There are people
whose
abilities and energy take them far past any limitations life tries to
place on
them. Booker T. Washington was one of those people. He rose up from
slavery and
illiteracy to become the most important and helpful leader of black
Americans
at the turn of the century.
His childhood was one
of
privation, poverty, slavery and back breaking work. Born in 1856, he
was from
birth the property of James Burroughs of Virginia. Not much is known of his father. Even
Washington
himself doesn't know much. His mother, Jane, raised him, and he was put
to work
as early as possible. Since it was illegal for a slave to learn to read
and
write, Washington received no education.
On September 22, 1862 Lincoln issued The Emancipation Proclamation, but of
course it
could not be enforced until the end of the Civil War in 1865. The
former slaves
were at first jubilant about being free but it quickly became apparent
that
there was no place for most of them to go. Washington's step-father was very fortunate because he
found work
packing salt in Malden, West Virginia. Jane moved herself and her children to join
her husband.
The nine-year old Washington spent long, exhausting days packing salt. Like
many blacks
after Emancipation, Washington wanted an education. So despite the exhausting
days he
used his free time to go to school. But it was not enough. When he was
16 he
decided that he wanted to go to Hampton Institute in Virginia. He did not know if he could make it in, and if
he got in
he didn't know how he was going to pay for it, but in 1872 he showed up
on
their doorstep flat broke and hungry.
Hampton Institute was
started
and run by General Samuel Chapman Armstrong. Armstrong and the
institution he
created were to become the one great influence in Washington's life. Armstrong believed in work, study,
hygiene,
morality, self-discipline and self-reliance - in large amounts. It was
not a
place for slackers. Armstrong's purpose was to train black teachers,
but he
believed every student should have a trade as well. Washington's trade was being a janitor. Later, when Washington developed the Tuskegee Institute it emphasized
these same
qualities and convictions.
After graduation Washington became a teacher in Tinkersville, West Virginia for three years. In 1878 he left to attend
Wayland
Seminary in Washington DC, but quit after six months. In 1879 Armstrong
asked him to
return to Hampton Institute as a teacher. Washington did so, and then in 1881 Armstrong recommended
him as the
principal of a new school called Tuskegee Institute in Tuskegee, Alabama.
July 4, 1881
was the first day of school at Tuskegee Institute. It was
a humble beginning, but under Washington's care both the school and Washington grew to
be world
famo
us.
His school made lasting and profound contributions to the South and to
the United States - such as through the work of one of its
teachers - George
Washington Carver. One of his main problems was always finding enough
money.
The support he received from the state was neither generous nor stable
enough
to build the kind of school he was developing. So he had to raise the
money
himself by going on speaking tours and solicitating
donations. He received a lot of money from white northerners who were
impressed
with the work he was doing and his non-threatening racial views.
Industrialists
like Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller would donate money on a
regular
basis.
It was these
non-threatening
racial views that gave Washington the appellation "The Great Accomodater".
He believed that blacks should not push to attain equal civil and
political
rights with whites. That it was best to concentrate on improving their
economic
skills and the quality of their character. The
burden of
improvement resting squarely on the shoulders of the black man.
Eventually they would earn the respect an
d
love of the white man, and civil and political rights would be accrued
as a
matter of course. This was a very non-threatening and popular idea with
a lot
of whites.
As Washington's influence with blacks and whites grew he got
several honors.
In 1901 he wrote a bestseller called 'Up From Slavery' -
which was his autobiography. He also was the advisor of the Prisident of the United States, Theodore
Roosevelt. He
became the first black everto eat over the
White
House with the President. This caused some trouble. Many white people
thought
that it was wrong for whites and blacks to mix socially, and for their
President to do it horrified them. Roosevelt defended his actions at the time, and he
continued to ask
for Washington's advice, but he never invited him back.
Eventually Washington's leadership of blacks began to
decline. It became apparent that the white people that had gained
control of
Southern institutions after Reconstruction did not ever want the civil
and
political status of blacks to improve - regardless of how hard they
worked or
how much character they had. They passed laws to keep them from voting
and to
keep them from mixing with whites in schools, stores and restaurants.
Many
blacks came to believe that a more forceful, demanding approach was
needed.
They turned to the leadership of William Monroe Trotter, W.E.B. DuBois and the NAACP.
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