JULY, MCMVIII No; 1
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New Thought
CONVENTION
August 1st to 12 th, inclusive, at
East Aurora, Erie Co., TVeo; Yor^
HERE will be two for¬
mal programs daily, after¬
noon and evening, when
speakers of National note
will take part. There will also be
musical events, walks and talks afield,
and much good fellowship and flow
of soul. Reservations at Roycroft Inn
can now be made 53 53 53 53 53
T oftentimes seems that the happiest days of
our lives were spent swinging on the Ol'
Front Gate. Each chance passer=by endured
our open=eyed inspection with a smile, pat=
ting our heads, wondering the while how in
the world any child could smear so much licorice on one
face. Q Who could expect a chance acquaintance to know
that Mother had given us two whole pennies that very
morning for being good. And at five, one usually knows
which Kandy Man gives the most for two cents. G[ As we
swung on that Ol' Front Gate, far out and back, so swing
we in our Kandy Loves: from licorice to lemon sticks;
from " All Day Suckers" to jelly beans, back to
peppermints and out again to bonbons. C( If the sweets
of to=day fail to satisfy you, write a note to the Roycroft
Kandy Kitchen Girls
THEY MAKE BOY-AND-GIRL KANDY FOR GROWN-UPS
In a snow=white kitchen, at Roycroft, with not too many
pots, kettles and pans for company—two Roycroft Girls
make Kandy. Sometimes only one makes the Kandy and
the other—she sits on the window=sill, plays her guitar and
sings. Q As much joy goes into the making of all Roy=
croft Kandy, naturally the one who eats takes it out again.
In fact everything made in the white kitchen stands as a
monument to some happy moment. One pound of Roy=
croft Kandy is guaranteed to swing one for an entire hour
on that Ol' Front Gate. One Dollar the pound, Post=paid.
Roycroft Kandy Kitchen Girls
EAST AURORA, ERIE COUNTY, NEW YORK
HE reason for the inevitable note of
dissent against the work of genius is
not far to seek; it inheres in the con¬
stitution of the human mind, which is
instinctively hostile to what is "out of the
common"—and a work of genius is pretty sure
to be that. It is by utterance of uncommon
thoughts, opinions, sentiments, and fancies that
genius is known. All distinction is difference,
unconformity. He who is as others are—whose
mental processes and manner of expression
follow the familiar order—is readily acceptable,
because easily intelligible to those whose narrow
intelligence, barren imagination, and meagre
vocabulary he shares.
To "the average man" what is new is incon¬
ceivable, and what he does not understand
affronts him. And he is the first arbiter in letters
and art. In this "fierce democracie" he domi¬
nates literature with a fat and heavy hand—a
hand that is not always unfamiliar with the
critic s pen.—A MBR OSE BIER CE
|FTENTIMES a person may be
a true artist at heart, tho* lack¬
ing the power of expression. To
think—to feel—to know—with¬
out transmission is indeed a hardship, yet
this country offers few places where the
Beginner may indulge his fancy in the
proper atmosphere. Knowing this, our own
artists have banded together, starting a
ROYCROFT SCHOOL OF ARTS
where the student's every effort will have
skilled guidance; where good example
and appreciation go hand in hand 3S S& S&
INSTRUCTORS—Alexis Fournier, Landscape; Jules
Maurice Gaspard, Portraiture and Illustration; Burt
Barnes, Landscape, Illustration and Design; Louis
Kinder and Lorenz Schwartz, Art Bookbinding;
Fritz Kranz, Leather Modeling.
' *
In the Land of Immortality Art runs
rampant and beautiful Nature poses eternally
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION
ROYCROFT SCHOOL OF ARTS
EAST AURORA, ERIE COUNTY, NEW YORK
J OVRNEYS
otkeH omes offecvk'
«cker>s
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54
BQKER. I ¥A5HlNCTON
\Vi*iiterk. lay Elbert- HvCtL^rA ocnl
done irvto o. PrrmtecL- Book 'hy
Tine I?oycrofters "tHeiir*
vSKop wKicK i.5 drkEsvst-
Axvro-r^y Erie CoviiitK
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j
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
THERE is something in human nature which always makes
people reward merit, no matter under what color of skin merit
is found. I have found, too, that it is the visible, the tangible, that
goes a long way in softening prejudices. The actual sight of a good
house that a Negro has built is ten times more potent than pages of
discussion about a house that he ought to build, or perhaps could
build
The individual who can do something that the world wants done,
will in the end, make his way regardless of his race.
