 | CHAPTER V. The future of the American negro |  |
CHAPTER V.
In this chapter I wish to show how,
at Tuskegee, we are trying to work out
the plan of industrial training, and trust
I shall be pardoned the seeming egotism
if I preface the sketch with a few words,
by way of example, as to the expansion
of my own life and how I came to undertake
the work at Tuskegee.
My earliest recollection is of a small
one-room log hut on a slave plantation
in Virginia. After the close of the war,
while working in the coal mines of West
Virginia for the support of my mother,
I heard, in some accidental way, of the
Hampton Institute. When I learned
that it was an institution where a black
boy could study, could have a chance
to work for his board, and at the same
time be taught how to work and to realise
the dignity of labor, I resolved to go
there. Bidding my mother good-by, I
started out one morning to find my way
and had no definite idea as to
where Hampton was. By walking, begging
rides, and paying for a portion of
the journey on the steam-cars, I finally
succeeded in reaching the city of Richmond,
Virginia. I was without money
or friends. I slept on a sidewalk; and
by working on a vessel the next day I
earned money enough to continue my
way to the institute, where I arrived
with a capital of fifty cents. At Hampton
I found the opportunity—in the
way of buildings, teachers, and industries
provided by the generous—to get
training in the class-room and by practical
touch with industrial life,—to learn
thrift, economy, and push. I was surrounded
by an atmosphere of business,
Christian influence, and spirit of self-help,
that seemed to have awakened
every faculty in me, and caused me for
the first time to realise what it meant to
be a man instead of a piece of property.
While there, I resolved, when I had
finished the course of training, I would
go into the Far South, into the Black
Belt of the South, and give my life to
providing the same kind of opportunity
for self-reliance, self-awakening, that I
had found provided for me at Hampton.
My work began at Tuskegee, Alabama,
in 1881, in a small shanty church,
with one teacher and thirty students,
without a dollar's worth of property.
The spirit of work and of industrial
thrift, with aid from the State and generosity
from the North, have enabled
us to develop an institution which now
has about one thousand students, gathered
from twenty-three States, and
eighty-eight instructors. Counting students,
instructors, and their families,
we have a resident population upon the
school grounds of about twelve hundred
persons.
The institution owns two thousand
three hundred acres of land, seven hundred
labor. There are six hundred head of
live-stock, including horses, mules, cows,
hogs, and sheep. There are over forty
vehicles that have been made, and are
now used, by the school. Training is
given in twenty-six industries. There
is work in wood, in iron, in leather, in
tin; and all forms of domestic economy
are engaged in. Students are taught
mechanical and architectural drawing,
receive training as agriculturists, dairymen,
masons, carpenters, contractors,
builders, as machinists, electricians, printers,
dressmakers, and milliners, and in
other directions.
The value of the property is $300,000.
There are forty-two buildings, counting
large and small, all of which, with the
exception of four, have been erected by
the labour of the students.
Since this work started, there has been
collected and spent for its founding and
support $800,000. The annual expense
simple manner the effort has been to
place a great object-lesson in the heart
of the South for the elevation of the
coloured people, where there should be,
in a high sense, that union of head,
heart, and hand which has been the
foundation of the greatness of all races
since the world began.
What is the object of all this outlay?
It must be first borne in mind that
we have in the South a peculiar and
unprecedented state of things. The
cardinal needs among the eight million
coloured people in the South, most of
whom are to be found on the plantations,
may be stated as food, clothing,
shelter, education, proper habits, and
a settlement of race relations. These
millions of coloured people of the
South cannot be reached directly by
any missionary agent; but they can be
reached by sending out among them
strong, selected young men and women,
and heart, who will live among them
and show them how to lift themselves up.
The problem that the Tuskegee Institute
keeps before itself constantly is
how to prepare these leaders. From
the outset, in connection with religious
and academic training, it has emphasised
industrial, or hand, training as a
means of finding the way out of present
conditions. First, we have found the
industrial teaching useful in giving the
student a chance to work out a portion
of his expenses while in school. Second,
the school furnishes labour that has an
economic value and at the same time
gives the student a chance to acquire
knowledge and skill while performing
the labour. Most of all, we find the
industrial system valuable in teaching
economy, thrift, and the dignity of labour
and in giving moral backbone to students.
The fact that a student goes
into the world conscious of his power
a set of harness gives him a certain
confidence and moral independence
that he would not possess without such
training.
A more detailed example of our
methods at Tuskegee may be of interest.
For example, we cultivate by
student labour seven hundred acres of
land. The object is not only to cultivate
the land in a way to make it pay
our boarding department, but at the
same time to teach the students, in
addition to the practical work, something
of the chemistry of the soil, the
best methods of drainage, dairying, cultivation
of fruit, the care of live-stock
and tools, and scores of other lessons
needed by people whose main dependence
is on agriculture.
