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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
power of mind from the training given his hands in the process of mastering
well three trades during the days of slavery. If one goes to-day into any
Southern town, and asks for the leading and most reliable coloured man in
the community, I believe that in five cases out of ten he will be directed
to a Negro who learned a trade during the days of slavery.
On
the morning that the school opened, thirty students reported for admission.
I was the only teacher. The students were about equally divided between the
sexes. Most of them lived in Macon County, the county in which Tuskegee is
situated, and of which it is the county-seat. A great many more students
wanted to enter the school, but it had been decided to receive only those
who were above fifteen years of age, and who had previously received some
education. The greater part of the thirty were public-school teachers, and
some of them were nearly forty years of age. With the teachers came some of
their former pupils, and when they were examined it was amusing to note that
in several cases the pupil entered a higher class than did his former
teacher. It was also interesting to note how many big books some of them had
studied, and how many high-sounding subjects some of them claimed to have
mastered. The bigger the book and the longer the name of the subject, the
prouder they felt of their accomplishment. Some had studied Latin, and one
or two Greek. This they thought entitled them to special distinction.
In
fact, one of the saddest things I saw during the month of travel which I
have described was a young man, who had attended some high school, sitting
down in a one-room cabin, with grease on his clothing, filth all around him,
and weeds in the yard and garden, engaged in studying a French grammar.
The
students who came first seemed to be fond of memorizing long and complicated
"rules" in grammar and mathematics, but had little thought or
knowledge of applying these rules to their everyday affairs of their life.
One subject which they liked to talk about, and tell me that they had
mastered, in arithmetic, was "banking and discount," but I soon
found out that neither they nor almost any one in the neighbourhood in which
they had lived had ever had a bank account. In registering the names of the
students, I found that almost every one of them had one or more middle
initials. When I asked what the "J" stood for, in the name of John
J. Jones, it was explained to me that this was a part of his
"entitles." Most of the students wanted to get an education
because they thought it would enable them to earn more money as
school-teachers.
Notwithstanding
what I have said about them in these respects, I have never seen a more
earnest and willing company of young men and women than these students were.
They were all willing to learn the right thing as soon as it was shown them
what was right. I was determined to start them off on a solid and thorough
foundation, so far as their books were concerned. I soon learned that most
of them had the merest smattering of the high-sounding things that they had
studied. While they could locate the Desert of Sahara or the capital of
China on an artificial globe, I found out that the girls could not locate
the proper places for the knives and forks on an actual dinner-table, or the
places on which the bread and meat should be set.
I
had to summon a good deal of courage to take a student who had been studying
cube root and "banking and discount," and explain to him that the
wisest thing for him to do first was thoroughly master the multiplication
table.
The
number of pupils increased each week, until by the end of the first month
there were nearly fifty. Many of them, however, said that, as they could
remain only for two or three months, they wanted to enter a high class and
get a diploma the first year if possible.
At
the end of the first six weeks a new and rare face entered the school as a
co-teacher. This was Miss Olivia A. Davidson, who later became my wife. Miss
Davidson was born in Ohio, and received her preparatory education in the
public schools of that state. When little more than a girl, she heard of the
need of teachers in the South. She went to the state of Mississippi and
began teaching there. Later she taught in the city of Memphis. While
teaching in Mississippi, one of her pupils became ill with smallpox. Every
one in the community was so frightened that no one would nurse the boy. Miss
Davidson closed her school and remained by the bedside of the boy night and
day until he recovered. While she was at her Ohio home on her vacation, the
worst epidemic of yellow fever broke out in Memphis, Tenn., that perhaps has
ever occurred in the South. When she heard of this, she at once telegraphed
the Mayor of Memphis, offering her services as a yellow-fever nurse,
although she had never had the disease.