—Booker T. Washington
LITTLE JOURNEYS
only Mammy's Pet. The T. stood for nothing, but later a
happy thought made it Taliaferro.
Most Negroes, fresh from slavery, stood sponsor to them¬
selves, and chose the name Washington; if not this, then
Lincoln, Clay or Webster.
This lad when but a child, being suddenly asked for his name,
exclaimed, "Washington," and stuck to it.
The father of this boy was a white man, but children always
take the status of the mother, so Booker T. Washington is a
Negro, and proud of it, as he should be, for he is standard by
performance, even if not by pedigree.
This Negro's father is represented by the sign X. By remain¬
ing in obscurity the fond father threw away his one chance
for immortality. We do not even know his name, his social
position, or his previous condition of turpitude. We assume
he was happily married and respectable. Concerning him
spelling-book. Before this he was
[HIS is a story about a Negro. The
j story has the peculiarity of be¬
ing true. The man was born a
slave in Virginia. His mother
was a slave, and was thrice sold
in the market-place. This man is
Booker T. Washington.
The name Booker was a fanciful
one given to the lad by play¬
mates on account of his love
for a certain chance dog-eared
i
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
legend is silent, and fable dumb. As for the child we are not
certain whether he was born in 1858 or 1859, and we know
not the day or the month. There were no signs in the East.
<| The mother lived in a log cabin of one room, say ten by
twelve. This room was also a kitchen, for the mother was
cook to the farm-hands of her owner. There were no win¬
dows, and no floor in the cabin save the hard-trodden clay.
There was a table, a bench and a big fireplace. There were no
beds, and the children at night simply huddled and cuddled
in a pile of straw and rags in the corner. Doubtless they had
enough food, for they ate the crumbs that fell from the rich
man's table—who, by the way, was n't so very rich.
One of the earliest recollections of Black Baby Booker was
of being awakened in the middle of the night by his mother to
eat fried chicken. Imagine the picture—it is past midnight.
Wo light in the room save the long, flickering streaks that
dance on the rafters. Outside the wind makes mournful,
sighing melody. In the corner the huddled children, creeping
close together with intertwining arms to get the warmth of
each little half-naked body.
The dusky mother moves swiftly, deftly, half frightened at
her task. <JShe has come in from the night with a chicken!
Where did she get it? Hush! Where do you suppose op¬
pressed colored people get chickens!
She picks the bird—prepares it for the skillet—fries it over
the coals. And then when it is done just right, Maryland style,
this mother full of mother-love, an ingredient which God
ver omits, shakes each little piccaninny into wakeful-
2
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
aiess, and gives him the forbidden dainty—drumstick, wish¬
bone, gizzard, white meat, or the part that went through the
fence last—anything but the neck.
Feathers, bones—waste are thrown into the fireplace, and
what the village editor calls the " devouring element" hides
all trace of the crime. Then all lie down to sleep, until the
faint flush of pink comes into the East, and jocund day stands
tiptoe on the mountain tops.
pnS ex-slave remembers a strange
and trying time, when all of the
colored folk on the plantation
were notified to assemble at the
"big house." They arrived and
stood around in groups, waiting
and wondering, talking in whis¬
pers. The master came out, and
standing on the veranda, read
from a paper in a tremulous
voice. Then he told them that
they were all free, and shook
hands with each. Everybody cried. However, they were very
happy in spite of the tears, for freedom to them meant
heaven—a heaven of rest. Yet they bore only love towards
their former owners. ®jf Most of them began to wander—
they thought they had to leave their old quarters. In a few
3
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
days the wisest came back and went to work just as usual.
Booker T.'s mother quit work for just half a day. But in a
little while her husband arrived—a colored man to whom
she had been married years before, and who had been sold
and sent away. Now he came and took her and the little
monochrome brood, and they all started away for West Vir¬
ginia where they heard that colored men were hired to work
in coal-mines and were paid wages in real money.
