN LOGAN.
Treasurer of the School.]
It so happened at this time that there was an old farm of 100 acres in
the western part of the town of Tuskegee, well suited to be the site of
such a school, which could be had for $500. But where was the money to
be found to pay for it? Mr. Washington himself had no money, and the
people of the town, much interested as they were in the enterprise, were
wholly unable to give direct financial assistance. General J. F. B.
Marshall, then treasurer of the Hampton Institute in Virginia, was
appealed to for a loan of $200 with which to make the first payment.
This he gladly made, and the farm was secured. In a few months
sufficient money was raised from entertainments and subscriptions in the
North and South (one friend in Connecticut giving $300) to return the
loan of General Marshall and pay the balance due on the purchase of the
property.
The land thus secured, preparations were at once begun to put up a
school building, toward the cost of which Mr. A. H. Porter, of Brooklyn,
N. Y., gave $500, the structure being named Porter Hall in recognition
of Mr. Porter's generosity. In this building, which has three stories
and a basement, all the operations of the school were for a time
conducted. In the basement were a kitchen, dining-room, laundry, and
commissary. The first story was devoted to academic and industrial
class-rooms; in the second was an assembly-room, where devotions and
public exercises for the whole school were held, while the third was
given up to dormitories.
From this small beginning has grown the present extensive plant at
Tuskegee, comprising 2,300 acres of land, on which are located 123
buildings of all kinds devoted to the uses of the institution. Some idea
of the impression which the size of the school makes upon one who sees
it for the first time may be gathered from the remark of a Northern
visitor, who, upon returning to his home from a trip through the South,
was asked by a friend if he had seen "Booker Washington's school."
"School?" he replied. "I have seen Booker Washington's city."
About 150 acres constitute the present campus, the rest of the
school-lands being devoted to farms, truck-gardens, pastures,
brick-yards, etc. Running through the grounds proper and extending the
entire distance of the farms for two or three miles is a driveway, on
either side of which, and on roads leading from it, are located the
buildings of the Institute. These, for the most part, are brick
structures, and have been built by the students themselves under the
direction of their instructors in the various building trades. The plans
for these buildings have been drawn in the architectural-drawing
division of the Institute. While not as ornate as the buildings of some
other institutions, they are substantial and well adapted to the uses
for which they are intended. The newer buildings, constructed in the
last ten years, are more artistic and imposing, showing great
improvement in matters of architectural design and finish. Not only have
the students performed the building operations that entered into the
construction of these buildings, but they have also manufactured the
brick, and have prepared much of the wooden and other materials that
were used. We sometimes speak of a man as self-made, but I have never
known another great educational institution that could be so described.
Tuskegee, itself, is distinctively self-made.
Porter Hall was completed and occupied in the spring of 1883. The
following year a brick building for girls was undertaken, and two years
later completed. This building, named Alabama Hall, is rectangular in
shape and four stories high. It contains a kitchen and dining-room,
reception-rooms, apartments of the Dean of the Woman's Department, and
sleeping-rooms. There was no special gift made for this building, the
money required for its erection being taken from the general funds of
the Institute as they could be spared. A wing added later gave more
space for dining-rooms and provided a number of sleeping-rooms.
The money used in putting up the buildings at Tuskegee is made to do
double duty. In the first place, it provides the buildings for which it
was primarily given, and, in the second place, furnishes opportunities
for young men to learn the trades which are employed in their
construction. Following closely upon the completion of Alabama Hall,
there was begun another brick structure to be used as a dormitory for
young men. Olivia Davidson Hall bears the honored name of the school's
first and only Assistant Principal. Miss Davidson performed a
conspicuous part in establishing the school and placing its claim for
support before the public. This building is a four-story structure, and
the first of the school's buildings for which the plans were made by the
teacher of architectural drawing. The plans for all the buildings put up
by the Institute are now made in the division of architectural drawing
in charge of Mr. R. R. Taylor, a graduate of the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, who is ably assisted by Mr. W. S. Pittman, a
graduate of Tuskegee and of the Drexel Institute in Philadelphia.
The need for a building to house the mechanical industries which, until
1892, had been conducted in temporary frame buildings on different parts
of the grounds, led to the erection of Cassedy Hall, a three-story brick
building standing at the east entrance to the grounds. Cassedy Hall,
together with a smaller building devoted to a blacksmith shop and
foundry, was used for the purpose mentioned, until three years ago, when
all the industries for men were moved into the Slater-Armstrong Memorial
Trades Building, at the opposite end of the grounds. Through the
generosity of Mr. George F. Peabody, of New York, Cassedy Hall has since
been converted into a dormitory for young men, and serves admirably for
this purpose.
Phelps Hall, which is the Bible Training School Building, is the gift of
two New York ladies who desired to do something to improve the Negro
ministry. The building is of wood and has three stories, containing a
lecture-hall, recitation-rooms, library, and sleeping-rooms for young
men. A broad veranda extends entirely around the building. Last year
there were enrolled fifty-six students for the course in Bible Training,
and among them were a number of ordained ministers who have regular
charges. Phelps Hall was dedicated in 1892, Dr. Lyman Abbott preaching
the dedicatory sermon and General Samuel C. Armstrong delivering an
address, which was among his last public utterances.
In the next year Science Hall (now called Thrasher Hall, after the
lamented Max Bennett Thrasher) was built. This is a handsome three-story
building, with recitation-rooms and laboratories in the first two
stories, and sleeping-rooms for teachers and boys in the third story.
About this time a frame cottage with two stories and attic was built by
the school as a residence for Mr. Washington. This he occupied until the
gift of two Brooklyn friends enabled him to erect on his own lot, just
opposite the school-grounds, his present handsome brick residence, where
he dispenses a generous hospitality to the school's guests and to the
teachers of the Institute. The cottage which he vacated was afterward
utilized for a time as a library, but now is the home of Director Bruce
of the Academic Department.
Alabama Hall, already mentioned, soon proved inadequate to meet the
needs of the Woman's Department. A long one-story frame building, having
the shape of a letter T, was then erected just in the rear of Alabama
Hall. It has been used for girls' sleeping-rooms until this year, when
it was taken down to make room for a park and playground for young
women. There were also successively built for the growing demands of
this department, and in the vicinity of the original girls' building,
Willow Cottage, Hamilton Cottage, Parker Memorial Home, Huntington Hall,
and only this last year Douglass Hall. Huntington Hall is the gift of
Mrs. Collis P. Huntington. In design, finish, and appointments it is one
of the best buildings owned by the school.
Three years ago a wealthy but unostentatious gentleman, who would not
permit his name to be used in connection with his benefaction, gave the
school $25,000 for a building for girls, suggesting that the structure
should bear the name of some noted Negro. Douglass Hall was erected with
this money and named in honor of that great leader of the race,
Frederick Douglass. It is a two-story brick building, with a basement in
its central section, and contains 40 sleeping-rooms, a reception-room,
bathrooms, and a large assembly-room with a seating capacity or 450. In
this room the Dean of the Woman's Department holds meetings with the
girls on questions of health, morals, and manners. The building is
heated with steam and lighted by electricity. All in all, Douglass Hall
is the best of the buildings so far built by the Institute, and is a
fitting monument to the man whose name it bears.
The Slater-Armstrong Memorial Agricultural Building was completed and
dedicated in 1897. Hon. James Wilson, Secretary of Agriculture of the
United States, honored the school by his presence and an address on the
occasion of the formal opening of this building. It is a brick structure
of two-and-a-half stories, with recitation-rooms, laboratory, museums,
library, and an office for the use of the Department of Agriculture. In
addition to its appropriation of $3,000 for the general work of the
school, the State of Alabama makes an annual appropriation of $1,500 for
the maintenance of an Agricultural Experiment Station. The plots of the
Station and the school-farm are in close proximity to the Agricultural
Building, and on these the young men taking the course in Agriculture
put in practise the theories which they learn in the class-room. Many
important experiments have been undertaken by the Station, of
particular interest being those relating to soil building, the
hybridization of sea-island cotton with some of the common short-staple
varieties, fertilizer tests with potatoes, by which it has been shown
that it is possible to raise as much as 266 bushels per acre on light,
sandy soil such as that comprising the school-lands, while the average
yield in the same part of Alabama is not more than 40 bushels to the
acre.
The next building of importance to be put up after the Agricultural
Building was the Chapel. Another gift from the two New York ladies who
gave the money for Phelps Hall made possible this magnificent structure,
admittedly one of the most imposing church edifices in the South. It is
built of brick, 1,200,000 bricks entering into its construction, all of
which were laid by student masons. It has stone trimmings, and in shape
is a cross, the nave with choir having a length of 154 feet, and the
distance through the transept being 106 feet. There are anterooms and a
study for the Chaplain of the Institute. Including the gallery the
seating capacity is 2,400. Here all gatherings of the school for
religious and other purposes are now held. The great Tuskegee Negro
Conference that assembles in February of each year holds its meetings
in the Chapel. Near the Chapel are the Barracks, two long, roughly
constructed one-story frame buildings, which are used as sleeping
quarters for young men until they can be better housed in permanent
buildings.
Until 1900 the mechanical industries at Tuskegee were conducted in
Cassedy Hall and some adjoining frame buildings. In that year they were
moved into the commodious quarters which the then just completed
Slater-Armstrong Memorial Trades Building furnished. This building is
rectangular in shape, is built about a central court, and covers more
space than any other of the school buildings. In its outside dimensions
it is 283 feet by 315 feet. The front half of the building is two
stories high, the rear half one story. It is constructed of brick, with
a tin roof, and, like the other larger buildings at the Institute, has
steam heat and electric light. The money for this building came in part
from the J. W. and Belinda L. Randall Charities Fund of Boston and the
steadfast friend of the school, Mr. George Foster Peabody, of New York.
There is a tablet in the building bearing the following inscription:
"This tablet is erected in memory of the generosity of J. W. and
Belinda L. Randall, of Boston, Massachusetts, from whose estate $20,000
were received toward the erection of the building."
The various shops in this building are fairly well equipped with tools
and apparatus to do the work required of them and to teach the trades
pursued by the young men. Taking the Machine Division as an example, we
find it supplied with one 18-inch lathe, one 14-inch lathe, one 20-inch
planer, one 12-inch shaping-machine, one 20-inch drill-press, one
6-1/2-inch pipe-cutting and threading machine, one Brown and Sharpe
tool-grinder, one sensitive drill-press, and, of course, the customary
tools that go with these machines. The Electric-Lighting Plant is also
located in this building. Not only does this Division light the
buildings and grounds of the Institute, but it furnishes light to
individuals in the town of Tuskegee, which is, at present, without other
electric-lighting facilities.
In 1895 the school suffered the loss by fire of its well-appointed barn,
together with some of its finest milch cows. This is the only serious
fire that has occurred in the history of the school--a record almost
unparalleled in an establishment so large. This fact has led to the
school being able to get insurance at a lower rate than is generally
given to educational institutions. It was not until 1900 that the school
fully recovered from the loss of its barn. In this year friends in
Brooklyn gave the money with which to rebuild the barn on a larger
scale. It was deemed wise not to put all the money into one building,
but to erect numbers of smaller ones and locate them so as to minimize
the fire risk. Accordingly, plans were made to build a hennery,
creamery, dairy-barn, horse-barn, carriage-house, tool-house, piggery,
silos, and slaughter-house. All these buildings were at once put up, and
are now giving effective service. At present the school owns 47 horses
and colts, 76 mules, 495 cows and calves, 601 pigs, and 977 fowls of
different kinds. These animals are all of good stock, some of them being
thoroughbreds, and are cared for by the students who work in the
Agricultural Department.
Dorothy Hall, the building which accommodates the Girls' Industrial
Department, was built in 1901 on the side of the driveway opposite the
Boys' Trades Building. This building is the gift of the two New York
ladies who gave the Chapel and Phelps Hall. It serves its purpose
admirably, the rooms being large, well lighted, and airy. Here are
conducted all the trades taught to young women, including sewing,
dressmaking, millinery, laundering, cooking, housekeeping,
mattress-making, upholstering, broom-making, and basketry. As with the
boys' trades, there is a very fair equipment of accessories for proper
teaching.
In point of time, the next important building provided was the Carnegie
Library, Mr. Carnegie giving $20,000 for the building and furnishings.
The structure is two stories high, with massive Corinthian columns on
the front. It contains, besides the library proper, a large
assembly-room, an historical room, study-rooms, and offices for the
Librarian. The building and the furniture are the product of student
labor.
In 1901, with $2,000 given by Mrs. Quincy A. Shaw, of Boston, and $100
contributed by graduates of the Institute as a nucleus, the Children's
House was built. This is a one-story frame building of good proportions,
in which the primary school of the town is taught. It is the
practise-school for students of the Institute who mean to teach. A
kindergarten has also been established.
Mr. Rockefeller has given a dormitory for boys, which was completed and
occupied last year. The lack of adequate sleeping quarters for young
men, from which the school has suffered from the beginning, was very
materially supplied in Rockefeller Hall, which is a three-story brick
structure, furnishing accommodations for 150 students. This need for
dormitories has been still further met through the gift of three brick
cottages by Miss Julia Emery, an American now living in London. Two of
these buildings were finished last year, and young men are now living in
them. The third is nearing completion. All are two stories high, with a
hall running through the middle, and contain 40 rooms of good size.
Until last year the offices of the Institute were scattered over the
grounds wherever room could be found. A New York friend, who does not
permit the use of his name, seeing the need of the school for a building
in which the offices might be concentrated, thus greatly increasing the
efficiency of its administrative work, gave $19,000 for this purpose.
The Office Building, completed in the latter part of 1903, is the result
of this benefaction. It is two-and-a-half stories high, and contains the
offices of the Principal, the Principal's Secretary, Treasurer, Auditor,
Business Agent, Commandant, Registrar, and the Post-Office and Savings
Department.
[Illustration: THE OFFICE BUILDING IN PROCESS OF ERECTION.
Student carpenters shown at work.]
The most pretentious building owned by the Institute is the Collis P.
Huntington Memorial Building, the new home of the Academic Department,
which is the gift of Mrs. Huntington as a memorial to her husband, who
was one of Tuskegee's stanchest supporters. It is built near the site of
the original building, Porter Hall, which it displaces as the center of
the academic work of the school. The outside dimensions are 183 feet by
103 feet. It is four stories in height. Besides recitation-rooms for all
the classes, it contains a gymnasium in the basement for young women,
and an assembly-room on the top floor capable of seating 800 persons.
The finishing is in yellow pine. The buildings of the Institute show a
steady progression in quality of workmanship, materials, and
architectural design and efficiency, from the rather rough, wooden
Porter Hall erected by hired workmen in 1882 to the stately Huntington
Hall built by students in 1904.
Located at different points on the grounds and on lots detached are
cottages occupied as residences by teachers and officers of the
Institute.
The furnishings for all the buildings, as well as the buildings
themselves, have been made by the students in the various shops, who at
the same time were learning trades and creating articles of use.
The annual cost of conducting the institution is, in round numbers,
$150,000. This may seem high, but when certain facts in regard to the
work are borne in mind it will not appear exorbitant. In the first
place, there are really three schools at Tuskegee--a day-school, a
night-school, and a trade-school. Such a system makes necessary the
employment of a larger number of teachers than would be needed in a
purely academic institution holding only one session a day. Teachers in
the trade-school, with special technical training, can be obtained only
by paying them higher salaries than are paid to those who simply teach
in the class-rooms.
Secondly, and principally, it is expensive to employ student labor to do
the work of the school. By the time students become fairly proficient in
their trades and reach the point where their services begin to be
profitable, their time at the institution has expired, and a new,
untrained set take their places, so that the school is constantly
working on new material or raw recruits. Then, too, Tuskegee is still in
the formative period of its growth as to buildings, laying-out and
improvement of grounds, and equipment of its various departments. When
the school's needs in these directions shall have been met, and the
Negro parent shall become able to pay a larger share of the cost of
educating his children, the expenses to the public of running the school
may be materially reduced.
Money for the support of the school is derived principally from the
following sources, viz.: The State of Alabama, $4,500; the John F.
Slater Fund, $10,000; the General Education Board, $10,000; the Peabody
Fund, $1,500; the Institute's Endowment Fund, $40,000; contributions of
persons and charitable organizations, $84,000; a total of $150,000. The
individual contributions are, for the most part, small, and come from
persons of moderate means. Yet the institution annually receives some
large gifts toward its expenses from those who are blessed with wealth.
Especial appeals are made by the institution for scholarships of $50
each, in order to pay the tuition of students who provide for their
other expenses themselves largely by their work for the school, but who
are unable to contribute anything toward the item of teaching. These
scholarships are not turned over to the students, but are held by the
institution and assigned for their benefit, the aim being to do nothing
for students which they can do for themselves, and thus help to develop
in them a spirit of manly and womanly self-reliance.
The majority of the large donations, aside from those for endowment,
have been for buildings and the purchase of additional farm-lands made
necessary by the enlargement of the school's agricultural work.
What may be regarded as the greatest need of the institution is an
adequate endowment which will put it upon a permanent basis and make its
future certain.
A gratifying beginning in the building up of an endowment has already
been made. It is a fact, still well remembered by the public, that Mr.
Andrew Carnegie has given to the endowment fund the princely sum of
$600,000. Before that time $400,000 had been collected from other
sources for the same purpose, the largest single contribution toward
this amount being $50,000 from the late Collis P. Huntington.
As already stated, the income from the present endowment is $40,000, out
of which several annuities are paid. This is only a little more than
one-fourth of the amount that must be had each year to pay the expenses
of the school. It will require an endowment of at least $3,000,000 to
yield an income adequate to the present needs of the institution alone.
III
THE ACADEMIC AIMS
BY ROSCOE CONKLING BRUCE
The Negro needs industrial training in eminent degree, because the
capacity for continuous labor is a requisite of civilized living;
because, indeed, the very first step in social advance must be economic;
because the industrial monopoly with which slavery encompassed black men
has fallen shattered before the trumpet-blast of white labor and eager
competition; and, finally, because no instrument of moral education is
more effective upon the mass of mankind than cheerful and intelligent
work. These ideas powerfully voiced, together with an unusually
magnanimous attitude toward the white South, have set the man who toiled
doggedly up from slavery, upon a hill apart. These things are
distinctive of this man; they suggest his temper, his spirit, his point
of view; but they do not exhaust his interests. Similarly, the
distinctive feature of Tuskegee--adequate provision for industrial
training--sets it upon a hill apart, but by a whimsical perversity
this major feature is in some quarters assumed to be the whole school. A
moment's reflection shows such a view to be mistaken.
[Illustration: ROSCOE C. BRUCE.
Director of the Academic Department.]
The very industries at Tuskegee presuppose a considerable range of
academic study. Tuskegee does not graduate hoe-hands or plowboys.
Agriculture is, of course, fundamental--fundamental in recognition of
the fact that the Negro population is mainly a farming population, and
of the truth that something must be done to stem the swelling tide which
each year sweeps thousands of black men and women and children from the
sunlit monotony of the plantation to the sunless iniquity of the slums,
from a drudgery that is not quite cheerless to a competition that is
altogether merciless. But the teaching of agriculture, even in its
elementary stages, presupposes a considerable amount of academic
preparation. To be sure, a flourishing garden may be made and managed by
bright-eyed tots just out of the kindergarten, but how can commercial
fertilizers be carefully analyzed by a boy who has made no study of
general chemistry? and how can a balanced ration be adjusted by an
illiterate person? Similarly, the girl in the laundry does not make soap
by rote, but by principle; and the girl in the dressmaking-shop does
not cut out her pattern by luck, or guess, or instinct, or rule of
thumb, but by geometry. And so the successful teaching of the industries
demands no mean amount of academic preparation. In this lies the
technical utility of Tuskegee's Academic Department.
Then, too, a public service has been rendered by Hampton and Tuskegee in
showing that industrial training--the system in which the student learns
by doing and is paid for the commodities he produces--may be so managed
as to educate. Among the excellencies of industrial training, I would
state that the severe commercial test in which sentiment plays no part
is applied as consistently to the student's labor as is the force of
gravitation to a falling body. Here we must keep in mind the unavoidably
concrete nature of the product, whether satisfactory or not; the
discipline such training affords in organized endeavor; the stimulus it
offers to all the virtues of a drudgery which, though it repel an
unusually ardent and sensitive temperament, yet wears a precious jewel
in its head; and an exceptionally keen sense of responsibility, since on
occasion large amounts of money and the esteem of the school at large
and the lives of a student's fellows depend upon his circumspection and
skill. Such training educates.
But that would indeed be a sorry program of education which blinked the
fact that the student must be rendered responsive to the nobler ideals
of the human race, that his eyes must be opened to the immanent values
of life. If a clear title to forty acres and a mule represents the
extreme upper limit of a black man's ambition, why call him a man? If a
bank-account represents the sum of his happiness, that happiness lacks
humanity. If you would educate for life, you must arouse spiritual
interests. "The life is more than meat, and the body than raiment."
Through history and literature the Tuskegee student is brought to
develop a criticism, an appreciation of life and the worthier ends of
human striving. To such a discipline, however elementary, the critic
will not, I take it, begrudge the name "education."
And if the reader wavers in contemplating the problems of trudging
Negroes, remember that the type of Negro who is a menace to the
community is he who, in moments of leisure, responds to somewhat grosser
incentives than the poetry of Longfellow, the romance of Hawthorne, and
the philosophy of Emerson. I would reassure your idealism with this
counsel of prudence.
Another question presses: Does the value of Tuskegee lie in the fact
that the school equips for happy lives merely as many persons as are
subjected to the immediate play of its influences; that its circle of
efficiency includes only as many as are enrolled in its various courses?
To that question every teacher in the school and the mass of graduates
and students would give an emphatic, a decisive, No! The real value of
the school lies in the service rendered to the people of the communities
where our young folks go to live and labor. Now, work in wood and iron,
however assiduously prosecuted, never erected in any human being's heart
a passion for social service; a finer material must be used, a material
finer than gold. And so the plan and deeper intent of Tuskegee Institute
are incapable of realization without the incentives supplied by history
and literature.
Finally, there is a trade for which the academic studies, supplemented
by specific normal instruction, are the direct preparation--teaching
school. In the census year there were over 21,000 Negro school-teachers
in the United States, and in the decade 1890-1900 the ratio of increase
was more than twice as rapid as that of the Negro population; but,
nevertheless, there were in 1900 more than twice as many teachers in the
South per 10,000 white children as per 10,000 colored. But such data can
not even approximately indicate the relative amounts of teaching enjoyed
by these two classes of children, for the statistical method can not
express the incalculable disparity in teaching-efficiency.
A friend of mine--a graduate of Brown University--was for several years
a member of a board which corrected the examination-papers of Negro
candidates for teachers' certificates in a certain Southern State where
the school facilities for the Negro population are exceptionally good;
but he confessed to me that repeatedly not a paper submitted deserved a
passing mark, but the board was "simply compelled to grant certificates
in order to provide teachers enough to go around." Nor is such a dearth
of black pedagogues in the least extraordinary. The mission of Tuskegee
Institute is largely to supply measurably well-equipped teachers for the
schools--teachers able and eager to teach gardening and carpentry as
well as grammar and arithmetic, teachers who seek to organize the social
life of their communities upon wholesome principles, tactfully
restraining grossness and unobtrusively proffering new and nobler
sources of enjoyment. And so the academic studies are wrought into the
essential scheme of Tuskegee's work.
Let us inspect with some closeness the organization of the institution.
The student-body is fundamentally divided into day-students and
night-students. The night-students work in the industries, largely at
common labor, all day and every day, and go to school at night, thus
paying their current board bills, and accumulating such credits at the
Treasurer's office as will later defray their expenses in the
day-school. The day-school students are divided perpendicularly through
the classes into two sections, section No. 1 working in the industries
every other day for three days a week and attending academic classes the
remaining three days, while this situation is exactly reversed for
section No. 2. Thus every week-day half of each day-school class is in
the Academic Department, while the other half is in the Industrial. This
arrangement induces a wholesome rivalry between the students of the two
sections, and effects an equal distribution of the working force and
skill over every week-day.
The day-school students consist, then, of two classes of persons: those
who, as night-students, have accumulated credits sufficient to pay their
way in the day-school, and those whose families are able to pay a
considerable part of their expenses. The earnings of a student in the
day-school can not be large enough to pay his current board bill, but
such a student is ordinarily enjoying the valuable advantage of working
at one of the more skilled trades.
The night-school student, perhaps, because of greater maturity in years
and experience, may be relied upon to apply himself with the utmost
diligence to his academic studies; so, in much less than half the
time-allotment, he advances in his academic studies about half as fast
as the day-school student. This schedule did not spring full-fledged
from the seething brain of any theorist; it is no fatuous imitation of
the educational practise of some remote and presumptively dissimilar
institution; it has, so to say, elaborated itself in adjustment to the
actual needs of the particular situation. This provision boasts not of
novelty, but of utility; though not ideal, it is practicable. But the
central fact is that this Tuskegee Plan, while clearly securing ample
time for the teaching of the industries, makes possible no mean amount
of academic study.
In order more clearly to exhibit the grounds of this proposition, I
shall refer in some slight detail to the course of study in English and
in Mathematics.
Mathematics represents the group of academic studies which possess
direct technical value for the industries; moreover, it is a pretty good
index of the grades comprehended in the Academic Department. In the
lowest class in the day-school--there is one lower in the
night-school--the arithmetical tables are mastered, and fractions
introduced and developed with the use of liquid, dry, surface, and time
measures; whereas in the Senior class algebra is studied through
quadratics and plane geometry through the "area of polygons." That is to
say, the lowest day-school class is about equivalent to a fourth grade
in the North, and the Senior to the first or the second year (barring
the foreign languages) in a Northern high school.
[Illustration: A PORTION OF THE SCHOOL GROUNDS.]
Despite a much smaller time-allotment, our students, roughly speaking,
keep pace with Northern students because they are older and somewhat
more serious, because the course is shortened by the elimination of
uselessly perplexing topics in arithmetic like compound proportion and
cube root, but chiefly because the utility of mathematics is made vivid,
and vigorous interest aroused by its immediate application in class-room
and shop to problems arising in the industries. Our students are not
stuffed like sausages with rules and definitions, mathematical or other;
they ascend to general principles through the analysis of concrete
cases.
English serves to represent the group of studies that exert a
liberalizing influence upon the student, that possess a cultural rather
than a technical value. From oral lessons in language in the lower
classes, the students advance to a modicum of technical grammar in the
middle of the course, and hence to the rhetoric of the Senior year.
Moreover, an unusually large amount of written composition is insisted
upon, the compositions being used not merely to discipline the student
in chaste feeling, consecutive thinking, and efficient expression, but
also to sharpen his powers of observation and to stimulate him to pick
out of his daily experience the elements that are significant. School
readers are used in the lower classes because the readers present
economically and compactly a whole gamut of literary styles and forms.
These readers are importantly supplemented and gradually superseded by
certain classics appropriate to the grades. The classic, whether
Robinson Crusoe, or Ivanhoe, Rip Van Winkle, the House of Seven Gables,
or The Merchant of Venice, presents an artistic whole, and permits the
students to acquire some sense of literary structure. The dominant
motive in literary instruction is, perhaps, esthetic, but I am convinced
that the ethical influence of this instruction at Tuskegee is profound
and abiding.
However liberal the provisions of the academic curriculum, the value of
the department is finally determined by the devotion and ability of the
teachers. Universities and normal schools, and the seasoned staffs of
public-school systems--from these sources, whether in Massachusetts,
California, or Tennessee, Principal Washington has gathered a force of
academic teachers of rare ability and devotion. Eminent for personality
rather than for method, these teachers are no tyros in method. In such
hands the excellent features of the curriculum are raised to the N-th
power.
Finally, academic and industrial teachers are animated with a sentiment
of solidarity, with an esprit de corps, which solves many a problem of
conflicting duty and jurisdiction, and which must impress the student
with the essential unity of Tuskegee's endeavor to equip men and women
for life. The crude, stumbling, sightless plantation-boy who lives in
the environment of Tuskegee for three or four years, departs with an
address, an alertness, a resourcefulness, and above all a spirit of
service, that announce the educated man.
[Illustration: ANOTHER PORTION OF THE SCHOOL GROUNDS.]
IV
WHAT GIRLS ARE TAUGHT, AND HOW
BY MRS. BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
"We wants our baby gal, Mary Lou, to come up to Tuskegee to git
eddicated and learn seamstress; kase we doesn't want her to work lak we
is," says the farmer. "I wish to help you plant this new industry,
broom-making," writes Miss Susan B. Anthony, "because you are trying so
earnestly to teach your girls other means of livelihood besides sewing,
housework, and cooking." This is the problem we have been trying to
solve at Tuskegee for over twenty years: What handiwork can we give our
girls with their academic training that will better fit them to meet the
demand for skilled teachers in the various avenues of the industrial and
academic world now opening so rapidly to women?
[Illustration: MRS. BOOKER T. WASHINGTON.
Director of Industries for Girls.]
Learning to sew, with the ultimate end of becoming a full-fledged
dressmaker, has been the height of ambition with the major part of our
girls when brought to the institution by their horny-handed fathers and
mothers fresh from the soil of Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, or Florida.
After the last gripless hand-shake, with the tremulous, "Take care of
yourself, honey," the hard-working father and mother have turned their
faces homeward, visibly affected by the separation, but resolved to
shoulder the sacrifice of the daughter's much-needed help on the
plantation, which oftentimes is all that they are able to contribute
toward her education.
Not infrequently the girl has begun in the lowest class in night-school.
Her parents send her articles of clothing now and then on Christmas; but
the largest contributions to her wardrobe come from the boxes and
barrels sent to the institution by Northern friends. She has remained in
school during the summer vacation, and within two years has entered
day-school with enough to her credit to finish her education. When the
happy parents return to see their daughter graduated, after six or seven
long years, their faces are radiant because of their realized hopes.
When they see their white-robed daughter transformed from the girl they
brought here clad in the homespun of the old days, and receiving her
certificate, the tears come unchecked, and the moving lips no doubt form
a whispered prayer.
In a recent class there was graduated a young woman of twenty-five. She
came to the school in her eighteenth year from the "piney woods" of
Alabama. She entered the lowest preparatory class in night-school and
was assigned to work in the laundry. She was earnest and faithful in
work and study. She passed on from class to class, remaining at school
to work during the vacation. After two years in the laundry she was
given an opportunity to learn plain sewing in that division. She was
promoted to the Dressmaking Division at the end of the year, and
received her certificate at the close of two years, after working every
day and attending night-school. She spent the last two years of her
school life in the Millinery Division, and received her certificate from
that division with one from the Academic Department on her graduation.
During these two years she taught the sewing-classes in the night-school
of the town of Tuskegee. At the outset she bought the materials used
with $1, left over from the sales of the previous year. From this small
nest-egg as a starter, seventeen girls were supplied with work. But so
efficient and frugal was the young teacher that she sold articles,
bought supplies for her class, and ended the year with $3.45 in the
treasury.
This is just a leaf from the history of one girl. Of the 520 girls
entering the institution during this year (1903-'04), 458 have remained
for the full scholastic year. About 50 per cent came from country
districts all over the United States. A large majority of them asked to
enter the Dressmaking Division to learn that trade; but, after the field
of industries was opened to their view, they were scattered about in the
different divisions, a very large per cent still leaning to the side of
dressmaking and millinery.
Taking into account the number of girls working their way through at
their trades by day and attending night-school, they were distributed as
follows: Horticulture, 4; training-kitchen, 13; housekeeping, 38;
dining-room, 29; hospital, 20; kitchen-gardening, 8; poultry-raising, 7;
tailoring, 14; dairying, 10; printing, 6; broom-making, 26;
mattress-making, 18; upholstering, 18; laundering, 54; plain sewing, 72;
millinery, 51; dressmaking, 69. All the girls were required to take
cooking twice a week and 209 of the girls in the normal classes took
basketry.
As the trades were the great attraction in the school curriculum, it was
deemed necessary to separate the school into two divisions, that
students might have an opportunity to receive instruction equally in the
Academic and Industrial Departments. This year this scheme worked
successfully by an arrangement that placed one division in the Academic
Department on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, while the other was at
work, and the other division in the Trades Department on Thursdays,
Fridays, and Saturdays, while the other was in school, and so on
regularly.
Girl life at Tuskegee is strenuous. Though study and work are constantly
to the fore, character is effectively developed with brain and muscle,
and the well-earned recreation-hour comes just frequently enough to lend
the highest source of pleasure. Though the girl usually comes with a
hazy conception of what the days in school will really mean for the
ripening of those powers that she earnestly intends to use for the best
development of herself, there is always a spirit of learning, that she
may be of service to others. That is what counts in the school-days of
the average girl in her struggle for more light.
The girl, coming a stranger from her home in the city or country, is
lost in a crowd of girls new to dormitory life. New surroundings and new
conditions are everywhere. New emotions, new purposes, new resolutions
chase one another in her thoughts, and she becomes a stranger to herself
only to find her bearings first in her own room. Here Maine and
California, far-away Washington and Central America, meet on common
ground. Alabama and Georgia alone feel kinship from geographical
propinquity.
Beds, one double and one single, chairs, a table, mirror, bookcase,
wardrobe, wash-stand, and screen, all manufactured on the grounds,
compose the simple furniture of the room. But a few pictures, a strip of
carpet before each bed, a bright table-covering, soon give the room the
appearance of home, and the untried life has begun. The duty-list
assigns to each girl her work, and perhaps the first lessons in order
and system will be fairly instituted.
How many and varied are the associations that cluster about the life of
the girl in her room, that refuge from a day of discouragement in
schoolroom or workshop, and a haven of peace during the quiet hours of
the Sabbath! Roommate meets roommate, quick to resent and as quick to
forgive--and the petty strife and envy suppressed at birth only serve
to discipline them for the coming days.
Up with the rising bell at five, the duties of the room are almost
finished when the girl leaves her beds to air while she takes her six
o'clock breakfast. Social amenities, the niceties of table-training, and
the tricks of speech that betray the sectional birthright, proclaim to
the ever-observant table-mates the status of each newcomer, and she
rises or falls in estimation just so far as her metal rings true. Thus
another element enters into her life, one that will prove a potent force
in balancing character; for the frankly expressed criticisms of
schoolmates play no small part in the development of students.
If a girl be one of the forty-five waitresses on the eighty-nine tables
of the dining-room, she eats her breakfast as the other students march
out, then finishes her room-duties and is ready for work at ten minutes
of seven wherever she happens to be assigned. If she is a dishwasher,
she does that work, waits for inspection of the table that she has set,
finishes her room-duty, and is admitted into her work division at half
past seven.
Gardening and greenhouse work are becoming so attractive through the
Nature-Study classes of the Academic Department that there are constant
applications for transfers from the sewing divisions to this outside
work. Equipped in an overall gingham apron and sunbonnet of the same
material, the girl begins her duties, and no prouder girl can be found
than she who takes her first basket of early spring vegetables to the
Teachers' Home.
If the day is to be spent with the whole agricultural force of girls
picking strawberries for the tables of the Boarding Department and the
local market, the stage takes the group out to the patch two miles back
on the farm--and that is happiness unalloyed for the schoolgirl. When
she correlates her outing with her school work on the day following,
there is seen nature at first-hand in the class-room.
If other classmates have been working in the Plain-Sewing Division
turning out cotton underwear and plain articles of clothing to supply
the demand of the Salesroom of the institution, the lesson in English
has a natural, practical bearing, arising from the fact that one hour
has been spent with the theory class of the workroom studying the warp
and woof of the materials used, perhaps the sixth or seventh lesson in a
series on cotton, introduced to the class first in its native heath.
Correlation comes in wherever it may, and the association of ideas
obtained in class-room and workroom is closely joined.