Miss
Davidon's experience in the South showed her that the people needed
something more than mere book-learning. She heard of the Hampton system of
education, and decided that this was what she wanted in order to prepare
herself for better work in the South. The attention of Mrs. Mary Hemenway,
of Boston, was attracted to her rare ability. Through Mrs. Hemenway's
kindness and generosity, Miss Davidson, after graduating at Hampton,
received an opportunity to complete a two years' course of training at the
Massachusetts State Normal School at Framingham.
Before
she went to Framingham, some one suggested to Miss Davidson that, since she
was so very light in colour, she might find it more comfortable not to be
known as a coloured women in this school in Massachusetts. She at once
replied that under no circumstances and for no considerations would she
consent to deceive any one in regard to her racial identity.
Soon
after her graduation from the Framingham institution, Miss Davidson came to
Tuskegee, bringing into the school many valuable and fresh ideas as to the
best methods of teaching, as well as a rare moral character and a life of
unselfishness that I think has seldom been equalled. No single individual
did more toward laying the foundations of the Tuskegee Institute so as to
insure the successful work that has been done there than Olivia A. Davidson.
Miss
Davidson and I began consulting as to the future of the school from the
first. The students were making progress in learning books and in
development their minds; but it became apparent at once that, if we were to
make any permanent impression upon those who had come to us for training we
must do something besides teach them mere books. The students had come from
homes where they had had no opportunities for lessons which would teach them
how to care for their bodies. With few exceptions, the homes in Tuskegee in
which the students boarded were but little improvement upon those from which
they had come. We wanted to teach the students how to bathe; how to care for
their teeth and clothing. We wanted to teach them what to eat, and how to
eat it properly, and how to care for their rooms. Aside from this, we wanted
to give them such a practical knowledge of some one industry, together with
the spirit of industry, thrift, and economy, that they would be sure of
knowing how to make a living after they had left us. We wanted to teach them
to study actual things instead of mere books alone.
We
found that the most of our students came from the country districts, where
agriculture in some form or other was the main dependence of the people. We
learned that about eighty-five per cent of the coloured people in the Gulf
states depended upon agriculture for their living. Since this was true, we
wanted to be careful not to education our students out of sympathy with
agricultural life, so that they would be attracted from the country to the
cities, and yield to the temptation of trying to live by their wits. We
wanted to give them such an education as would fit a large proportion of
them to be teachers, and at the same time cause them to return to the
plantation districts and show the people there how to put new energy and new
ideas into farming, as well as into the intellectual and moral and religious
life of the people.
All
these ideas and needs crowded themselves upon us with a seriousness that
seemed well-night overwhelming. What were we to do? We had only the little
old shanty and the abandoned church which the good coloured people of the
town of Tuskegee had kindly loaned us for the accommodation of the classes.
The number of students was increasing daily. The more we saw of them, and
the more we travelled through the country districts, the more we saw that
our efforts were reaching, to only a partial degree, the actual needs of the
people whom we wanted to lift up through the medium of the students whom we
should education and send out as leaders.
The
more we talked with the students, who were then coming to us from several
parts of the state, the more we found that the chief ambition among a large
proportion of them was to get an education so that they would not have to
work any longer with their hands.
This
is illustrated by a story told of a coloured man in Alabama, who, one hot
day in July, while he was at work in a cotton-field, suddenly stopped, and,
looking toward the skies, said: "O Lawd, de cottom am so grassy, de
work am so hard, and the sun am so hot dat I b'lieve dis darky am called to
preach!"
About
three months after the opening of the school, and at the time when we were
in the greatest anxiety about our work, there came into market for sale an
old and abandoned plantation which was situated about a mile from the town
of Tuskegee. The mansion house--or "big house," as it would have
been called--which had been occupied by the owners during slavery, had been
burned. After making a careful examination of the place, it seemed to be
just the location that we wanted in order to make our work effective and
permanent.
But
how were we to get it? The price asked for it was very little --only five
hundred dollars--but we had no money, and we were strangers in the town and
had no credit. The owner of the land agreed to let us occupy the place if we
could make a payment of two hundred and fifty dollars down, with the
understanding that the remaining two hundred and fifty dollars must be paid
within a year. Although five hundred dollars was cheap for the land, it was
a large sum when one did not have any part of it.