It took months and months to make the journey. They
carried all their belongings in bundles. They had no horses—
no cows—no wagon—they walked. If the weather was
pleasant they slept out-of-doors, if it rained they sought a
tobacco shed, a barn, or the friendly side of a straw-stack.
For food they depended upon a little corn meal they carried,
with which the mother made pone cakes in the ashes of a
camp-fire. Kind colored people on the way replenished the
meal-bag, for colored people are always generous to the
hungry and needy if they have anything to be generous with.
Then Providence sent stray, ownerless chickens their way,
at times, just as the Children of Israel were fed on quails in
the wilderness. Once they caught a possum—and there was a
genuine banquet where the children ate until they were tight
as drums.
Finally they reached the promised land of West Virginia, and
at the little village of Maiden, near Charleston, where a man
by the name of John Brown was hanged, they stopped, for
here was the coal-mine and the salt-works, where colored men
were hired and paid in real money.
4
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
Booker's stepfather found a job, and he also found a job for
little Booker. They had nothing to live on until pay-day, so
the kind man who owned the mine allowed them to get things
at the store on credit. This was a brand-new experience—and
no doubt they bought a few things they did not need, for
prices and values were absolutely out of their realm. Besides,
they did not know how much wages they were to get, neither
could they figure the prices of the things they bought. At any
rate, when pay-day came they were still in debt, so they saw
no real money—and certainly little Booker at this time of his
life never did.
colored person in the neighborhood who could spell cat,
much less write his name. A few could count to five. Booker
5
[ENERAL LEWIS RUFFNER
I owned the salt-works and the
coal-mine where little Booker
worked. He was stern, severe,
strict. But he believed Negroes
were human beings, and there
were those then who disputed
the proposition.
Ruffner organized a night-school
for his helpers, and let a couple
of his bookkeepers teach it.
At this time there was not a
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
must have been about ten years old when one day he boasted
a bit of his skill in mathematics. The foreman told him to
count the loads of coal as they came out of the mine. The boy
started in bravely, " One—two—three—four—dere goes one,
dere goes anoder, anoder, anoder, anoder, anoder!"
The foreman laughed.
The boy was abashed, then chagrined. " Send me to the night-
school and in a month I '11 show you how to count!"
The foreman wrote the lad an order which admitted him to
the night-school.
But now there was another difficulty—the boy worked until
nine o'clock at night, the last hour's work being to sweep out
the office. The night-school began at nine o'clock and it was
two miles away.
The lad scratched his head and thought and thought. A great
idea came to him—he would turn the office clock ahead half
an hour. He could then leave at nine o'clock, and by running
part of the way could get to school at exactly nine o'clock.
The scheme worked for two days, when one of the clerks in
the office said that a spook was monkeying with the clock.
They tried the plan of locking the case, and all was well.
Booker must have been about twelve years old, goin' on
thirteen, when one day as he lay on his back in the coal-mine,
pushing out the broken coal with his feet, he overheard two
men telling of a very wonderful school, where colored people
were taught to read, write, and cypher too, also to speak in
public. The scholars were allowed to work part of the time to
pay for their board.
6
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
The lad crawled close in the darkness and listened to the con¬
versation. He caught the names " Hampton" and " Arm¬
strong." Whether Armstrong was the place and Hampton
was the name of the man, he could not make out, but he clung
to the names.
Here was a school for colored people—he would go there!
That night he told his mother about it. She laughed, patted
his kinky head, and indulged him in his dream.
She was only a poor black woman—she could not spell ab,
nor count to ten, but she had a plan for her boy—he would
some day be a preacher.
This was the very height of her imagination—a preacher!
Beyond this there was nothing in human achievement.
The night-school came after a day of fourteen hours' work.
Little Booker sat on a bench, his feet dangling about a foot
from the floor. As he sat there one night trying hard to drink
in knowledge, he went to sleep. He nodded, braced up, nodded
again, and then pitched over in a heap on the floor, to the
great amusement of the class, and his own eternal shame
The next day, however, as he was feeling very sorrowful over
his sad experience, he heard that Mrs. Ruffner wanted a boy
for general work at the big house.