The large class of the Dressmaking Division, spending the day from seven
until half past five making the blue uniform dresses, filling orders for
tailor-made dresses in silk and cloth, measuring, drafting, cutting, and
fitting, has many a representative in the schoolroom the succeeding day;
and still more is the lesson varied by the practical illustrations in
Mathematics or the recital of the experiences of the day in the English
classes.
The girl in the millinery work, shaping forms, trimming hats, blending
colors, drawing designs, studying textiles and fabrics for analysis in
her theory classes twice during her three days of work, finds added
inspiration for her three days of class-room study. If she is in the
Senior class, she specializes in geometry on her school-days and
mechanical drawing on her work-days. When our girl has finished her
course in drawing and begins one of the uniform hats worn by the
hundreds of girls, she ranks among the first milliners of the land in
the estimation of the beginners. She completes hat after hat, drapes
them until the number meets the requirement, and then comes her own
creation, a pattern hat, undersized of course, but a real dress hat and
a thing of beauty. It usually finds its way to the old home for her
mother and neighbors to admire. The commendation that comes back to the
school is worth its weight in gold.
[Illustration: A CLASS IN MILLINERY.]
But there are backward learners. Some there are who excel in embroidery,
crocheting, making ties and other fancy articles, but who have no
aptitude for shaping and trimming hats. They plod on, and win at last.
Then there is the girl whose parents wish her to open a millinery
establishment in their town. She tries, but finally agrees with her
long-suffering instructor that she would succeed at mattress-making and
upholstering instead.
The work in the Mattress Division begins with sheet, pillow-case,
table-linen, and comforter-making for the endless demands of the lodging
division of the boys and girls. Pulling shucks for the mattress is the
next step in advance, and when shucks are covered by the cotton layers
in the making, they prove an excellent substitute for the hair filling
of a more expensive manufacture, and they have an advantage in the
matter of cleanliness. Covering screen frames made in the Carpentry
Division for the numerous rooms, caning couches, rockers, and stools,
help add to the variety of work in the division. The girl is not
awarded her certificate until she has completed the round of work,
including the fashioning of a bedroom suite from barrels finally covered
with neat-figured denim. The semiweekly theory classes are not unlike
those of the plain-sewing division, and the girl is as proud of her
achievement with needle, hammer, and saw as if she were an adept in
lighter work.
When the machinery was introduced for Broom-making, the girls looked
askance at the appliances. But when the broom-corn was delivered from
the farm, and the pioneer girl broom-maker began threshing of the seed
in the cleaner, an interest was evinced that has increased with the
knowledge that the work, study, or manufacture (call it what you will)
is very productive, especially in the confines of the girls'
broom-factory at Tuskegee Institute. The poultry-yard bought the seeds
threshed off the broom-stalks; the hundreds of old handles collected
cost nothing, and when the wiring, stitching, and clipping were finished
and the girl saw the first broom turned out, there was triumph in the
fact that the industry was the most inexpensive and still the most
productive of credit of all the girls' industries under the roof of
Dorothy Hall. The evolution from the flag-straw broom used in cabins of
the South to the ones now completed and labeled, creates the sensation
of the girl-world in the trades school. The wonders brought out in the
theory class in connection with broom-making were marvelous.
Broom-making has come to remain with our other girls' industries.
Work in the Laundry presents another aspect to the onlooker, and he
doubtless decides on the spur of the moment that all is drudgery here.
Girls are then assorting countless pieces received on Mondays from
students and teachers. They are placing the assorted articles in cages
in the basement. Two boys are filling three washers with bed-linen, and
in another apartment two girls are weighing and measuring materials to
make more soap to add to the boxes standing in the soap-room. Girls
up-stairs in the wash-room are busy rubbing at the tubs. Some girls are
starching, and others are sending baskets down on the elevator for girls
below to hang in the drying-room. Others are in the assorting-room
putting away clothes-bags into numerous boxes. The ironing-room farther
on is filled with busy workers. Days come during every week when time is
spent in the study of laundry chemistry. Rust and mildew stains and
scorching are some of the problems of the Laundry, and they find
solution. Soap, starch, water, and bluing have their composite qualities
and are analyzed, and no more interesting correlation is there than that
of the laundry with the class-room.
Although each Tuskegee girl is expected to become proficient in one
trade at least, all are required to attend the cooking classes. Girls
belonging to certain classes are scattered in the various divisions,
each busily engaged at her chosen trade. At the ringing of the bells in
each division at stated hours, classes form and pass to the
training-kitchen for their lesson in cooking. Both night-school and
day-school girls report every day until every girl has received her
lesson weekly. The normal classes have theory and practise one hour
each, the preparatory girls one hour weekly for their trades.
This is true also of girls in the normal classes. They spend one hour in
basketry study, making in all three hours away from their individual
trades each week. Theory is combined with practise, and many a fanciful
thought is woven in with the reed and raffia of the Indian baskets,
African purses, belts, and pine-needle work-baskets. The shuck hats and
foot-mats are so foreign in design that one often wonders how it were
possible to utilize the same material in so widely different purposes.
But our girl is progressive, and not a few instances have occurred when
one has been informed of the presence of a Tuskegee student in a remote
country district, by the inevitable shuck hat prettily designed and worn
by an utter stranger. So remunerative has been the work that many have
earned money enough from the sales of these hats to purchase books for
the school year and pay their entrance fees.
Few girls work at typesetting. Those learning the trade are in the Boys'
Trades Building. The same is true of the girl tailors, who are as
capable workers in the trade as the boys. The majority of these girls
are in night-school, and of late years have not earned much for their
work. In former years the greater body of the students were working
their way through school, and by their labor would earn enough to
complete their education in the Academic Department and the Industrial
as well. Last year the pay schedule was reduced, and many appeals for
assistance came from those battling their way through. A young girl
whose monthly statement warned her that she owed the school $15, at the
end of the school year wrote the following:
"DEAR MRS. WASHINGTON: I write to inform you of the enormous sum
that I owe on my board bill. I am not satisfied, because I want to
earn something in life, but it seems that means and opportunity
will not permit me. I can't help from crying when I think how
anxious and willing my people are to help me to be something, and
yet they are unable to help me.
"My mother has struggled to bring up eight of us, and now is to the
point where she can give me no more help, and that leaves me alone
to be something by myself. I am anxious to enter day-school so I
may finish my course of study and my trade, and at last let my
mother see me a good, noble woman, who will take care of her.
"I will thank you very much for your kindness, if you will look
into my board bill and help me as soon, and as much, as possible.
Yours gratefully."
As the day girls have put in so many hours of work recently under the
new system, it eliminates the necessity of so many night-school girls
being paid for their work. It is to the interest of the school and its
day-students that fewer work their way through school, and the time has
come to teach this fact. The boy or girl for a time will stagger in the
attempt to gain education, but will be all the more able, later, to
reach the desired goal.
All girls are taught housekeeping incidentally in the care of their
rooms; but the number assigned to the regular division yearly are
instructed in all branches of home industry. The course covering two
years is mapped out thoroughly, and when the girls reach the Senior
class, all have their turn at housekeeping in the Practise Cottage of
four rooms. No girl is graduated from the school without the finishing
touch of the little home. Marketing, the planning of meals,
table-setting, the care of table- and bed-linen, dusting, sweeping, and
everything else pertaining to a well-kept house, are taught by the
teacher in domestic science who is in charge of the training-kitchen
where the senior girls received their first lessons in cookery. The
young housekeepers have reached the stage of efficiency when they may
prepare a meal for a distinguished guest.
A red-letter day in the history of the cottage came when a warm-hearted
and much-beloved trustee of the institution expressed a wish to dine
with the girls during one of his visits to the institution. The flowers
that graced the small table on this day were brought by the
distinguished visitor, who came from a stroll in the "piney" woods. The
girls, apprehensive of their success in preparing the dinner for one
with so cultured a palate, felt visibly relieved on the disappearance of
the roast, the vegetables, and the dessert. The corn bread was voted the
best ever eaten, and the dinner, as a whole, a delicious preparation. If
ever, in the years to come, any of the four forgets the kindly heart
that made all forget station or condition, "the right hand will forget
its cunning."
Days pass all too quickly in work and study. After the supper at six,
the girls in the normal classes go to their rooms or the Carnegie
Library for study, the girls in the preparatory classes go to the
study-hour, and those who have been working at the trades during the day
spend two hours in night-school covering half as much ground as those in
day-school, and consequently spend a longer period in school. At the
ringing of the bell at half past eight all the girls form in line to
pass to the Chapel for prayers.
School and work over for the day, every girl seems to lose her
personality in her blue braided uniform, with her red tie and turnover
on week-day evenings at Chapel, and her white ribbon on Sundays when she
passes the platform as she marches by out of the Chapel to her room. Her
carriage at least identifies her class-standing, and one may easily
note the difference in the manner of her who has newly arrived and
another who has been in school with the advantages of several years.
Friday afternoons mark an hour for lectures, girls' clubs, and circle
entertainments. Saturday evenings are spent optionally. Time for class
gymnastics or sewing or swimming is always spent pleasantly on schedule
time during the week. Our girl attends the Christian Endeavor Sunday
mornings at nine, Chapel at eleven, Sunday-school at one, and, after
dinner is out of the way, spends the enforced quiet hour in her room
from three until four o'clock reading. The band concert on the lawn
calls all to listen, some walking, some sitting on the seats on the
green, but all presenting a picturesque appearance in the blue skirts
and white waists of the spring season.
Thus the days and weeks pass, mingled with the sorrows and joys of
school-life, its encouragements and disappointments. The months and
seasons come and go, and, before one is scarcely aware of the fact, the
Commencement Week is here and the hundreds of young people whose lives
have come in touch with one another pass on to their homes. Some go out
as helpful workers, giving useful service to others; many will return
to complete the course begun, but all, we hope, will give out the light
that will not fail. Some are workers with ten talents, some with five,
some with one; but all, we trust, will be using them for the upbuilding
of the kingdom here on earth.
V
HAMPTON INSTITUTE'S RELATION TO TUSKEGEE
BY ROBERT R. MOTON
In his eloquent address in May, 1903, at the memorial services of
General Samuel Chapman Armstrong, Founder, and for twenty-five years
Principal, of Hampton Institute, Dr. Booker T. Washington said: "A few
nights ago, while I was driving through the woods in Alabama, I
discerned in the distance a large, bright fire. Driving to it, I soon
found out that by the glow of this fire several busy hands were building
a nice frame cottage, to replace a log cabin that had been the abode of
the family for a quarter of a century. That fire was lighted by General
Armstrong years ago. What does it matter that it was twenty-five years
passing through Hampton to Tuskegee and through the Tuskegee Conference
to that lonely spot in those lonely woods! It was doing its work very
effectually all the same, and will continue to do it through the years
to come."
The relations existing between Tuskegee Institute and Hampton Institute
are much like those existing between a son and the father who has
watched the growth and development of his child through the formative
transition periods of his youth, and looks with pride upon him as he
stands forth in the full bloom of manhood, enumerating successes already
achieved, with large promise of greater and more far-reaching
achievements for the immediate future. The child never reaches the point
where he does not seek the approval and blessing of the parent, or where
he refuses to accept advice and assistance if needed.
In the early days of Tuskegee Mr. Washington turned naturally and
properly to Hampton for anything that was needed, as he so beautifully
and repeatedly testifies in his autobiography, Up from Slavery. For a
long time the men and women who helped him were from Hampton, more than
fifty such having been there.
While there is a large number of Hampton graduates in the Industrial
Departments of Tuskegee, the teaching force, especially in the Academic
Department, represents a dozen or more of the best colleges and
universities in this country. The same may be said of Hampton.
Up to about eight or ten years ago we at Hampton spoke of Tuskegee as a
small Hampton, but "small" no longer describes Tuskegee, and I doubt
seriously if _large Hampton_ would be altogether proper.
While Tuskegee was founded on the Hampton plan, and has consistently
followed that plan as far as possible, and while these two great
"Industrial Universities" are very much alike in spirit and purpose,
they are, on the other hand, very dissimilar in external appearance as
well as in internal conduct. Each sends out into the benighted districts
of the South, and Hampton also into the Indian country of the West,
hundreds of men and women who are living influences of civilization and
Christianity in their deepest and most far-reaching sense, adding much
to the solution of the perplexing questions with which the nation has to
deal.
The conditions surrounding the two schools have necessitated certain
differences in their evolution. The personnel of the two institutions is
different. Hampton has always been governed and controlled by white
people, and its teachers have come from the best families of the North.
Tuskegee was founded by a Negro, and its teachers and officers have come
from the best types of the American Negro and from the best schools
opened to them. Hampton deals with a different class of student
material, including the Indian, who is almost as different in traits and
characteristics from the Negro as he is in feature and origin. These
are, in a sense, external differences which must of necessity affect the
character and internal machinery of the two institutions.
This is no reflection upon either school, for each is unique and
complete in its way, and any marked ethnic change in the management of
either would be unfortunate. Hampton is a magnificent illustration of
Anglo-Saxon ideas in modern education. Tuskegee, on the other hand, is
the best demonstration of Negro achievement along distinctly altruistic
lines. In its successful work for the elevation and civilization of the
children of the freedmen, it is also the most convincing evidence of the
Negroes' ability to work together with mutual regard and mutual
helpfulness. When Tuskegee was started there was a serious question as
to whether Negroes could in any large measure combine for business or
educational purposes. The only cooperative institutions that had been
successful among them were the Church and, perhaps, the secret
societies.
In material development, in the rapid and steadily improving accession
of student material, in enlarging powers for greater usefulness, in
influence upon the educational methods of the country and the civilized
world, and in the sympathy and respect it has gained for the Negro
through the writings and speeches of its Founder and Principal, the
Tuskegee Institute has without doubt passed beyond the expectations of
those who were most sanguine about its future.
The Tuskegee torch, from the Hampton fire started so many years ago by
General Armstrong, has spread and is spreading light to thousands of
homes and communities throughout the South, and is the greatest pride
and glory of Hampton Institute, and a constant source of inspiration and
encouragement to the devoted men and women who have always made
Hampton's work possible.
At the conclusion of an address in a Northern city in the interest of
Hampton, in which I had quoted Dr. Curry's saying that, "if Hampton had
done nothing more than to give us Booker Washington, its history would
be immortality," a New England lady of apparently good circumstances and
well informed, in the kindness of her heart, took me to task for
distorting my facts in saying that Tuskegee had grown out of Hampton.
She was sure that it was just the other way--that Hampton was an
offshoot of Tuskegee. She certainly could not have paid a higher tribute
to Hampton, and likewise to Tuskegee.
For the past few years Mr. Washington's deserved popularity and
prominence have brought Tuskegee conspicuously and constantly before the
public. This has in no sense been a disadvantage to Hampton, but has
been a distinct gain in enabling Hampton to point to the foremost man of
the Negro race, and to the largest and most interesting and in many ways
the best-managed institution of the race, as the best and most
conspicuous product of the peculiar kind of education for which Hampton
stands.
While Tuskegee is, perhaps, in many respects, better known than Hampton,
its antecedent, Hampton, is without doubt much better known and more
highly thought of because of the existence of Tuskegee.
Tuskegee in its present state of development would be one of the marvels
of the age, even if the personality of its Principal were left out of
consideration.
Two thousand Negroes who are scarcely a generation removed from
bondage, being trained, disciplined, controlled by 200 or more of the
same racial type; 2,000 Negroes being educated, morally, industrially,
intellectually; an industrial university with 100 large buildings well
equipped and beautifully laid-off grounds, with a hum and bustle of
industry, scientifically and practically conducted by a race considered
as representing the lowest ethnic type, upsetting the theories of many
well-meaning people who believe the Negroes incapable of maintaining
themselves in this civilization, incapable of uniting in any successful
endeavor without being under the direct personal control of the dominant
Aryan--this is one of the greatest achievements of the race during its
years of freedom.
Hampton, though a dozen years older, the pioneer in industrial
education, equally well equipped, quite as well conducted, doing as
great a work in the elevation of the races it represents, and holding
just as important a place in the scheme of modern education, is not so
interesting or so wonderful, because its conception and execution are
the product of Aryan thought and Aryan ingenuity. New ideas, new
discoveries, new inventions and organizations, new methods and new
institutions, have been conspicuous among the white race for a thousand
years. General Armstrong's wisdom and foresight were truly wonderful, as
indeed are also those of his worthy successor, Dr. H. B. Frissell, under
whose direction the school's influence and usefulness have steadily
increased, and along lines that General Armstrong would approve; but had
Hampton been founded and brought to its present state of proficiency by
a Negro, and its dominating force been of the African race, it would be
a more wonderful and interesting institution. In other words, the white
race has long since passed its experimental period. It now is the
standard of measurement for all other races. The Negro's achievements,
then, are considered largely with reference to the impression which they
make upon the race of whose civilization and government he is a part.
[Illustration: THE EXECUTIVE COUNCIL.]
Tuskegee, therefore, stands out more prominently than Hampton as an
exponent of industrial education, and has been more severely questioned
because of the imagined disloyalty in a Negro's aggressive attitude for
this particular kind of education for his race. There are people of both
races who, while they do not on the whole oppose Hampton and Tuskegee in
their educational methods, are honestly afraid that, because of the
growing importance and influence of these two schools and others of a
similar kind, the idea will be thoroughly established that the Negro
needs only and is capable only of the narrowest sort of industrial
training--such as is represented by the "rule-of-thumb carpenter" and
the "one-suspender mule-driver," who work by rule and rote rather than
by principle and method, not in the slightest degree comprehending the
science underlying the work in which they are engaged, whose
mathematical knowledge is bounded by "the distance between two corn or
cotton rows."
To fix such an idea in the minds of the people of this country--which is
not likely to be done--would, no doubt, be disastrous to us for
generations to come, and make it much more easy than it is now to
deprive the Negro of the civil and political rights which are guaranteed
by the Constitution. It would, without question, defeat the objects for
which Hampton and Tuskegee have persistently stood, and for which they
have ever worked and are still very successfully working.
No one familiar with the curricula of these two schools would for a
moment raise such a question. General Armstrong saw, as few people did,
the moral and intellectual value of industrial training aside from its
merely economic importance. He founded a school on an entirely different
basis from any that had been known before--the basis of
character-building through practical education, industrial training, and
self-help.
During the thirty-six years of its history, Hampton has sent into the
world about 1,200 graduates and 5,000 undergraduates, many of whom have
taken with them the spark that has started many other Hamptons, large
and small, among the Negroes of the South and the Indians of the West.
Hampton's success, and indeed the success of any institution, depends
not so much upon the scholastic attainments of its pupils as upon the
work that those who have received its instruction accomplish. Hampton
glories, and justly, in the loyalty of its graduates and in the
faithfulness with which they have inculcated and exemplified the
traditions and principles for which it stands. Hampton glories in
Tuskegee, because Tuskegee has started in so many communities the spark
of true life and real civilization; in the impetus and inspiration it
has given, so beautiful and so perfect a consummation of the prophetic
vision of Hampton's founder.
Can the relations between the two institutions be better stated than in
the words of their two founders? After a visit to Tuskegee, General
Armstrong said: "The Tuskegee school is a wonderful work and Mr.
Washington is a remarkable man. He has carried out the idea of training
the head, hand, and heart in a wonderfully complete and perfect way.
This school is very much like the one at Hampton, and any one can
recognize the similarity, but he has made many improvements. It is not
merely an imitation. It is the Hampton Idea adapted and worked into a
most sensible and efficient application to the needs of the Alabama
Negroes." In the same memorial address at General Armstrong's funeral
from which I quoted at the beginning of this paper, Mr. Washington said,
"The rose I place on his grave is _his_ work at Tuskegee."
Hampton and Tuskegee, striving along common lines for common ends,
intimate in relationship, interdependent, each frankly criticizing and
freely advising, each profiting by the failures of the other, each
benefiting by the successes of the other, are both working as best they
may toward that "far-off divine event to which the whole creation
moves."
_PART II_
_AUTOBIOGRAPHIES BY GRADUATES OF THE SCHOOL_
I
A COLLEGE PRESIDENT'S STORY
BY ISAAC FISHER
I was born January 18, 1877, on a plantation called Perry's place, in
East Carroll Parish, Louisiana, and was the sixteenth and last child of
my parents. My early childhood was uneventful, save during the year
1882, when, by reason of the breaking of the Mississippi River levee
near my home, I was compelled, together with my parents, to live six
months in the plantation cotton-gin, fed by the Federal Government and
by the determination never to live so close to the "Big Muddy" again;
and during 1886, in which year my mother died.
Up to this latter year my life had been nothing more than that of the
average Negro boy on a cotton-farm. While I had been too young to feel
the burden of farm-life toil, I had not been spared a realization of the
narrowness and the dwarfing tendencies of the lives which the Negro
farmers and their families were living, and, in my heart, I cursed the
farm and all its environs as being in verity an inferno on earth. A
broader knowledge of the causes which operated to produce the cheerless
life against which my child-nature rebelled, and a clearer insight into
the possibilities of rural life, have altered this early impression; and
to-day I find myself thinking some thoughts relative to the life lived
near to nature's heart which are not at all complimentary to the bustle
and selfishness of city life.
The death of my mother furnished the opportunity to leave the farm and
go to a city; and I took advantage of this, going to Vicksburg, Miss.,
to live with an older sister. I had always desired to go to school, and
had spent four terms of six months each in the country school near my
home; but for some reason, which I can not now remember, I attended the
city school in Vicksburg but one year, after which I was employed as a
cake-baker's assistant and bread-wagon driver. A short time before this
I was a house-boy in the city. I was, at the time of my employment in
the bakery, an omnivorous reader of the newspapers, and, in fact, of all
kinds of literature; but my hours of labor at both places were so long
and incessant that I found it almost impossible to do any reading during
my employment at either place.
Finally I saw and took advantage of an opportunity to secure employment
with the drug firm of W. H. Jones & Brother; and I count my work in this
store, and with these gentlemen as employers, as the turning-point in my
life, because there my work demanded some intelligence above the
average. I had some chance to study, and in addition, when it was found
by these white men that I loved to read, all magazines, newspapers, and
drug journals, not needed by the firm and the physicians whose offices
were with them, were given to me. I never make any mention of my life in
Vicksburg without mentioning, in particular, Mr. W. H. Jones; for not
only was he a kind and considerate employer, but I learned from his
actions that a white man could be kind and interested in a Negro--a fact
which no amount of reasoning could have driven into my stubborn
understanding previous to that time.
There came a time when I learned that at the Tuskegee Institute, in
Alabama, any poor Negro boy who was willing to work could pay for all
his education in labor. To hear was to act. I wrote to Mr. Washington,
asking if my information was correct. The affirmative answer came at
once. It was the middle of August, and school began in September, but I
determined to be present at the opening of the school year. I was then a
boy wearing short trousers, but I immediately set about preparing to
deliver a "lecture" to help raise funds for my trip. With a knowledge of
the subject, and an assurance which I have never since assumed, I spoke
to a large audience in Vicksburg on the question, Will America Absorb
the Negro? I settled the question then and there to my own satisfaction,
even if I did not convince the nation that my affirmative conclusion was
rational. The "lecture" netted me my fare to Tuskegee, with a few
dollars over, and brought me from Rev. O. P. Ross, pastor of the African
Methodist Episcopal Church in Vicksburg, the offer of a scholarship at
Wilberforce College at the expense of his church. I respectfully
declined the offer, feeling that I did not want to bind myself to any
particular denomination by accepting so great a gift; but I have always
felt very kindly toward that church ever since.
My first glimpse of Mr. Washington was had in the depot in Montgomery,
Ala., where a friend and I, on our way to Tuskegee, had changed cars for
the Tuskegee train. Two gentlemen came into the waiting-room where we
were seated, one a man of splendid appearance and address, the other a
most ordinary appearing individual, we thought. The latter, addressing
us, inquired our destination. Upon being told that we were going to
Tuskegee, he remarked that he had heard that Tuskegee was a very hard
place--a place where students were given too much work to do, and where
the food was very simple and coarse. He was afraid we would not stay
there three months. We assured him that we were not afraid of hard work,
and meant to finish the course of study at Tuskegee at all hazards. He
then left us. Very soon after, the gentleman who had so favorably
impressed us, and whom we afterward found to be the capable treasurer of
the Tuskegee Institute, Mr. Warren Logan, came back and told us that our
interlocutor was none other than the President of the school to which we
were going.
Arriving at Tuskegee, I found what it meant to be in a school without a
penny, without assurance of help from the outside, and wholly dependent
upon one's own resources and labor; and I found further that in the
severe, trying process through which Mr. John H. Washington,
superintendent of industries, brother of Mr. Booker T. Washington, and
familiarly though very respectfully known to the students as "old man
John," put all students who offered to work for their education, only
the fittest, and the fittest of the fit at that, survived.
I was assigned work with the resident physician, a very efficient woman
doctor from Philadelphia; and I have a recollection, by no means dim,
that when this good woman made her monthly report to the treasurer, she
could write, "Health Department to Isaac Fisher, Dr., $12.50--value
received." Every morning before breakfast it was my duty to go to the
rooms of six hundred young men to see if any were ill, have those who
were, carried to the hospital, report all such to four departments, take
meals to those confined in the hospital, attend to all their wants, keep
their building heated and supplied with fuel, and-- But space will not
permit the full catalogue of duties. At the end of such a day's work I
would attend the night-school during its session of two hours.
Desiring to learn a trade, I asked permission to enter the
printing-office for the next year. This was not granted until it was
found that I would not leave the school during the summer, but would
remain and work until the beginning of the next school year.
Accordingly, when my second year began I entered the printing-office as
an apprentice. During that year I suffered actual want and privation in
the matter of shoes and clothes; but later came under the notice of Mrs.
Booker T. Washington, who made arrangements by which I could procure
some of the second-hand clothes and shoes sent from the North to the
school for just such cases. At the end of this year my health, as a
result of my work in the office, was so poor that the resident physician
recommended my removal therefrom. To the surprise of Mr. J. H.
Washington, I asked to be transferred to the farm; and I think I proved
while working on the school-farm that I was sincere when I said that I
would work wherever I was placed.
It was during this summer that Mr. Booker T. Washington showed me that I
had come favorably under his notice. At one of the weekly
prayer-meetings, conducted by the chaplain, Mr. Penney, and at which Mr.
Washington was present, I made some remarks relative to the agnosticism
of the late Col. Robert G. Ingersoll. The following day Mr. Washington
sent for me, inquired my age and class in the school, and then said some
very kind things about the talk which I had made in the prayer-meeting,
and made me a conditional promise of his friendship, which, despite my
oft-proven unworthiness, he has ever since given me in unstinted
measure. After that second year my hardships as a "work-student" were
practically over.
In my third year I entered the day-school, working one day in every week
and every other Saturday, and going to school the remainder of the time.
While the school made compulsory the earning of some money on the part
of all students, it set no maximum limit on the amounts to be earned. I
elected to earn as much as I could under the circumstances, earning, by
reason of the many odd jobs which I did, often as much as $20 per month,
going to school every day in the meantime. The average amount usually
earned is $5 and $6 per month. At one time I worked eight days per month
on the farm, sent notes of the school to 127 Negro newspapers, cleaned
one laboratory every day, played in both the brass band and the
orchestra, blew the bugle for the battalion, and taught two classes in
the night-school, for each of which duties I received pay; and even
though I broke down under the accumulated strain soon after my
graduation, I carried my point and completed the course of study as I
had planned.
[Illustration: THE CARNEGIE LIBRARY BUILDING.]
In my fourth year I won the Trinity Church (Boston) Prize of $25 for
oratory; and in my senior year won the Loughridge Book Prize for
scholarship, and also the valedictory of my class, graduating in 1898.
I was immediately sent to the Schofield School, a Quaker institution for
Negroes in Aiken, S. C., to organize farmers' conferences on the order
of those conducted by the Tuskegee Institute, and to serve as a teacher
in the school. After one year's service in that position Mr. Washington
asked me to accept the position of Assistant Northern Financial Agent
for Tuskegee. I accepted, and remained two years in New England, helping
to interest friends in my _alma mater_. At my own request I was
transferred from the Northern work to the South, being assigned this
time to the Negro Conference work in Alabama. Before beginning this work
I was married to a Tuskegee girl, Miss Sallie McCann.
Within a few months a principal was needed for the Swayne Public School
of Montgomery, Ala., and this in the middle of the school year. Mr.
Washington recommended me for the work, and I was elected to the
position. At the close of the term I went to New York to study the
public-school system of that city as far as possible. While there I was
reelected principal of the Swayne School, and a notice of the election
reached me one morning. Three hours later I received a letter from the
secretary of the University of Arkansas (white) informing me that my
name had been presented to the board of trustees of that institution,
and I had been elected to the presidency of the State Branch Normal
College at Pine Bluff, Ark. I was not a candidate for the position, but
seeing in it an opportunity for greater usefulness, I accepted the
position in my twenty-fifth year, and have just been reelected to serve
a third term as president of the school. The Branch Normal College was
established in 1875 as one of the Land Grant colleges, and has a
property valuation of $100,000.
Over my desk hangs a picture of the Principal of Tuskegee; and in my
desk are views of the institution which he has built. But these may be
removed. In the book of my memory and in the secret chambers of my heart
I have enshrined the two names which, with God and the parents now on
the other side of the Great Divide, have shaped and given direction to
my whole life--Tuskegee and Booker T. Washington.
II
A SCHOOL PRINCIPAL'S STORY
BY WILLIAM H. HOLTZCLAW
I was born in Randolph County, Ala., near the little town of Roanoke.
The house in which I first saw the light--or that part of it which
streamed through the cracks, for there were no windows--was a little log
cabin 12 by 16 feet. I know very little of my ancestry, except that my
mother was the daughter of her mother's master, born in the days of
slavery, and up to 1864 herself the slave of her half-brother. She was
born in the State of Georgia. My father was born in Elmore County, Ala.
He never knew his father, but remembered his mother and eleven brothers.
My mother was married twice before she married my father. She married
first at the age of fifteen. I am the fifth of fifteen children, and my
father's oldest child. Neither my father nor my mother could read or
write; mother could get a little out of some pages of the Bible by
spelling each word as she came to it.
My early years were spent on a farm. When only four years old I was put
to such work as I could do--such as riding a deaf and blind mule, while
my brother plowed him in order to make him go forward, for he cared
nothing for assault from the rear. We worked for a white man for
one-fourth of the crop. He furnished the stock, land, and seeds, and we
did the work, although he was supposed to help. He furnished money to
"run" us at fifteen to a hundred per cent, according to the time of the
year. He grew wealthier; we grew, if possible, poorer. Before I was
fifteen years old I instinctively felt the injustice of the scheme. When
the crop was divided he got three loads of corn to our one, and somehow
he always got all the cotton: never did a single bale come to us.
Those were hard times for us; for it must be remembered that this was in
the days of reconstruction and the Ku-Klux-Klan, and if to this be added
the fact that my father, a young and inexperienced man, had started out
with a family of six on his hands, some idea of the situation may be
had. I can recall having been without food many a day, and the pangs of
hunger drove me almost to desperation. But mother and father would come
late at night from a day of depressing toil and excruciating inward
pain, the result of their inability to relieve our suffering, and pacify
us for the night with such things as they had been able to get. When I
awoke the next morning they were gone again on a food mission.
Hunger would sometimes nearly drive us mad. My brother and I were given
a meal of pie-crusts from the white folks' table one day, and as we ate
them, Old Buck, the family dog, who resembled an emaciated panther,
stole one of the crusts. It was our dinner. We loved Old Buck, but we
had to live first; so my brother lit on him, and a battle royal took
place over that crust. Brother was losing ground, so I joined in, and,
coming up from the rear, we conquered and saved the crust, but not till
both of us were well scratched and bitten.
I was put to school at the age of six. Both mother and father were
determined that their children should be educated. School lasted two
months in the year--July and August. The schoolhouse was three miles
from our house, but we walked every day, my oldest sister carrying me
astride her neck when I gave out. Sometimes we had an ear of roasted
green corn in our basket for dinner, or a roasted sweet potato, but more
often simply persimmons, or fruit and nuts picked from our landlord's
orchard and from the forest.
When cotton began to open, in the latter part of August, the landlord
wanted us to stop school and pick cotton, and I can distinctly remember
how my mother used to outgeneral him by slipping me off to school
through the woods, following me through the swamps and dark places, with
her hand on my back, shoving me on till I was well on the way, and then
returning to try to do as much in the field that day as she and I
together would be expected to do. When the landlord came to the quarters
early to look for me, my mother would hide me behind the cook-pot and
other vessels. When I was a little older I had to play my part on the
farm. Mother now worked another scheme. I took turns with my brother at
school and at the plow. What he learned at school on his school-day was
taught to me at night, and vice versa. In this way we got a month of
schooling each during the year, and got the habit of home study.
Our family was increasing rapidly, and to keep the children even roughly
clothed and fed was about all that could be done under the
circumstances. When the school exhibition took place and every girl was
expected to have a white dress and every boy a pair of white
pantaloons, my mother was often put to her trumps to get these things.
Father would not trouble himself about them, as he said they were
useless. But the teacher said they were necessary, and his word was law
and gospel with most parents in our community. An exhibition was near at
hand and three of us had no white pantaloons. Mother manipulated every
scheme, but no cloth yet to make them! Finally the day arrived, but not
till mother solved the problem by getting up before dawn that morning
and making three pairs of white pantaloons for us out of her Sunday
petticoat. Mother was of a determined disposition, and seldom failed to
solve a domestic problem. We looked about as well as other people's
children in that exhibition--at least we thought we did, and that was
sufficient. But it must be remembered that there is just so much cloth,
and no more, in a petticoat. So our suits were necessarily made tight. I
had to be careful how I got around on the stage.
I usually had different teachers every year, as one teacher seldom cared
to stay at a place for more than a session. I well remember the
disadvantages of this custom. One teacher would have me in a Third
Reader and fractions, another in Fifth Reader and addition. When I
reached the point where the teacher ordered me to get a United States
History, the book-store did not have one, but sold me a biography of
Martin Luther instead, which I studied for some time, thinking that I
was learning something about the United States. I did not know what the
United States was or was like, although I had studied geography and knew
something about South America and Africa; and my teacher did not tell
me. My teacher at this time was a good man, but that was all. Many of my
teachers knew very little, but I thought they knew everything, and that
was sufficient, for their teaching was wholesome. I remember one or two,
however, whose work, under the circumstances, would be hard to match
even now.
As soon as I was old enough I was hired out for wages, to help support
the family. My school opportunities were now almost gone, and for this
reason, together with a desire for more excitement, I began to grow
restless on the farm. I grew morose. I pulled myself loose from all
public functions, ceased to attend any public meetings, save regular
monthly church meetings, and betook me to the woods, where I read
everything I could get. It was during this time that accidentally, I
may say providentially, I got hold of a book containing the life of
Ignacius Sancho; and I have never read anything that has given me more
inspiration. I wish every Negro boy in the land might read it. I read
and worked, and helped to support the family. I had vowed that as soon
as I was twenty-one I would leave for some school and there stay until I
was educated. I was already a little in advance of the young people in
my community, so I spent my long winter evenings teaching a little
night-school to which the young people of the neighborhood came.
All my life up to this time my father had been working as a tenant. He
now determined to strike out for himself--buy stock and rent land. The
mule he bought soon became hopelessly lame in the back. It was a
peculiar sort of illness. Once upon his feet, he could work all day
without difficulty, but when he lay down at night he had to be helped up
the following morning. During that entire season the first thing I heard
each morning was the voice of my father, "Children, children, get up!
let's go and help up the old mule." A neighbor also was called in each
morning to help. Toward the end of the season the school opened. We were
so anxious to enter, that we determined to help the old mule. My
brother and I hitched ourselves to the plow, and sister did the plowing.
Early each morning we plowed in this way, and soon finished the crop and
entered the little school.