Friends some time ago provided
means for the erection of a large new
chapel at Tuskegee. Our students
made the bricks for this chapel. A
the students at our saw-mill, the plans
were drawn by our teacher of architectural
and mechanical drawing, and students
did the brick-masonry, the plastering,
the painting, the carpentry work,
the tinning, the slating, and made most
of the furniture. Practically, the whole
chapel was built and furnished by student
labour. Now the school has this
building for permanent use, and the
students have a knowledge of the trades
employed in its construction.
While the young men do the kinds of
work I have mentioned, young women
to a large extent make, mend, and laundry
the clothing of the young men.
They also receive instruction in dairying,
horticulture, and other valuable industries.
One of the objections sometimes
urged against industrial education for
the Negro is that it aims merely to
teach him to work on the same plan
This is far from being the object at
Tuskegee. At the head of each of the
twenty-six industrial divisions we have
an intelligent and competent instructor,
just as we have in our history classes,
so that the student is taught not only
practical brick-masonry, for example,
but also the underlying principles of
that industry, the mathematics and the
mechanical and architectural drawing.
Or he is taught how to become master
of the forces of nature, so that, instead
of cultivating corn in the old way, he
can use a corn cultivator that lays off
the furrows, drops the corn into them,
and covers it; and in this way he can do
more work than three men by the old
process of corn planting, while at the
same time much of the toil is eliminated
and labour is dignified. In a word, the
constant aim is to show the student
how to put brains into every process of
labour, how to bring his knowledge of
carpentry, forging, foundry work,
how to dispense as soon as possible
with the old form of ante-bellum labour.
In the erection of the chapel referred
to, instead of letting the money which
was given to us go into outside hands,
we made it accomplish three objects:
first, it provided the chapel; second, it
gave the students a chance to get a
practical knowledge of the trades connected
with the building; and, third,
it enabled them to earn something
toward the payment of their board
while receiving academic and industrial
training.
Having been fortified at Tuskegee by
education of mind, skill of hand, Christian
character, ideas of thrift, economy,
and push, and a spirit of independence,
the student is sent out to become a centre
of influence and light in showing
the masses of our people in the Black
Belt of the South how to lift themselves
one or two examples. Ten years ago
a young coloured man came to the institute
from one of the large plantation
districts. He studied in the class-room
a portion of the time, and received practical
and theoretical training on the
farm the remainder of the time. Having
finished his course at Tuskegee, he
returned to his plantation home, which
was in a county where the coloured
people outnumbered the whites six to
one, as is true of many of the counties
in the Black Belt of the South. He
found the Negroes in debt. Ever since
the war they had been mortgaging their
crops for the food on which to live while
the crops were growing. The majority
of them were living from hand-to-mouth
on rented land, in small one-room log
cabins, and attempting to pay a rate of
interest on their advances that ranged
from fifteen to forty per cent, per annum.
The school had been taught in
and had never been in session
longer than three months out of twelve.
He found the people, as many as eight
or ten persons, of all ages and conditions
and of both sexes, huddled together
and living in one-room cabins
year after year, and with a minister
whose only aim was to work upon the
emotions. One can imagine something
of the moral and religious state of the
community.
But the remedy! In spite of the evil
the Negro got the habit of work from
slavery. The rank and file of the race,
especially those on the Southern plantations,
work hard; but the trouble is that
what they earn gets away from them in
high rents, crop mortgages, whiskey,
snuff, cheap jewelry, and the like. The
young man just referred to had been
trained at Tuskegee, as most of our
graduates are, to meet just this condition
of things. He took the three
his work. Then he organized the older
people into a club, or conference, that
held meetings every week. In these
meetings he taught the people, in a
plain, simple manner, how to save their
money, how to farm in a better way,
how to sacrifice,—to live on bread and
potatoes, if necessary, till they could get
out of debt, and begin the buying of
lands.
Soon a large proportion of the people
were in a condition to make contracts
for the buying of homes (land is very
cheap in the South) and to live without
mortgaging their crops. Not only this;
under the guidance and leadership of
this teacher, the first year that he was
among them they learned how and
built, by contributions in money and
labour, a neat, comfortable school-house
that replaced the wreck of a log cabin
formerly used. The following year the
weekly meetings were continued, and
three months of school. The next year
two more months were added. The
improvement has gone on until these
people have every year an eight months'
school.
I wish my readers could have the
chance that I have had of going into
this community. I wish they could
look into the faces of the people, and
see them beaming with hope and delight.