Here was a chance—Mrs. Ruffner was a Vermont Yankee,
which meant that she had a great nose for dirt, and would not
stand a " sassy nigger." Her reputation had gone abroad,
and of how she pinched the ears of her " help," and got them
up at exactly a certain hour, and even made them use soap
and water at least once a day, and even compelled them to
7
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
to use a tooth-brush; all this was history, well defined*
«J Booker said he could please her even if she was a Yankee.
He applied for the job and got it, with wages fixed at a dollar
a week, with a promise of twenty-five cents extra every week,
if he did his work without talking back and breaking a tray
of dishes.
promptly, finish the job and keep
still when they had nothing to say.
He set himself to please her—and he did.
She loaned him books, gave him a lead-pencil, and showed
him how to write with a pen without smearing his hands and
face with ink.
He told her of his dream and asked about Armstrong and
Hampton. She told him that Armstrong was the man and
8
ENIUS! No hovel is safe from it!"
I says Whistler.
Genius consists in doing the right
thing without being told more
than three times.
Booker silently studied the awful
Yankee woman to see what she
really wanted.He finally
decided that she desired her
servants to have clean skins,
fairly neat clothing, do things
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
Hampton the place. €J At last he got her consent to leave
and go to Hampton.
When he started she gave him a comb, a tooth-brush, two
handkerchiefs and a pair of shoes. He had been working for
her for a year and she thought, of course, he saved his wages.
He never told her that his money had gone to keep the family,
because his stepfather had been on a strike and therefore out
of work.
So the boy started away for Hampton. It was five hundred
miles away. He did n't know how far five hundred miles is—
nobody does unless he has walked it.
He had three dollars, so he gaily paid for a seat in the stage.
At the end of the first day he was forty miles from home and
out of money. He slept in a barn and a colored woman handed
him a ham bone and a chunk of bread out of a kitchen win¬
dow, and looked the other way.
He trudged on East—always and forever East—towards the
rising sun.
He walked weeks—months—years, he thought. He kept no
track of the days J- He carried his shoes as a matter of
economy «jfc &
Finally he sold the shoes for four dollars to a man who paid
him ten cents cash down, and promised to pay the rest when
they should meet at Hampton. Nearly forty years have passed
and they have never yet met.
On he walked—on and on—East, and always forever East.
He reached the city of Richmond, the first big city he had
ever seen. The wide streets—the sidewalks—the street lamps
9
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
entranced him. It was just like heaven. But he was hungry
and penniless, and when he looked wistfully at a pile of cold
fried chicken on a street stand and asked the price of a drum¬
stick, at the same time telling he had no money, he dis¬
covered he was not in heaven at all. He was called a lazy
nigger and told to move on.
Later he made the discovery that a " nigger" is a colored per¬
son who has no money.
He pulled the piece of rope that served him for a belt a little
tighter, and when no one was looking, crawled under a side¬
walk and went to sleep, disturbed only by the tramping over¬
head
When he awoke he saw he was near the dock, where a big
ship pushed its bowsprit out over the street. Men were un¬
loading bags and boxes from the boat. He ran down and asked
the mate if he could help. " Yes!" was the gruff answer.
He got in line and went staggering under the heavy loads &
He was little, but strong, and best of all, willing, yet he
reeled at the work.
" Have you had any breakfast? Yes, you liver-colored boy—
you, I say, have you had your breakfast?"
" No, sir," said the boy, " and no supper last night nor dinner
yesterday!"
Well, I reckoned as much. Now you take this quarter and
go over to that stand and buy you a drumstick, a cup of coffee
and two fried-cakes!"
The lad did n't need urging. He took the money in his palm,
went over to the man who the night before had called him a
10
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
lazy nigger, and showing the silver, picked out his piece of
chicken.
The man hastened to wait on him, and said it was a fine day
and hoped he was well.
RRIVING at Hampton, this
colored boy, who had tramped
the long weary miles, stood
abashed before the big brick
building which he knew was
Hampton Institute.
He was so little—the place was
so big—by what right could he
ask to be admitted ?
Finally he boldly entered, and in
a voice meant to be firm, but
which was very shaky, said, " I
am here!" and pointed to the bosom of his hickory shirt.
The Yankee woman motioned him to a chair. Negroes coming
there were plentiful. Usually they wanted to live the Ideal
Life. They had a call to preach—and the girls wanted to be
music teachers.