My father and some others had built a little school out of pine poles
which they had cut, and hauled to the spot on their shoulders. The
teacher, a married man, easily won all his pupils, but I could never
forgive him for winning and finally eloping with his pretty assistant
teacher.
Christmas eve, 1889, I went to bed a boy. Just after breakfast the next
morning I became a man--my own man. "Sandy Claw" did not come that
night, although I had hung up my stocking, and I was feeling bad about
it. After breakfast my father called me out into the yard, where we
seated ourselves on the protruding roots of a large oak-tree, and there
he set me free.
"Son," said he, "you are nearing manhood, and you have no education;
besides, if you remain with me I will not be able to help you when you
are twenty-one. We've decided to make you free, if you'll make us one
promise--that you will educate yourself."
By that time my mother had joined the party. I cried, I know not why,
and my mother cried; even my father could not conceal his emotion. I
accepted the proposal immediately, and although we usually took
Christmas till New Year's day, my Christmas that year was then at an
end. Manhood had dawned upon me that morning. I tried to be calm, but
inwardly I was like a fish out of water.
I struck out to find work, that I might make money to go to school. One
mile across the forest brought me to a man who hired me, and promised me
$9.25 a month for nine months.
At the end of six months I came across the Tuskegee Student, published
at the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. I read every line in
it. On the first page was a note: "There is an opportunity for a limited
number of able-bodied young men to enter the Tuskegee Normal and
Industrial Institute and work their way through, provided application is
made at once. Booker T. Washington, Principal."
Work their way through! I had never heard of such a thing before.
Neither had I heard of Tuskegee. I sent in my application. I did not
know how to address a letter, and so only put "Booker T. Washington" on
the envelope. Somehow he received it and gave me permission to come.
There ensued a general scramble to get ready to go by the opening of
school. I broke off relations with my employer by compromising for a
suit of clothes and $8 in money. My chum, a man of about forty years of
age, seeing the struggle I was making to get off, offered to help me, or
rather to show me how to get the money easily by stealing a few chickens
and selling them. It was a tempting bait, but against all the previous
teachings of my mother. He argued, and my mother, who was not there,
also argued within me. I could not consent. My friend pitied me and
offered to do the job himself.
To get a supply of clothes to take to Tuskegee was the question. Up to
that time I had never worn an undershirt, or a pair of drawers, or a
stiff-bosom shirt, or a stiff collar. All these I had not only to get,
but had to learn to wear them. My shirts and collars were bought
second-hand from a white neighbor and were all too large by three
numbers.
The last day of September, 1890, I left for Tuskegee. When I reached
there, although I was a young man, I could not tell what county I lived
in, in answer to Mr. Washington's question. I was admitted, after some
hesitancy on the part of Principal Washington, and sent to the farm to
work for one year in the daytime and to attend school at night.
I was dazed at the splendor of Tuskegee. There was Armstrong Hall, the
most imposing brick structure I had ever seen. Then came Alabama Hall,
where the girls lived. How wonderful! I could hardly believe that I was
not dreaming, and I was almost afraid I should awake. When I went to bed
that night I got between two sheets--something I had not been accustomed
to do. About twelve o'clock an officer came in, threw the cover off me,
and asked some questions about nightshirts, comb and brush, and
tooth-brush, with all of which I was but meagerly acquainted. He made me
get up, pull off my socks, necktie, collar, and shirt, and told me I
would rest better without them. I didn't believe him, but I obeyed.
The next morning I saw more activity among Negroes than I had ever seen
before in my life. Not only was everybody at work, but every soul seemed
to be in earnest. I heard the ringing of the anvil, the click of
machinery, the music of the carpenters' hammers. Before my eyes was a
pair of big fat mules drawing a piece of new and improved farm
machinery, which literally gutted the earth as the mules moved. Here was
a herd of cattle, there a herd of swine; here thumped the mighty
steam-engine that propelled the machine which delivered up its many
thousand of brick daily; there was another machine, equally powerful,
turning out thousands of feet of pine lumber every day. Then there were
the class-rooms, with their dignified teachers and worthy-looking young
men and women. Amid it all moved that wonderful figure, Booker T.
Washington.
I began at once a new existence. I made a vow that I would educate
myself there, or I would die and be buried in the school cemetery. When
Mr. Washington stood at the altar in the first service which I attended
and uttered a fervent prayer asking for guidance, and for spiritual and
financial strength to carry on that great work, I felt that the Lord
would surely answer his prayer. Since then I have traveled practically
all over this country, and in one foreign country, without once seeing
anything that made so deep an impression on me.
[Illustration: MORNING AT THE BARNS ON THE SCHOOL FARM.
Teams of horses and cattle ready to start for the day's work.]
Simultaneously with this opportunity for self-education came many real
hardships--to say nothing of imaginary hardships--which nearly resulted
disastrously to my health. I was poorly clad for the extraordinary
winter then setting in. I had only one undershirt and one pair of
drawers. I could not, of course, put these articles in the laundry, and
therefore had to pull them off on Saturday nights, wash them, and get
them dry enough to wear by breakfast on Sunday morning. It followed that
many Sunday mornings found me sitting at the table wearing damp
underwear. I could do no better, without leaving school, and this I was
determined not to do. I was earnest in my work, and was promoted from a
common laborer to be a hostler in charge of all boys dealing with
horses, and then to the much-sought position of special assistant to the
farm manager.
I was beginning to see the mistakes of my former life, the time I had
lost, and now applied myself diligently. I carried a book with me
everywhere I went, and not a second of time would I lose. While driving
my mules with a load of wood, I would read until I reached the place of
unloading. Mr. Washington took note of this, and upon one occasion,
while admonishing the students to make good use of their time, said:
"There is a young man on the grounds who will be heard from some day
because of his intense application to study and diligence in his work."
I listened. I knew he was speaking of me, and the fact that I was to be
"heard from" later made me double my resolutions.
In September, 1891, I had to my credit in the treasury of the
institution $100, and I was now ready to enter the day-school, to
measure arms with the more fortunate students. But, alas! sickness
overtook me, and when I emerged from the hospital, after about two
months' sickness, my doctor's bill was exactly $100. My accumulated
credit went to pay it.
This was the penalty for making the transit from a lower to a higher
civilization. When I went without undergarments at home, my health was
saved because of uniformity of habit. Now it was injured because I could
wear them this week, but might not be able to do so the
next--irregularity of habit. Then, too, Tuskegee gave me such
living-rooms as I had never lived in, or hoped to. I had lived in log
houses, which are self-ventilating. Now I had either overventilated or
failed to ventilate my room. It is a difficult matter to make the
transit from a lower to a higher civilization. There are many obstacles,
and many have fallen by the way.
I went home to recuperate, but returned to Tuskegee in a few weeks, and
as I had no money I was again permitted to enter the night-school and
work during the day. This time I took up the printers' trade. Here I
broke over the conventional rule of acting "devil" six months, and began
setting type after one month in the office. In six months I was one of
the school's regular compositors; and in one term I had sufficient
credit with the treasurer to enter the day-school.
But I was not yet to enter. A letter came from my father, saying, "If
you wish to see me again alive, I think it would be well to come at
once." I went. My father died a few days after I got home, June 27,
1893.
All hope of future schooling seemed now at an end. My only concern was
to do the best I could with the exceedingly heavy load now left on my
hands. I pulled off my school-clothes, went to the field, and finished
the crop father had left. There was a heavy debt, and I began to teach
school to pay this debt. Of course I knew very little, but I taught what
I knew--and, I suppose, some things I didn't know.
I think even now that I did the people some good. I had not learned much
at Tuskegee in books, but I had learned much from Mr. Washington's
Sunday evening talks in the chapel. I had listened carefully to him and
had treasured up in my heart what he had said from time to time. Now I
was teaching it to others. I felt I was to this little community what
Mr. Washington was to Tuskegee. So I made the people whitewash their
fences and fix up their houses and premises generally. They were very
poor, and when the school closed they could not pay me. I told them I
would take corn, peas, potatoes, sirup, pork, shucks, cotton-seed--in
fact, anything with which they wished to pay me.
Wagons were secured and loaded, and for several days all sorts of
provisions were hauled to my mother's house and stored away for winter.
I went to the house of one good widow, who said:
"'Fesser, I ain't got nothin' to pay you wid but dis 'ere house-cat, and
he's a good'n. I owes you twenty-five cents, and I wants to pay it. You
done my little gal good--more'n any teacher ever did. She ain't stop'
washin' her face yit when she gits up in de mornin'."
"Very well," I said, "I'll take the cat with thanks and call the debt
square."
Another said: "'Fesser, I heard you was coming, and I hid all my meat
in de smoke-house, and says: 'I'll tell him I ain't got none;' but when
I seed you coming I tole de chillen to go open de smoke-house. Anybody
who do my chillens as much good as you, can get every bit de meat I
got." From that woman I got fifty pounds of meat.
Another good woman wanted me to take her only pair of scissors, and when
I refused to do so, she put them into my coat-pocket, saying the man who
taught her child so much must be paid.
For three years I taught school with one personal object in view--the
support of my mother and her family. Mother was not satisfied with this;
she wanted me educated. Finally she married again, for no higher reason
than to permit me, and the other children growing up, to go to school.
My hope for an education was again renewed, and I went back to Tuskegee.
Nearly everybody had forgotten that I had ever been there.
Notwithstanding I had been out nearly three terms, I had kept pace with
my class, making one class each year, the same as if I had been in
school. Upon a very critical examination, in which I averaged
ninety-three for all subjects, I entered the B Middle class in the
day-school.
Financially I was very little better off than when I left, but I had
learned how to manipulate things in such a way as to make it possible to
remain in school. I knew a trade at which I could easily make a dollar a
day in credit, and I could teach during the vacation. Things went
smoothly for one year. Then my brother came, and I had to support him in
part. Just about the time I was getting myself adjusted to this, my
sister came. I knew I should have to support her almost wholly, so I
felt like giving up under such a triple burden; but I held on. I had to
deny myself many of the pleasures of school life in order to make two
ends meet. I had to wear two pairs of pantaloons and one pair of
drawers; and I remember one Sunday, while the school was enjoying a good
sermon by a great bishop, I was in the shop melting some glue, with
which I glued patches on my only pair of pantaloons, which had reached a
condition where thread would no longer hold the patches on. I will not
tell what happened when the patches had been on for a few days.
But amid all these conflicting affairs of my school-days ran an immense
amount of pleasure, more than I had ever known before. I was gradually
coming to see things as they are in the affairs of men. I thought then,
and I still think, that no sacrifice was too great when there was such
a golden opportunity. To sit and listen to one Sunday evening talk by
Principal Washington was worth all the trouble one had to undergo for a
year.
Two years before I graduated I began to inquire what I was made
for--what calling should I follow? It was hard to decide. Mr.
Washington's teaching had impressed me that I should do something to
help those less fortunate than myself, and that in the very darkest
place I could find. My father had called me to his death-bed and said to
me: "Son, I want you to become a teacher of your people. I have done
what I could in that direction. The people need your services." I
recalled how in his last moments I had promised him I would carry out
his wishes. There was nothing else left for me to do but to go into
those dark places. But there was the rub; and every Sunday evening Mr.
Washington thundered that same theme: "Go into the darkest places, the
places where you are most needed, and there give your life with little
thought of self." I knew about those dark places. I had been born in one
of them. I had been spending my vacations teaching in them.
Once, while teaching in the State of Georgia, I boarded with a family
where there were fifteen besides myself, all sleeping, eating, and
cooking in the same room. There were three young women in the family.
When bedtime came I had to go out of doors and amuse myself with the
stars till all the women were in bed; then they would extinguish the
hearth-light by putting some ashes on it and let me come in and go to
bed. I had to keep my head under the cover the next morning while they
got up and dressed. I used to sleep with my nose near a crack in the
wall in order to get fresh air. One little girl in the family, while
saying her prayers one night, begged the Lord to let the angels come
down and stay with them that night. Her little brother promptly
interrupted her by saying that she ought to have sense enough to know
that there was no room in that bed for angels, as there were already
five persons in it. I was used to the country and its worst conditions.
I prayed over the matter till finally I gave myself, heart and mind, to
whatever place should call me.
During my last year at Tuskegee I was made a substitute salaried teacher
in the night-school. My financial burdens were now lifted and my school
life became one great pleasure. Toward the end of my Senior year I
decided to try for the Trinity Prize of $25 for the best original
oration. I remembered what Mr. Washington had so often said: that a man
usually gets out of a thing what he puts into it. I determined to put
$100 worth of effort into this contest. I was awarded the prize.
A place was offered to me at Tuskegee as academic teacher, but I
declined it. I had settled in my mind that I would go to the State of
Mississippi, which I had found by two years of investigation was the
place where my services were most needed. I could not go to Mississippi
at once. I had not money to pay my way, so I accepted a position with my
friend, William J. Edwards, at his school in Snow Hill, Ala., where I
worked for four years, never losing sight of my Mississippi object.
While at Snow Hill I married Miss Mary Ella Patterson, a Tuskegee
graduate of the Class of '95. We put our earnings together and built us
a comfortable little home. One child, William Sidney, was born to us,
but lived only six months.
It took me just two years to convince my wife that there was any wisdom
or judgment in leaving our little home and going to Mississippi, where
neither of us was known. But finally she gave herself, soul and body, to
my way of thinking.
The way was now clear for me to make the start. Just before I left for
Mississippi, one of my old teachers from Tuskegee visited me. He
inquired about my going to Mississippi, and when I explained the scheme
to him, he said jestingly, "You know there is no God in Mississippi." I
simply replied that then I would take "the one that Alabama had" with
me.
I could not take my wife, for she was under the care of a physician at
that time. I decided to leave nearly all my ready cash with her. I did
not take quite enough for my railroad fare, for I had expected to sell
my wife's bicycle when I reached Selma, the nearest town, and thus
secure enough money to finish my trip. But when I got to Selma the wheel
would not sell, so I boarded the train without money enough to reach
Utica, the place in Mississippi to which I was bound.
I had not got far into the State of Mississippi when my purse was empty.
I stopped off at a little town, late at night, where there were no
boarding-houses, and no one would admit me to a private house to sleep.
I wandered about until I came upon an old guano-house, and crawled into
this and slept until the break of day. Then I crawled out, pulled myself
together, jumped astride my bicycle, and made my way toward Utica,
through a wild and unfrequented part of Mississippi. But before I could
reach Utica my wheel broke down, whereupon I put it upon my shoulder,
rolled up my trousers, and continued the journey to Utica. I soon met a
young man who relieved me of my burden by trading me his brass watch for
the wheel and giving me $2 to boot.
I had previously got myself elected principal of the little county
school, which, if I could pass the State examination, would pay me a
little salary, which would be a great help to me while I worked up the
Industrial and Normal School which I had come to build. Much depended on
my ability to pass the examination. Tuskegee's reputation was at
stake--my own reputation was at stake; for, if I failed, the people
would certainly lose confidence in me, and make it impossible for me to
accomplish my purpose.
I was out of money, and this was the only way I could see to get any for
a long time. If I failed, my wife--who was still in Alabama, and who
believed in my ability to do anything--would perhaps lose respect for
me, and, most of all, the failure to pass the examination might upset
all my plans and blast all my hopes. I confess I went to that
examination with a sort of anxious determination. I did not, however,
find it half so difficult as I had expected. I soon succeeded in
obtaining the necessary license to teach in the public schools of the
State.
The little schoolhouse where the school had been heretofore was so much
out of repair that we could not risk having pupils under its roof. I had
hoped to open in the church, but the good deacons would not permit this.
So the few pupils who came the first day were gathered together under an
oak-tree, and there were taught. After some time a temporary cabin was
fixed up, and in this we taught the entire winter. The cabin was
practically no protection against the rain, and less against the winter
winds. The wind literally came through from all directions--from the
sides, ends, above, and beneath.
We soon had the floor stopped up with clay. This brought about another
disadvantage: when it began to rain through the roof, the water would
collect on the floor until it was two or three inches deep. Two young
women were helping me to teach. They often amused me by trying to
maintain their dignity and keep out of the water at the same time. They
would stand upon stools and fire questions at their pupils, who were
standing in the water below while answering them. On such days as this
I usually wore my overcoat and rubber shoes. I would then stand in the
water and teach with as much indifference as possible. We bored holes in
the floor to let the water out, but it usually came through the roof
faster than it could escape. There was much suffering at this time on
the part of both teachers and students, but it was all a joy and
pleasure to me, for I felt that I had found my life-work.
I was a stranger to the people, and they had very little confidence in
me. Some of them questioned my motives in every direction. At the first
meeting of the patrons for the purpose of raising money, seventy-five
cents were collected and were turned over to me to hold. In a couple of
days some one demanded that the collection be taken out of my hands. I
quietly turned it over to them. Then they got up a scramble as to which
one should hold it. They settled the quarrel by selecting a white man in
the town of Utica, in whom all of them had confidence. I then went out
canvassing and got $10, which I promptly turned over. Immediately they
wanted to turn it back to me to hold, together with what the white man
had. They never again questioned my sincerity.
My wife, who was still in Alabama, kept writing me to let her join me.
Explanations would do no good. She laid aside all the comforts of home
life and came to live in a hovel. We rented a little room, bought a
skillet and a frying-pan, a bed and two chairs, and set up housekeeping.
I did the cooking, for my wife was a city girl and did not know how to
cook on the open fireplace. We never contrasted our condition in
Mississippi with that in Alabama; we simply made the best of what we
had.
At first there was difficulty in securing land for a location, and many
of the patrons began to feel that nothing would be accomplished. To
offset this idea I purchased lumber for a building, had it put in the
churchyard, and cut up ready for framing. The enthusiasm had to be kept
up. Land was soon bought and the building started. Everybody felt now
that something was going to be done. At the end of the first year's work
I was able to make to the trustees a creditable report, from which the
following is taken:
As soon as we secured a cabin to teach in, the young people came in
great numbers. We soon had an attendance of 200. One teacher after
another was employed to assist, until seven teachers were daily at
work. After three months in our temporary quarters conditions were
very trying. There was no money to pay teachers or to meet the
grocery bills for teachers' board. The winter was well on, and the
structure in which we were located was little protection against
it. The rain easily came through the roof, and water was often two
inches deep on certain parts of the floor. Several teachers and
students were suffering with pneumonia or kindred disorders, as a
result of all this exposure. I confess that during this dark period
only a carefully planned system and much determination prevented
despair.
During all this time I was trying to secure the interest of the
people. I went from door to door, explaining our efforts; then I
made a tour of the churches; after riding or walking five or ten
miles at night I would return, and then teach the next day. After a
protracted struggle of this kind, and after visiting almost
everybody for many miles, I found that I had secured about $600.
This greatly relieved us. Forty acres of land were purchased, and a
part of the lumber for a good, comfortable building was put upon
the grounds. Some of our trustees in New York city and Boston now
came to our assistance, and with this, and contributions from a few
other friends, we were able to get through the year. Although it
was a great struggle, I found in it some pleasure. To know that
you were doing the work that the world needs, and must have done,
is a pleasure even under trying difficulties.
Starting last October without a cent, in the open air, we have
succeeded in establishing a regularly organized institution
incorporated under the laws of the State of Mississippi, with 225
students and seven teachers, and with property valued at $4,000.
Forty acres of good farm-land about a mile from town have been
secured. A model crop is now growing on this farm. We have erected
a building--a two-story frame--at a cost of something over $2,000.
I hope you will not get, from what I have said, an idea that I am
measuring the success of my efforts by material advancement. I am
not. There are forces which our labors have set to work here, the
results of which can not be measured in facts and figures. One year
ago religious services were held once a month, at which time the
day was spent in singing, praying, and shouting. The way some of
the people lived for the next twenty-nine days would shock a
sensitive individual to read about it. Young people would gamble
with the dice, etc., in a most despicable way, within a short
distance of the church, during services; others would discharge
revolvers at the church door during services; ignorance,
superstition, vice, and immorality were everywhere present,
notwithstanding the handful of determined Christian men and women
who were trying to overcome these evil tendencies. I do not
maintain that these evils have been crushed out. They have not. But
what I do maintain is that the general current has been checked.
The revolution is on; and if we continue the work here, as we
surely will, these evil tendencies will soon be crushed out.
During this year the people themselves furnished $1,000 toward the
support of the school. They have never before spent a tenth as much for
education. The second year eleven teachers were employed and 400
students were admitted. The cost of operations was $10,000, all of which
was raised during the year. We are now entering into our third term.
Fifteen teachers have been employed, and the expenses of operation will
be about $15,000, all of which I must raise by direct effort. Our
property, all deeded to a board of trustees, is valued at $10,000.
I can not feel that I have accomplished much here in Mississippi,
because I see all around me so much to be done--so much that I can not
touch because of lack of means. But, being in the work to stay, I may,
in the end, contribute my share to the betterment of man. If I have
suffered much to build up this work, I can not feel that it is a
sacrifice. It is a colossal opportunity. The greater the sacrifice, the
more extensive the opportunity. Whatever may have been accomplished
already is certainly due more to my wife's superior judgment than to my
own activity. Whatever I have been able to do myself here in Mississippi
for my people has been due, first, to the teachings of my mother, and,
second, to the all-important life-example and matchless teachings of
Booker T. Washington.
III
A LAWYER'S STORY
BY GEORGE W. LOVEJOY
I can give no accurate date as to my birth, as my mother was a slave and
thus it was not recorded, but I think I was born in the month of
February, 1859. I was born in Coosa, one of the middle counties of
Alabama.
I am the third child and the second son of eleven children, seven of
whom are still living.
My father I do not remember, as he died when I was very young, but I
most vividly remember my stepfather, the only father I ever knew.
Childhood to me was not that long season of "painless play" of which
Whittier so beautifully sings, but I do remember that I was early
impressed that my feet must have been made for the express purpose of
treading "the mills of toil." When seven years of age my stepfather put
a hoe in my little hands and bade me go and help my mother weed the
cotton-patch, and from that day to the present time I have been
constant in my application to some form of labor.
When my mind reverts to that early period of my life I become my own
photographer and get various pictures of myself, either as picking,
hoeing, or planting cotton, of pulling fodder or splitting rails, for
these were the things I did from childhood to manhood.
My stepfather had been the foreman, or "driver," for his master when he
was a slave, and I am persuaded to believe that he must have been an
excellent one, for I can not remember in all my life when a day's work
had been so full, so complete, so well done, that he would not press for
a little more the next day.
Mortgaging of crops was then in vogue, as it is to-day, and my mind
revolts when I think of how my young life and the lives of my mother,
sisters, and brothers were burdened with the constant grind of trying to
eke out a living and, if possible, get even a little ahead.
Some years, when conditions had been favorable, we were able to clear
ourselves of debt and begin anew. But, seemingly, this prosperity was
not for us, for these years of plenty were almost invariably followed by
one or two less fruitful ones that came and "swallowed up the whole,"
leaving us as forlorn and as wretchedly poor as we were before. This
failure of the crops because of drouths unduly long, wet seasons, the
ravages of worms, caterpillars, and other uncontrollable circumstances,
not only meant that the whole of that year's labor was to bring no
tangible rewards, but that much property accumulated in more prosperous
times was to be dissipated as well. I can recall repeated instances when
all of my stepfather's live stock was taken for debt under this crushing
system. And thus it was that my stepfather, and my mother, and the rest
of the farmers for miles around existed!
During all these years my brothers, sisters, and myself were growing up
in ignorance. Until I was ten years old I had never heard of a school
for colored children. Even after the privilege of attending school two
months of the year--July and August--had been accorded me, I am certain
that the instruction received was of that kind that hinders more than it
helps. Year after year the course of study would be repeated. Perhaps
this repetition was necessary for more than one reason:
First, ten months' vacation does not tend to firmly impress upon one's
mind the knowledge acquired in two.
Second, the teachers themselves had such limited knowledge that two
months were ample time in which to exhaust their store of knowledge,
and, as examinations were so easy, it was not imperative that they do
more than "keep school."
I remember quite distinctly that when I did go to school we used the
proverbial Webster's blue-back speller. The majority of the pupils began
with the "A, B, C," the alphabet, and went as far as "horseback," while
apt pupils might be able to reach "compressibility." And so for years we
went from "A" to "compressibility" on "horseback."
In those days the three "R's" were not confounded. Only one of them was
given to us, and that in broken doses, for I reached manhood without
being able to write a single word or to work a problem in mathematics.
Neither my mother nor stepfather could read or write a line; not a book,
newspaper, or magazine was ever seen in our home. It was most unusual to
see a colored man or woman who could either read or write.
When a mere boy I inwardly protested against this manner of
bringing-up. I determined to make my life more useful, to make it better
than it was. But how long these years were! However, the day came when I
was twenty-one, and I began to create a "life" for myself.
I immediately went to work doing farm labor, and saved my earnings until
I had twenty-five or thirty dollars ahead. I then decided to go to
school somewhere and to learn something. I found my first opportunity in
Montgomery, Ala. I went there in November, 1883, and entered the Swayne
School.
Everything was new and strange to me. I had never seen so large a
schoolhouse before. I was dazed, bewildered. There I was, a great, grown
man, in the class with little children, who looked upon me as a
curiosity, something to be wondered at. I, too, looked at them with
amazement, for it seemed next to impossible for young boys and girls to
know as much as they seemed to know.
I can not say that I was heartily received by the pupils. I was awkward,
and I discovered that the city children did not find me pleasingly
companionable.
It is probable that at this point I should have grown discouraged and
given up had I not met that great and good man, Rev. Robert C. Bedford,
who is now, as he has been for many years, secretary of the board of
trustees of the Tuskegee Institute, and who travels among and reports
upon the work of Tuskegee graduates and former students, but who was at
that time pastor of the First Congregational Church in Montgomery. I
regularly attended his church and the Sunday-school connected therewith,
and received such help and encouragement from him as but few men can
impart to others.
It was he who first told me of Tuskegee and advised me to enter there. I
felt that this advice, if heeded, would work for my good. I was admitted
to Tuskegee for the session beginning September, 1884, three years after
the school had been opened.
When I entered Tuskegee I was filled with loathing for all forms of
manual labor. I had been a slave to toil all my life and had resolved
that, if it were possible for a colored man to make a living by doing
something besides farming, splitting rails, or picking and hoeing
cotton, I would be one of that number. I was compelled at the school,
however, like the others, to work at some industry. I did some work on
the farm and was one of the school's "boss" janitors.
[Illustration: STUDENTS PRUNING PEACH-TREES.]
Though I had no real inclination to learn a trade or to perform any kind
of manual toil, I did desire to be useful, and throughout my whole
school life at Tuskegee I had visions of myself seated in an office
pondering over Blackstone, Kent, and Storey, with a "shingle" on the
outside announcing my profession to all passers-by.
After spending some time in Tuskegee and diligently applying myself, I
was much gratified to find that I was able to pass the State examination
for a second-grade certificate, and to teach, during the vacation
period, the very school in which I had so long before learned to spell
"horseback" and "compressibility."
I spent four years in the Tuskegee Institute, graduating with the class
of 1888.
Before graduating, I divulged to Mr. Washington my long-cherished
ambition, and was somewhat chagrined to find that he did not think much
of my dreams. He apparently sympathized with this larger vision, but
seemed to think I ought to have more education. I suspect he was right.
However, I was determined to make an effort to realize my ambitions. I
insisted that he must help me to find a place to read law. After a
while it was decided that I should begin in the office of Mr. William M.
Reid, of Portsmouth, Va.
With this end in view, I taught in the State of Alabama from May, 1888,
until April, 1889. I then left for Portsmouth.
Though I had worked for eleven months, I had but $1.25 when I reached
Portsmouth. My salary had been meager, I had paid every cent I owed the
school, and had met the many obligations necessary to living in a
decently comfortable manner.
I found Mr. Reid to be an intelligent, studious, hard-working young man,
with a fairly good practise, and in that hour of uncertainty and
embarrassment he proved himself to be "the friend in need." With his aid
I was not long in finding work by which I earned enough to pay my board
and buy books to help me in my study of law at night.
I worked during the daytime at the United States Navy-Yard in
Portsmouth, receiving $1.25 per day. I had never before earned so much
money. I was able not only to meet my regular bills but to save
something, and soon began to collect a law library. I worked at the
Navy-Yard for three years. It was my privilege to work upon the
second-class battleship Texas, and upon the steel-protected cruiser
Raleigh, both of which rendered admirable service in the
Spanish-American War.
In the spring of 1892 I felt that I had sufficient knowledge of law to
begin practising. I left Virginia and returned to Alabama. The tug of
war had now begun. I found it exceedingly difficult to get examined.
After trying for five months, I succeeded in getting a lawyer, a Mr.
Thompson, of Macon County, Ala., to recommend me to the chancery court
of that county for examination. I was examined in open court before all
the practising attorneys of that bar, and was given license to practise
law in the State of Alabama.
I was elated, overjoyed--my dream was nearing its realization!
I selected Mobile, Ala., a city of about fifty thousand inhabitants, as
my field of labor. I opened my office on September 8, 1892, and have
practised law there from that time to the present date. Though I have
met many obstacles and have had many difficulties to surmount, I have
never had to close my office, or seek other employment to make a living.
I have done well.
I have experienced no embarrassment because of prejudice. The judges and
juries have discussed cases with me in the same manner that they would
with any other lawyer at the bar. I have even had a few white clients.
To get the confidence of my own people is the hardest problem I have had
to solve, for I find that men are still sometimes without honor in their
own country.
I am daily confronted with many petty difficulties. I sometimes find
that even a religious difference will come between me and a probable
client. Some think I should be a Baptist, others would have me a
Methodist, and others still suggest that I should embrace the Catholic
faith. I should also belong to every secret society in the city, and
attend every public gathering no matter what the hour, whether it be
called at high noon or at dawn of day.
Despite these things to be expected of a people but forty years free,
and used to white judges, and juries, and lawyers, and unused to dealing
with one of their own, I feel that I am still winning my way. It is my
desire to help my fellow men, and in return receive an appreciable
share of their help.
After practising my profession for nearly two years, I was married to
Miss Sarah E. Ogden, who was at that time a student at the Tuskegee
Institute. We have been happily married for ten years and have been
blessed with six children, only three of whom, I am sorry to state, are
living.
I feel that I can not close this short sketch without paying a closing
tribute to my _alma mater_--Tuskegee. Those lessons of thrift, industry,
and integrity dwelt upon by Principal Washington and his coworkers, I
shall never forget. My heart thrills and its pulses beat whenever I
think of what it has meant to me to come in contact with the quickening
influences of that school.
I lift up my voice and call her blessed, my Tuskegee!
IV
A SCHOOL TREASURER'S STORY
BY MARTIN A. MENAFEE
I was born on a plantation in Lee County, Ala., and, as my parents were
very poor, I was placed in the field and did not see the inside of a
schoolroom until I was twelve years old. I then had a chance to attend a
three months' school for six months, or for two years, as we usually
called it. Before this I had had one of my shoulders dislocated through
an accident and have been able to use but one arm since.
At this period I made up my mind to secure an education, and a gentleman
who was teaching school at my home took me to an Alabama college,
thinking that he could perhaps get me in school there. I told the
president of the college that I wanted an education, and offered him my
services in return for such opportunities as he would open to me, but
seeing my condition, he soon concluded that I could render but little in
the way of services. I pleaded with him for a trial, but he refused me
admittance, albeit in a very nice and polite manner.
I returned home, then at Oakbowery, Ala. Very soon after my return I
heard of the Tuskegee Institute, and I think it was in July of that year
when I made up my mind that I would start for this school, which was
about forty miles from where I lived. After walking to Auburn, Ala.,
twelve miles, I waited for the train and, as she glided up, I walked in
and took my seat. Before I left home I knew some walking would be
necessary, and preferred doing it at the beginning of the journey. I was
admitted on my arrival, after some parleying, and was promptly assigned
to work in the brick-yard. After I had been there for two days I found
that the sun had no pity on, or patience with, me; it seemed to blister
me through and through. I finally concluded that the sun, together with
the brick-yard, was blasting the hopes I had entertained and the
determination I had fostered, of securing an education. I tried to get
my work changed, but the Director of Industries did not see it as I did,
and would not do it.
The next thing that I settled upon for relief was to get sick, but a
day's trial of that showed that would not work. I decided that I would
return home, where I was sure I would at least find no brick-yard to
harass or disturb. My stay at the school was just about seven or eight
days. I would like to add just here, however, that I am very glad that I
was put on the brick-yard, as it certainly left in me the spirit of work
after I got over that first affliction of heat.
Very soon after I had returned home I received a letter from one of the
teachers of Talladega College, a Miss S. J. Elder, who met me when I was
there seeking entrance, asking me to go to Jenifer, Ala., and attend a
school there conducted by two white ladies; she said she would "foot"
all of my bills. This greatly relieved me, and I considered it a great
thing. Very soon thereafter I had my clothes ready, and was at Jenifer.
I was there for one year, but Tuskegee was constantly on my mind; in
fact, I had made up my mind to give it a second trial.
On October 29, 1894, I again went to Tuskegee and asked for admission. I
was admitted with the understanding that I should stand up in the Chapel
and make a public acknowledgment of the wrong I had done in leaving the
school without permission. This seemed like a great humiliation, as I
could hardly talk to one person, to say nothing of the thousand
students and teachers then there, as I stammered so much. Mr. Washington
seemed to understand the situation and was kind enough to help me out by
asking questions.
I was given work on the farm, and started out again with renewed vigor
and determination to complete a course of study. The farm manager, Mr.
C. W. Greene, was very kind to me and gave me work that I could do.
After I had been on the farm about two weeks he placed me at the gates
to keep out the cows and hogs that might be tempted to walk in on the
school-lawns. This work I enjoyed, and very soon established an "office"
under a tree near the gate. I held this position and kept this "office"
for two years.
I was then taken from there and placed in Mr. Greene's office to help
him. It was at Tuskegee that I first saw a typewriter and shorthand
writing. I made up my mind that I would be a stenographer and
typewriter, and thought that if I could learn this, that would be as
high up as I cared to go in life. I borrowed a book on shorthand, not
being able to purchase one, and began the study without a teacher. Very
soon I realized that I had learned a little, and my ambition grew. I
wanted a typewriter.
I got up enough courage to go to the Rev. R. C. Bedford, who often
visited the school, and who was one of my best friends, and, in fact, is
largely responsible for my being able to stay at Tuskegee as long as I
did, and told him I wanted a typewriter; I repeatedly told him that my
success in life largely depended upon my securing it. Mr. Bedford said
he would see what could be done, and, in a very short time, he came from
the North and brought the machine. When he informed me that he had
brought it, it did seem that I could not stay on the grounds. I felt
then that I had all that was necessary to make me a stenographer, and
very soon declared myself a member of the stenographic world.
I advanced very well in these new studies and was given some work to do
in the offices. The regular school stenographers helped me all they
could.
The saddest experience I ever had in connection with the Tuskegee
Institute was at the end of my second summer. I was very anxious to
remain in the employ of the school, as my people were very poor and I
did not care to be home on them unless I could become a full field hand,
and I felt that the school had much work that I could do. I appealed to
the Director more than once to let me remain, but he replied each time
that the work department was closed; that he could not take any more,
and furthermore, that it was best that I return home. Mr. Bedford
encouraged me all he could and told me that I might find something to
do; that I should launch out for myself. I went to Opelika, and Mr.
Bedford was on the same train. He and I were in Opelika together for
about a half day. He was on his way to Beloit, Wis., his home, and I was
on my way home to Oakbowery. About thirty minutes before it was time for
my train to leave, I noticed a man who was very busy superintending the
hauling of some lumber. This man asked my name, what I could do, and
where I was from. For a moment I hesitated to tell him, but finally did.