In
the midst of the difficulty I summoned a great deal of courage and wrote to
my friend General J.F.B. Marshall, the Treasurer of the Hampton Institute,
putting the situation before him and beseeching him to lend me the two
hundred and fifty dollars on my own personal responsibility. Within a few
days a reply came to the effect that he had no authority to lend me the
money belonging to the Hampton Institute, but that he would gladly lend me
the amount needed from his own personal funds.
I
confess that the securing of this money in this way was a great surprise to
me, as well as a source of gratification. Up to that time I never had had in
my possession so much money as one hundred dollars at a time, and the loan
which I had asked General Marshall for seemed a tremendously large sum to
me. The fact of my being responsible for the repaying of such a large amount
of money weighed very heavily upon me.
I
lost no time in getting ready to move the school on to the new farm. At the
time we occupied the place there were standing upon it a cabin, formerly
used as a dining room, an old kitchen, a stable, and an old hen-house.
Within a few weeks we had all of these structures in use. The stable was
repaired and used as a recitation-room, and very presently the hen-house was
utilized for the same purpose.
I
recall that one morning, when I told an old coloured man who lived near, and
who sometimes helped me, that our school had grown so large that it would be
necessary for us to use the hen-house for school purposes, and that I wanted
him to help me give it a thorough cleaning out the next day, he replied, in
the most earnest manner: "What you mean, boss? You sholy ain't gwine
clean out de hen-house in de day-time?"
Nearly
all the work of getting the new location ready for school purposes was done
by the students after school was over in the afternoon. As soon as we got
the cabins in condition to be used, I determined to clear up some land so
that we could plant a crop. When I explained my plan to the young men, I
noticed that they did not seem to take to it very kindly. It was hard for
them to see the connection between clearing land and an education. Besides,
many of them had been school-teachers, and they questioned whether or not
clearing land would be in keeping with their dignity. In order to relieve
them from any embarrassment, each afternoon after school I took my axe and
led the way to the woods. When they saw that I was not afraid or ashamed to
work, they began to assist with more enthusiasm. We kept at the work each
afternoon, until we had cleared about twenty acres and had planted a crop.
In
the meantime Miss Davidson was devising plans to repay the loan. Her first
effort was made by holding festivals, or "suppers." She made a
personal canvass among the white and coloured families in the town of
Tuskegee, and got them to agree to give something, like a cake, a chicken,
bread, or pies, that could be sold at the festival. Of course the coloured
people were glad to give anything that they could spare, but I want to add
that Miss Davidson did not apply to a single white family, so far as I now
remember, that failed to donate something; and in many ways the white
families showed their interested in the school.
Several
of these festivals were held, and quite a little sum of money was raised. A
canvass was also made among the people of both races for direct gifts of
money, and most of those applied to gave small sums. It was often pathetic
to note the gifts of the older coloured people, most of whom had spent their
best days in slavery. Sometimes they would give five cents, sometimes
twenty-five cents. Sometimes the contribution was a quilt, or a quantity of
sugarcane. I recall one old coloured women who was about seventy years of
age, who came to see me when we were raising money to pay for the farm. She
hobbled into the room where I was, leaning on a cane. She was clad in rags;
but they were clean. She said: "Mr. Washin'ton, God knows I spent de
bes' days of my life in slavery. God knows I's ignorant an' poor; but,"
she added, "I knows what you an' Miss Davidson is tryin' to do. I knows
you is tryin' to make better men an' better women for de coloured race. I
ain't got no money, but I wants you to take dese six eggs, what I's been
savin' up, an' I wants you to put dese six eggs into the eddication of dese
boys an' gals."
Since
the work at Tuskegee started, it has been my privilege to receive many gifts
for the benefit of the institution, but never any, I think, that touched me
so deeply as this one.
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