The test was simple and severe: would they and could they do
one useful piece of work well?
Booker sat and waited, not knowing that his patience was
being put to the test.
ii
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
Then Miss Priscilla in a hard Neill Burgess voice " guessed"
that the adjoining recitation room needed sweeping and dust¬
ing. She handed Booker a broom and dust-cloth, motioned to
the room, and went away.
Oho! Little did she know her lad. The colored boy smiled to
himself—sweeping and dusting were his specialties—he had
learned the trade from a Yankee woman from Vermont! He
smiled. ^ Then he swept that room—moved every chair, the
table, the desk jfc He dusted each piece of furniture four
times. He polished each rung and followed around the
base-board on hands and knees.
Miss Priscilla came back—pushed the table around and saw
at once that the dirt had not been concealed beneath it. She
took out her handkerchief and wiped the table top, then the
desk &
She turned, looked at the boy, and her smile met his half-
suppressed triumphant grin.
" You '11 do," she said.
12
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
EN. SAMUEL C. ARMSTRONG,
the founder of Hampton
Institute, and the grandfather
of Tuskegee, was a white man
who fought the South valiantly
and well.
He seems about the only man
in the North, who, at the close of
the war, clearly realized that the
war had just begun—that the
real enemies were not subdued,
and that these enemies were
ignorance, superstition and incompetence.
The pitiable condition of four million human beings, flung
from slavery into freedom, thrown upon their own resources,
with no thought of responsibility, and with no preparation for
the change, meant for them only another kind of slavery J>
General Armstrong's heart went out to them—he desired to
show them how to be useful, helpful, self-reliant, healthy.
For the whites of the South he had only high regard and
friendship. He, of all men, knew how they had suffered from
the war—and he realized also that they had fought for what
they believed was right. In his heart there was no hate. He
resolved to give himself—his life—fortune—his intellect—
his love, his all, for the upbuilding of the South. He saw with
the vision of a prophet that indolence and pride were the
actual enemies of white and black alike. The blacks mustbe
taught to work—to know the dignity of human labor—to
13
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
serve society—to help themselves by helping others. He
realized that there are no menial tasks—that all which serves
is sacred.
And this is the man who sowed the seeds of truth in the heart
of the nameless black boy—Booker Washington. Arm¬
strong's shibboleth, too, was, " With malice toward none,
but with charity for all, let us finish the work God has given
us to do."
DO not know very much about
this subject of education, yet I
believe I know as much about
what others know about it as
most people. I have visited the
principal colleges of America and
Europe, and the methods of
Preparatory and High Schools
are to me familiar. I know the
Night-schools of the cities, the
" Ungraded Rooms," the Schools
for Defectives, the Manual
Training Schools, the educational schemes in prisons, the
New Education (first suggested by Socrates) as carried out
by Stanley Hall, John Dewey, and dozens of other good men
and women in America. I am familiar with that School
for the Deaf at Malone, New York, and the School for
14
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
the Blind at Batavia, where even the sorely stricken are
taught to be self-sufficient, self-supporting and happy. I have
tumbled down the circular fire escape at Lapeer with the in¬
mates of the Home for the Epileptics, and heard the shouts of
laughter from lips that never laughed before. I have seen the
Jewish Manual Training School of Chicago transform Rus¬
sian refugees into useful citizens—capable, earnest and ex¬
cellent. I know a little about Swarthmore, Wellesley, Vassar,
Radcliffe, and have put my head into West Point and An¬
napolis, and had nobody cry, " Genius!"
Of Harvard, Yale and Princeton I know something, having
done time in each. I have also given jobs to graduates of Ox¬
ford, Cambridge and Heidelberg, to my sorrow and their
chagrin. This does not prove that graduates of the great uni¬
versities are, as a rule, out of work, or that they are incom¬
petent. It simply means that it is possible for a man to grad¬
uate at these institutions and secure his diploma and yet be a
man who has nothing the world really wants, either in way of
ideas or services.
The reason that my " cum lauda" friends did not like me, and
the cause of my having to part with them—getting them a
little free transportation from your Uncle George—was not
because they lacked intelligence, but because they wanted to
secure a position, while I simply offered them a job.