I found that he was the principal of the colored city school at Opelika,
Professor J. R. Savage. Mr. Savage proved to be a true friend. He gave
me work at once in the Summer Normal School he was conducting. I went to
my home that evening, rejoicing that I had found work. When I returned
to Opelika Mr. Savage asked me to take charge of the business department
of the Summer Normal and teach shorthand and typewriting. I worked with
him in this way for three summers, my vacation periods, with much
success. We worked well together and in perfect harmony.
At the opening of each school year at Tuskegee I would be among the
first to get there to begin my studies. I found that, in order to remain
at Tuskegee, students had to have a real purpose. I had one, and I think
so impressed the Faculty before leaving there.
I did not have all smooth sailing, and, at times, I would all but give
up.
I was at Tuskegee for six years, and I recall those years with much
pleasure and satisfaction. During my stay there I made many friends, and
I can not refrain from mentioning the Rev. R. C. Bedford, who has helped
me in so many ways; Mr. Warren Logan, the Treasurer of the school; Mrs.
F. B. Thornton, the Matron, who took me as her son, and my dear friend,
the farm manager, Mr. C. W. Greene. Many others were also very kind to
me.
I completed my course of study in 1900. By this time Mr. Bedford had
secured a position for me at Denmark, S. C., as stenographer to the
principal, Miss Elizabeth E. Wright, a Tuskegee graduate. I did not hold
this position very long before it was decided in a meeting of the board
of trustees to have me act as the school's treasurer. On being asked to
take this place, I answered that I would do my best. I have now been
here since the fall of the year of my graduation. I like the work
immensely.
A word about the school: It is known as the Voorhees Industrial School,
and is located in the midst of an overshadowing Negro population. It has
just completed the seventh year of its existence. Miss Wright, the
principal, founded it on faith. She is a delightfully spiritual woman,
and was at first greatly opposed in her efforts by both the black and
white people of this section. She persevered, however, and all the
people are now her friends. Her work here has been but little short of
marvelous. The pride of the grounds is a splendidly arranged Central
Building, which cost $3,000. It contains offices, class-rooms, and a
chapel that will seat 600 persons. A large building for girls, costing
$4,000, has also been erected. A Tuskegee graduate drew the plans for
both of these buildings. A barn which cost $800 we have also been able
to complete, and are now using.
In our Faculty, in addition to Miss Wright, who is of the Class of 1904,
Tuskegee Institute, we have six other Tuskegee graduates: a farm
superintendent, a carpenter, a teacher of drawing, a principal of the
primary department, a sewing and cooking teacher, a millinery teacher
and industrial helper, and a treasurer and bookkeeper, myself.
The day- and boarding-pupils number 300.
Voorhees is one of the sixteen larger "offshoots" of Tuskegee Institute,
manned and controlled by Tuskegee graduates. It is a chartered State
institution, and has on its board of trustees white and colored persons,
Northern and Southern. One of its very best and most helpful supporters
and friends is a Southern white man who has helped it in ways
innumerable, and has backed it when the courage of all of us has all but
faltered.
By precept and example the school is helping the black masses of rural
South Carolina to help themselves. The work we do is far different from
that done by any other school in the State; we provide the way for our
students, as at Tuskegee, because of their poverty, to work on the farm
and in the shops during the day and attend school at night. Without this
help most of them would be without any chance to attend school. Our
students are learning to dignify labor. None have yet graduated, as our
school is young and most of those who come to us can not read or write a
word. They are wofully ignorant, but so willing to learn, so earnest,
and so persevering.
During the last school year, 1903-'04, we received from all sources
$18,310.43. This will give some idea as to the scope and importance of
our work, and of my work in disbursing this large sum as the treasurer
of the school.
Our present property valuation is $25,000, and consists of 300 acres of
land, 3 large buildings, a large barn, a schoolhouse for primary
children, 4 cottages, an industrial building, 10 mules, 6 horses, 30
cows, 3 wagons, 3 buggies, etc., all free from indebtedness of any
character. We stay out of debt; that for which we can not pay we do
without.
We afford instruction in the following industries: Farming in its
various branches, shoemaking, carpentry, cooking, sewing, housekeeping,
laundering, millinery in a small way, printing, and blacksmithing.
The training received at Tuskegee has been of so much help to me since
leaving there. I made up my mind after graduation that I would urge my
parents and relatives to cease paying five and six bales of cotton each
year for rent, and instead take the same amount of cotton and buy a
place of their own. I am glad to say, through my efforts in this regard,
they have been placed on a tract of 160 acres of good land, and it is
practically paid for, they paying four bales of cotton a year. They are
doing well and are making something for themselves. This project seemed
a little strange to them for the first two years, but they are now used
to it.
"He that hath a trade," saith Franklin, "hath an estate, and he that
hath a calling, hath a place and honor." Since being out in the world I
have learned not to wait for a higher position or a better salary, and
have steadily sought to enlarge the ones I have had. I have tried to
fill such positions as I have had as they were never filled before, by
doing better work, by being more prompt, by being more thorough, more
polite, and, in fact, I have filled them so completely that no one else
could slip in by me. I have always laid great stress on work as a means
of developing power; I am called by some of my friends a fanatic on this
subject. My experience at Tuskegee taught me that our racial salvation
is to come through hard, earnest, intelligent, sincere work. I owe a
world of gratitude to the Tuskegee Institute for the training I received
there and for the great work it is doing for the Negro people.
I repeat, if I accomplish anything in life that is worth while, it will
be due wholly to the Tuskegee Institute, to its officers and teachers.
No true graduate of Tuskegee ever forgets the lessons learned there. I
am sure I shall not.
V
THE STORY OF A FARMER
BY FRANK REID
I am glad to be able to give some facts regarding what my brother Dow
and I have been able to do since leaving the Tuskegee Institute.
We did not graduate, I am sorry to say, but the lessons given us have
not been forgotten. These lessons started us on the way to our present
success. I do not use the word "success" boastfully, but because it
really states a fact: we have done much more than we ever hoped to do,
and have been the means of contributing in some slight measure toward
the uplifting of the immediate community about us.
We are located at a place called Dawkins, not more than twelve miles
from the Tuskegee Institute, and immediately within its sphere of
influence.
Our mother and father were born within a few miles of where we now live.
Both of our parents, at the time I write, are living, and are each
about sixty-five years of age; they were, for twenty-five years each,
slaves. Neither can read or write. My brother and I each spent about
three years at Tuskegee, and, in addition, he attended school for two
years at Talladega College.
I had a very thorough course in carpentry, and my brother worked on the
Institute farm. We married two sisters, Susie and Lillie Hendon. Shortly
after my marriage my beloved wife Susie died, leaving me with one child.
My brother's wife still lives; they have three children.
Until ten years ago we, with our father, were renters, all of us working
together. But the Sunday evening talks at Tuskegee by Principal
Washington, and his urgent insistence, at all times, that Tuskegee
graduates and students should try to own land, led us to desire to
improve our condition. We were large renters, however; for twenty-three
years our father and his relatives had leased and "worked" a tract of
1,100 acres of land, having leased it for ten years at a time. We still
lease this tract, and, in addition, rent an additional 480 acres in the
same way, ten years at a time. We subrent tracts of this total of 1,580
acres to thirty tenants, charging one and one-half bales of cotton for
each one-horse farm. We pay twenty-three bales for the rent of the
1,580 acres. My brother and I run a sixteen-horse farm, doing much of
the work ourselves and paying wages to those who work for us. A number
of others also work for us on "halves"--that is, we provide the land,
furnish the seeds, tools, mules, feed the mules, and equally divide
whatever is raised. This is largely done in all the country districts of
the South.
About ten years ago we bought in our own right our first land, 320
acres. Since that time we have acquired by purchase another tract
containing 285 acres. The first tract we paid for in two years; the
other is also paid for. The total of 605 acres, I am glad to say, is
without incumbrance of any kind.
The following statements may give some idea as to what we have been able
to do since leaving Tuskegee:
During the year 1904 alone, we paid out $5,000, covering debts on land,
fertilizers, and money borrowed with which to carry our thirty tenants.
We own sixteen mules and horses, fourteen head of cattle, thirty hogs,
and have absolutely no indebtedness of any character.
My brother Dow lives in a good three-room house. My father and I live in
a good six-room house, with a large, airy hall, and kitchen; it cost
us to build, $1,500.
[Illustration: A SILO ON THE FARM.
Students filling it with fodder corn, steam-power being used.]
We conduct a large general store, with everything carried in a country
store of this kind. The colored Odd Fellows use the hall above our store
for their meetings.
The Government post-office is located in our store, and here all of the
surrounding community come for their mail.
Our store does a large yearly business averaging about $5,000.
We have a steam-gin and grist-mill. We gin about 500 bales of cotton a
season for ourselves and others living near; of the 150 bales got from
the land owned and rented by us, 100 are ours, the other 50 belong to
our tenants.
We raise large quantities of corn, potatoes, and peas, in addition to
our cotton crop.
We are now trying to purchase the 480 acres we have been so long
renting.
The church and the schoolhouse are on four acres of land immediately
adjoining ours. The church is roomy, well-seated, ceiled and painted, in
striking contrast with most of those in the country districts of the
South. The schoolhouse has two rooms, and is but partially ceiled,
though it is nicely weather-boarded. The school is regularly conducted
for five months each year, and part of the time has two teachers. Mr. J.
C. Calloway, a Tuskegee graduate, Class of '96, is principal of the
school. We are cooperating with Mr. Calloway in an effort to supplement
the school funds and secure an additional two months. We helped pay for
the land, and gave a part of the money toward the schoolhouse, and have
done all possible to help, keeping in mind Principal Washington's
oft-repeated statement that "it is upon the country public schools that
the masses of the race are dependent for an education."
My brother and I, with our father, it will be noted, own and rent 2,185
acres of land, but we try to help our tenants in every possible way,
and, when they desire it, subrent to them such tracts as they desire for
ten years, or less. We have established a blacksmith-shop on our land,
and do all our own work and most of that of the whole community. Rev.
Robert C. Bedford, secretary of the board of trustees, Tuskegee
Institute, some time ago visited us, as he does most of the Tuskegee
graduates and former students. He is apprised of the correctness of the
statements set forth above. He wrote the following much-appreciated
compliment to a friend regarding our homes and ourselves: "The homes of
the Reid brothers are very nicely furnished throughout. Everything is
well kept and very orderly. The bedspreads are strikingly white, and the
rooms--though I called when not expected--were in the very best of
order."
This further statement may not be amiss: Under the guidance of the
Tuskegee influences, the annual Tuskegee Negro Conferences, the visits
of Tuskegee teachers, etc., the importance of land-buying was early
brought to our attention, but because of the crude and inexperienced
laborers about us, we found that we could, with advantage to all, rent
large tracts of land, subrent to others, and in this way pay no rent
ourselves, as these subrenters did that for us. We could in this way
also escape paying taxes, insurance, and other expenses that naturally
follow. We could, as many white farmers do, hire wage hands at from
$7.50 to $10 a month, with "rations," or arrange to have them work on
"halves," as I have already described.
But at last we yielded to the constant pounding received at Tuskegee
whenever we would go over, that we ought to own land for ourselves; and
then, too, it occurred to me that we might not always have the same
whole-souled man to deal with, and that terms might be made much harder.
My brother and father agreed, and we set about to purchase the first 320
acres. As I feared, rental values have increased; formerly we rented the
1,100 acres for three bales of cotton; now we give sixteen bales for the
same land.
My brother, our father, and I have worked together from the beginning.
We have had no disputes or differences; we have worked on the basis of a
common property interest.
We have encouraged the people of our community as much as possible to
secure homes, buy lands, live decently, and be somebody. The following
are some typical examples of thrift and industry in the community about
us:
Turner Moore owns 210 acres of land adjoining ours. He was born near
where he lives and was over twenty-five years a slave. He has 11 mules
and horses and raised 65 bales of cotton last year. His property is all
paid for. His brother, Moses Moore, also has 65 acres, all paid for, and
Reuben Moore, a nephew, owns 212 acres, all paid for. Their farms join.
James Whitlow, father-in-law of Mr. J. C. Calloway, the teacher referred
to, owns 1,137 acres in one body, only about two miles from our place.
It is all paid for, and the deeds are all recorded at the Macon County
Courthouse. He was born right where he now lives, and was twelve years
old when freed.
Mr. Whitlow rents a gin, but will own one of his own this year. He also
carries on a store. He has 20 tenants, who will raise over 100 bales of
cotton this year together. He has raised over 30 himself. He has 20
mules, 3 horses, 30 head of cattle, and about 75 hogs. He does not owe a
nickel. His taxes are $60 per year. He has a very good four-room house,
besides a kitchen.
Mr. Whitlow has fourteen children, ten boys and four girls, who go to
school on our place. He himself can not read or write, but he helps the
school and church.
J. C. Calloway was born near us. He graduated from Tuskegee, and has
continued to work near his old home. He married James Whitlow's
daughter. He has a very good two-room frame house. Mr. Whitlow gave them
40 acres of land, and he is trying to buy an additional 100 acres. He
raised 17 bales of cotton this year and 150 bushels of corn. He has 4
horses and mules and 7 head of cattle, besides hogs, chickens, etc. He
is very highly thought of in his school work, and is successful as a
farmer.
I believe we are doing well. Our community is rated high, and I shall
never fail to praise Tuskegee for starting us in the way we are going.
VI
THE STORY OF A CARPENTER
BY GABRIEL B. MILLER
The plantation on which I was born in 1875 is located near Pleasant
Hill, Ga. At that time Pleasant Hill was twenty miles from any railroad,
and I did not see a railroad train till I was twelve years of age.
I lived on a plantation on which more than two hundred men and women
worked for the owner. The children had no especial educational
opportunities. Few of them were even permitted to attend the makeshift
public school located near. For six months only, of the twelve years my
father lived on that plantation, did I attend any school, and that a
small one taught by a Southern white woman who had owned my father. When
I was twelve years of age my father moved from the plantation on which
he had been working "on shares" and rented land which he and his family
cultivated. Soon there were thirteen children in his family, of which
number I was the second.
In December, 1892, I drove a wagon with two bales of cotton to a little
Georgia town. While waiting for the wagon preceding me to move off the
scales on which the cotton was weighed, I heard a colored man, who had
heard of Tuskegee Institute, telling of its advantages, and he quite
glowingly recounted the glories of the place as they had been related to
him. As he proceeded he informed those gathered about him that at this
school a boy could work his way if perchance he could reach the
institution. I got nearer to him and heard and treasured every word he
said. Especially did I remember his statement that he had been informed
that some of the boys graduating from there had not paid a single cent
in cash for their education, having worked it all out.
When I reached home that night I told my father of what I had heard. For
three successive years our crops had failed and my father was more than
$500 in debt. The prospect of interesting him in any project that meant
the expenditure of money was discouraging, but an eager desire to secure
an education led me to make him a proposition, viz.: that he should
permit me during the next year, 1893, to have full and complete charge
of the farm, and if I succeeded in settling all of his indebtedness I
was to be released to attend school at Tuskegee, provided I could secure
admittance, whether he cleared any money or not. This proposition my
father readily agreed to. He sympathized with my ambitions, but the
heavy burden of carrying a large family with short-crop returns dwarfed
whatever good intentions he might have.
On the first of January, 1893, those of the family who could work joined
me in starting early and working late during the whole of the year. We
ran a two-horse farm. From that year's work we gathered 25 bales of
cotton, 800 bushels of corn, 300 bushels of cow-peas, 250 gallons of
sugar-cane sirup, 5 wagon-loads of pumpkins, a great amount of hay and
fodder, and picked at night for neighbors about us, white and black, 25
bales of cotton. We had rented two mules and the wagon used that year,
but now at the close bought two younger, stronger mules and a new wagon
and paid cash for the whole outfit. We settled our indebtedness with
everybody, and my father, who had earnestly worked under my supervision
along with the others, was very, very happy. Of course, we had a very
small balance left--not enough to be of any service to me in keeping me
in school except I should be allowed to help myself by working. After
"laying the crops by" I made home-made baskets during the summer and
sold them, realizing about $16. In one year I had accomplished a task my
father thought impossible of accomplishment. He religiously kept his
word, and was as enthusiastic about my getting off to school as I was.
I had now learned more of the Tuskegee Institute, and was impatient to
reach there. Others, too, became eager and enthusiastic, and so when I
started, January 19, 1894, it was a red-letter event in our little
community. I left home with only the $16 I had saved from the sale of my
baskets. The next morning after reaching Tuskegee I was piloted to the
Principal's office and my recommendations requested. I was puzzled. I
did not know what was wanted. I had not followed the usual routine and
written for permission to enter as students are required to do, but had
gone ahead, thinking the presentation of myself all that would be
necessary. I had no recommendations, but mustered courage enough to ask
for a trial before being refused. My request was granted, and I became a
student--proud event in my life!--of the famous Tuskegee Normal and
Industrial Institute.
I had always wanted to be a carpenter; as long ago as I can remember
this was my ambition, but when carried to the office of the director of
industries he refused to assign me to work there, as that division was
filled, but assigned me instead to the sawmilling division. I was not
angry, of course. I was too glad to be at Tuskegee; but I was bitterly
disappointed, especially after I had seen the carpenter shop, some of
the work of the young men, and the imposing buildings on which they had
been and were working. I was promised the first vacancy, and that
temporarily eased my sorrow. A vacancy did not occur for one and a half
years. In the meantime I had become reconciled, and had worked as
earnestly as I could to please the instructor in sawmilling. I tried to
learn all there was to learn in that division, and at the end of that
period could adjust and run proficiently every machine in the sawmilling
division. The school cut then, as it does now, most of the lumber used
in the carpentry division, and efficient students were needed and
desired. My instructor was so well pleased with my progress that he
recommended, over my protest, to the director of industries, my
retention in the division.
I had kept so busily after the director during those eighteen months to
allow me to enter the shop that he could not well refuse to grant my
request when a vacancy occurred. I was admitted to the carpenter shop.
For five years I was an apprentice, doing work of every kind. I also
took mechanical drawing along with carpentry. When I graduated in 1900 I
received not only a diploma from the academic department, but a
certificate from the carpentry division as well. I had improved every
opportunity, and had a fair knowledge of architectural as well as of
mechanical drawing. This latter instruction I had made a place for along
with my other studies.
Maj. J. B. Ramsey, the Commandant, had been so well pleased with my
general deportment that for years I was commissioned by him to command,
as captain, one of the companies of the Tuskegee Institute battalion of
cadets. This had pleased and encouraged me very much indeed.
To my surprise, three months before my graduation I was asked to remain
in the employ of the Tuskegee Institute as one of the assistant teachers
in the carpentry division. I had contracted, however, to do some work at
Montgomery, Ala., and I could not accept the place offered. I spent
about four months working at my trade in Montgomery, and was again
reminded of the offer made me at Tuskegee. I returned to Tuskegee, but
did not remain long, as the Executive Council of the Institute
recommended me, when application was made for a competent man to take
charge of the carpentry division of the Fort Valley High and Industrial
School, Fort Valley, Ga. The terms offered were satisfactory and I
accepted the position.
I began work here November 9, 1900, in a shop 30 feet by 60 feet. No
tools and no work-benches were provided, only a lot of inexperienced
boys to whom I was expected to teach carpentry. I owned a chest of
tools, and these I used until the school could secure some. I proceeded
at once to make work benches, and my boys had their first lessons in
carpentry in providing these. Quite often visitors who come to see us
ask if these benches were not made at some factory, they are so well
made. We next proceeded to fit out a drawing-room, as I intended that my
boys should work--as I had been compelled to do from the very beginning
at Tuskegee--from drawings. Everything I had done there had to be
carefully worked out in advance, and, knowing the value of that kind of
thing, I did not want these boys to have anything less than the kind of
instruction I had had. We made tables and desks for the drawing-room;
next we ceiled and finished twelve rooms in the main school building
that had long been left unfinished. All of the work pleased the
authorities of the school, I have reason to know. Near the close of my
first term at Fort Valley it was decided to erect a dormitory building
for girls. I was asked to submit plans and specifications. My training
as a carpenter at Tuskegee had fitted me for just that kind of thing,
and I set about designing a building that would meet the requirements of
the young women attending Fort Valley.
My plans were finally accepted, and I thought to go on with the erection
of the building during the summer, as had been planned; but one or two
of the building committee began to object, urging that I was too young,
that I had not had enough experience, and that a building of that
quality should be erected by a builder of proved reputation. After much
delay I was permitted to proceed. I began with ten "green" boys, and
they, under my direction as I worked side by side with them, did all of
the work except the hanging of the window-sashes, doors, etc. I had
outside help in doing this part of the finishing. The building is a real
pride to all of us here. It is 36 feet by 78 feet, 2-1/2 stories high,
has 22 sleeping-rooms, a splendidly arranged dining-room, 36 feet by 36
feet, and cost $3,200. No one, hereabouts at least, now doubts that I
can build anything I say I can. I am glad that so soon after beginning
the work here I was able to prove the claims of my Tuskegee instructors
as to my fitness for the position for which they had recommended me.
Unfortunately, before I had completed the dormitory for girls, a fire
destroyed our main school building with the contents. This fire left us
without class-rooms. We took refuge in the Carpenter Shop, and held
classes there until money was secured with which to build a
training-school for the lower grades. This latter building I also put up
entirely with student labor. It contains three large rooms, each 25 feet
by 30 feet. The appointments in every way accord with approved hygienic
laws. Dr. Wallace Buttrick, Executive Secretary of the General Education
Board, spoke complimentarily of the building when he saw it, as one of
the few in the State he had seen that met all the requirements of a
class-room. We were able to build it for $1,600.
Even during the construction of the training-school I was drawing the
plans for a large brick building to replace the one burned. My plans
were submitted to friends of the work in the North, and by the time we
had finished the training-school we had money enough to begin the
brickwork on the new building. By April, 1903, the brickwork was
complete, and as we had no additional money we were compelled to allow
the building to stand until June, 1904, at which time we were able to
resume.
My boys did all of the woodwork, did the hod-carrying, and most of the
unskilled labor. The building cost $8,000, and is 86 feet 8 inches by 52
feet 8 inches in its dimensions, is 2-1/2 stories high, and has a deckle
roof with dormer windows. The chapel is on the first floor, 6
recitation-rooms on the second floor, and 13 sleeping-rooms for boys on
the one-half third-story floor. A basement for storage purposes, 25 feet
by 50 feet, is a great convenience.
Of the many contractors and builders who have visited our school-grounds
none have failed to speak in praise of the design, the workmanship, the
strength, and the relative relation to each other of the school
buildings with regard to future additions.
I need not add that this has been very pleasing to me. I was married
December 9, 1904, at Atlanta, Ga., to Miss Mary E. Hobbs.
To me Tuskegee has been all in all, and I still remember with gratitude
the man who, in my hearing, spoke so glowingly of the school as I
weighed my cotton in the little Georgia town away back in December,
1892.
VII
COTTON-GROWING IN AFRICA
BY JOHN W. ROBINSON
As all autobiographical sketches begin, so do I begin this one. I was
born in Bennettsville, S. C., in 1873. Neither of my parents could write
their names; but my father could read a little, and taught me the
alphabet.
My paternal grandfather was a slave of some intelligence. He was a
competent carpenter, had charge of his master's saw- and grist-mills,
and kept the accounts of the two mills. His master, who was a member of
the State Legislature, was very kind to him. He allowed him a portion of
the savings from these industries he was controlling, and even promised
him his freedom. The latter he delayed so long that my grandfather ran
away. He succeeded in reaching Charleston, S. C. He had secured a ticket
and was about to take passage for Canada, when he was captured and
returned to his master's home. His master was attending the General
Assembly of the State of South Carolina, and it became the overseer's
duty to punish the returned fugitive. My grandfather never recovered
from the effects of the brutal punishment meted out to him for daring to
desire freedom in his own right.
My father was the oldest boy and the second child in a family of five.
He was a farmer and a cobbler. At the age of twenty-seven he was married
to my mother.
I suppose the history of my mother's life would be monotonous and dull
to many ears, but I remember that I never grew tired of hearing her
relate its somber happenings. She often told us how her grandmother
could relate the thrilling story of her capture on African soil and of
being brought to America, of the horrors of the passage, and of much
else that I shall always remember.
After their marriage my parents began farming in Bennettsville,
Marlborough County, S. C., the place where I was born. I remember most
vividly that two-roomed log cabin where my parents' ten children were
born--
"Low and little, and black and old,
With children as many as it could hold."
However, my father soon began working for wages, and received $10 per
month and the proverbial "rations"--three pounds of meat and a peck of
meal per week. What a financier he must have been, for from that mean
sum he managed to save $50 or $75 each year, and I still cherish the
memory of how fondly I felt those crisp green-backs once a year. He
brought them home every Christmas and allowed each member of the family
to feel them--yes, even caress them.
When I was about nine years of age I entered the public school of the
community, which was in session about four months in a year, opening
late in the fall and going through the winter. My parents were so
delighted and gratified at the progress I made that I was occasionally
privileged to spend one month in the subscription school conducted near
by during the summer.
When I was fourteen years of age a great sorrow visited our home. My
mother died. I often wonder if any one can realize what it means to lose
a mother without having suffered that bereavement. My father did not
marry again.
About this time the authorities opened a school nearer us than the one I
had been attending, but the teachers were usually very incompetent and
my progress was seriously hindered.
The absorbing desire of my life had been to some day graduate from some
institution of learning, but I found myself at eighteen years of age far
from the goal of my ambition. I became alarmed. I realized what it would
mean to grow to manhood in ignorance; I also knew that there were seven
children younger than I to be cared for. I seriously thought the matter
over. I finally broached it to my father, and he consented that I should
try to make a way for myself.
I rented a small farm, trusting that by cultivating it I would be able
to clear enough money to begin my education. I began wrong, for I had in
advance mortgaged my crop. I began with $75, but when the year closed I
had only $10. However, my aspirations were not to be daunted; I was
resolved on going to school.
With this $10 I purchased the necessary books, paid my entrance fee, and
entered the village graded school. I was poorly clad, and much of the
time was without food, but I felt that I could not even ask my father
for assistance because of his responsibility in caring for the younger
children. I was constant, however, in my endeavor to find work, and
finally a companion and I succeeded in getting an old farmhouse about
three miles from the village in which to live. In a measure this suited
me, for I loved the country.
The house was an old, dilapidated one, and I do not see now how we stood
that first severe winter; but though I was in rags and my food was often
roasted potatoes or peas with a little salt, I did not miss a single
day's schooling that year, and great was my joy and satisfaction when,
at the end of the year, I stood at the head of my class.
During this time I had done such work in the surrounding neighborhood as
could be obtained. My Saturdays and afternoons were spent in splitting
rails, chopping wood, driving garden palings, and doing any other work
that would enable me to exist. Although I had stinted myself and had
often gone without food, at the end of the year I was $12 in debt. But
this was not sufficient to make me despair.
When vacation came I immediately sought work, and though I was diligent
in my application to it when I had obtained it, steady employment was
not to be had. My wages were never more than fifty cents a day, but I
often received less. For two years I lived in this way. At the
expiration of that time I decided that it would benefit me to enter a
higher institution of learning. I knew that this would mean that I must
have more remunerative employment.
By some means my attention was directed to the orange industry of
Florida, and in the summer of 1894 I regretfully left my companions and
relatives, went to Deland, Fla., and secured the desired work. The
winter proved to be an unusually cold one, and the orange industry was
greatly hindered; therefore I was soon out of employment, and at the
season of the year when I most needed it. I was not long idle, however,
for the very cause of my loss of work opened another avenue; I was kept
busy chopping wood. Though I went to Florida penniless, at the end of
six months I had saved $60.
It was at Deland that I learned of the magnificent opportunities
afforded earnest young men and women at Tuskegee Institute. I at once
made application to become a student. That morning I did not know that
such a school existed; that night, while I slept, the Southern Railway
was bearing my letter of application to Mr. Washington. My anxiety
almost reached fever-heat during those few intervening days that I
waited for an answer, and my joy was boundless when it came, setting
forth the requirements for admittance. I sent a portion of the money I
had saved to my father. With the rest I bought some necessary clothing,
and left Deland far behind for Tuskegee.
I shall always remember how little and insignificant I felt when I
entered the school-grounds and was told that all those buildings and all
those acres of ground were a part of the Tuskegee Institute. I had read
of it in the circular of information which was sent me when I applied
for admission, but the realization was, to me, almost overpowering.
After paying my entrance fee and purchasing my school-books I had $15
left. Thus I began what has proved to be a "new life."
Fifteen dollars were, of course, an inadequate sum with which to pay my
expenses through the day-school, and so I was permitted to enter the
night-school, as so many others as poor as I had done. This means that I
was given an opportunity to work at some industry during the day and
attend classes at night. I was not only receiving training at an
industry, being provided with food, shelter, and fuel, and receiving
instruction at night, but I was earning enough over my board to be
placed to my credit in the school's treasury to help pay my board when I
should enter the day-school.
My first term was spent at work on Marshall Farm, where the greater
part of the school's farming was at that time done.
When I entered Tuskegee I had no thought of preparing myself for
returning to farm life. Even the word "farm" brought to my mind visions
of dull, hard work and drudgery without comforts. I had not been at the
Tuskegee Institute long, however, before I was led to know that
"agriculture" is the very highest of all industrial callings. I had
never known that agriculture had so many subdivisions, that soils could
be analyzed and treated, that rotation of crops enriched the soil, that
a certain crop planted season after season on the same soil made it
poor, because it was ridding it of some life-giving chemical. To me
soils simply "wore out." But through lectures and practical experiments
my agricultural horizon began to expand, and a sense of the beauty of
the industry grew upon me.
It was to me a marvelous thing to go into the dairy and take milk but
recently milked, pour it into the Sharpless Separator, set the machine
in motion, and behold a stream of rich, sweet cream flow from one avenue
of escape, while a foamy jet of milk passed from another. There, too, I
learned cheese-making and butter-making.
My school life was filled with difficulties because of financial
embarrassments. I was one of the competitors in the first Trinity Church
(Boston) Prize Contest, founded at the school by Dr. E. Winchester
Donald, successor of Phillips Brooks, and rector of Trinity until his
death, and I remember that I was greatly discomfited because the socks I
wore had no feet in them, and my shoes had that afternoon been sewed
with thread blackened with soot.
However, I was the successful contestant, the first winner of the prize
of $25. The next day I provided myself with new shoes and socks. I also
received my diploma that same year, 1897, within two days of receiving
the prize, and was very happy to receive it and the diploma at the same
time.
Two summers and one winter after graduating I taught school at Mamie,
Ala. When I was not teaching I worked on the farm of the family with
which I boarded. For this work I received very little pay, but I had
been taught at Tuskegee that it was better to work for nothing than to
be idle--a Booker T. Washington precept.
The second winter I was first assistant in the Ozark city school, Ozark,
Ala., and was offered the principalship for the next term, but I
declined in order to further pursue postgraduate studies in agriculture
at Tuskegee. I remained there for six months. I then went West, to
Rockford, Ill., to do practical work in that section for the purpose of
strengthening and improving the theory and practise already learned.
It was harvesting season and I soon secured work. I put all my energy
into the work of the rugged Western farm and succeeded admirably in
following the threshing-machine, in husking corn, and in doing the other
farm labors common to Western fall and winter seasons. My first four
months were spent on the farm of a widow. After the harvesting was over
she offered me the farm, with its implements, barns, horses, and dairy
herd, if I would remain and pay her certain percentages of the profits,
but I told her that I was only a student in search of knowledge.
The next spring I secured work with a very progressive Irishman. He was
a farmer, as well as secretary and treasurer of a modern creamery and
butter factory. This work I preferred, because it was along my chosen
line, and of a very high grade.
For one year I worked in this establishment, and was not absent from
duty even one day. My employer once said to me that he had heard and
also read that Negroes were lazy, shiftless, and untrustworthy. He had
not come into contact with enough Negroes to draw his own conclusions,
so he asked me if there were more like me. I told him that I did not
consider myself an exception, but that I had had the advantages of
superior training at Tuskegee. He did not know before that I was a
Tuskegee graduate. He seemed surprised to know that a graduate would
work as a common farm-hand. He said he had found no white ones who
would. I then explained to him that I was seeking a comprehensive
knowledge of farming conditions North and South. I value that year on
those Western farms next to my training at Tuskegee.
I was planning to return to the South and start a farm of my own, when I
was asked by Mr. Washington to join a company of Tuskegee young men who
were wanted to go to Africa for the purpose of experimenting in
cotton-growing under the German Government. It was a call I could not
resist. Here was a chance for the largest possible usefulness. Here I
could have a part in a monumental undertaking, and I gladly agreed to
go. The wages offered were flattering, and all expenses in connection
with the trip were borne by the Kolonial Komittee of the German
Government. The Executive Council of the Institute selected Shepherd L.
Harris, Allen L. Burks, and myself, all graduates of the school, and Mr.
James N. Calloway, a member of the Faculty, who had had charge of the
school's largest farm, and who was selected to head the expedition. We
sailed from New York on November 3, 1900, and reached Togo by way of
Hamburg on December 31, 1900. Later five additional Tuskegee students
joined us, but of the original party I am the only one left. A report of
the beginnings of our work was published after two years, with elaborate
illustrations to commemorate what we had been able to accomplish.
Samples of the cotton made into hose and various other articles were
distributed among those interested in the success of the experiment.
That report may be secured from the Kolonial-Wirtschaftliches Komittee,
Berlin, Germany.
Not long since I sent to Principal Washington a summary of the work we
have been trying to do. He regularly insists that Tuskegee graduates
shall send him reports of what they are doing, and my letter to him was
in response to that request. We keep in touch with Tuskegee and its
work after leaving the institution through a correspondence prized by
every graduate of the school. The summary I include here, as it may be
of interest to the reader:
At the outset it was very difficult to excite any interest at all
in our work on the part of the natives. For some reason they
mistrust every proposition made them by a foreigner, and in the
beginning they would not even accept the gift of cotton-seeds from
us. They claimed that if they should accept our seeds we would come
again and claim our own with usury. Many of the Europeans here said
that the natives would never become interested in the movement. But
we worked on, and now already in the farming districts are hundreds
of native cotton farms. Now they no longer mistrust us, but they
come and ask for cotton-seeds, and a conservative estimate places
the incoming native harvest near the thousand-bale mark. Of course
the native methods are very irrational. They cultivate their cotton
altogether as a secondary crop. But we are content, at the
beginning, to let them cultivate in their own way.
We find distributed through the colony not less than three distinct
species of cotton, with some hybrids and varieties; but none of
these are indigenous, and, having been left in a neglected state
for centuries, are consequently not far removed from nature and are
not so remunerative when put under even the best culture. The seeds
imported from America are not able to survive the greatly changed
conditions of climate. Here is our greatest obstacle. Our course
was plain. If we did not have a plant that exactly suited us, we
had to make it.
The production of a commercial plant is very important. Our present
domestic seeds will yield about four hundred pounds of seed-cotton
per acre, and the character of the fruit and the arrangement upon
the stalk make it very expensive to harvest. Besides, the stalk
grows too much to a tree and is not prolific proportionately, and
the quality of the lint is equal to American "middling." We are
trying to develop a plant that will yield 1,000 pounds of
seed-cotton to the acre, with a lint equal in quality to fully good
"middling" or to Allen's 1-7/8-inch staple.
Now suppose we succeed in making this plant as I have above
outlined; the 4,000 acres under cultivation would then at least
produce 2,000 bales of seed-cotton where they now produce but 1,000
bales. We can see how greatly the annual income of the natives will
be increased. Such a plant is forthcoming.
Through selection and crossing of American and native cottons we
have obtained a new variety, which is satisfactory in every primary
respect. It is more hardy than the average American plant and
fifty per cent more productive than the average native plant. A
sample of the lint of this new, would-be variety was submitted to
the Chamber of Commerce in Berlin, and it was pronounced good in
every way, and brought in January, 1904, about twenty cents a
pound.