I wish they could see the two or
three room cottages that have taken the
place of the usual one-room cabin, see
the well-cultivated farms and the religious
life of the people that now means
something more than the name. The
teacher has a good cottage and well-kept
farm that serve as models. In a
word, a complete revolution has been
wrought in the industrial, educational,
and religious life of this whole community
by reason of the fact that they
have had this leader, this guide and
the money and effort that had hitherto
been scattered to the wind in mortgages
and high rents, in whiskey and gewgaws,
and how to concentrate it in the direction
of their own uplifting. One community
on its feet presents an object-lesson
for the adjoining communities,
and soon improvements show themselves
in other places.
Another student, who received academic
and industrial training at Tuskegee,
established himself, three years
ago, as a blacksmith and wheelwright
in a community; and, in addition to the
influence of his successful business
enterprise, he is fast making the same
kind of changes in the life of the people
about him that I have just recounted.
It would be easy for me to fill many
pages describing the influence of the
Tuskegee graduates in every part of
the South. We keep it constantly in
the minds of our students and graduates
of the masses of our people must be
improved, as well as the intellectual,
before there can be any permanent
change in their moral and religious life.
We find it a pretty hard thing to make
a good Christian of a hungry man. No
matter how much our people "get
happy" and "shout" in church, if they
go home at night from church hungry,
they are tempted to find something to
eat before morning. This is a principle
of human nature, and is not confined
alone to the Negro. The Negro has
within him immense power for self-uplifting,
but for years it will be necessary
to guide him and stimulate his energies.
The recognition of this power led us
to organise, five years ago, what is known
as the Tuskegee Negro Conference,—
a gathering that meets every February,
and is composed of about eight hundred
representatives, coloured men and
women, from all sections of the Black
buggies, on muleback and horseback,
on foot, by railroad. Some travel
all night in order to be present. The
matters considered at the conference are
those that the coloured people have it
in their own power to control,—such as
the evils of the mortgage system, the
one-room cabin, buying on credit, the
importance of owning a home and of
putting money in the bank, how to
build school-houses and prolong the
school term, and to improve their moral
and religious condition. As a single
example of the results, one delegate reported
that since the conference was
started, seven years ago, eleven people
in his neighbourhood had bought
homes, fourteen had gotten out of debt,
and a number had stopped mortgaging
their crops. Moreover, a school-house
had been built by the people themselves,
and the school term had been extended
from three to six months; and, with a
done libin' in de ashes."
Besides this Negro Conference for the
masses of the people, we now have a
gathering at the same time known as
the Tuskegee Workers' Conference,
composed of the officers and instructors
of the leading coloured schools in the
South. After listening to the story of
the conditions and needs from the
people themselves, the Workers' Conference
finds much food for thought and
discussion. Let me repeat, from its
beginning, this institution has kept in
mind the giving of thorough mental and
religious training, along with such industrial
training as would enable the
student to appreciate the dignity of
labour and become self-supporting and
valuable as a producing factor, keeping
in mind the occupations open in the
South to the average man of the race.
This institution has now reached the
point where it can begin to judge of the
Some years ago we noted the
fact, for example, that there was quite a
movement in many parts of the South to
organise and start dairies. Soon after
this, we opened a dairy school where
a number of young men could receive
training in the best and most scientific
methods of dairying. At present we
have calls, mainly from Southern white
men, for twice as many dairymen as we
are able to supply. The reports indicate
that our young men are giving the
highest satisfaction, and are fast changing
and improving the dairy product in
the communities where they labour. I
have used the dairy industry simply as
an example. What I have said of this
industry is true in a larger or less degree
of the others.
I cannot but believe, and my daily
observation and experience confirm me
in it, that, as we continue placing men
and women of intelligence, religion,
community in the South, who will prove
by actual results their value to the community,
this will constitute the solution
for many of the present political and
sociological difficulties. It is with this
larger and more comprehensive view of
improving present conditions and laying
the foundation wisely that the Tuskegee
Normal and Industrial Institute is training
men and women as teachers and
industrial leaders.
Over four hundred students have finished
the course of training at this institution,
and are now scattered throughout
the South, doing good work. A
recent investigation shows that about
3,000 students who have taken only a
partial course are doing commendable
work. One young man, who was able
to remain in school but two years, has
been teaching in one community for ten
years. During this time he has built
a new school-house, extended the school
has bought a nice farm upon which he
has erected a neat cottage. The example
of this young man has inspired
many of the coloured people in this
community to follow his example in
some degree; and this is one of many
such examples.
Wherever our graduates and ex-students
go, they teach by precept and
example the necessary lesson of thrift,
economy, and property-getting, and
friendship between the races.
| CHAPTER V. The future of the American negro | |