They were like Cave-of-the-Winds of Oshkosh, who is an ice-
cutter in August, and in winter is an out-of-door horticul¬
turist—a hired man is something else.
As a general proposition, I believe this will not now be dis-
15
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
puted: The object of education is that a man may benefit
himself by serving society.
To benefit others, you must be reasonably happy: there must
be animation thru useful activity, good cheer, kindness and
health—health of mind and health of body. And to benefit
society you must also have patience, persistency, and a firm
determination to do the right thing, and to mind your own
business so that others, too, may mind theirs. Then all should
be tinctured with a dash of discontent with past achieve¬
ments, so you will constantly put forth an effort to do more
and better work.
When what you have done in the past looks large to you, you
have n't done much to-day.
So there you get the formula of Education: health and happi¬
ness thru useful activity—animation, kindness, good cheer,
patience, persistency, willingness to give and take, seasoned
with enough discontent to prevent smugness, which is the
scum that grows over every stagnant pond.
Of course no college can fill this prescription—no institution
can supply the ingredients—all that the college can do is to
supply the conditions so that these things can spring into be¬
ing. Plants need the sunlight—mushrooms are different.
The question is, then, what teaching concern in America sup¬
plies the best quality of actinic ray?
And I answer, Tuskegee is the place, and Booker Washington
is the man. " What!" you exclaim, " The Ideal School a
school for Negroes, instituted by a Negro, where only Negroes
teach, and only Negroes are allowed to enter as students?"
16
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
And the answer is, " Exactly so." *J At Tuskegee there are
nearly two thousand students, and over one hundred and
fifty teachers. There are two classes of students, " Day-
School" and " Night-School " students. The night-school
students work all day at any kind of task they are called
upon to do. They receive their board, clothing and a home—
they pay no tuition, but are paid for their labor, the amount
being placed to their credit, so when fifty dollars is accumu¬
lated they can enter as " Day Students."
The " Day Students " make up the bulk of the scholars. Each
pays fifty dollars a year. These all work every other day at
manual labor or some useful trade. <| Tuskegee has fully
twice as many applicants as it can accommodate; but there is
one kind of applicant who never receives any favor. This is
the man who says he has the money to pay his way, and
wishes to take the academic course only «sfc The answer
always is, " Please go elsewhere—there are plenty of schools
that want your money. The fact that you have money will not
exempt you here from useful labor."
This is exactly what every college in the world should say jt
The Tuskegee farm consists of about three thousand acres.
There are four hundred head of cattle, about five hundred
hogs, two hundred horses, great flocks of chickens, geese,
ducks and turkeys, and many swarms of bees. It is the in¬
tention to raise all the food that is consumed on the place, and
to manufacture all supplies. There are wagon-shops, a saw¬
mill, a harness-shop, a shoe-shop, a tailor-shop, a printing
plant, a model laundry, a canning establishment. Finer fruit
17
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
and vegetables I have never seen, and the thousands of peach,
plum and apple trees, and the vast acreage of berries that
have been planted, will surely some day be a goodly source of
revenue.
The place is religious, but not dogmatically so—the religion
being merely the natural safety-valve for emotion. At Tuske-
gee there is no lacrymose appeal to confess your sins—they
do better—they forget them.
I never heard more inspiring congregational singing, and the
use of the piano, organ, orchestra and brass band are import¬
ant factors in the curriculum. In the chapel I spoke to an
audience so attentive, so alert, so receptive, so filled with
animation, that the whole place looked like a vast advertise¬
ment for Sozodont.
No prohibitive signs are seen at Tuskegee. All is affirmative,
yet it is understood that some things are tabu—tobacco, for
instance, and strong drink, of course.
We have all heard of Harvard Beer and Yale Mixture, but be
it said in sober justice, Harvard runs no brewery, and Yale
has no official brand of tobacco. Yet Harvard men consume
much beer, and many men at Yale smoke. And if you want to
see the cigarette fiend on his native heath, you '11 find him
like the locust on the campus at Cambridge and New Haven.
But if you want to see the acme of all cigarette bazaars, just
ride out of Boylston Street, Boston, any day at noon and
watch the boys coming out of the Institute of Technology.