There is one feature that I would like to speak about before I have
done with the subject, because I know it will please you. In one of
the letters you wrote me some time ago you advised me to "labor
earnestly, quietly, and soberly, discharging my duty in the way
that would eventually make me one of the most influential persons
in the community." Being faithful in small things is one of the
fundamental principles of Tuskegee, and is what I am able to do
without even striving. It has become natural for me to be faithful,
it matters not how small or insignificant the service. I find
myself to-day possessing much influence in the work in which I am
now engaged.
In order to make secure the work begun and to insure a normal and
well-balanced progress for the future, it was recommended to
institute, along with the present undertaking, what I am pleased to
call "A Cotton-School and Plant-Breeding Station." At this school
are gathered young men from all over the colony, who come for a
two-years' course in modern methods of farming. The boys are to be
taught some of the simple rules and practises of agriculture. The
boys are 45 in number, representing the most intelligent classes;
the station consists of 250 acres of land, 8 oxen, 2 asses, 1
horse, farm implements, cotton-gin, press, etc. Such an institution
appeared to me necessary to the healthy progress of the
undertaking. There will soon be in operation 3 ginning- and
pressing-stations run by steam-power, besides a dozen or more
hand-gins. This, I believe, tells the whole story. My health is
very good. I hope you will write me often, because your letters are
always so interesting and helpful.
That my life has been as useful and successful as it has is due to the
training and inspiration received at Tuskegee Institute, perhaps not so
much to the agricultural department, for I did not finish that course,
but to the general awakening and stimulating influence which permeates
and is a part of the training of Tuskegee students.
And now while I write, and daily as I work, I am prompted on to better
and stronger efforts because of the Tuskegee in embryo that looms before
me. And as I think, and work, and write, I am gratified because of the
assurance that I am only one of that increasing host whose loyal hearts
and useful lives shall make Tuskegee live forever.
VIII
THE STORY OF A TEACHER OF COOKING
BY MARY L. DOTSON
I graduated with the Class of 1900, Tuskegee Institute. It was the
culmination of an event to which my mother and I had long looked
forward.
I was born in 1879, in a small country village in the southwestern part
of Alabama. My mother was the exceptional colored woman of our
community. She was a dressmaker and tailoress and had all the work she
could do. She owned her own home, a quite comfortable one, and earned
continuously from her work a tidy sum of money.
I have always counted myself fortunate to have had such a home and such
a mother. Very few of the colored people about us owned their own homes;
the village school was a poor makeshift, and it was in session only two
to four months in a year--that is, when some one could be secured to
teach it for the very small salary paid. Both my father and mother had
great respect for educationally equipped people, and desired that their
children should have the opportunity to secure educational advantages.
They tried in every possible way to interest the people in their own
welfare, at least to the extent of supplementing the meager
public-school fund, so as to provide decent educational facilities for
the children. This effort failed. My mother had a room added to her
home, and in it conducted, with my sister's help, a school for the
children of the community. Two of my sisters had been sent away to
school, one to Selma and the other to Talladega. In addition to the
school conducted at our home, my mother was able to get the cooperation
of some of the people in other parts of the county, and two other
schools were started. These schools were afterward taken up, and have
since become helpful factors in the life of the people.
My first lessons were given in the home, and my mother always claimed
that I learned quite rapidly. As soon as I was old enough she also made
me take lessons in sewing. Sewing made no appeal to me, however, but
cooking did, and whenever possible I would steal away to my
grandmother's to cook with her. Most of the time I was only permitted to
wash dishes, but after a while I was permitted to help with her
cooking. Soon I was able to make cakes for my father's store. He was
always very proud that his "little" daughter was able to replenish his
stock when it was exhausted.
At eight years of age I was sent to Meridian, Miss., to stay with an
older sister and attend school. The advantages there were far superior
to those provided for me at my home. After remaining two years at
Meridian I went to Memphis, again in search of better school facilities.
I have said that even at my age I had a fondness for cooking. At Memphis
I had my first cooking lesson, this lesson being given along with the
eighth grade work of the public school. I was delighted, but my aunt
refused to allow me to practise in the home, however, and so all the
practise I got was at school.
While in Memphis, a Tuskegee Institute graduate came there to teach in
the colored public schools. Though we had lived in Alabama, we had not,
until that time, heard of the Tuskegee Institute. The loyalty of that
graduate to the school, the stories of the opportunities provided, and
all, delighted my mother, my aunt, and myself, and it was decided that I
should be sent there.
I entered the Tuskegee Institute in December, 1894, and was assigned,
after examination, to the Junior class, the first class of the normal
department. I remained at Tuskegee during the following summer and
worked in the students' dining-room as a waitress. The next year I was
compelled to enter the night-school so as to help lighten my mother's
burden. I knew nothing of the science of foods; nothing at all, at that
time, of anything that indicated that cooking is a real science. None
but girls of the Senior class were then permitted to take cooking
lessons, but I was often able to provide some excuse for visiting the
very small and incompletely furnished room used for that purpose. I
picked up much useful information in that way.
When I reached the A Middle class, next to the Senior class, the young
women of that class were permitted to take cooking lessons.
Now I was to learn cooking. I had long desired the opportunity, and the
chance had come at last. The study of foods was among the first lessons
brought to my attention. While anxious to know all that was to be
taught, I could never see the reasons for knowing. I wanted to cook
food, and that, with me, was the end.
I began to study chemistry in the academic department, and when it was
applied in my cooking lessons my eyes were opened. I now saw much that I
had not dreamed of. A cooking teacher, a noted expert from Wisconsin,
came to the school about that time and lectured not only to the cooking
classes, but to the young women teachers, and to the married women of
the Institute families. I was especially detailed to work with her, and
was put to working out a diet for the students' boarding department.
This instruction, with that of my regular instructor, convinced me that
here was a real profession. I continued until the end of my school days
to carry, along with all of my academic work, progressive work in
cooking.
I had made such progress that when I came to graduate, Mrs. Washington,
who is in charge of the industries for girls, offered me a vacancy in
the cooking division. I did not feel that I was adequate to the
requirements of the place, and so remarked to Mrs. Washington and my
instructor. They recommended that I spend the summer at the Chautauqua
Summer School, New York. I prepared to go immediately following the
Tuskegee commencement exercises. A scholarship was secured for me.
Domestic science teachers of proved efficiency are in charge there. They
were pleased with what I had already been able to accomplish. My work
was with the classes taking courses in chemistry, physiology,
bacteriology, management of classes, and cooking demonstration.
At the end of the summer I felt stronger than ever, and returned to
Tuskegee in the fall with real enthusiasm. I first began my work in the
little room in which I had been taught. Another academic class of girls
had now been admitted to the cooking classes, the three upper ones.
When Dorothy Hall, the building in which all of the industries for girls
are located, was completed, my division was given a suite of rooms, an
assistant was provided, and the work broadened and made more useful than
ever. Under this division we now have a model kitchen, a regular kitchen
in which the practise-cooking of the girls is done, two dining-rooms, a
model bedroom, a model sitting-room, and a bathroom.
Principal Washington has insisted from year to year that, since cooking
is so fundamental, every young woman, in the day-school at least, shall
take lessons in cooking. For the current school year, 1904-'05, 458
young women are receiving instruction.
The course covers, in its entirety, four years, but is so comprehensive
that even one and two years fit young women for the cooking of ordinary
foods. Each of these girls is required to attend upon the outlined
catalogue course of instruction, and in addition, from time to time,
upon lectures bearing upon the several subjects comprehended under
domestic science. The furnishing of the rooms is simple, but ample; the
furniture, in the main, being made by the young women in the
upholstering division. It has been widely praised by all who have seen
it.
After teaching for two years, I requested leave of absence for one year
so as to attend the Domestic-Science School of the Young Women's
Christian Association, Boston. This additional study, of course, helped
me very much. My studies were of foods, of the home, the teaching of
demonstration and settlement classes, etc. Much other useful information
also came my way.
When I returned to Tuskegee the next year I felt more able than ever to
be of assistance to the girls who come to us. I was better able to
outline my course of study. The thing that pleased me greatly, however,
both at Chautauqua and at Boston, was the fact that my former Tuskegee
training was commented on so favorably, as having been planned along
properly comprehensive lines.
No part of the Tuskegee Institute work is more valuable than that of the
domestic training. It is the policy of the institution to give special
attention to the training of girls in all that pertains to dress,
health, physical culture, and general housekeeping.
The girls are constantly under the strict and watchful care of the dean
of the woman's department, Miss Jane E. Clark, a graduate of Oberlin
College, a woman of liberal attainments and culture, and an example to
them in all that makes for the development of character; of Mrs. Booker
T. Washington, the director of industries for girls, and of the women
teachers, a body in every way representative of the qualities the girls
are besought to seek to attain. A corps of matrons, four in number,
specially assist the dean of the woman's department and keep in close
individual touch with the girls.
My own connection with the girls is in the cooking classes, as I have
indicated, and in the Parker Model Home and the Practise Cottage. The
Parker Model Home is the home of the young women who each year reach the
Senior class. Eight large, conveniently arranged rooms are set apart for
them, and they are taught things by having to do them. The class, as a
whole, is required to do actual work in the line of general
housekeeping, cooking and serving food, and laundering.
In order to give practical demonstration in housekeeping and to develop
the sense of responsibility in the work, a four-room house has been set
aside, in which the Senior girls "keep house." Four girls at a time live
in this house and have the entire care of it. They do all the work that
pertains to ordinary housekeeping, from the Monday morning's washing to
the Saturday's preparation for Sunday. They are also charged with the
responsibility of purchasing the food supplies which they consume. Three
dollars are allowed as the weekly expenditure for food. In view of the
low prices that obtain for provisions here, four girls can live
comfortably on this small allowance and have variety and plenty, and at
the same time very wholesome food. Thus the lesson of economy is taught
in the most effective way. The girls learn to appreciate the purchasing
power of money, a kind of training which boarding-students, who have
so much done for them, do not get. They acquire the habit of evolving
their own plans, of exercising unhampered their own tastes. Regularity,
system, exactness, neatness, and the feeling of responsibility, are all
developed in this way.
[Illustration: A MODEL DINING-ROOM.
From the department where table-service is taught.]
In both the Parker Model Home and the Practise Cottage I have charge,
with my assistant, of the oversight of what is done in the direction of
providing food, cooking it, serving it, etc.
Twenty-one classes a week are now taught; the preparatory classes one
hour per week, and the normal classes two to three hours per week. The
girls are required to work in groups, to wear white aprons, caps, and
sleeves, and to bring to the classes towels and holders. Each girl
brings her own blank books and keeps, through the year, a full report of
each lesson given.
Most of the girls who come to us know absolutely nothing of cooking and
housekeeping. They are, as a rule, like most beginners, more anxious to
make cakes, candies, pies, etc., than to make bread, to care for
utensils, and learn the practical things most necessary. Improvement
soon follows, however.
We do some outside "extension work," in addition to what has been
enumerated: a cooking class in the town of Tuskegee for those unable to
attend the school at all, and classes for the children at the Children's
House, the model training-school of the institution, where they are
given understandable lessons in cooking and housekeeping. A bedroom, a
dining-room, a bathroom, and a kitchen are also provided in connection
with the Children's House.
I am happy in the thought that I have a part in this fundamental,
home-building part of the instruction being given the girls who come
from thirty-six States and territories of the Union, and from Cuba and
Porto Rico and other foreign countries, to attend this famous school, of
which I am myself a graduate.
When the girls are fitted to make better homes, a better people are the
result. To have some part in this work was a fond wish while a student,
and is a prized privilege now that I have the opportunity to render some
slight service in return for all that Tuskegee has done for me.
IX
A WOMAN'S WORK
BY CORNELIA BOWEN
Of myself and the work I have done there is not a great deal to say. I
was born at Tuskegee, Ala., on a part of the very ground now occupied by
the famous Tuskegee Institute. The building first used by the school as
an industrial building for girls was the house in which I was born. That
old building (and two others, as well) is carefully preserved by the
institution as an old landmark, and never do I go to Tuskegee that I do
not search it out among the more imposing and pretentious buildings
which have come during the later years of the school's history. This
building and the two other small ones were on the property when it was
acquired by Principal Washington.
My mother lived the greater part of her life at this place as the slave
of Colonel William Bowen, who owned the plot of ground upon which the
Tuskegee Institute now stands. The birthplace of my mother was
Baltimore, Md. She was taught to read by her master's daughter in
Baltimore, and was never forbidden to read by those who owned her in
Alabama.
When a child, I could never understand why she read so well and could
not write. I was very sorry at times that she could read and was not
like other children's mothers whom I knew. She always knew when I did
not get my lessons, and often the hours of play that were dear to me
were taken away until my reading lesson was learned. Sundays, with my
sisters gathered about her knees, we would sit for hours listening as
mother would read church hymns for us. These days were days of freedom,
as I do not remember, and know nothing of, those of slavery. My mother
always refrained from telling her children frightful stories of the
awful sufferings of the slave days. She occupied the position of
seamstress and house-servant in her mistress's home, and was never
allowed to mingle with plantation slaves.
My first teacher was a good-hearted Southern white woman, who knew my
mother well and lived in the town of Tuskegee.
She taught me to read from McGuffey's First Reader. I often read my
lessons by looking at the pictures, for I did not know one word from
another--so far as the letters were concerned. She detected one day,
however, that I was looking out into the street and at the same time
reading what I supposed to be the lesson. From that time on she devoted
herself to teaching me so that I should know letters, and that I should
read properly. She always claimed that I was an apt pupil. At any rate,
at a very early age I was able to both read and write. As I grew older I
was sent with my sisters to the public schools of Tuskegee. It was
always my ambition, it is not immodest to say, to excel in whatever I
undertook. That which brought tears to my eyes quicker than any other
one thing was to have some member of my class recite a better lesson, or
"turn me down"--that is, go up ahead of me in the class.
Having been brought up in the Methodist Sunday-school, I later joined
the Methodist Church. Mr. Lewis Adams, a Trustee of the Tuskegee
Institute, was then Superintendent of the Methodist Sunday-school. He
was very desirous that the young boys and girls of the Sunday-school
should take an active part in the work. I was given a class of girls to
teach much older than myself. They tried to disgust me at times by
paying no attention to my teaching. I was not to be discouraged,
although I cried many times because of their conduct. My own sister, who
was a member of the class, also rebelled because I was younger than she;
she thought that she should be teaching me instead of having it
otherwise. It was the common opinion of the girls that even if I could
read better than any of them, they were older and should be shown the
preference. I owe much of my interest in the study of the Bible to my
mother and to Mr. Lewis Adams, the faithful worker and Sunday-school
Superintendent. Mr. Adams was in those early days as he is now, the
leader of the colored people of the town of Tuskegee in all that went to
make for the uplifting of his people. I can pay no better tribute to him
than to quote what Principal Washington himself says in his monumental
autobiography, Up from Slavery:
In the midst of the difficulties which I encountered in getting the
little school started, and since then through a period of nineteen
years, there are two men among all the many friends of the school
in Tuskegee upon whom I have depended constantly for advice and
guidance; and the success of the undertaking is largely due to
these men, from whom I have never sought anything in vain. I
mention them simply as types. One is a white man and an
ex-slaveholder, Mr. George W. Campbell; the other is a black man
and an ex-slave, Mr. Lewis Adams. These were the men who wrote to
General Armstrong for a teacher.
Mr. Campbell is a merchant and banker, and had had little
experience in dealing with matters pertaining to education. Mr.
Adams was a mechanic, and had learned the trades of shoemaking,
harness-making, and tinsmithing during the days of slavery. He had
never been to school a day in his life, but in some way he had
learned to read and write while a slave. From the first, these two
men saw clearly what my plan of education was, sympathized with me,
and supported me in every effort. In the days which were darkest
financially for the school, Mr. Campbell was never appealed to when
he was not willing to extend all the aid in his power. I do not
know two men--one an ex-slaveholder, one an ex-slave--whose advice
and judgment I would feel more like following in everything which
concerns the life and development of the school at Tuskegee than
those of these two men.
I have always felt that Mr. Adams, in a large degree, derived his
unusual powers of mind from the training given his hands in the
process of mastering well three trades during the days of slavery.
I did not graduate from the public schools as children do nowadays in
the cities. Mr. Booker T. Washington's coming to Tuskegee and the
establishment of the Tuskegee Normal School put an end to the
public-school work on "Zion Hill," where the Tuskegee public school for
colored children was located. I was one of the first of the students
examined for entrance in the school. Mr. Washington gave the examination
in arithmetic, grammar, and history. I never knew what a sentence was,
nor that it had a subject and a predicate before he said so. I doubted
very seriously the existence of such terms as these new ones mentioned
by him. I thought I knew grammar, and I did, so far as I had been
taught, but I had no insight into its real meaning and use. Mr.
Washington decided after my examination that I would make a good Junior
pupil. It was all new to me and I could not understand all of the new
words, even though simple they were, used by him. He himself took charge
of our classes, and I have always been very proud that I can say that he
was my teacher. He was most particular in regard to spelling and the
right use of verbs. As a history teacher he was the best I have had the
privilege of studying under. I have often said that if he could teach
the classes in the beginning of history and grammar, and give talks on
spelling at Tuskegee as he did when I was a pupil there, many who finish
at Tuskegee would be thankful in the years to come. However, he can not
do this until he is relieved of the great burden of raising funds for
the school.
The industrial departments at Tuskegee were not, of course, so elaborate
and so many while I was a pupil there. My four years at Tuskegee were
given wholly to class-room work. To my class, that graduated in
1885--the first one to graduate, we proudly boast--three Peabody medals
were awarded for excellence in scholarship. Our diplomas were also
graded. We took an examination for the medals, as there were ten in the
graduating class. I was awarded one of the medals. The Class of '85 had
high ideals and always regretted that any member should receive a
second-grade diploma. I was very thankful to learn after two weeks'
waiting that, in the opinion of the Faculty, I was worthy of a
first-grade diploma.
After graduating, I was employed as the principal of the
training-school--now known as the "Children's House"--of the Tuskegee
Institute. Feeling that I could be of more service to my people, and
could better teach in the outside world the principles for which
Tuskegee stands, I resigned my work at Tuskegee, after several terms,
for a broader field of usefulness.
A call reached Mr. Washington in 1888 for a teacher to begin a work in
the vicinity of Mt. Meigs, Ala., similar to the work done at Tuskegee,
but, of course, on a smaller scale. Mr. E. N. Pierce, of Plainville,
Conn., had resolved to do something in the way of providing better
school facilities for the colored people living on a large plantation,
into the possession of which he had come. Mr. Washington answered the
call while in Boston, and telegraphed me that he thought me the proper
person to take charge of and carry on the settlement work Mr. Pierce and
his friends had in mind.
I found at Mt. Meigs, after studiously investigating conditions, that
the outlook for support was far from hopeful. Not one person in the
whole community owned a foot of land, and heavy crop mortgages were the
burden of every farmer. It became evident at once that pioneer work was
very much needed. Homes were neglected, and the sacredness of family
life was unknown to most of the people. The prospect was a gloomy one.
The little Baptist church in which the older people gathered for worship
two Sundays in each month badly needed repairing.
I began first of all to connect myself with the Sunday-school, and
taught there every Sunday. I organized a large class of the older people
and encouraged them in every way to attend the Sunday-school every
Sunday with the children. None of these mothers or fathers could read or
write.
I taught them Scripture verses by repeating verse after verse till they
were able to recite them for me. I also sought to teach them to read,
and quite a large number can read now because of the opportunities
provided by my Sunday-school class. I have kept this class of older
people together, and it is one of the most active ones of all. We have
studied together many other things aside from the Sunday-school lessons,
and it has been necessary to do so, because the people have none of the
opportunities provided for those who live in the towns and cities. I was
early much encouraged to note that my efforts were appreciated by the
people.
I was often called upon to act as arbiter in all kinds of difficult and
unpleasant disputes involving family relations and other differences
among the people. Many and many a time did I take the place of the
minister and speak to the people when he could not be present.
To teach the people self-help, the surest sign of progress, we decided
to plan for a main school building which should mark the center of our
activities. This building we were able to erect at a cost of $2,000, and
it is a satisfaction to the people of the community that they alone paid
every cent of the cost, not one penny coming from the outside. The
struggle was a long one, a hard one, with bad crops and other hard
conditions interfering with our plans.
This building is a two-story one, well ventilated, roomy, and
accommodates 300 pupils. From the first we have sought to follow in the
footsteps of the parent institution, and have had the industries taught;
agriculture was introduced at once.
A large Trades Building was soon erected and teachers from Tuskegee
secured to help in the work. Blacksmithing, wheelwrighting, carpentry,
painting, and agriculture have been provided for the young men, and
cooking, laundering, housekeeping, and sewing for the young women.
The following buildings we now have in addition to those named: a
dormitory for girls, a blacksmithing-shop, and a teachers' home. More
than 4,000 pupils have come under the influence of the school.
[Illustration: THE CULTURE OF BEES.
Students at work in the apiary.]
I have continuously, for seventeen years, with the exception of a short
period, been in charge of the school; during the absence referred to I
was studying in New York city, and afterward, through the generosity of
a friend, was able to spend one year in Queen Margaret's College,
Glasgow, Scotland.
I am pleased with the progress the people have made. Many now own their
own homes, and eight and ten persons are no longer content to sleep in
one-room log cabins, as was only too true during the earlier years of my
work. I have regularly had "mothers' meetings," and these have raised
the home life of the people to a higher standard. I know what I am
saying when I state that sacred family ties are respected and
appreciated as never before in this immediate region.
The emotional church life of the people no longer prevails hereabouts,
and the minister preaches forty minutes, instead of two hours as
formerly.
Many farmers are out of debt, and a mortgage upon a man's crop is as
disreputable as a saloon.
The Mt. Meigs Institute is the first school of its kind in Alabama to
demonstrate the fact that a school planted among the people in the rural
districts of the South will make for intelligent, honest, thrifty
citizenship. The success of this work made possible the establishment of
many similar schools that have been planted in Alabama and other parts
of the South.
Of the young men and women who have attended my school I can not speak
too highly. Sixty have graduated, and fifty-seven of the number are
still living. Not only they, but many who could not afford to stay and
graduate, are at work in an effort to help their less fortunate
brethren. Thirty-six of my graduates have taken academic or trade
courses in other schools, twenty-one of them at Tuskegee Institute. Ten
have graduated from Tuskegee, or from other schools. Thirty-eight of
them have learned trades, and all of them are at work and prosperous.
They include dressmakers, cooks, housekeepers, laundresses, carpenters,
blacksmiths, wheelwrights, painters, etc. Several are successful
farmers, and one of the girls is a large cotton-planter and general
farmer. Two are successful merchants in Birmingham, Ala.; one is a
prominent minister, having also taken a course at the Virginia Union
Seminary, Richmond, Va.; one is in charge of an orphan asylum, and
several are teachers; one taught with me for seven years after having
also graduated from Tuskegee. Thirty have married, fifteen have bought
homes, one has property valued at $7,000, others have property ranging
in value from $800 to $2,000. Of the sixty, only four have failed to
maintain their moral character.
Six teachers are now employed; we really need another. About 30 boarding
pupils are regularly enrolled, with 250 pupils in daily attendance from
near-by homes.
The school is conducted just as economically as it well can be; the
annual expense is about $2,000, of which sum I have insisted that the
people themselves shall annually meet one-half.
If I have been of any service to my people, I owe it all to Mr.
Washington and to one of the noblest women that ever lived, Mrs. Booker
T. Washington, née Davidson, both of whom indelibly impressed upon me
while attending the Tuskegee Institute those lessons which led me to
want to spend myself in the helping of my people.
X
UPLIFTING THE SUBMERGED MASSES
BY W. J. EDWARDS
I was born in Snow Hill, Wilcox County, Ala., in the year 1870. My
mother died when I was twelve months old. About five or six years after
this, perhaps, my father went away from Snow Hill; the next I heard he
was dead. Thus at the age of six I was left without father or mother. I
was then placed in the care of my old grandmother, who did all that was
in her power to send me to the school located near us. Often for weeks I
would go to school without anything but bread to eat. Occasionally she
could secure a little piece of meat.
I well remember one morning, when I had started to school and she had
given me all the meat that we had in the house, how it worried me that
she should have nothing left for herself but bread. Worrying over our
cramped condition, I resolved that what she did for me should not be
thrown away. I longed for the time when I could repay her for all she
had done for me.
At the age of twelve it pleased the Almighty God to take from me my
grandmother, my only dependence. I was now left to fight the battle of
life alone. I need not tell of the hard times and sufferings that I
experienced until I entered school at the Tuskegee Institute. But
knowing that I was without parents, and being sick most of the time, my
hardships can be imagined.
Through a minister I heard of the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial
Institute in the early part of 1888, and so favorably was it recommended
that I decided I would rent two acres of land and raise a crop, and take
the proceeds and go to Tuskegee the following fall. After paying my
rents and other small debts I had $20 left with which to buy my clothes
and start for Tuskegee, which I did, starting on the 27th of December,
1888, and arriving at Tuskegee on the first day of January, 1889, with
$10. I had walked most of the way. I was at Tuskegee for four and
one-half years. I managed to stay there for that length of time by
working one day in the week and every other Saturday during the term and
all of the vacations.
During my Senior year I was helped by Mr. R. O. Simpson, the owner of
the plantation on which I was reared. I had trouble that year in
deciding just what I should do after graduation. It had been my
conviction that I must be a lawyer or a minister. In contemplating the
idea of becoming a lawyer, however, I could not see wherein I could
carry out the Tuskegee Idea of uplifting the masses. The ministerial
profession was very little better, since the work of the minister in our
section of the country must be limited almost wholly to one
denomination. So I finally decided to try to plant an institution
similar to the Tuskegee School, an undenominational one, in a section of
Alabama where such work should be needed. I chose, as my field of labor,
Snow Hill, the place from which I had gone to enter school at Tuskegee.
The school is now known as the Snow Hill Normal and Industrial
Institute, and is located in the very center of the "Black Belt" of the
State of Alabama. This is a much-used term; it is not applicable,
however, to every Southern State, neither does it apply to every county
in any one State. It is only to certain counties in certain States to
which it may properly be applied. Wilcox and the seven adjoining
counties constitute one of these sections in Alabama. The latest census
shows that these eight counties have a colored population of 201,539,
and a white population of 69,915.
Alabama has sixty-seven counties, with a total colored population of
827,307. Thus it will be seen that one-eighth of the counties contain
one-fourth of the entire colored population. Because the colored people
outnumber the white people in such great proportion, this is called the
"Black Belt" of the State. These counties lie in the valley of the
Alabama River, and constitute the most fertile section of the State.
During the early settlement of the State, white men coming into these
fertile counties not only would settle as much land as a family of four
or five in number could cultivate, but as much as they were able to buy
Negroes to cultivate. Quite a few families with only five or six in
number would have land enough to work from 100 to 1,000 Negroes. One can
see from this how a few white families would, as they often did, own a
whole county. Now the Negro is not migratory in his nature; having been
brought to these counties during slavery, he has remained here in
freedom. He is not, therefore, primarily responsible for his being here
in such great numbers. These white families settled in little villages
seven or eight miles apart. The distances between were made up of their
plantations, on which were thousands of slaves. Only a few Negroes were
employed as domestics in comparison with the great numbers who worked on
plantations. It was only these few who, in learning to serve the white
man, properly got a glimpse of real home life. The masses had absolutely
no idea of such a life; nothing was done that would lead them to secure
any such knowledge.
Since their emancipation the masses of these people have had neither
competent preachers nor teachers; consequently most of them have
remained hopelessly ignorant even until this day. One hearing the great
condemnation heaped upon the Negro in these sections for his failure to
measure up to the standards of true citizenship and to proper standards
of life would get the idea that the proud Anglo-Saxon has spent a great
deal of time in trying to teach him the fundamental principles that
underlie life; but this is not the case. There are exceptions to all
rules, however, and here and there one may find noble and patriotic
white men laboring for the uplift of fallen humanity without regard to
race, color, or previous condition.
During the summer of 1893, after returning from Tuskegee, being anxious
to learn more of the real condition of our people in the "Black Belt," I
visited most of the places in Wilcox County and a few places in the
counties of Monroe, Butler, Dallas, and Lowndes, making the entire
journey on foot.
It was a bright and beautiful morning in June when I started from my
home, a log cabin. More than two hundred Negroes were in the near-by
fields plowing corn, hoeing cotton, and singing those beautiful songs
often referred to as plantation melodies. Notably, I am Going to Roll in
my Jesus' Arms; O Freedom! Before I'd be a Slave I'd be Carried to My
Grave, etc., may be mentioned. With the beautiful fields of corn and
cotton outstretched before me, and the shimmering brook like a silver
thread twining its way through the golden meadows, and then through
verdant fields, giving water to thousands of creatures as it passed, I
felt that the earth was truly clothed in His beauty and the fulness of
His glory.
But I had scarcely gone beyond the limits of the field when I came to a
thick undergrowth of pines. Here we saw old pieces of timber and two
posts.
"This marks the old cotton-gin house," said Uncle Jim, my companion, and
then his countenance grew sad; after a sigh he said: "I have seen many a
Negro whipped within an inch of his life at these posts. I have seen
them whipped so badly that they had to be carried away in wagons. Many
never did recover."
From this our road led first up-hill, then down, and finally through a
stretch of woods until we reached Carlowville. This was once the most
aristocratic village of the southern part of Dallas County. Perhaps no
one who owned less than a hundred slaves was able to secure a home
within its borders. Here still are to be seen the stately mansions of
the Lydes, the Lees, the Wrumphs, the Bibbses, the Youngbloods, and the
Reynoldses. Many of these mansions have been partly rebuilt and
remodeled to conform to modern styles of architecture, while others have
been deserted and are now fast decaying. Usually these mansions are
occupied by others than the original families. The original families
have sold out or have died out.
In Carlowville stands the largest white church in Dallas or Wilcox
Counties. It has a seating capacity of 1,000, excluding the balcony,
which, during slavery, was used exclusively for the Negroes of the
families attending.
Our stay in Carlowville was necessarily short, as the evening sun was
low and the nearest place for lodging was two miles ahead. Before
reaching this place we came to a large one-room log cabin, 30 feet by 36
feet, on the road-side, with a double door and three holes for windows
cut in the sides. There was no chimney nor anything to show that the
room could be heated in cold weather. This was the Hope-well Baptist
Church. Here 500 members congregated one Sunday in each month and spent
the entire day in eating, shouting, and "praising God for His goodness
toward the children of men." Here also the three months' school was
taught during the winter. A few hundred yards beyond this church brought
us to the home of a Deacon Jones.
He was living in the house occupied by the overseer of the plantation
during slavery. It was customary for Deacon Jones to care for strangers
who chanced to come into the community, especially for the preachers and
teachers. So here we found rest.
His family consisted of himself, his wife, and six children--two boys
and four girls. Mrs. Jones was noted for her ability to prepare food
well, and in a short while invited us to a delicious supper of fried
chicken, fried ham, some very fine home-made sugar-cane sirup, and an
abundance of milk and butter. At supper Deacon Jones told of the many
preachers he had entertained and their fondness for chicken.
After supper I spent some time in trying to find out the real condition
of the people in this section. Mr. Jones told me how, for ten years, he
had been trying to buy some land, and had been kept from it more than
once, but that he was still hopeful of getting the right deeds for the
land for which he had paid. He also told of many families who had
recently moved into this community. These newcomers had made a good
start for the year and had promising crops, but they were compelled to
mortgage their growing crops in order to get "advances" for the year.
When asked of the schools, he said that there were more than five
hundred children of school age in his township, but not more than two
hundred of these had attended school the previous winter, and most of
these for a period not longer than six weeks. He also said that the
people were very indifferent as to the necessity of schoolhouses and
churches. Quite a few who cleared a little money the previous year had
spent it all in buying whisky, in gambling, in buying cheap jewelry, and
for other useless articles. After spending two hours in such talk I
retired for the evening. Thus ended the first day of my search for
first-hand information.
We had a fine night's rest. Mr. Jones was up at early dawn to feed his
horses and cattle, and before the sun was up he was out on his farm.
Mrs. Jones and one of the daughters were left to prepare breakfast, and
soon they, too, were ready to join the others on the farm. We took
advantage of this early rising and were soon off on our journey.
Instead of going farther northward, we turned our course westward for
the town of Tilden, which is only eight miles west of Snow Hill. The
road from Carlowville to Tilden is somewhat hilly, but a very pleasant
one, and for miles the large oak-trees formed an almost perfect arch.
On reaching Tilden we learned that there would be a union meeting of two
of the churches that night. I decided that this would give me an
opportunity to study the religious life of these people for myself. The
members of churches No. 1 and No. 2 assembled at their respective places
at eight o'clock. The members of church No. 2 had a short
praise-service, and formed a line of procession to march to church No.
1. All the women of the congregation had their heads bound in pieces of
white cloth, and they sang their peculiar songs as they marched. When
the members of church No. 2 were within a few hundred yards of church
No. 1, the singing then alternated, and finally, when the members of
church No. 2 came to church No. 1, they marched around this church three
times before entering it. After entering, six sermons were preached to
the two congregations by six different ministers, and at least three of
these could not read a word in the Bible. Each minister occupied at
least one hour. Their texts were as often taken from Webster's blue-back
speller as from the Bible, and sometimes this would be held upside down.
It was about two o'clock in the morning when the services were
concluded.
Here, again, we found no schoolhouses, and the three months' school had
been taught in one of the little churches.
The next day we started for Camden, a distance of sixteen miles. This
section between Tilden and Camden is perhaps the most fertile section of
land in the State of Alabama. Taking a southwest course from Tilden, I
crossed into Wilcox County again, where I saw acres of corn and miles of
cotton, all being cultivated by Negroes.
The evening was far advanced when we reached Camden, but having been
there before, we had no difficulty in securing lodging. Camden is the
seat of Wilcox County, and has a population of about three thousand
inhabitants.
The most costly buildings of the town were the court-house and jail, and
these occupied the most conspicuous places.
Here great crowds of Negroes would gather on Saturdays to spend their
earnings of the week for a fine breakfast or dinner on the following
Sunday, or for useless trivialities.
On Saturday evenings, on the roads leading to and from Camden, as from
other towns, could be seen groups of Negroes gambling here and there,
and buying and selling whisky. As the county had voted against licensing
whisky-selling, this was a violation of the law, and often the
commission merchant, a Negro, was imprisoned for the offense, while
those who supplied him went free.
In Camden I found one Negro schoolhouse; this was a box-like cottage, 20
by 16 feet, and was supposed to seat more than one hundred students.
This school, like those taught in the churches, was open only three
months in the year.
After a two days' stay in Camden I next visited Miller's Ferry; this is
on the Alabama River, twelve miles west of Camden. The road from Camden
is one of the best roads in the State, and for miles and miles one could
see nothing but cotton and corn.
At Miller's Ferry a Negro schoolhouse of ample proportions had been
built on Judge Henderson's plantation. Here the school ran seven months
in the year, and the colored people in the community were prosperous and
showed a remarkable degree of intelligence. Their church was equally as
attractive as their schoolhouse.
Judge Henderson was for twelve years Probate Judge of Wilcox County. He
proved to be one of the best judges this county has ever had, and even
unto this day he is admired by all, both white and black, rich and poor,
for his honesty, integrity, and high sense of justice. From Judge
Henderson's place we traveled southward to Rock-west, a distance of more
than fifteen miles. During this journey hundreds of Negroes were seen at
work in the corn- and cotton-fields. These people were almost wholly
ignorant, as they had neither schools nor teachers, and their ministers
were almost wholly illiterate.