I once asked a Tech Professor if cigarette smoking was com¬
pulsory in his institution. " Yes," he replied, " but the rule is
18
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
not strictly enforced, as I know three students who do not
smoke."
Tuskegee stands for order, system, cleanliness, industry,
courtesy and usefulness. There are no sink-holes around the
place, no " back yards." Everything is beautiful, wholesome
and sanitary. All trades are represented The day is
crammed so full of work from sunrise to sunset that there is
no time for complaining, misery or fault-finding—three
things that are usually born of idleness. At Tuskegee there are
no servants. All of the work is done by the students and
teachers—everybody works—everybody is a student, and all
are teachers. <J We are all teachers, whether we will it or
not—we teach by example, and all students who do good
work are good teachers.
When the Negro is able to do skilled work, he ceases to be a
problem—he is a man. The fact that Alexander Dumas was a
Negro does not count against him in the world's assize.
The old-time academic college, that cultivated the cerebrum
and gave a man his exercise in an indoor gymnasium, or not
at all, has ruined its tens of thousands. To have top—head
and no lungs—is not wholly desirable. The student was made
exempt from every useful thing, just as the freshly freed slave
hoped and expected to be, and after four years it was often
impossible for him to take up the practical lessons of life. He
had gotten used to the idea of one set of men doing all the
work and another set of men having the culture. To a large
degree he came to regard culture as the aim of life. And when
a man begins to pride himself on his culture, he has n't any to
19
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
speak of. Culture must be merely incidental, and to clutch it
is like capturing a butterfly—you do not secure the butterfly
at all—you get only a grub.
Let us say right here, that there is only one way in which a
Negro, or a white man, can ever make himself respected.
Statute law will not do it; rights voted him by the state are of
small avail; making demands will not secure the desired
sesame. If we ever gain the paradise of freedom it will be be¬
cause we have earned it—because we deserve it. A make-be¬
lieve education may suffice for a white man—especially if he
has a rich father, but a Negro who has to carve out his own
destiny must be taught order, system, and quiet, persistent,
useful effort.
A college that has its students devote one-half their time to
actual, useful work is so in line with commonsense that we
are amazed that the idea had to be put into execution by an
ex-slave as a life-saver for his disenfranchised race. Our great
discoveries are always accidents: we work for one thing and
get another. I expect that the day will come, and ere long,
when the great universities of the world will have to put the
Tuskegee Idea into execution in order to save themselves from
being distanced by the Colored Race.
If life were one thing and education another, it might be all
right to separate them. Culture of the head over a desk, and
indoor gymnastics for the body are not the ideal, and that
many succeed in spite of the handicap is no proof of the
excellence of the plan. Ships that go around the world
accumulate many barnacles, but barnacles as a help to the
20
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
navigator is an iridescent dream. CJ A little regular manual
labor, rightly mixed with the mental, eliminates draw-poker,
high-balls, brawls, broils, Harvard Beer, Yale Mixture,
Princeton Pinochle, Chippee dances, hazing, roistering,
rowdyism and the bull-dog propensity The Heidelberg
article of cocked cap and insolent ways is not produced at
Tuskegee. At Tuskegee there is no place for those who lie in
wait for insults and regard scrapping as a fine art. As for
college athletics at the Orthodox Universities, only one man
out of ten ever does anything at it anyway—the college man
who needs the gymnasium most is practically debarred from
everything in it and serves as a laughing stock whenever
he strips. Coffee, cocaine, bromide, tobacco and strong drink
often serve in lieu of exercise and ozone, and Princeton winks
her woozy eye in innocency.
Freedom cannot be bestowed—it must be achieved. Educa¬
tion cannot be given—it must be earned. Lincoln did not free
the slaves—he only freed himself. The Negroes did not
know they were slaves, and so they had no idea of what free¬
dom meant. Until a man wants to be free, each kind of free¬
dom is only another form of slavery. Booker Washington is
showing the colored man how to secure a genuine freedom
thru useful activity. To get freedom you must shoulder re¬
sponsibility.
If college education were made compulsory by the state, and
one-half of the curriculum consisted of actual, useful manual
labor, most of our social ills would be solved, and we would
be well out on the highway towards the Ideal City.
21
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
Without animation, man is naught—nothing is accom¬
plished, nothing done. People who inspire other people have
animation plus.