At Rock-west I found a very intelligent colored man who had attended
school at Selma, Ala., for a few years. He owned his home and ran a
small grocery. He told of the hardships with which he had to contend in
building up his business, and of the almost hopeless condition of the
Negroes about there. He said that they usually made money each year, but
that they did not know how to keep it. The merchants would induce them
to buy buggies, machines, clocks, etc., but would never encourage them
to buy homes. We were very much pleased with the reception which Mr.
Darrington gave us, and felt very much like putting into practise our
State motto, "Here We Rest," at his home, but our objective point for
the day was Fatama, sixteen miles away.
On our journey that afternoon we saw hundreds of Negro one-room log
cabins. Some of these were located in the dense swamps and some on the
hills, while others were miles away from the public road. Most of these
people had never seen a locomotive. We reached Fatama about seven
o'clock that night, and here for the first time we were compelled to
divide our crowd in order to get a night's lodging. Each of us had to
spend the night in a one-room cabin. It was my privilege to spend the
night with Uncle Jake, a jovial old man, a local celebrity. After
telling him of our weary journey, he immediately made preparation for me
to retire. This was done by cutting off my bed from the remainder of the
cabin by hanging up a sheet on a screen. While somewhat inconvenient, my
rest that night was pleasant, and the next morning found me very much
refreshed and ready for another day's journey. Our company assembled at
Uncle Jake's for breakfast, after which we started for Pineapple.
We found the condition of the Negroes between Fatama and Pineapple much
the same as that of those we had seen the previous day. No schoolhouse
was to be seen, but occasionally we would see a church at the
cross-roads. We reached Pineapple late in the afternoon.
From Pineapple we went to Greenville, and from Greenville to Fort
Deposit, and from Fort Deposit we returned to Snow Hill, after having
traveled a distance of 157 miles and visiting four counties.
In three of these counties there is a colored population of 42,810
between the ages of five and twenty years, and a white population of
7,608 of the same ages. In fact, the Negro school population of Wilcox
and the seven adjoining counties is as follows: Wilcox, 11,623; Dallas,
18,292; Lowndes, 13,044; Monroe, 5,615; Butler, 5,924; Marengo, 12,362;
Clark, 6,898; Perry, 10,723; making a total of 85,499. Speaking of
public schools in the sense that educators use the term, the colored
people in this section have none. Of course, there are so-called public
schools here and there, running from three to five months in the year
and paying the teachers from $7.50 to $18 per month; but the teachers
are incompetent, and the schools are usually in the hands of those not
too much interested in the cause of education. Many of these trustees do
not visit the schools once in ten years, and they know absolutely
nothing of the methods of discipline even used by the teachers.
Our trip through this section revealed the following facts: (1) That
while many opportunities were denied our people, they abused many
privileges; (2) that there was a colored population, in this section
visited, of more than 200,000, and a school population of 85,499; (3)
that the people were ignorant and superstitious; (4) that the teachers
and preachers for the most part were of the same condition; (5) that
there were no public or private libraries and reading-rooms to which
they had access; (6) that, strictly speaking, there were no public
schools and only one private one. Now what can be expected of any people
in such a condition? Can the blind lead the blind? They could not in the
days of old, and it is not likely that they can now.
After this trip through the "Black Belt" I was more convinced than ever
before of the great need of an industrial school in the very midst of
these people; a school that would correct the erroneous ideas the people
held of education; a school that would put most stress upon the things
which the people were most likely to have to do with through life; a
school that would endeavor to make education practical rather than
theoretical; a school that would train men and women to be good workers,
good leaders, good husbands, good wives, and finally train them to be
fit citizens of the State, and proper subjects for the kingdom of God.
With this idea the Snow Hill Normal and Industrial Institute was started
ten years ago in an old, dilapidated, one-room log cabin with one
teacher, three students, and no State appropriation, and without any
church or society responsible for one dollar of its expenses. Aside
from this unfortunate state of affairs, the condition of the people was
most miserable. This was due partly to poor crops and partly to bad
management on their part.
In many instances the tenants were not only unable to pay their debts,
but were also unable to pay their rents. In a few cases the landlords
had to provide, at their own expense, provisions for their tenants. This
was simply another way of establishing soup-houses on the plantations.
The idea of buying land was foreign to all of them, and there were not
more than twenty acres of land owned by the colored people in this whole
neighborhood. The churches and schools were practically closed, while
crime and immorality were rampant. The carrying of men and women to the
chain-gang was a frequent occurrence. Aside from all this, these people
believed that the end of education was to free their children from
manual labor rather than prepare them for more and better work. They
were very much opposed to industrial education. When the school was
started, many of the parents came to the school and forbade our
"working" their children, stating as their objection that their children
had been working all their lives, and they did not mean to send them to
school to learn to work. Not only did they forbid our having their
children work, but many took their children out of school rather than
have them do so. A good deal of this opposition was kept up by
illiterate preachers and incompetent teachers, here and there, who had
not had any particular training for their profession. In fact,
ninety-eight per cent of them had attended no school. We continued,
however, to keep the "industrial plank" in our platform, and year after
year some additional industry was added until we now have thirteen
industries in constant operation. Agriculture is the foremost and basic
industry of the institution. We do this because we are in a farming
section and ninety-five per cent of the people in this section depend
upon some form of agriculture for a livelihood. How changed are the
conditions now as regards our work! From the little one-room log cabin,
the school has grown so that it now owns 100 acres of land, 14
buildings, counting large and small, with property valued at $37,000.
From three students, it has grown so that we now have a school with more
than four hundred students annually in attendance, representing more
than a dozen Alabama counties and seven States. It has also grown from
one to twenty teachers and officers. Including the class that graduated
last term, thirty-seven have finished the course. All are living but
one. No charge of criminal wrong-doing has been brought against even one
of them. One of the young women is married to the head teacher, another
to the superintendent of industries, and seven other graduates are
employed in responsible positions by the school. One of these has taken
a special course at Harvard University, three have taken additional
courses at Tuskegee, one is in charge of the woman's department of a
large school in Mississippi, two have founded schools of their own, one
at Tilden, Ala., the other at Greensboro, Ala. All have remained in the
country among the masses whom they are helping to uplift, and most of
them in Wilcox County, the county in which the school is located. Of the
thirty-seven graduates, twenty-seven own their own homes. Aside from the
graduates, about five hundred others have been under the influence of
the school for a longer or shorter period; many of these are making
exceptionally good records.
The growth on the part of the people has kept corresponding pace with
the growth of the institution. The farmers, who ten years ago depended
wholly on the landlords for food supplies, have grown to be independent,
raising most of their own supplies. They are rapidly passing from the
renters' class to the owners' class; they are possessing themselves of
the soil. This may be seen from the fact that ten years ago they owned
in this county but twenty acres of land; to-day they own 4,000 acres of
land. Many of the most prosperous farmers have opened bank-accounts. The
people no longer oppose industrial education; they now refuse to send
their children to any school where they can not secure some industrial
education.
For our part we find it wholly impossible to accommodate all who come to
us from time to time to take the trades' instruction. The churches
hereabout have been revived, new and better schoolhouses have been
built, and the county school terms extended in many cases from two and
three to five and six months; competent teachers and preachers, both
intellectually and morally, have been employed. Crime and immorality are
being uprooted, and virtue and civic righteousness are being planted in
their stead. The commercial and economic conditions have improved in
every way, and there was never a more cordial relation existing between
the races in this section than now. With these things true, the one-room
log cabin can not survive, and is rapidly giving way to houses having
three, four, and, in some places, six and seven rooms.
After having been here at Snow Hill for a few years, we felt that while
we were helping the children in the class-room, something should be done
to help the parents; so we organized what we call the Snow Hill Negro
Conference, on January 13, 1897. This conference is modeled after the
famous Tuskegee Negro Conferences, and meets once a year. At this
conference the farmers from this and the adjoining counties come
together. There were 500 at our last conference. The school is almost
wholly given up to farmers on Conference day. Here we listen to
educational, religious, moral, and financial reports from many sections.
Those who have succeeded, tell the others how they have done so, and
those who have not succeeded tell how they are trying to succeed. From
these annual meetings the farmers get new ideas, new information, and
take fresh courage; they return to their farms more determined to
succeed than ever before. When we commenced these meetings the reports
were discouraging, and from many sections the condition of the race
thereabout seemed hopeless. Many said that in the same section they
could not buy land at any price. There were only twenty acres of land
reported at the first conference. At the last one, reports showed that
the people had purchased more than four thousand acres since the
beginning of these conferences seven years ago. At our first meeting the
reports showed that the one-room log-cabin home was the rule; at our
last meeting it had become the exception. These conferences have tried
all along to induce the people to raise more of their own food-supplies.
We also waged a ceaseless war upon the one-room log-cabin home, which
has resulted in almost annihilating them. This war shall never cease
until there is not a one-room log cabin left in all this section. The
one-room log cabin is a pestilent menace to decent living.
Following the farmers' conference, we have the workers' conference
during vacation. This conference is chiefly composed of teachers and
preachers, and represents an idea got from Tuskegee. In this conference
we get a clear idea of what the teachers and preachers are doing, the
methods they are pursuing, and the results being achieved. The teachers
are encouraged to make education less theoretical and more practical;
the preachers are urged to preach to our people less of the dying
religion and more of the living religion. While they are encouraged to
build better schoolhouses and churches, they are also reminded of the
fact that these are not the ends, but only the means to an end; that
they are only of value in proportion as they can be used to build up a
hopeful and noble life in the communities where they are located.
However much the material side may be held up to them, they are told
that in the last analysis the spiritual is always the end. The reports
at our last Workers' Conference were most encouraging. Wherever the
intelligent teacher and preacher have gone, the condition of the people
has been improved. To my mind this demonstrates most clearly that the
great need of our people is intelligent leaders, and it is this that we
ask for; it is this for which Snow Hill is striving. While much good is
being accomplished through the Workers' Conference, the "Black Belt
Improvement Society," which I have organized, deals more directly with
the people in our immediate neighborhood. The aim of this society is
clearly set forth in its constitution, a part of which is as follows:
1. This society shall be known as the Black Belt Improvement
Society. Its object shall be the general uplift of the people of
the Black Belt of Alabama; to make them better morally, mentally,
spiritually, and financially.
2. It shall be the object of the Black Belt Improvement Society to,
as far as possible, eliminate the credit system from our social
fabric; to stimulate in all members the desire to raise, as far as
possible, all their food supplies at home, and pay cash for
whatever may be purchased at the stores.
3. To bring about a system of cooperation in the purchase of what
supplies can not be raised at home wherever it can be done to
advantage.
4. To discuss topics of interest to the communities in which the
various societies may be organized, and topics relating to the
general welfare of the race, and especially to farmers.
5. To teach the people to practise the strictest economy, and
especially to obtain and diffuse such information among farmers as
shall lead to the improvement and diversification of crops, in
order to create in farmers a desire for homes and better home
conditions, and to stimulate a love for labor in both old and
young. Each local organization may offer small prizes for the
cleanest and best-kept house, the best pea-patch, and the best ear
of corn, etc.
6. To aid each other in sickness and in death; for this purpose a
fee of ten cents will be collected from each member every month and
held sacred, to be used for no other purpose whatever.
7. It shall be one of the great objects of this society to
stimulate its members to acquire homes, and urge those who already
possess homes to improve and beautify them.
8. To urge our members to purchase only the things that are
absolutely necessary.
9. To exert our every effort to obliterate those evils which tend
to destroy our character and our homes, such as intemperance,
gambling, and social impurity.
10. To refrain from spending money and time foolishly or in
unprofitable ways; to take an interest in the care of our highways,
in the paying of our taxes, and the education of our children; to
plant shade trees, repair our yard fences, and in general, as far
as possible, bring our home life up to the highest standards of
civilization.
This society has several standing committees, as follows: on government,
on education, on business, on housekeeping, on labor, and on farming.
The chairman of these respective committees holds monthly meetings in
the various communities, at which time various topics pertaining to the
welfare and uplift of the people are discussed. As a result of these
meetings the people return to their homes with new inspiration. These
meetings are doing good in the communities where they are being held,
and our sincere hope is that such meetings may be extended. The ills
that most retard the Negroes of the rural South are sought to be reached
by the school and by the several organizations which have been organized
by it. These articles of the simple constitution go to the very bottom
of the conditions.
If one would again take the trip which I made in the summer of 1893, he
would find that two-thirds of the land lying between Snow Hill and
Carlowville, a distance of seven miles, is now owned and controlled
entirely by Negroes. In Carlowville, instead of the old one-room-cabin
church, there is a beautiful church with glass windows. An acre of land
has been bought, and a neat and comfortable schoolhouse with glass
windows has been erected, and a graduate of my school is the teacher.
Many families in that section are now owning homes. A great revolution
is also taking place in Tilden. John Thomas, one of our graduates, Class
of '01, has gone into this place, induced the people to buy thirty acres
of land, on which they have erected a splendid building having two
rooms, and the school is being conducted seven months in the year. Many
farmers in this section are now owning homes, some of them owning as
much as 400 acres of land. This improvement is steadily going on in all
sections where the influence of our school has reached.
Thus it will be seen that the work in the class-room is only a small
part of what we are trying to do for the uplift of the Negro people in
the Black Belt.
In order that this good work may be pushed more rapidly, it is necessary
that we give some time to this particular movement. This can only be
done by our having here a strong and healthy institution with an
endowment sufficiently large to relieve us of our great financial
burden. An adequate endowment would meet this need. While we are anxious
to raise an endowment fund, our burden could be partially relieved by
the school securing possession of a large plantation in the neighborhood
which is now, and has been for three years, offered to us. This
plantation contains between three thousand and four thousand acres of
land, and can be bought for $30,000, and would afford us unbounded
opportunity for the extension of the agricultural features of our work,
which would enable us to raise more, if not all, of our food supplies.
I have tried as simply as possible in this article to state the real
condition of the people in the Black Belt section of this State, and to
tell how we are trying to cope with these conditions. Our constant
feeling is that there is so much to be done, and that so little has been
accomplished.
In closing: The inspiration derived at Tuskegee; the instruction given
in shop, and field, and class-room; the guiding hand of its illustrious
Principal--all of these have had their impress upon me and have urged me
to dedicate myself unreservedly to these people, among whom I was
reared, among whom I shall continue to labor, among whom I shall at the
last be buried.
XI
A DAIRYMAN'S STORY
BY LEWIS A. SMITH
In any attempt to write a story of my life and work, the "work" feature
must predominate.
I was born March 27, 1877, at Louisville, Ky. My father and mother were
slaves of old Georgia stock. My father, after freedom, was for a time
permitted to attend Howard University, Washington, D. C. He was a
candy-maker. My mother attended Atlanta University.
In 1878 my parents left Atlanta, where my two brothers were born, and
located in Louisville. Leaving Louisville in 1881, the family moved to
Chicago, Ill., where I lived until I entered Tuskegee Institute, of
which my mother and I had heard much.
After reaching Chicago, my parents established a confectionery store. My
earlier days were mostly spent behind the counter in the store, not as a
clerk helping to earn profits, but in an endeavor to make profits
disappear. I was much in love with the nice things we had for sale.
An unfortunate family "incident" in 1882 resulted in placing my two
brothers and me in the custody of my mother. Our childhood pleasures
were marred by this affair. Although I was too young to fully understand
the situation, I realized that I lacked the pleasures that other
children had; I realized the absence of that paternal care and affection
that other children enjoyed--the home was not complete. I can not recall
my childhood with any special pleasure.
I entered the public schools of Chicago when I was seven years of age. I
made a very good record in my studies, attested by the fact that I made
two grades the first year, and one grade with excellent marks each
succeeding year thereafter. My deportment was not exemplary. I can
remember occasions when I was severely reprimanded for being absent from
school without an excuse, having gone fishing, or bathing in Lake
Michigan, or skating in the parks in winter.
[Illustration: IN THE DAIRY.
Students using separators.]
That was before the compulsory school law went into effect, or at least
before it affected me. I was not, however, a bad boy. I was neither
rough nor tough; I had no bad habits other than smoking corn-silk
cigarettes, and I soon stopped that as the novelty of the thing wore
off. My young mind and body required recreation. Unlike the children of
the South, who had three months of school and nine months of play or
work in the fields, I had nine months of school and three months of
play. I thought the ratio was in the wrong proportion. But as I grew
older I became more settled and more interested in my studies.
Although during the greater portion of my school life in Chicago I was
the sole Negro pupil in my classes, yet I do not remember a single
occasion when prejudice was leveled at me by teacher or schoolmate.
Early, after throwing off my wildness, I realized the need and the
advantage of possessing an education, and, having such excellent
facilities at hand, determined to become educated, and diligently
pursued that object. Just as I was about to enter the eighth grade,
however, I had to give up going to school, and go to work.
I secured employment with a wood-engraving firm as general office- and
errand-boy. My wages were $2.50 a week. About fifty cents of this sum I
spent each week for car-fare and incidentals. As I lived three miles
from my work it would have been necessary for me to spend my whole
allowance for car-fare had I not stolen rides on railroad trains. I
often wonder now how I could have jumped on and off swift-moving trains,
day after day, without receiving some serious injury. Surely Providence
must have protected me in my endeavor to save my scanty earnings. My
clothing did not cost much, as I was the "happy" recipient of the
cast-off clothes of the older members of the family.
My work was agreeable and my employer was generously sympathetic.
Realizing that wood-engraving and illustrating would offer remunerative
employment, I sought to learn the trade, but was told that I would have
to serve an apprenticeship of six months without pay; that precluded all
hope of learning that trade.
Manhood approached before I was prepared to do anything. I did not earn
much in my youth, and could not expect to earn much in manhood without
preparation. I then resolved to enter school again, but the expense of a
thorough course was an apparently insurmountable obstacle. I had been
unable to save much from my meager allowance. I had heard of the
Tuskegee Institute and of the opportunities there offered to poor young
men and women. I decided to enter that school. A friend helped me to
purchase an excursion ticket to Atlanta, Ga., where was being held the
Cotton-States and International Exposition. I left Chicago in November,
and after two days spent in Atlanta with relatives and in seeing the
sights, I exchanged my return coupon for a ticket to Tuskegee.
I arrived at Chehaw, the station where passengers transfer for Tuskegee,
and taking passage in a wagonette, a crude substitute for our modern
means of interurban transit--the little train was not running on that
day--we drove through a picturesque country abounding in woods, vales,
and cultivated fields, occasionally coming across landmarks of
antebellum days. Here one was really in communion with Nature, so
different it was from the massive specimens of architecture, the clatter
of horses on the cobblestone pavement, the rattle of elevated trains,
and the activity of commercial life of the Western metropolis from which
I had come. As we reached high elevations glimpses of the institution
came into view.
Tuskegee was a surprise to me; it surpassed my fondest hope. The
majestic buildings, the monuments to the fidelity and building skill of
past classes, the well-designed landscape architecture, made me feel
that I had at last found the place where I could be prepared for real
life. I received a cordial welcome from the teachers; also from the
students, especially from those connected with the religious and
literary organizations, of which there are quite a number.
When asked the industry I wished to learn, I chose that of agriculture.
Like hundreds of boys confined to city environment, I had a craving for
Nature, a fondness for live stock, and for all that I should come in
contact with while taking that course. I worked during the daytime the
first year and attended school at night, thereby acquiring experience
and accumulating a credit to apply to my board when I should enter the
day-school. Soon after entering the agricultural department I had made
such progress that I was placed in charge of the hotbeds and grew
vegetables all winter. It was a marvelous accomplishment with me, for I
could not have grown them even in the summer before I entered that
department. The care of the various seeds used on the farm was also in
my charge.
This privilege afforded me opportunities for seed-testing and for
observing plant development; it was all very instructive. While
attending the academic classes at night, the daytime was devoted
entirely to study in the various divisions of the agricultural
department.
At the expiration of my first year as a night-school student, I entered
day-school, devoting about equal time to academic and agricultural
classes, and a small portion of the time to the study of music, being a
member of the Institute brass band, and in my last year a member of the
orchestra.
During my second summer's vacation I went into the southern part of
Montgomery County, Ala., in search of a school to teach. There was no
schoolhouse, no school fund, nor any appropriation available except for
a three months' term during the winter. After further canvass I was
permitted to open a school in the little church at Strata, Ala. The
large attendance of pupils and their eagerness to learn won my sympathy
and I would gladly have planted a sprig of Tuskegee there had I not had
strong inclinations for a commercial life. I conducted a class in
agriculture for the benefit of the farmers. I believe it was helpful to
them. My spare time was spent in going through the country noting the
waste of the land and the lack of enterprise among the owners and
tenants, due in large measure, I am sure, to the mortgage system and the
deep ignorance of the people. Most of the evenings I spent listening to
the terrible stories of slavery days from the lips of those who had
passed through them.
In the midst of this service I received a telegram announcing the death
of my mother. I was too far from home to return in time to see the last
of her, even if I had had the means to do so. I was in grief; I had
sustained a great loss; she was my all, my mother.
I returned to Tuskegee and graduated with the Class of '98.
I am grateful to Tuskegee Institute, to the genius of Mr. Washington,
for the opportunities I had to acquire an education; to the members of
the Faculty for their assistance, and to my father, who gave me much of
material aid and encouragement.
After graduating, I spent two months at special work in the school
dairy; then, with the assistance of my father, I secured a position with
the Forest City Creamery Company of Rockford, Ill. Entering this
company's employ about the 15th of August, 1898, I have been employed
ever since at the same place.
The Forest City Creamery is one of the largest butter-making concerns
in the United States, averaging twenty thousand pounds of butter per
day. We make two grades of butter, known as process, or renovated, and
creamery butter. There are employed at this plant about seventy-five
persons.
My work consists in what is known to the trade as "starter-making" and
preparing the flavor for the butter. The work is bacteriological,
propagating a species of bacteria which produces the pleasant aroma and
flavor of good butter. It requires not only an understanding of
bacteriology, but skilled workmanship and earnest attention to details.
The secret processes of this company are known to a close group only, of
which I am one. My work here has been entirely successful and
satisfactory to my employers, if I may judge from a highly complimentary
interview with one of the officers of the company regarding my work,
published in one of the leading daily newspapers of Rockford, and the
fact that I am now receiving double my initial wages.
I have a record not surpassed by any other employee of this company.
Between June 24, 1901, following a wedding-trip to Tuskegee, and August
15, 1904, when we visited the St. Louis Exposition, I have worked each
day at the Creamery, including Sundays and holidays, my work requiring
that I do so. These 1,155 consecutive days of labor were made possible
by a total abstinence from all intoxicating liquors and tobacco. My
success here can be credited to the efficient training I received at
Tuskegee.
"It is not well for man to live alone." Following this injunction I have
taken unto myself a helpmeet, who is all that the word implies, loving,
economical, and well trained in domestic arts. Shortly after our
marriage we began paying for a home of eleven rooms located in a good
residence portion of the city. The lower part of the house, containing
six rooms, we occupy, and have comfortably furnished; the up-stairs
portion, containing five rooms, we rent to a family of white people; the
rent we receive equals the interest on the investment.
We have one child, a little girl two years old, who furnishes sunshine
to an already happy home.
Our house is surrounded by a lawn with shade- and fruit-trees, and many
flower-beds. The back yard contains a garden with berry plants, a
well-built and well-arranged poultry-house, a yard containing a flock of
pure-bred fowls, the nucleus of a future enterprise, and a barn with a
good horse, a buggy, etc., for our pleasure and convenience.
My ambition when leaving school was first to endeavor to become
independent financially, so that I might enjoy my old age; then, if it
were possible, to gain that independence early in life by economy, by
earning for myself what I earn for my employer; to try to make it
possible for the Negro farmer to sell his produce to the Negro gin, the
Negro cotton-mill, or creamery, as the case might be; my idea being, by
this community of interest, to help the Negro people about me to help
themselves and their fellows. I believe, in the words of the motto of
the Class of '98--my class--that "we rise upon the structure we
ourselves have builded." I have tried to live with this thought ever
before me.
XII
THE STORY OF A WHEELWRIGHT
BY EDWARD LOMAX
I was born in the small town of Demopolis, in the western part of the
State of Alabama, January 17, 1877. My uncle was a wheelwright, and I,
at an early age, was led to desire to become an artisan such as my uncle
was. I interceded with him and became the "handy boy" around the shop in
which he worked, and picked up much useful information; but there was
nothing progressive or directly helpful in the work I was permitted to
do. I also did some little work in blacksmithing while in the shop.
What to me was a fortunate circumstance was the meeting with a chance
acquaintance who was returning from Tuskegee Institute for his vacation.
This young man told me most glowing stories of the Tuskegee Institute.
He was so enthusiastic that he imparted much of his enthusiasm to me. He
himself was taking instruction in the wheelwrighting division, and could
give at first-hand the information I most desired. The whole Tuskegee
plan was outlined to me: how I could learn my trade, and at the same
time get book instruction; how I could earn by labor enough to carry me
through school while securing to myself the advantages mentioned. I had
had to learn by seeing others do, and it was now pointed out to me how I
could "learn by doing," and that was the thing I wanted. I had been used
to being kept from the use of tools and everything that would really
help me to learn wheelwrighting; the only chances I ever had being to
"knock about" the shop, occasionally having some worthless job, with
cast-off tools to work with, entrusted to me.
The upshot of it was that I decided to go to Tuskegee, and carefully
saved as much of my wages of $2.50 per week as I possibly could, so as
to purchase clothing, books, and those incidentals insisted upon by the
school that each student must have. I wrote to the school, and received
a letter from Principal Washington admitting me should I find myself
able to meet the requirements stated as follows:
No person will be admitted to the school as a student who can not
pass the examination for the C Preparatory class. To enter this
class one must be able to read, write, and understand addition,
subtraction, multiplication, and division. Applicants for
admission must be of good moral character and must bring at least
two letters of recommendation as to their moral character from
reliable persons of their communities.
_The Day-School._--The Day-School is intended for those who are
able to pay all or the greater part of their expenses in cash.
Students attending the Day-School are required to work one day in
each week and every other Saturday.
They must also be fourteen years of age, of good physique, and able
to pass the examination for the C Preparatory class, as stated
above.
_The Night-School._--The requirements for entering the Night-School
are the same as for entering the Day-School, with the additional
requisites: Applicants must be fully sixteen years of age instead
of fourteen, and physically able to perform an adult's labor.
Cripples are under no circumstances admitted to this department.
The Night-School is designed for young men and women who earnestly
desire to educate themselves, but who are too poor to pay even the
small charge made in the Day-School. Students will not be admitted
to the Night-School who are known to be able to enter the
Day-School; and when a student has fraudulently gained admission,
upon discovery of the deception, must either enter the Day-School
or leave the institution.
Trades are assigned as nearly as possible in accordance with the
students' desires. In assigning young men and women to a trade,
their mental ability and intelligence to grasp it, and physical
ability to perform the duties required, are all carefully
considered. At the beginning of the school year it often happens
that certain of the industries are quickly filled; and when this
happens, applicants for this particular industry are assigned to
some other division until a vacancy occurs.
The school authorities also sent me a card notifying me as to the
school's requirements in the way of discipline. These seemed to me to be
rather overexacting, but I resolved to try to live up to them if I
should be admitted. Among these were the following:
The rules governing the school are aimed to be those which best
promote the welfare and happiness of all.
Each student is required to have a Bible.
Regular habits of rest and recreation are required.
No student is allowed to leave the grounds without permission.
Male students when permitted to leave the grounds must wear the
regulation cap.
No young woman is permitted to leave the grounds of the institution
unless accompanied by a teacher.
The Institute has adequate facilities for bathing, and all
students are required to bathe at stated periods. Bath-houses for
young men and young women, with swimming-pools and shower-bath
appointments, afford every facility in this regard.
The use of intoxicating drinks and the use of tobacco are strictly
forbidden.
Dice-playing and card-playing are strictly prohibited.
Students are liable to be dropped for inability to master their
studies, irregularity of attendance, or for failure to comply with
the regulations of the school after due notice.
The demeriting system has been adopted by the school as the
principal method of discipline for misconduct: 33-1/3 demerit marks
constitute a "warning," and upon receiving three warnings a student
is liable to suspension or expulsion, according as the Executive
Council may determine.
All non-resident students are expected to board on the
school-grounds, unless there is some good reason for a contrary
arrangement.
Students are not registered for a shorter period than one month;
those who leave before the end of a month are charged for a full
month's board.
When students desire to leave the school they are required to have
parents or guardian write directly to the Principal for permission
to do so.
The Dean of the Woman's Department meets all the young women of the
school each Friday afternoon, and the Commandant all of the young
men every Saturday evening, at which times talks, both instructive
and corrective, are given. No student is excused from these
meetings except by special permission.
Students who sign a contract to work a specified time at some trade
or other work must be released from their contract before
application for an excuse from school will be considered. Any
student leaving without a written excuse will not be allowed to
return, and students under contract will not only be dismissed, but
will forfeit whatever cash there may be to their credit in the
school treasury. Students must settle their accounts before
leaving.
Remittances in payment of bills should be made to the Principal or
Treasurer (and not to the student) by post-office money-order,
registered letter, or check.
Students are not allowed to retain firearms in their possession.
The Commandant of Cadets will retain and give receipts for any
brought.
Low or profane language will subject students to severe discipline.
Students are liable to reprimand, confinement, or other punishment.
Letter-writing is subject to regulation, and all mail- and
express-packages are inspected and contents noted. Students are
urged to write their parents at least once a week.
Wardrobes and rooms of students are subject to inspection and
regulation by proper officers at all times, and regular and
thorough inspection of same are made from time to time.
I was admitted in due course of time.
I reached Tuskegee on the 5th of September, 1896, and after purchasing
books, etc., my "cash assets," $12, were about exhausted. I could not
enter as a day-school student, as I did not have the money to do so. In
the night-school I found a chance which I gladly embraced. As I had
desired, I was assigned to the wheelwright division for two years,
signing a formal contract to that effect. I spent the whole of each day
in the shop, attended industrial or theory classes two afternoons in
each week, besides taking mechanical drawing (as all trades students are
required to do), and attended evening classes.
I applied myself as earnestly as I possibly could, and lost no time in
getting right down to business. So well had I done that, that when a
call reached the school during the spring of 1897 for a competent
blacksmith, I was sent to do the work. I was excused from school on
April 15th of that year and went to Shorter's, Ala., a settlement about
eighteen miles from Tuskegee. I remained there until October.
[Illustration: STUDENTS AT WORK IN THE HARNESS-SHOP.]
In a way, I regarded that period somewhat as a vacation period, as I did
not lose much time from my classes. The surroundings were pleasant and
profitable, and I had a chance to enter into the life of the people and
help them a great deal. While there I earned enough money to send for my
brother and enter him in Tuskegee, that he might have the same chance I
was enjoying to get an education. I wanted my brother to enter the
blacksmith-shop, as I saw visions of a blacksmithing and wheelwrighting
business to be owned and conducted by Lomax Brothers some time in the
future. I also provided clothing out of what I had earned for both my
brother and myself.
At close of the school term in 1898 I was able to secure employment at
Uniontown, Ala., with Messrs. J. L. Dykes and Company, doing a general
wheelwrighting and blacksmithing business--the largest business of its
kind in the town. I remained at Uniontown, working for the firm until
October, when I again returned to Tuskegee. The sum per day I received
was a most flattering tribute to Tuskegee's ability to take a stiff
country lad like myself, and turn him, in a few months, into a workman
commanding decent wages.
What this means to the masses of the students who go to Tuskegee the
general public can have no idea. It is a great thing for a boy who never
earned more than the merest pittance a day to go to a school where he
can secure an education by working for it, and at the same time be
fitted to earn wages, as many of them do, three and even five times as
high as before going there. This accounts, in a large measure I am sure,
for the fact that so large a number refuse to remain and go through the
full courses of academic study.
Many of them, finding themselves able in a few months to earn sums far
beyond any previous hope, decide to take advantage at once of this
increased earning capacity; but since the work is so well graded, no boy
can get his trade without getting, at the same time, academic
instruction, and instruction in those character-forming things all about
the student at Tuskegee.
I began the new term with $50, which sum was to my credit in the school
treasury, having been earned by my labor.
During the summer of 1899 I was again offered work at Uniontown by
Messrs. J. L. Dykes and Company. I remained with them only two months,
however. Afterward I worked at the McKinley Brothers' Wagon Factory at
Demopolis, Ala.; as a journeyman workman at Tuskegee, in the Institute's
Wheelwrighting Shop, and with the Nack Carriage Company at Mobile, Ala.,
the largest shop of its kind in that city and one of the largest in the
whole South, a firm doing strictly high-grade work. In all of these
positions I have every reason to believe that I gave full and complete
satisfaction. While with the last-named company I won the personal favor
and interest of the manager and continued to study. He recommended that
I add to my Tuskegee training by taking the correspondence course of the
Technical School for Carriage Draftsmen and Mechanics, New York. I
remained with this firm until I was offered a position by Mr. R. R.
Taylor, the present director of mechanical industries of the Tuskegee
Institute, three years ago. I was greatly pleased and flattered when I
was called to take charge of the division in which I had received my own
instruction. Since being at Tuskegee I have continued to study, and am
satisfied that I have well used my opportunities.
This division over which I preside is located on the first floor of the
Trades Building. It is well fitted for work in general wheelwrighting
and repairing.
Included in the equipment are ten woodworkers' benches 32 inches high,
42 inches wide, and 8 feet long. Each bench is divided into two parts,
making it possible for two persons to work at the same bench without
interference. The benches have three drawers and one closet on each
side, in which tools used by the students are kept.
Each pupil is provided with the following tools: One coach-maker's vise,
one 26-inch No. 6 cross-cut saw, one 12-inch back saw, one set of
planes, one set of chisels, one set of auger-bits, one set of
gimlet-bits, one ratchet-brace, one coach-maker's drawing-knife, one
spoke-shave, one thumb-gauge, one try-square, one bevel, one hammer, and
one mallet. Other tools are kept in reserve by the instructor and are
used only when needed.
The division is constantly building new work, such as wagons, drays,
horse- and hand-carts, wheelbarrows, buggies, and road-carts. The work
of repairing vehicles and farm implements for the school, and a large
amount of repairing for the locality, is done by my students. The course
is as follows:
_The First Year._--Care of shop, names and care of tools, general
measurements; elementary work with saw, plane, drawing-knife,
chisel, and spoke-shave; practise in the making and application of
joints, i. e., splices, mortises, tenons, and miters; kinds of wood
used and how to select; practise-work on parts of wagons and
bodies; Industrial Classes and Mechanical Drawing during the year.
_The Second Year._--Pattern-making, working by patterns,
practise-work on parts of wagons continued; making wheelbarrows and
hand-carts, repairing wagons; practise in wheel-building;
construction of wagons, carts, and drays; practise on parts of
buggies and wagons; industrial classes and Mechanical Drawing
during the year.
_The Third Year._--Building wheels; general repairs on buggies and
wagons continued; practise-work on parts of buggies, phaetons,
farm- and business-wagons; shop economics, estimates, bills of
material; industrial classes and Mechanical Drawing during the
year.
The student in wheelwrighting receives instruction in wood-turning;
the course is the same as that given to students in carpentry.
I was married late last summer, 1904, and am now living at Tuskegee as a
member of the Faculty of the school I entered as a raw recruit.
XIII
THE STORY OF A BLACKSMITH
BY JUBIE B. BRAGG
Both my mother and father were compelled to work in the field as
farmers. They had four children, all now living, of whom I am the
eldest. I was born in Twiggs County, Ga., February 17, 1876, but in 1881
the family moved to Macon, Ga., where they lived until 1886. The
cruelest possible blow befell us when both mother and father died in
April of that year, within ten days of each other.
My parents were intelligent, and though they had had no opportunities
for securing an education, yet they were able to teach their children
the alphabet and how to spell a few simple words. My first lessons were
in Webster's blue-back speller, so when I started to school at six years
of age I was not the dullest boy beginning at the same place, because of
the instruction I had received. I first went to a Miss Mary Tom, who
taught in St. Paul's Church in East Macon. I went there but one school
session. I was next sent to a Miss Carr, who taught in the basement of
the Presbyterian church on Washington Avenue, West Macon. To her, also,
I only went one term. I was next started in Lewis' High School, now
known as Ballard's Normal School, but was soon compelled to cease going
there because of the death of both parents, as already mentioned, in
April of that same term.
I was now but ten years of age. My aunt took charge of me and of the
other children. I was immediately "hired out" to a family named Horton,
for my victuals and clothing. I worked for this family about six months,
all of whom were kind to me, especially Mr. Horton, Jr., who at this
time had charge of an ice-house. Each day I carried his meals to him and
could confidently count upon receiving from him a nickel (five cents),
which was forthwith invested in candy as I returned. It was a real
pleasure to meet and make myself known to Mr. Horton, Jr., the young man
who had been so kind to me in Birmingham, Ala., in 1901, after my
graduation from Tuskegee. He was apparently glad to see me, and
especially to learn that I had been attending the Tuskegee Institute.
After leaving the Horton family I went to work in a grocery store, that
of a Mrs. Machold, from whom I received $4 a month for my services. I
only remained with her a short while.
The work I liked best of all, however, was that with the shoe firm of
Bearden and Brantley. I had my Sundays, and was off from work at six
o'clock each week-day--a great change from my former employment.
When I was twelve years of age I went to visit an uncle who lived in
Baldwin County, Ga. I had gone to remain two weeks; as a matter of fact
I was with him three years. I worked on the farm every day while with
him, and went to school about two months each year. In this short time I
was only able to review the lessons I had already had. After returning
to Macon, a number of young men who had been to Tuskegee persuaded me to
consider going there to school. The most strenuous opposition came from
my own relatives. After many conversations about the matter I had
finally to go against their will. They honestly felt that such reading
and writing as I could do was quite enough education for me, or for any
other Negro boy.
I reached the school, after being properly admitted, on the 11th of
September, 1893, and registered as a student in the night-school, as I
had no money, and could pay in cash for no part of my expenses. I was
assigned, after examination, to the A Preparatory class. I was assigned
work at the barns, fed cows, milked, and rendered such other service as
was required by the instructor.
Soon after reaching Tuskegee and after I had begun "working out" my
expenses, I learned that the officers of the school were contemplating a
new scheme whereby all of the students in the night-school would work
one-half of each day, go to school one-half of each day, and pay $4 a
month in cash into the school treasury. Mrs. Washington, the "guardian
angel" of the student body at Tuskegee called me and several other
students into conference and asked us to frankly state how the new
schedule would affect us, what we thought of the plan, how much money we
were able to pay, etc. Out of the whole number only four declared they
were able to pay the $4 a month; the larger number, like myself, were
utterly unable to pay anything in cash, being dependent absolutely upon
our ability to cover our expenses by work in some of the industrial
divisions. It was finally decided to forego this contemplated
arrangement, and I, and the majority of others situated like myself,
were made very happy. My whole future hinged on this decision, as I
should have been compelled to leave school if it had been put in
operation. I remained at the school during the summer of 1894, the
school very kindly arranging each summer to keep a large number of
students and providing work for them. It was to me an advantage to
remain. I had no money for railroad fare, and I was sure of securing a
trade, wheelwrighting, at the beginning of the next term. I had desired
to go into the blacksmith-shop, but it was so crowded that there was no
reasonable assurance that I should be able to secure entrance thereto.
At the beginning of the fall term, 1894, I entered the wheelwright-shop,
at the same time, of course, carrying my academic work; I had been
successively each year promoted to the next higher class. I not only
worked all of that school year in the wheelwrighting-shop, but remained
the summer of 1895.
Shortly after the new school year began, my instructor, Mr. M. T.
Driver, was selected to take charge of the school's elaborate exhibit at
the Cotton States and International Exposition, Atlanta, Ga., at the
opening of which Principal Washington had spoken so effectively and
powerfully for the Negro people of the country. I had made such
substantial progress that Mr. J. H. Washington, then serving as director
of mechanical industries, notified me that I had been selected to manage
the shop during Mr. Driver's six months' absence.
I was not very much inclined to take the responsibility, but at Tuskegee
polite notification of selection to do a thing is a command. I accepted
the work and did my very best. There were about twenty young men in the
shop when I took charge, some older, some younger than I, but most of
whom had been there longer than I had. I had no serious complaints as to
the quality of work turned out by me during the instructor's absence.
I now had to my credit more than enough money to carry me through the
remaining two years. The next year I entered the day-school. I had
become in most respects a new person. I had gone to Tuskegee
country-bred, raw, ignorant. The school's transforming influence I was
able to note in my carriage, and, of course, in my conversation, in my
care for neatness and order, and in the ideals I was forming and trying
to live up to. During the summer I returned home for the first time. I
worked at my trade during the vacation and earned enough money to buy
clothing and other necessaries. I did not return to school until
December 28, 1897, as I needed the money I was earning at my trade. I
had never earned in money more than the small amounts referred to in the
first part of this paper, and so was delighted with my earning capacity.
I then sought work in the blacksmithing-shop, the shop I had first
desired to enter, so that I might become a first-class blacksmith in
addition to having a working knowledge of wheelwrighting. After
completing the school term I went to Montgomery, Ala., and worked as a
wheelwright and blacksmith. This outside experience was most helpful to
me. My last school year was that of 1899-1900. I was very happy to
receive, along with my academic diploma, a certificate also from the
blacksmithing division. I was now fitted to begin my life in the great
outside world.
My first work was as instructor in blacksmithing and wheelwrighting in
the Hungerford Industrial School at Eatonville, Fla. I then secured work
at my trades in Birmingham until August, 1901, when three of us who had
been classmates at Tuskegee decided to form a partnership and conduct on
a large scale a general blacksmithing and wheelwrighting business. I
was deputed to select the place where we should locate. After
interviewing a number of persons, Anniston, Ala., was suggested, and I
decided to go there to personally investigate conditions. After getting
there and going about the town, I agreed that at Anniston we should find
a place that would properly support our business. There was no place
vacant that we could rent, so after some further consideration we
decided to purchase a place. This we were fortunate enough to do, and
came into possession of a building for our shop, 50 by 60 feet. We met
all obligations after opening the shop and secured the most flattering
support. Our work met the most exacting requirements, and I was very
much disinclined to accept an offer which reached me from Mr. Nathan B.
Young, who had had charge of the academic work at Tuskegee during a part
of my stay there. Mr. Young, however, represented that I could render
much more effective racial service by reaching a large number of
persons, young men, daily. After much hesitation I went to the Florida
State Normal and Industrial School, to which Mr. Young had been called
as President, as instructor in blacksmithing and wheelwrighting, where I
have since been employed. I have done well, and am proud that I can say
so.
Of my stay at Tuskegee, what shall I say? It was all in all to me. The
lessons in shop and class-room, the lessons not at all catalogued that
go into character-forming--all of these I found most helpful and
invaluable, in making me a man who "thinks and feels." I should be
tempted to eulogy should I try to tell how much I owe to Dr. Washington,
to his teachers, and to all of the influences that assist the student at
Tuskegee.
XIV
A DRUGGIST'S STORY
BY DAVID L. JOHNSTON
Shortly after the smoke had cleared away from the battle-fields of the
Civil War, I was ushered into the world in a one-room log cabin in
Alabama, county of Macon, and near the little town of Tuskegee,
afterward made famous by virtue of the fact that there was established
near it, by Booker T. Washington, July 4, 1881, the Tuskegee Normal and
Industrial Institute. That I have the honor of being an alumnus of that
school is one of the best things of which I can boast.
Because I have said that I was born in a one-room log cabin, the reader
will readily imagine that my parentage was humble. My mother and father
both have gone to the Great Beyond. I bless and revere their memory, for
two more noble souls never lived, hampered as they were by slavery and
its terrible environments.
My parents continued to live in the one-room cabin until three other
children, making nine in all, had come to them. Another room was added
about this time. The biting poverty of it all led my father, with his
family, to move to one of the famous cotton plantations of Dallas
County, Ala. I seem to recall taking an interest in the world about me
quite early. Especially do I recall, as one of my earliest
recollections, the death of Garfield, so cruelly slain by the madman
Guiteau. My father was greatly distressed, I remember, by his death.
For five successive years my life was spent working each year on the
farms for and with my aged father and other members of the family, and
spending the time, when not so employed, in near-by public schools,
which at that time, as is true in large part now, were conducted only
about three months in each year. After having acquired a slight
knowledge of mathematics, it was a great pleasure to me to go up each
fall to the market at Selma, Ala., with my father, to dispose of the
products of the farm. On one occasion there was an apparent interest
manifested in me by one of the commission merchants, a white man. He
persuaded me to return to Selma, after I had accompanied my father home,
and to accept a position with him as office-boy. I returned as agreed,
to find either that his promise was a stroke to induce my father to
trade with him, or that my stay at home had been too extended--although
it was only for three or four days. The position, meanwhile, he said,
had been filled by another. Thus, I found myself, a raw country lad,
twenty-seven miles from home, without employment and among strangers.
Next morning, without the knowledge of my parents, I applied for
admittance as a student to the Knox Academy at Selma, and without
recommendations, which were immediately demanded of me. I was turned
away, but not discouraged, for the next morning, accompanied by a white
friend of my father, I again applied and was admitted on his
recommendation. An examination entitled me to begin with the fifth-grade
class.
I also secured employment at this white man's home. The money thus
received paid for my board. By doing odd jobs I managed to make
sufficient money to pay for lodging with a good family. I was thus
enabled to spend the fall of 1883 and the spring of 1884 in school, to
my very great benefit. I was compelled to return home, however, before
the term ended, because my father's health completely failed him, to
take charge of the farm, as I was the senior male child in the family
at that time. My juvenile mind had been awakened by this short school
experience in Selma, and from that time forth I had a thirst for more
knowledge.
I was absorbed by this longing, but I took up the various other duties
which fell to my lot, with the earnest purpose of doing my very best. As
a result, with the aid of other members of the family I succeeded in
turning over to my invalid father, the succeeding fall, eleven bales of
cotton and other farm products in like proportion. My father's health
having completely failed, and because of a constantly increasing desire
for more knowledge, I conceived the idea of returning to our old home
near Tuskegee again.
January, 1885, found us again living in close proximity to the old log
cabin in which I was born. Not four years before the Tuskegee Normal and
Industrial Institute had been established. The height of my ambition was
to be enrolled as a student there, but not having sufficient money to
care for the family and remain in school at the same time, and since the
term for that year was half spent, I sought employment for the remaining
winter months, doing such odd jobs in and around the little town as I
could find to do. When spring came, having a fair knowledge of farming,
I found ready employment with the planters of that community. With an
ambition to enter school the coming fall, I then and there began to
study every possible method of economy, and when summer had passed and
school-time had come again, with the aid of a younger brother I had
cared for the family, and had to my credit my first savings of $85.
Now began the most memorable and the most pleasant days in my life. On
the 15th day of September, 1885, I matriculated as a student at
Tuskegee, and, after what was then considered a rigid examination,
succeeded in entering the Junior class, the lowest class of the normal
grade. There was yet before me the task of caring for an aged father and
mother. That task I considered a sacred duty, and, with my limited
savings in hand, made such purchases as would best give them ordinary
comforts through the winter months, and on the 22d day of the same
month, after having made such expenditures as I thought necessary, I
found that my little pile had been reduced from $85 to $14.50, with
which sum I paid my tuition and board at the normal school.
I was permitted by the school authorities to work on the school farm the
entire term. On the 26th day of May, when the school closed, there yet
remained to my credit a sufficient amount to purchase a ticket to
Birmingham, and thence out to Pratt City, a near-by suburb. At Pratt
City I learned to dig coal, and at the end of every month they paid me
in gold. These shining pieces were precious possessions. For four
successive summers, in order to get sufficient money to care for my
mother and father and make my way in school, I went to Pratt City and
worked in the mines, at the furnaces, on the railroads, and around the
coke-ovens, enduring hardships which language can hardly describe. But
it all paid. The summer of 1888 was a trying one, but when the time came
for me to leave for school I had saved $200.
On the 30th day of May, 1889, a new epoch in my life began. I was
ushered into the busy world as a graduate of Tuskegee, being in a class
of twenty-two. I had looked forward to this event with pride and was
very happy.
So imbued was I with the pleasant thought that I was a graduate of
Tuskegee, that I little thought of the great responsibilities that
awaited me, but when my more sober thought came I realized that I was
going from most pleasant surroundings not to return the next year; that
I was going out not to return and meet indulgent and persuasive
teachers, loving classmates, and devoted friends. I then realized the
full meaning of the phrase we had selected that year as our class motto,
"Finished, yet just begun." Finished I had at Tuskegee, but I had to
begin work and life in the great busy world, with confidence alone as an
asset. The Commencement exercises on this particular occasion were most
impressive to me, made so in part, I suspect, because I was to be the
happy recipient of a coveted diploma. The Commencement speaker was the
late Joseph C. Price,[1] of North Carolina, and he was at his best.
Knowing no other field more inviting, I returned to Pratt City, where I
had worked successfully. On the 6th of June, 1889, I alighted from the
cars, and after spending a few days visiting relatives and friends,
applied at No. Four (4) Slope for a set of checks to dig coal. The
checks were readily given me because of my previous record as a miner.
After working there during the summer months, and with the same success
as had attended me previously, I had secured sufficient money to
straighten out my little financial affairs and move my parents and a
widowed sister with six small children from Tuskegee to Pratt City,
where I had decided permanently to live.
About this time Pratt City was made, by act of the Alabama Legislature,
a separate and independent school district, and I had the honor of being
elected to the principalship of the Negro school. There I had my first
experience as a teacher. I put my whole soul into the work. I had before
me the example of the Tuskegee teachers, and the lessons so thoroughly
taught there. That I must serve my fellows earnestly and unselfishly was
never forgotten.
So pleased was the Board of Education with my work that my salary was
soon advanced to $110 per month. This salary was somewhat extraordinary,
but Pratt City, Birmingham, Ensley, etc., are in one of the richest
mining sections in the world, and the money earned by blacks and whites
is greatly in excess of that earned in other parts of the State. I held
this position for four years, teaching eight and nine months in the
year, and spending the remaining three or four months of the time
working in the mines.
After a time my physical system had begun so completely to run down,
that I was reluctantly compelled to resign the position of teacher. In
the meantime I had purchased a home at Pratt City. Leaving my parents
there, I went to Milldale, Ala., to take up new work that offered a
change of climate. I returned every fifteen or thirty days, however, to
look after the needs of my parents. The entire expense of caring for
them, my sister and her children, was quite $60 a month. My work at
Milldale made good returns. I was with the Standard Coal Company, and
after I had been there fifteen months I had to my credit $1,000, an
amount I had long striven to save.
During this time my mother was stricken with fever, and after lingering
three months (one of which I spent at her bedside) she died. Our little
home was cast in deep sorrow. I returned to Milldale and resumed work
there. After two years had expired I had to my credit, I am glad to say,
$1,460. With this sum in hand I concluded I would take a course in
pharmacy. On October 15, 1894, I entered the Meharry Medical College at
Nashville, Tenn., the dean of which is that prince of gentlemen and
father of Negro physicians, Dr. George W. Hubbard. I completed the
course February 4, 1896, graduating at the head of the class with a
general average of 94-1/4 per cent.
I had pleasant associations while there with many of my former Tuskegee
class- and school-mates, among them being Dr. A. H. Kenniebrew, now of
Jacksonville, Ill., and for a while Resident Physician of the Tuskegee
Institute; Dr. T. N. Harris, of Mobile, Ala., and Dr. A. T. Braxton, of
Columbia, Tenn. Each of these is succeeding at the places named most
satisfactorily as physicians. At Meharry it was our constant pleasure to
refer to our training at Tuskegee, and to acknowledge how indelibly the
lessons learned there had been stamped upon our minds and hearts. While
there I had the opportunity to compare the instruction received at
Tuskegee--that of the academic department--with that of the other
institutions of learning in this and even other countries. At Meharry
one is thrown in direct contact with educated men and women from the
leading Negro colleges of this country, and with many from English
institutions of note. After careful investigation I found that the
Tuskegee-trained student, at all times, was among the very best there.
At Tuskegee I still consider that one of the greatest lessons taught is
that of "learning to learn."
[Illustration: AT THE HOSPITAL.
A corner in the boys' ward.]
At the close of my first year at Meharry I returned to Birmingham, and
after a conference with Drs. A. M. Brown and J. B. Kye, colored
graduates in medicine and pharmacy, and Mr. George F. Martin, we decided
to open a drug-store to be located in Birmingham. About May 7, 1895, the
doors of the People's Drug Company were opened to the public, with the
above-named gentlemen and myself as the stockholders and owners. Here I
invested my first money of consequence in a business enterprise, putting
in the greater part of the money to open the business, which invoiced
$1,600 or more in about five months after the opening. After affairs
were in good running order I left, and returned to Milldale to resume
work with the Standard Coal Company. During the spring and summer of
that year I realized about $500 from my mining operations.
In the fall of 1895 I returned to Meharry to complete the course already
begun. During that fall and winter the business was encouragingly
successful under the management of Dr. Kye, aided by Drs. Brown and
Mason; for about that time Dr. U. G. Mason, another colored physician,
had bought Mr. Martin's interest in the company and had become a partner
in the concern. My instructions to the management were to turn over to
my father my share of the net proceeds of the business while I was away.
My share of the profits kept the family going. My stay at Meharry this
last term was most pleasant. I had been promoted to the dignified
position of assistant to Dr. W. M. Savier, who was, and is, Dean of the
Pharmaceutical Department of the institution.
When I had completed my course I returned to Alabama to begin my work as
a pharmacist, and about April 1, 1896, successfully passed the required
State examination and was admitted to the practise of pharmacy. I took
the examination in Selma, the beautiful little city on the Alabama River
where, thirteen years before, I had had my desire for knowledge and
better opportunities awakened. I sold my interest in the People's Drug
Company at a sacrifice, and immediately opened business on "my own hook"
at 34 South Twentieth Street, Birmingham, Ala. In order to begin
business with some assurance of success, I organized another company,
and had associated with me in this new enterprise (the Union Drug
Company) Rev. T. W. Walker, Rev. J. Q. A. Wilhite, and Mr. C. L.
Montgomery--all responsible and enterprising citizens of Birmingham.
By hard and diligent work the business proved a success, and from time
to time I bought out the interests of the persons named, and accepted as
a partner a well-known physician and surgeon, Dr. George H. Wilkerson.
Dr. Wilkerson's connection with the business caused it rapidly to
increase in volume. When more help was required, as soon it was, we
secured the services of Mr. Jimmie James, a young pharmacist who is with
me until now. After a period of pleasant business association, Dr.
Wilkerson's interests in Mobile, his former home, demanded his presence
there. I purchased his interest in the Union Drug Company, and the name
was changed to the Union Drug Store. We had but recently located in our
own neat little quarters at No. 101 South Twentieth Street, a one-story
brick structure, at which place I continued to do business, supported by
Drs. W. L. Council and J. B. Goin, who sent their prescriptions to my
store, until February 8, 1904. In January, 1904, I secured a lot at No.
601 South Eighteenth Street, Birmingham, and personally erected there a
two-story frame building, which I now occupy.
During my short business career since graduation from the medical
school, I sought out a partner for life, and was fortunate to win the
hand of Miss Pearl L. Strawbridge, of Selma, Ala., who had come to
Birmingham to make her home with her brother, Mr. H. Strawbridge, who
now holds the honored position of secretary and general manager of one
of the largest fraternal insurance concerns in the country owned and
controlled by Negroes. Two children, a girl and a boy, have been added
to our family since the marriage.
Whatever I have done, or whatever I may do, that will deserve favorable
comment, I largely attribute to the fact that I was a student at
Tuskegee, and came under the personal care and instruction and guidance
of its distinguished Founder and Principal, Dr. Booker T. Washington,
and that I have striven, from the first day until now, to put into
practise the lessons taught me by him and his excellent body of
teachers. At Tuskegee we were taught the truism, "If you can not find a
way, make one." I hope I am not immodest in saying that I think I have,
in some degree, done this.
[1] Said to be one of the most eloquent speakers of the Negro people. He
died in the prime of life. He was President of Livingston College, which
is mainly supported by the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, and
has a large membership among the colored people.
XV
THE STORY OF A SUPERVISOR OF MECHANICAL INDUSTRIES
BY JAMES M. CANTY
I was born December 23, 1863, in Marietta, Cobb County, Ga. My parents,
James and Adella Canty, were slaves. I am the eldest of two brothers and
three sisters, who are all living. My father died in the fall of 1895.
Since that time, because of circumstances and inclinations, it has been
my lot to look after the welfare of my mother, who is still living in
Marietta, Ga., a place of about four thousand inhabitants.
At an early age I entered the public school at my home. My father,
however, soon put me to work, so that I grew up quite ignorant of books.
He was a carpenter and butcher, and fairly skilled in working iron. For
a number of years he kept a meat-market. At the age of sixteen I was
doing the principal part of the butchering. Some years later, when
father was appointed street "boss" of the town, I worked as one of the
street laborers. When he changed his occupation from street "boss" to
farmer, mine likewise changed. The rule was, a change from one
occupation to another, working day by day without attention to mental
growth, and having no thought of the future, till I was persuaded to
join several other boys who had decided to form themselves into a
night-class for purposes of self-improvement.
About this time, in compliance with my father's desire, and to my
delight, I entered a carriage factory as an apprentice. It was while
working there that I received a newspaper from a girl student at
Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. The paper contained a long
descriptive article, with cuts of buildings, class-rooms, teachers, and
students. The student who had sent the paper was from my home, and with
it came a letter from her stating that she had spoken to Mr. Washington
in my interest, and that if I would come to Tuskegee I would be given a
chance to get an education. I shall never forget the impression made
upon my mind by that newspaper article and the young woman's letter.
[Illustration: IN THE TIN-SHOP.]
My father was consulted, and advised against my going away to school,
saying: "You can continue night-school here at home and at the same time
learn a trade. I never went to school a day in my life." Well, I knew
that my father, nevertheless, could read and write a little and do some
figuring, and that he at one time came within a few votes of being
elected to the State Legislature of Georgia. Contrary to his advice, I
concluded to go to Tuskegee. Looking back now, and connecting the
present with the day on which my decision was made, I think that time
and events have vindicated the wisdom of my decision.
After giving my employer two weeks' notice of my intention to give up my
work, I hastened to arrange my affairs, fearing that procrastination
might allow some event to change my mind and thus alter the whole course
of my life. Two weeks after giving notice to my employer, I started for
Tuskegee. I bought a ticket to Atlanta, where I spent the night. The
next morning I went to the station and asked for a ticket to Tuskegee.
The agent, on looking over his guide-books, said to me: "There is no
such place as Tuskegee in the guide-books." I walked away from the
window, thinking that, after all, Tuskegee was some place that existed
only on paper.
Not wishing to give it up, I turned and approached the agent again. He
got out maps and guides, and finally found Tuskegee, but said he could
not sell me a ticket to that place as it was not on a railroad, and that
the best thing for me to do was to purchase a ticket to Chehaw, Ala. So
my ticket read, From Atlanta to Chehaw. On turning to leave the
ticket-agent, I inquired how I could get to Tuskegee from Chehaw. He
replied that he did not know. But I got there, going from Chehaw over a
narrow-gauge road. The engine that pulled the one coach composing the
train was named the "Klu-Klux," a thing I had heard of but had not
understood. That there should be many new things to me in the world was
not to be wondered at, when it was known that I had never before been
out of the county in which I was born except on three occasions, when my
trips extended only to adjoining counties.
It was in the month of March, 1886, while passing through the town of
Tuskegee, that I beheld for the first time, standing at a distance, the
institution that has, in my opinion, done more than any other one agency
to elevate the Negroes of the South. About eight o'clock P. M. I arrived
on the campus and was assigned to a room by the commandant, through the
officer of the day.[2] For about thirty minutes I was alone in the
room, the student body being at devotional exercises--the Tuskegee
Institute holding its daily devotions at night, instead of in the
morning like most schools. This is done on account of the day- and
night-school system, it being impossible to get all the students of the
school together except at night after the night-school session.
While sitting and thinking of home, of the past, and of the future, I
took out my pocketbook and counted $7.50. Not one cent more had I, and
as I looked at the money with the thought that $7.50 represented the
entire savings of my life up to that time, gloom and despondency almost
overcame me.
The next morning I went to the Principal's office. From there I went to
be examined, and then again to see the Principal. Mr. Washington
explained that board was charged for at $8 per month, and that my books
would be sold to me at cost. He informed me further that if I entered
night-school I would be able to work out my board and accumulate each
month a balance to be used in paying my expenses when I entered
day-school. I was made to understand that this offer was on condition
that my work and conduct be in every way satisfactory. As the amount of
money I had did not justify me in entering day-school, I matriculated as
a night-school student. The blacksmith-shop being short of students, I
was assigned to this division of industry.
During the remaining part of the year, and the following summer, I
worked in the shop ten hours each day, except Sundays, and devoted about
two hours and a half at night to study and recitations. It is no easy
task, during warm weather in Alabama, for one to work ten hours a day
and spend two and a half hours at night studying in a room lighted by
several large lamps suspended from the ceiling. Yet this is what
hundreds of poor boys and girls have done at Tuskegee. Hundreds still
attend the night-school, but electric lights have taken the place of the
large oil-lamps. Tuskegee is now more modern than it was when I was a
student there. Barrels and boxes are no longer used in the raw state for
furniture, as was largely the case at that time. Day-students were
required to work one school-day each week and every other Saturday. I
was a student nearly five years, counting the time when I was a
night-student.
After I entered day-school it was necessary that I should work not only
on my regular work-days and two Saturdays each month, but whenever
there was work to be done and I could find time in which to do it.
During my entire life at Tuskegee I worked every Saturday except three.
I was not long at Tuskegee before an indescribable force began to have
its influence upon me. Whatever this power may be called, it was both
refining and energizing. People who know the school and have been there
and know of its influence, call this force "the Tuskegee spirit." This
spirit, to the student possessing a spark of manhood, is irresistible.
The change in a student at Tuskegee is not sudden, nor is it wrought by
any one element. Things that may seem small when taken separately, are
invaluable when considered in the aggregate.
At Tuskegee one's attention is constantly called to little things. It
was a habit of mine, I regret to say, to give little or no thought to my
hat being on my head when I was in any of the boys' dormitories, or when
passing through the halls of the buildings containing the class-rooms.
My attention was finally called to this habit by one of the lady
teachers. Passing me one day in the hall, she said: "Canty, you have a
habit of wearing your hat through the halls. It is a very bad habit."
When I entered Tuskegee I had not worn a night-shirt since I was a
child. Here it was soon impressed upon me that sleeping in a night-shirt
was a sign of cleanliness, of civilization. If there is any place where
cleanliness is regarded and practised as one of God's first laws, that
place is Tuskegee.
One day Mr. Washington sent for me to come to his office. I received the
message with fear and trembling. I had, before this time, had but one
opportunity to speak to Mr. Washington, and then only for a few minutes
upon the day following my arrival. On my way to the office I wondered if
any rule of the institution had been violated by me. Though I had been
there only three or four weeks, I knew a request for a student to report
at the Principal's office meant that he was to be given notice of
imminent punishment, or consulted upon some matter of vital interest.
When I entered the office, Mr. Washington asked me to write to two or
three worthy young men at my home and inquire if they desired a chance
to work their way through school. Several days had passed when I
received an answer from one of the young men to whom I wrote. It so
happened that on the day the letter was received I met Mr. Washington
on his way to his office, and said, "Mr. Washington [drawing the letter
from my pocket], I have received a letter from--" Here my first sentence
was cut short by Mr. Washington forcibly gesticulating and saying, "Come
to the office; come to the office and see me there." That one lecture on
business methods impressed me in a way that a chapter of this length
could not have done.
One day I closed a door with considerable force, which attracted the
attention of one of the teachers. The teacher, in my presence, again
opened the door and gently closed it, noiselessly and without a word. I
have never since forgotten the proper way in which to open and close
doors. Little details are big essentials in the rounding out of
character. They show the influence of the "Tuskegee spirit." But, after
all, this spirit would not be so irresistible in its influence for good
if the teachers and officers of the institution were not the embodiment
and living example of it. Here, as elsewhere and everywhere, example is
more potent than precept.
Every institution has policies peculiarly its own. It is necessary that
every teacher and officer support that policy to make it effective.
Each instructor has a distinct individuality that becomes a part of the
student, in smaller or greater degree, and at the same time gives force
and strength to the policies of the institution. Though I felt the
influence of every one of the thirty-odd teachers then at Tuskegee, the
individuality of some of these made a very great impression on me. I
remember Mr. W. D. Wilson as a very quiet and effective disciplinarian.
Mr. Warren Logan, the treasurer, has the ability to teach the student
the value of a dollar by making him sacrifice almost beyond the point of
endurance. At the same time, with a smile and a cheerful disposition, he
would make the student feel that his burden was light. Through the
kindness and special interest manifested in me by Mr. M. T. Driver, who
was in charge of wheelwrighting and blacksmithing, I made rapid progress
at my trade. Miss Adella H. Hunt, who has since become the wife of
Treasurer Logan, was then a teacher who had the faculty of touching a
responsive chord in a student. Mrs. Booker T. Washington, then Miss
Margaret J. Murray, impressed me very much. Strong and resourceful in
dealing with students, she always won the best that was in them. My
student-days were almost at an end when she came to Tuskegee.
[Illustration: STUDENTS CANNING FRUIT.]
I shall ever feel grateful to Mr. J. H. Washington for the encouragement
he gave me. Being superintendent of industries, he was then, as he is
now, in constant touch with every male student. He is a believer in, and
a firm advocate of, steady, thorough, earnest work, and is quick to see,
appreciate, and encourage the smallest degree of ability shown by any
student. No time seemed too valuable for him to give in trying to
advance a student in his work. I might add here that the teachers here
named are, with two exceptions, among the pioneers in the building of
the school.
Mr. Booker T. Washington's personality is the great thing at Tuskegee,
and every student who goes there feels the strength of the man's rugged
individuality. "Mr. B. T." is an affectionate term used by the students,
but it springs from an indescribable, spontaneous feeling of love and
veneration. His Sunday evening talks to the students are to me like the
Book of Proverbs, always timely, encouraging, and applicable to the
affairs of every-day life. It is from these family talks that the
students learn, as they never have before, the beauty that lies in real,
every-day Christianity, and in living a real and simple life. It is
from these talks that the students learn so much of the great heart and
center of the institution. Mr. Washington still delivers Sunday evening
talks when at school, and they are published in the school's weekly
paper, The Tuskegee Student. Graduates throughout the country eagerly
read these talks with the same interest and pleasure with which they
listened to them while in school.
Mr. Washington taught then, as he teaches now, psychology to the Senior
class. The student has not become intimately acquainted with Mr.
Washington until he becomes a Senior. It is here that the members of the
Senior class talk of their past and future lives and receive the
outpourings of a great but simple soul. Mr. Washington's long and
frequent absences from the school are no less regretted by the teachers
than by the students.
Soon after entering school I began to think of what I should do after
graduating. My inclination led me to feel that success would be found
along mercantile lines. In spite of this I applied myself zealously to
my trade. During my last two years in school I did what teaching in
blacksmithing my literary work permitted, the school being without an
instructor in this industry for a short while. There was then no course
in engineering or in machinery, so I did all the pipe-work and kept the
machinery of the school in repair. In this way I learned something of
machinery without an instructor. With some pride I recall the fact that
I "ironed" the first farm-wagons, the first two-seated spring-wagon, and
the first buggy made at Tuskegee. I also "piped" the school's first
bathroom for girls.
In May of my Senior year I was very much surprised to receive a note
from Principal Booker T. Washington intimating that he desired me to
connect myself with the school the following year. Later he stated the
nature of the work he wanted me to do. I accepted the offer he made me.
I was asked to teach in the night-school and instruct in the
blacksmith-shop one-half of each week-day.
A few days after graduation I visited my home with the intention of
spending the summer there. I was there about three weeks, when I
received a letter from Mr. John H. Washington requesting my return to
Tuskegee the next week, if I could so arrange. He at that time was both
superintendent of industries and commandant. On my return he informed me
that the Principal had decided that since his duties as superintendent
of industries were so important, he was to be relieved of all others,
and that in lieu of instructing in the blacksmith-shop, I was to be
offered the work as commandant.
At once I set about getting the boys' rooms in order for the opening of
school. During the two previous years, even while a student, I had
virtually been acting as commandant, since no one man could carry double
responsibilities such as Mr. J. H. Washington had been carrying. I was
appointed commandant, and placed in charge of the night-school for a
year. I then resigned, looking forward to following my old-time
inclination of engaging in some mercantile business. I knew that I could
accumulate means for this purpose sooner by working at my trade, as I
received two dollars per day working as a blacksmith during vacation
seasons at Birmingham, Ala.
My first marriage occurred in 1891, my wife being Miss Sarah J. Harris.
We were classmates at Tuskegee four years, and graduated together. She
died in 1894 at Institute, W. Va. Our long association and acquaintance
made us understand each other even before we were married. Having become
a Christian before myself, she had much to do with my conversion while I
was a student. She was a great help to me in many ways, and through her
economy I was able to begin the purchase of my first property. Portia,
the oldest and only child now living of the three children born to us,
is in the Little Girls' Home at Knoxville College, Tenn. In 1897 I was
married to Miss Florence Lovett, a graduate of Storer College, Harpers
Ferry, W. Va. She shares my burdens, and is in every way a part of
whatever success I am able to achieve. Four children have been born to
us.
After resigning my position as commandant and head of the night-school
at Tuskegee, I spent a few weeks visiting relatives, and then returned
to Marietta. Here I worked at my trade in a carriage-shop, where a great
deal of machine-work was done for two furniture factories and a
planing-mill. Much of my time was spent in repairing machinery and
making bits and knives for the factories.
While at home I tried to make myself a part of the people in a helpful
way. I lived with my parents about two miles from the town. On my
father's farm was a church, the ground for which had been given by my
father. I was elected superintendent of the Sunday-school of this
church, and filled this position as long as I remained there. Soon
after the Sunday-school was started it occurred to me that the young
people of the community could be greatly helped by a literary society.
With the aid of others I organized a society and was elected its
president. We met every Friday night at the house of some member. It was
the custom to meet at different places, so that the long distances
necessary to walk would be equally shared by all. Even by this
arrangement some had to walk three and four miles, but the pleasure and
benefit derived from attending the society repaid us for the trouble.
After I had been at my home about a year, I received a letter from Mr.
Booker T. Washington requesting that I write to Mr. J. Edwin Campbell,
Principal of the West Virginia Colored Institute, then located near
Farm, W. Va. Enclosed with Mr. Washington's letter was one Mr. Campbell
had written, asking that a Tuskegee graduate be named to take the
position of Superintendent of Mechanics. This title has since been
changed to Superintendent of Mechanical Industries. On January 3, 1893,
I arrived at the West Virginia Colored Institute and entered upon my
duties, and have held the position ever since.
[Illustration: STARTING A NEW BUILDING.
Student masons laying the foundation in brick.]
In the early summer of 1898 Mr. J. H. Hill, who was then principal,
resigned to accept a Lieutenancy in a company of United States
Volunteers. During the interim following the resignation of Mr. Hill and
the appointment of Mr. J. McHenry Jones, the present principal, I was
placed in charge of the school by the Board of Regents. Mr. Jones was
elected principal September 21, 1898.
Until the fall of 1898 my duties were many and varied, as I had no
assistance in carrying on the industrial work of the school. I taught
blacksmithing, carpentering, and mechanical drawing. Besides this, I
have had to put the sewerage system into the institution, and the
heating apparatus into several of the school buildings. Still, a part of
my time in 1894 was devoted to teaching in the literary department. My
work now, while as exacting as ever, is more along the line of
superintending the mechanical industries and in teaching mechanical
drawing.
The school has grown, since my coming here, from 3 teachers and 30
students to a faculty of 18 teachers and 187 students. There are 6
instructors in the mechanical department for boys. We give instruction
in carpentry, printing, blacksmithing, brick masonry, plastering,
wheelwrighting, and mechanical drawing. These industries are housed in a
building--the "A. B. White Trades Building"--that cost $35,000.
In concluding this sketch, I repeat with emphasis what I said in the
beginning: Whatever my accomplishments may be, the credit is due to
Tuskegee. I do not wish in life to be regarded as a man of chance
possibilities, but rather as one who has consistently persevered in all
of his struggles. Tuskegee teaches nothing with greater force than that
success lies in that direction. Principal Washington, among other
things, has taught that it is necessary to get property and have a
bank-account. I have complied with that teaching. I own a farm of 100
acres within one-eighth of a mile of the school. My first property,
which I still own, consists of a one-acre lot and a seven-room house. It
gives me pleasure to contribute annually $10 to Tuskegee, although this
but inadequately expresses my gratitude to the institution to which I
owe so much.
[2] The West Point system is followed in training the young men. Except
that there are no guns, a complete battalion organization exists.
XVI
A NEGRO COMMUNITY BUILDER
BY RUSSELL C. CALHOUN
I have been asked to here set forth incidents of my life as I remember
them, especially as they relate to my life at Tuskegee and my work since
leaving there. Though there have been quite a number of events in my
life, it is somewhat difficult for me to give them in the way they are
now desired, as it never occurred to me that they would be worth
repeating.
Concerning my ancestry, it is impossible for me to give anything beyond
my maternal grandfather, who was about three-fourths Indian. My
recollections of him go back to the time when I was about six or seven
years of age. My mother, having more children than she could really care
for, decided to allow one of my brothers, who was perhaps a year and a
half younger than I, and myself, to live with him and his second wife.
My grandfather was quite seventy-five years of age when we went to live
with him, and was too feeble to work. He was supported from the
poor-house, which gave him a peck of meal, 2-1/2 pounds of bacon, 1
pound of coffee, 1 pound of brown sugar, and once a month 25 cents'
worth of flour. That, together with the little his wife could earn from
place to place, constituted the "rations" of all of us for a week.
Of my birth no record was kept, my mother having been a slave. All I
have been able to learn of the date of my birth is what my mother
remembers connected with the close of slavery. In trying to ascertain
from her when I was born, she said, "You was born some time just after
Christmas, in the month of January, the third year after the surrender."
My mother had twelve children. I was the eighth child and the second one
born after slavery. All except two of the children were born in the same
one-room log cabin with a dirt floor, in the town of Paulding, Jasper
County, Miss. My mother did the cooking for her master's family and the
plantation help, did all of the milking, and was also washer-woman.
In the summer of 1896 I again visited Paulding, just after graduating
from Tuskegee. I had to go there to move my aged mother to more
comfortable quarters. She was quite ill, and died soon after I reached
Florida with her. When I went to Paulding I measured the house in which
I was born, and found it to be 9 feet wide, 17 feet long, 7 feet high,
with no windows, with but one door, and a dirt chimney. The furnishing
as I remember it was composed of a chair, a stool, a table, and my
mother's bed, which was constructed in one corner of the house. The bed
was made by putting a post in the ground and nailing two pieces of wood
to the wall from this post, then by putting in a floor, making something
like a box to hold the bedding. The children slept in a similarly
constructed place, except that the mattress was on the ground and was
filled with straw. Our bedding, for the most part, was what wearing
apparel we possessed thrown over us at night. Outside the house was a
long bench, which was kept for the accommodation of visitors.
A peculiar incident in our home life happened one Sunday morning in
March--one Easter Sunday. All of the smaller children were seated on the
floor eating their breakfasts from pans and skillets, when a big black
snake, without any regard for the children, went into a hole by the
fireplace. When one of my older brothers undertook to find him and
opened this hole, he found, instead of one, four black snakes that had
been wintering in the side of the house.
There was no church or school for us in that whole section. A white man,
a Doctor Cotton, to whom I was afterward given until I should become
twenty-one years of age, sent his boys to a school which required that
they walk eight miles to it and return each day.
When I was perhaps eight years of age I remember that my mother and all
of the children went to Spring Hill to a camp-meeting; that was the
first service at which I had heard a minister. They had a Sunday-school,
and I was put into a class. The teacher gave us leaflets and asked us to
read where we found the big letter "A." This was the first and only
letter that I knew for many years. This camp-meeting was held once a
year, though at times there would be prayer-meetings among the different
families on the plantation.
My mother, being a hard-working woman and knowing the value of keeping
children busy, compelled every one of us to work in some way around the
house or on the farm. I know of no lesson which she taught me and which
has been of more value to me than that of "doing with your might what
your hands find to do." It was a rule of her household that we should
not go to bed without having water in the house. The water had to be
brought from a spring a mile and a half away. I remember clearly how one
night one of my brothers and myself tried to deceive her; how we secured
some not overclear water from a hole near-by our home, and how she
pitched it out and sent us the whole distance to the spring. Although
this was many years ago, I now see, more and more, what it means to go
all the way to the real spring, and I thank her memory for the lesson.
When I was about ten years of age the same Doctor Cotton of whom I have
spoken came to my grandmother's to hire one of the boys to mind the
bars, as the teams were hauling corn to the barn and the drivers did not
want to put them up each time. I was delighted to be the chosen one of
the two. My first chance to earn money was thus offered.
I stayed there every day from sunrise to sunset for a little more than
three weeks, and it was a happy day when Doctor Cotton requested all
hands to come up and be paid off. I do not know what the rest received;
though I had boarded from the scanty fare before mentioned at my
grandmother's home, he gave me fifteen cents, paying me in three
nickels. I had never had any money in my hands before, and for fear I
might lose it I put it in my pocket and held the pocket with both hands,
and ran for more than two miles, carrying it home. One nickel of the
three was given me for my share.
Seemingly this Doctor Cotton was very much impressed with the way I had
performed my duty at the bars, for in the next few weeks he again
visited my grandmother. I was quite anxious to know what his frequent
visits meant, and was very much delighted, as well as surprised, when it
was told me, one morning when it was very cold, and I had on only two
pieces of clothing made of some very coarse material resembling canvas,
that I was to live with Doctor Cotton until reaching manhood, and was to
eat at his house. He told me in my grandmother's presence that if I
would stay with him until I was twenty-one years of age I would receive
a horse, a bridle and saddle, a suit of clothes, and $10, in addition to
my "keep." This was such an apparently big offer that my grandmother's
and my heart leaped for joy.
When I had lived with him for a few days he had given me the first pair
of shoes, of the copper-toe variety, I ever wore.
I have never forgotten my first day's stay at this new home. My whole
object that first day was to eat everything in sight. At my own home I
slept on the dirt floor; at this new home I slept in the attic, my bed
being a pile of cotton-seed with a quilt for covering. My duty at this
new home was to attend to the horses, to bring the cows from the
pasture, sweep the yard, wait on the table, nurse two children, etc. I
stayed at this place for two and one-half years, and as my knowledge of
things increased my duties became more and more exacting.
During this whole time, and for two years before, I had not seen or
heard from my mother. I was twenty miles from any railroad, and had
never seen or heard of a railroad train. We lived on the public road
between Paulding and Enterprise, and by some means I heard that my
mother had gone to the "railroad." Though I had never been away on my
own resources, I resolved to do better than I was doing. I remember very
well that it was Monday morning when one of the doctor's daughters said
to me, "Russell, you go down to 'Vina's house, tell her to come and
scour for me; come by the store and get a package of soda; then come
through the field and drive the turkeys home." Providence never favored
any one more than it did me on that day. I went by the store and told
them to do up the soda, I went by and told 'Vina that she was wanted,
but I did not drive the turkeys home.
I started out in search of my mother, and after walking more than half
the distance I overtook an ox-team, and the driver allowed me to ride a
part of the way. I reached the railroad town about night, and standing
there was a freight train of the Mobile and Ohio Railroad.
I was never so frightened in all my life as when the whistle blew and
this object moved away. I remember asking the driver of the ox-team
where the thing's eyes were, and where the horses were that pulled it.
The doctor, suspecting that I had gone to Enterprise in search of my
mother, made plans to capture me and have me returned, but all of this
failed. By good fortune I found my brother, who was married and living
in this town; here again I became a nurse, having to care for his two
children.
Afterward I went to live with a white family which was very kind to me.
The young man who carried me to his house as a nurse put into my hands,
after I had been there some months, the first spelling-book I had ever
had; saying to me that if I would stay with them for two years, he would
at the end of that time send me to school. I stayed at this place for
some months, when my mother came from somewhere, I know not where, and
with five of the boys we joined ourselves together to work on a
plantation on "halves." We worked very hard that year.
Our food was furnished by the owner of the plantation. On many of those
long, cold days, for all day, we had only a "pone" of corn bread. At the
close of the year, after the owner had taken his half, and on account of
bad management on the part of an older brother who had charge of
affairs, my mother and her younger children received nothing for the
year's work, and this, notwithstanding the fact that we made five and
one-half bales of cotton and a large quantity of corn and peas. I
received as my "salary" for the year's work one shirt worth thirty cents
and a pair of suspenders worth about fifteen cents. I resolved to run
away again. This trip was made at night, on foot, over newly laid
railroad-ties, for a distance of seventeen miles.
I reached Meridian, Miss., at a late hour of the night, and took refuge
in a shed used for the storing of railroad iron. The next morning I
overheard two colored men, who were on their way to get meat ready for
the town-market two miles away, talking. I joined these men, and sought
employment along with them, but they soon learned that I knew nothing of
"butchering." However, the owner of the pen, who had a large garden,
gave me a trial, and I remained with him for three years.
After I was there a little more than a year my work was to plant and
care for the small seeds. This man, Mr. Nady Sims, was a good man, and I
had no cause for leaving him except that of wishing to get a place to
earn more money, that I might help care for my mother and her smaller
children.
I went next to a brick-yard, where I received fifty cents per day. There
were three boys at each "table," and we had to "off-bear" 5,500 bricks,
the task for each day. This was indeed hard work.
Drifting into hotel work, I soon acquired the habit of most of those who
are engaged in such work: I spent all I earned for fine clothes.
During my stay on the vegetable farm I boarded at the home of one of the
young men previously referred to, whose sister, Mary Clinton, who has
since become my wife and devoted assistant, one day heard a woman say
she knew of a school in Alabama where boys and girls could work for
their education, and that she was going to send her boy to that school.
This thought remained in her mind for some months, and she decided to go
to Tuskegee, though her brothers and sisters discouraged the idea,
feeling, as they said, that if she went to this unknown place her whole
life would be a failure.
She reached Tuskegee in September, 1885, at a time when there was but
one building. She worked in many places while there, including the
laundry, the teachers' dining-room, the sewing division, with Principal
Washington's family, as well as with the families of other teachers. On
account of poor health, especially because of throat trouble, she was
compelled to return home at the end of five years without graduating.
No sooner had she reached home again than she began a crusade for
Tuskegee. I was then twenty-one years of age, had never had a day's
schooling, and could read but very little. I proposed marriage to Miss
Clinton as soon as she returned, but she replied: "You do not know
anything except about hotel work. I have been to Tuskegee and see the
need of your knowing something. I also need to know more than I do. I
can easily marry some one who knows more than you do, but if you will go
to school I will assist you in any way that I can." This proposition I
accepted, and on September 2, 1890, I reached Tuskegee and began my
first day in school.
I had some knowledge of carpentry, and was for that reason assigned to
the carpenter-shop for work during the day; I attended school at night.
There were ninety-three young men and women in the class when I entered
school; of that number only two, in addition to myself, remained through
the entire course. I can never forget my examination by Miss Maggie J.
Murray, now Mrs. Booker T. Washington. There were quite three hundred
new students in the chapel of Porter Hall, one of the oldest buildings
of the institution, taking examinations at the same time.
She gave me two slips of paper, a pencil, and the questions, and said to
me: "Write the answers to these questions." She went about other duties,
and after about three hours returned to me for my papers; then for the
first time in my life I learned the meaning of geography and arithmetic.
The slips of paper mentioned asked questions on those subjects. I had
not put anything on the paper. She asked me if I knew of any large
cities; if I had ever crossed a river or seen a hill; if I knew the name
of the railroad over which I had come to reach Tuskegee.
I was able to answer each of these questions very readily; and she said,
"Calhoun, that is geography."
She assigned me to one of the lowest classes in the night-school. I
bought books which cost $1.70, and had fifty-two cents left. I soon
spent the fifty cents.
For seven months during my first year's stay my only possession was
represented by a two-cent stamp. I had had many "good friends" before
going to Tuskegee, and debated long as to which of them I should devote
the two-cent stamp, trusting to receive some financial aid. Finally I
decided on one of these "good friends." I used the stamp, and have not
heard from him from that day to this.
While carpentry was my special trade, I found the opportunity to get
information as to the other industries on the grounds. All of this
supplemental study has proved most helpful to me in my present work.
Most persons who enter school for the first time, and especially
industrial schools, get wrong impressions at the start. Notwithstanding
the fact that I was a young man who had "knocked about" the world quite
a little, I thought I had made a mistake in entering school, and did not
begin to see that I had done properly until I had been there for eight
or nine months. I asked for an excuse to leave school early in the first
term; it was denied me. I tried to sell my trunk for $7, so that I might
run away. I had a penchant for running away from disagreeable
surroundings. I was offered $6, but for the sake of the difference of $1
I decided to remain.
I do not hesitate to say that each day I live in my heart I most
heartily thank the good friends who have made it possible for Tuskegee
to be; I am also most grateful that I was able to reach it and receive
the training which I received there. I did nothing great while at
Tuskegee, but I remember with pride that I gave no trouble in any way
during my sojourn.
I used my spare hours making picture-frames, repairing window-shades,
making flower-stands and flower-boxes, and working flower-gardens for
the various Faculty families. The money received I saved until the end
of the school term. At the end of each term there were always a large
number of students who cared nothing for their books, and all but gave
them away. Looking three months ahead, I bought these books and sold
them to new students who entered the following year.
One year alone I cleared $40 in this way. The second-hand book business
among the students began from this effort on my part to add to my little
pile of cash money.
Having completed the course with a class of thirty-one members, May 26,
1896, I started straight for my home, Meridian, Miss.
For six years, as a student, I had been at Tuskegee and under its
influences; now I had only my conscience to dictate to me and to keep me
straight. Feeling that I could not do much good at Meridian, I started
for Texas, having had a position promised me.
I reached Mobile, Ala., while en route, and heard that Miss Mary
Clinton, previously mentioned, was in Tampa, Fla. Feeling that she still
had some interest in me, I again decided to go to her for advice.
I reached the city of Tampa with but a small sum in my pocket. The town
was undergoing a "boom," and I was certain that it would not be long
before I would be earning something, but, to my disappointment, I found
about thirty men looking for every job in sight. After much wearying
search I became thoroughly convinced that Tampa was too large a city not
to give me something to do besides "looking up into the air." Finally,
one rainy morning I secured work at a freight-house.
It was my lot to go first up the wet, steep, and slippery gang-plank.
Not being used to such a task, I fell, the truck with 350 pounds
narrowly escaping me. I got up and made a second attempt to carry my
load, and with success. I had been there two months when the agent
wanted some new shelves built in the storehouse. He told one of his
employees to go for a carpenter. He replied, "This man Calhoun can do
any such work you want done." The agent had me get my tools and do the
work. A few days afterward he wanted a first-class cook to prepare and
serve a special Christmas dinner. The same employee told him, "Calhoun
can do it."
The motto of my class was, "We Conquer by Labor."
On April 29, 1897, both Miss Clinton and myself were called to a school
in South Carolina, and in a simple way, with $50 saved, we married and
boarded the train for our new field of labor. After giving up our work
and reaching Sanford, 125 miles away, we received a letter asking us to
defer our coming until the following October.
This was a very, very sad disappointment and trial to us. It was two
weeks before the State examinations would be held. We prepared as best
we could, and as a result of the examination we were sent to Eatonville,
Fla., to take charge of the public school there. Eatonville is a Negro
town with colored officers, a colored postmaster, and colored merchants.
There is not a single white person living within the incorporated city;
it promises to be a unique community. It is situated near the center of
Orange county, six miles from Orlando, the county seat, and is two miles
from the Seaboard Air-Line Railroad, and one and one-half miles from the
Atlantic Coast Line Railroad.
It was said by the late Bishop H. B. Whipple, of Wisconsin--whose winter
home for a number of years was a half mile from this place--who had
helped the people of this community, and who was a constant helper and
adviser to my wife and me in our work until his death, that you might
travel the whole State over and not find a more healthy place. We were
here but a few days when we decided that this was the place for us to
begin putting into practise the lessons taught us at Tuskegee. We felt
that we wanted to do something toward helping our people. We decided to
cast our lot permanently at Eatonville.
Our first "industrial" service was done with the aid of the school
children: we cleaned the street of tin cans and other rubbish.
We found the lessons in economy which we had received at Tuskegee very
valuable to us at this trying time. We felt that if we would properly
impress the lessons most needed we should own a home, a cow, some
chickens, a horse, and a garden; we felt that there should be tangible
ownership on the part of the people of some of these things, at any
rate.
These things we started to get as soon as possible. We wanted to teach
the people by example.
After talking in a general way for some days of the value of industrial
education, coupled with that of intelligent class-room instruction, Mrs.
Calhoun succeeded in getting four girls to come to her home for sewing
lessons. That was the first step.
Incidentally, we heard of the philanthropic instincts of a gentleman,
Mr. E. C. Hungerford, living at Chester, Conn., who had conditionally
offered to another school twenty acres of land, and whose offer was not
met. I wrote to him asking if he would give us the land. He replied that
he would be glad to give us forty acres if we would use it for school
purposes.
On February 24, 1899, having the deed in hand, a board of trustees was
selected, and, with the aid of nine men who cleared one and one-half
acres of land while their wives furnished the dinner, we started what is
now the Robert C. Hungerford Industrial School. The new school now owns
280 acres of land secured as follows: From Mr. and Mrs. E. C.
Hungerford, 160 acres; from Mr. and Mrs. T. W. Cleavland, 40 acres; from
Mrs. Nancy B. Hungerford, 40 acres; by purchase, an additional 40 acres.
The school has two dormitories, Booker T. Washington Hall, the J. W.
Alfred Cluett Memorial Hall, and six other buildings used for shops,
barn, and dining-room. The total value of the property, clear of all
indebtedness, is $22,445. We teach the boys blacksmithing,
wheelwrighting, carpentry, agriculture, stock-raising, poultry-raising,
and truck-gardening; the girls receive instruction in dressmaking, plain
sewing, cooking, laundering, millinery, basketry, and housekeeping. We
give no industry at the expense of the literary work.
The academic department covers a useful course of the English branches.
The moral, religious, industrial, and financial influence of the school
upon the community, as well as upon the students who have attended, who
come from many counties in the State, has grown steadily as the years
have come and gone. The school has at present forty-five young people in
the boarding department, including seven teachers, three of whom have
come from Tuskegee; a large enrolment of students from the immediate
community and from the surrounding territory.
I have not said very much regarding the difficulties, the struggles, to
plant this work, but I am glad to say that from the beginning we have
had the friendliest support and advice from all the white people of this
section, officials and citizens alike.
I owe much of my success in the work here to the cheerful and freely
given counsel at all times of Hon. W. L. Palmer, Representative in the
State Legislature, and to the members of the Board of Public Instruction
of this (Orange) county.
The colored people have had little to give in cash, but have been most
liberal in their contributions of labor. They have been willing to help
themselves.
My constant, my most earnest desire is to prove myself worthy of my
opportunities, that I may continue to be a worthy representative of
Tuskegee. I feel that I owe all that I am, all that I can hope to be, to
the training of my mother, to the constant help and counsel of my wife,
and to Tuskegee, my Tuskegee, from which I have received so many lessons
that have been of incalculable help to me. I look back to my lessons in
carpentry, as well as to all the others, with gratitude for the
thoroughness insisted upon in all directions. I was rescued from a life
of aimlessness, and put in the way of doing something of good for my
fellows.
XVII
THE EVOLUTION OF A SHOEMAKER
BY CHARLES L. MARSHALL
I was born in the town of Henderson, State of Kentucky, January 1, 1867.
My father and mother were both slaves. My father rendered service during
the Civil War as a Union soldier.
As early as I can remember there was in Henderson a public free school
for colored children. In 1872 there came to our town a young man from
Louisville, Ky., John K. Mason by name, to take charge of the school.
How he secured his education I never learned, but that he devoted his
life to the uplift of his race is everywhere in that section clearly in
evidence. Unfortunately, I was not permitted as a boy to go to school,
but became a factory lad instead; for, almost before I was old enough to
begin my education, I was put to work in a tobacco factory, and there I
remained. From childhood to manhood I think I spent, all told, not more
than three years in school.
Somehow I had a faint idea of the value of education, and manifested a
desire for learning by securing the services of a young man, whose
country-school term had expired, to give me lessons at night when not
otherwise engaged. He was quite a "society" man, so that my
school-nights were few in number.
While my father did not provide for my education, he was himself an
industrious man and provided that I should not be idle. Each year, when
the tobacco season was over, I had regular employment in a cooper-shop
with my father, and I learned to make barrels and hogsheads. This trade
I found to be quite valuable, for before I was twenty-one years of age I
was able to demand wages of two dollars a day as a cooper.
Quite incidentally I heard of the work being done at Tuskegee by
Principal Booker T. Washington and the opportunity offered there to get
an education. I at once applied for admission. I received a letter from
the Principal admitting me to school in the autumn of 1889, when I was
twenty-two years of age. I did not enter the school, however, until
1890. I registered as a night-school student and asked to be assigned to
the carpenter-shop, as that seemed more in line with coopering. This
division was so crowded that I was forced to take shoemaking instead. At
this trade I worked two years and attended night-school. At the end of
this period I resolved to go to North Alabama and work in the coal-mines
to get money for clothing, books, and to help me along with my expenses
when the money earned at Tuskegee should run out. Realizing that every
dollar in my school life would count, I decided to live most cheaply,
even cooking for myself. In the end, following this method, I had more
money with which to return to school. I worked all day and returned to
work again the same night, that I might not lose the prize of education,
the pursuit of which I kept daily before me.
Somewhere I heard this quotation, "If anybody else can, I can, too."
With this sentiment I continued to push ahead, until in May, 1895, I
completed the course of study with the first honor of my class.
During my stay at Tuskegee I made such a record in the shoemaking-shop
that my instructor was anxious to have me take an assistant's place with
him. This I refused, preferring to start a career in Texas, of which I
had heard such glowing accounts. In the months of June, July, and a
part of August, 1895, I was employed with others making the shoes which
constituted a part of Tuskegee's Industrial Exhibit at the Atlanta
Exposition. At the solicitation of a number of persons living at
Mineola, Tex., I decided, even before graduation, to begin my life-work
at that place. Reaching Mineola, I found a fight on hand between the
teacher of the colored school and the patrons of the school. Immediately
on learning this fact I withdrew from the contest, notwithstanding the
fact that my cash earnings were almost exhausted and those who had
invited me there seemed unable to guarantee me the position. An incident
occurred at Mineola which I shall never forget. It was the second
meeting with Prof. H. T. Kealing, then president of Paul Quinn College,
Waco, Tex., but now editor of the African Methodist Episcopal Church
Review, an ambitious magazine publication of the great African Methodist
Episcopal Church. The occasion was a Quarterly Conference of the African
Methodist Episcopal Church at Mineola, and Professor Kealing was there
to deliver a lecture. Our first meeting was at Tuskegee while I was a
student there during my Senior year. In that far-away country I was very
glad to see some one I knew, and after the meeting I was not long in
making myself known to Professor Kealing. He heard my story, praised the
stand I had taken, and expressed regrets that he was not able to offer
me a place in Paul Quinn College. He suggested that I take a letter of
introduction to Dr. I. B. Scott, then president of Wiley University,
Marshall, Tex., but now a Bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church, the
first colored man to be elected to the episcopacy of that great church.
At Wiley I was kindly received by Bishop Scott, and entered into a
contract with him to teach shoemaking for my board and the proceeds of
the shop. I entered into the spirit of Wiley with such earnestness that
at the close of my first month I was made a salaried teacher at $35 a
month, and before the session was half gone my salary had been raised to
$40. I completed the year's work with perfect satisfaction to all
concerned. What I enjoyed most of all during my year at Wiley was the
esteem and personal friendship of Bishop Scott. His letters addressed to
me upon the eve of my resignation, the esteem he placed on my work while
in the employ of the University, and his entreaties that I should not
tender my resignation so embarrassed me that for a time I was unable to
tell what I should do. I felt I owed it to Tuskegee to go wherever
Principal Washington thought my services were most desired. On two
occasions since I left there Bishop Scott has taken occasion to voice
his approval of my conduct while at Wiley: once before the East
Tennessee Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in October,
1902, to my students, when he came to visit me at the Christiansburg
Institute.
About the first of May, 1896, I received a telegram from Principal
Washington requesting me to allow him to present my name to the Board of
Managers of the Christiansburg Industrial Institute for the
principalship then vacant. I agreed, and was elected to the place.
Before entering upon the duties of my new position at Christiansburg I
made a visit to Tuskegee, for the purpose of gaining information as to
the scope of my work and as to how I should best proceed.
After spending nearly two months at Tuskegee, I made my way to my new
field of labor in Virginia, reaching Christiansburg the 15th of July,
1896. The appearance of things at Christiansburg did not come up to my
expectations, nor was my reception in accordance with what I had
expected. Under the conditions which then existed, one of more
experience than I had would have expected just about such a reception as
I received. The people seemed almost crazed that a Tuskegee graduate
should be planning to engraft the Tuskegee Idea in that section--and
this, too, in spite of Hampton. In my effort to carry out the plans
sanctioned by Dr. Washington, I soon realized I was facing opposition
well-nigh insurmountable. This was due to their misunderstanding of Dr.
Washington, and of what Tuskegee really stands for. As far as possible,
I gathered around me men and women who, like myself, were thoroughly
imbued with the Tuskegee Idea, and together we pushed ahead with our
plans.
From the first I was given to understand that the desire of the Board
was that there should be at Christiansburg a school similar to Hampton
and Tuskegee; though smaller, it should be no less perfect in what it
was designed to do. To reach this end the school had to undergo the
change from a distinctly literary school to one with both literary and
industrial branches; from a regular, ordinary school to one with a
boarding department. My plans met the approval of all concerned, yet
there was little idea on my part as to the amount of money and labor
necessary to put them into operation. The course of study was rearranged
to suit the new conditions, and five industries were installed. A
circular setting forth the purposes of the school was published and
scattered abroad. We then thought that this was nearing the end of the
great task, when in reality we had hardly begun.
[Illustration: GIRLS GARDENING.]
The Board of Managers did not oppose the boarding department, yet they
did not sanction it to the extent of supporting it.
I had confidence in my plans and was willing to start alone. This step
was far more perplexing than I had at first imagined. As the time drew
near for the opening of school, I was aware that for the boarding
department I had to find a suitable house and procure necessary
furniture. In the basement of the school building was some lumber which
had been used for a platform. With the assistance of one of the teachers
this stage-lumber was converted into five bedsteads and three small
tables. I succeeded in getting one of the merchants to credit us for
several lamps. With this furniture, several stools, an equal number of
dry-goods boxes, and a few kitchen utensils, the boarding department of
the institution was started. Notwithstanding the scanty arrangement, I
am glad to say that for the most part there was but little or no
complaint.
Sufficient money was appropriated by the Board of Managers to provide
for the purchase of necessary working tools for the added industrial
classes.
I kept our friends in the North reminded of our need of additional land.
The industrial-school idea with a department of agriculture was not
succeeding well on a half-acre of ground. After two years of patient
toil this question of land was recognized as a necessity, and
accordingly two friends undertook to solicit subscriptions to the amount
of $5,000 with which to purchase a farm of 100 acres, two horses, a set
of harness, a wagon, and a plow. By this time spring was well on and we
were planning to make a crop. In a runaway one of the school horses was
badly injured. The purchase of the farm, etc., had about exhausted our
Northern resources and the school was in debt. To my credit in the Bank
of Christiansburg was a small sum of money, with which I purchased a
horse. The crop that year was fairly successful.
Before taking possession of the farm, it was understood that instead of
the proceeds of the farm going toward maintaining or paying teachers'
salaries, the money should go toward building up the soil, which was
well run down, and that we should devote all possible effort in the
direction of restoring the soil to its once high state of fertilization.
Owning this farm, we had the "Big House" where the master once lived,
and several of the slave cabins, which still remain, where the slaves
resided. Hundreds of slaves, I have been told, tilled this soil in the
days long ago, when its productive power was greater than that of any
estate in this whole section.
It is a remarkable and significant fact that where the master once lived
is a recitation building for colored boys and girls, and where the
slaves once huddled around the flickering light of a pine-knot young
Negro students are quartered daily, preparing for the duties of the
morrow.
In building up the school to its present position, five persons, almost
from the very beginning, have figured most prominently, viz.: E. A. Long
and his wife, Miss Willie Mae Griffin, the writer and his wife--all
Tuskegee graduates. It is needless that I remark here that the burdens
borne by the men have been in no sense heavier than those borne by these
faithful women. The road along which we have traveled has not been, by
any means, a smooth one. We all had been toilers at Tuskegee and knew
well how to face the duties of life. This was decidedly in our favor. I
was the oldest of the company and perhaps had seen more of hardship than
the others; it therefore fell to my lot to give courage to the others
when hope was all but gone.
Some time previous to our taking possession of the farm, some of the
occupants had sown about half an acre in a kind of radish commonly known
hereabout as "pig radish." It must be remembered that each year, after
the eight months' academic work was over, we received no money from any
source whatever. Paying the salaries of teachers who were to leave for
the summer and meeting other demands of the institution always exhausted
the school's treasury before the summer season began. With a "cropping"
season of four months ahead, no money, no source from which any could be
expected, the nice tender "pig radish," year after year, became our
food-supply for the early part of the summer at least. Thus, while
pushing the operations of the farm, rebuilding the soil by means of
turning under green crops, fertilizers, etc., "pig-radish" greens,
western side meat, and corn-meal constituted our chief diet. Beef came
to us as a luxury twice a week. The work was divided so that E. A. Long,
our treasurer, was gardener, I was farmer, our wives and Miss Griffin
were matrons and cooks. The 4th of July, 1900, found the work of the
farm in such a prosperous condition that it was decided to celebrate the
event with a cake and some ice-cream, for by this time we owned a cow.
One peculiar thing happened about the time we purchased this farm. We
were teaching a graded school which we were eager to turn into a
boarding institution. The pupils and patrons were in perfect accord with
the faculty, but as soon as the fact became known that we had purchased
a large tract of land and would endeavor to build a boarding and
industrial school thereon, the members of the faculty at once became
objects of scorn to almost the entire colored population. There were at
that time enrolled in the school 240 children. Within less than a month
more than 100 had dropped out. When school closed in May there were only
60 children attending.
We went about our duties, however, without complaint. While we worked,
Nature also worked for us. Vegetation flourished wherever seed were
sown; the trees bore a harvest of apples such as I have not seen since,
and all went well.
As I look back over those years of trial, of privation, of sacrifice, I
find they were conditions precedent to laying an enduring foundation.
Our hope has been to establish a school where poor but earnest boys and
girls can secure an education. It was through our efforts, first of all,
that we were able to prove to the supporters of the school that such an
institution could live and grow and do great and lasting good for those
it is designed to help. Year by year the school has grown. Year by year
the people of the community realize the sincerity of my teachers and
give them hearty support. Patience, toil, trust in God, and enterprise
are the elements which are fast putting this work on its feet.
Every person who visits the school sees earnestness manifested on farm,
in shop, in class, about the grounds, everywhere, and goes away a
sincere friend. Not alone do we have our visitor's friendship, but he
tells the simple story to others and the number of friends increases.
Mr. R. C. Bedford, of Beloit, Wis., after visiting the school in
January, 1905, took occasion to address a gentleman in the North who had
interested himself in raising funds for the school, in the following
language: "I have not visited the school for three years. Great changes
have taken place since then. The good there being accomplished is simply
immeasurable. Mr. Marshall and Mr. Long work together in such perfect
harmony as to constitute a force of singular directness and power. I
think the work is carried on most economically, and such a clear and
full account of all expenditures is given to the public that you must
have the utmost confidence of all your friends."
A few years ago it was difficult for our Treasurer to raise $1,875. The
raising of funds for institutions is always difficult, but it is not as
hard now to raise $6,000 to $8,000 as it was to raise $1,875 a few years
ago.
Mr. E. A. Long, our treasurer, whose faithful assistance I have had in
every effort to develop the school, was with me, embarrassed by a debt
of the boarding department of more than $600. This condition grew, in a
large measure, out of the fact that we attempted to supply students'
work on the farm to pay their expenses, and the proceeds of the farm
were expended as far as possible in the direction of building up the
soil. In the fall of 1902 the board of managers assumed the
responsibility of the boarding department, paid all indebtedness, and
to-day the school is operated on a cash basis.
During four years there have been contributed toward this work
$43,528.77. We have added to the original plant one $10,000 dormitory, a
cottage costing $750, a barn at a cost of $2,000, and a shop building
valued at $1,000. Much has been spent in the way of repairs. We have
$1,000 invested in live stock, and more than $300 worth of farming
implements. In each of the industrial departments fairly good equipment
can be found. We have grown from a half acre of ground to more than 100
acres; from 2 horses to 43 head of live stock; from a printing-press
weighing 75 pounds to one weighing 2,500 pounds. Agriculture, carpentry,
printing, shoemaking, laundering, cooking, sewing, and basketry are
carried on successfully. The farm produces large crops of cereals,
vegetables, fruits, and raises a large share of the meat used by the
school. All the flour for the past three years came from the wheat
produced on the farm.
The growth of the school has commended itself favorably to those who
have had occasion to investigate its claims. A committee appointed to
look into the condition of the school some time ago made the following
statement: "In conclusion, your committee would say that it feels that
Messrs. Marshall and Long and their wives have made many sacrifices for
the good of the school and have shown a true missionary spirit in
carrying on the work, and their ideals and purposes are in accord with
the very best. They have borne an awkward and heavy burden in financing
the school, and your committee feels that if released from this care
their teaching-work will be much improved and become very valuable in
building up the school."
In addition to the cultivation of the home-farm of 100 acres, the
increased amount of stock makes it necessary to rent an adjacent pasture
of 80 acres, the property of two of our teachers.
I have made an effort to supplement the knowledge acquired at Tuskegee
through a school of correspondence and through the Chautauqua Reading
Circle with some degree of success.
The success of this school, in a very large measure, is due to the
consecrated effort of the members of the Friends' Freedmen's Association
of Philadelphia and the board of managers of the institution. From the
time I entered upon the work to the present, Principal Washington has
also been a constant source of help and encouragement. Five hundred
dollars given by him in the spring of 1903 was the first money toward
the erection of our new dormitory. A combination woodworking-machine is
also a result of his interest.
We have on hand an endowment fund of several thousand dollars which we
are anxious to increase. Definite plans have been made for the erection
of two new buildings. When the plans thus far mapped out are completed,
the plant, now worth $30,000, will easily have a valuation of $75,000.
THE END
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