And animation plus is ecstasy. In ecstasy the spirit rushes
out, runs over and saturates all. Oratory is an ecstasy that
inundates the hearer, and makes him ride upon the crest of
another's ideas.
Art is born of ecstasy—art is ecstasy in the concrete. Beauti¬
ful music is ecstasy expressed in sound, regulated into rhythm,
cadence and form. " Statuary is frozen music," said Heine.
A man who is not moved into ecstasy by ecstasy is hope¬
less. A people that has not the surging, uplifting, onward
power that eestasy gives, is decadent—dead.
The Negro is easily moved to ecstasy. Very little musical
training makes him a power in song. At Tuskegee the con¬
gregational singing is a feature that once heard is never to be
forgotten. Fifteen hundred people lifting up their hearts in an
outburst of emotion—song! Fifteen hundred people of one
mind, doing anything in unison—do you know what it
means? Ecstasy is essentially a matter of sex. In art and
religion sex cannot be left out of the equation. The simple
fact that in forty years the Negro race in America has in¬
creased from four million to ten million, tells of their ecstasy
as a people. " Only happy beings reproduce themselves," says
Darwin. Depress your animal and it ceases to breed, so there
are a whole round of animals that do not reproduce in cap¬
tivity. But in slavery or freedom the Negro sings, and
reproduces—he is not doomed nor depressed—his soul arises
22
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
superior to circumstance. <| Without animation, education
is impossible. And the problem of the educator is to direct
this singing, flowing, moving spirit of the hive into useful
channels.
Education is simply the encouragement of right habits—the
fixing of good habits until they become a part of one's nature,
and are exercised automatically.
The man who is industrious by habit is the only man who
wins. The man who is not industrious except when driven to
it, or when it occurs to him, accomplishes little.
Man gets his happiness by doing: and work to a slave is
always distasteful. The power of mimicry and imitation is
omitted—the owner does not work—the strong man does not
work. Ergo—to grow strong means to cease work. To be
strong means to be free—to be free means no work!
It has been a frightfully bad education that the Negro has had
—work distasteful, and work disgraceful! And the slave¬
owner suffered most of all, for he came to regard work as
debasing.
And now a Negro is teaching the Negro that work is beautiful
—that work is a privilege—that only thru willing service can
he ever win his freedom. Architecture is fixed ecstasy, in¬
spired always by a strong man who gives a feeling of security.
Athens was an ecstasy in marble.
Tuskegee is an ecstasy in brick and mortar.
Don't talk about the education of the Negro! The experiment
has really never been tried, excepting spasmodically, of edu¬
cating either the whites or blacks in the South—or elsewhere.
23
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
A Negro is laying hold upon the natural ecstasy of the Negro,
and directing it into channels of usefulness and excellence.
Can you foretell where this will end—this formation of habits
of industry, sobriety and continued, persistent effort towards
the right?
Booker Washington, child of a despised race, has done and is
doing what the combined pedagogic and priestly wisdom of
ages has failed to do. He is the Moses, who by his example is
leading the children of his former oppressors out into the light
of social, mental, moral and economic freedom.
I am familiar in detail with every criticism brought against
Tuskegee. On examination these criticisms all reduce them¬
selves down to three:
1. A vast sum of money has been collected by Booker
Washington for his own aggrandisement and benefit.
2. Tuskegee is a show-place where all the really good work is
done by picked men from the North.
3. Booker Washington is a tyrant, a dictator and an egotist.
If I were counsel for Tuskegee—as I am not—I would follow
the example of the worthy accusers, and submit the matter
without argument. Booker Washington can afford to plead
guilty to every charge; and he has never belittled himself by
answering his accusers.
But let the facts be known, that this man has collected up*
ward of six million dollars, mostly from the people of the
North, and has built up the nearest perfect educational in¬
stitution in the world.
It is probably true that many of his teachers and best workers
24
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
are picked people—but they are Negroes, and were selected
by a Negro. The great general reveals his greatness in the
selection of his generals: it was the marshals whom Napoleon
appointed who won for him his victories, but his spirit
animated theirs, and he chose them for this one reason—he
could dominate them. He infused into their souls a goodly
dash of his own enthusiasm.
Booker Washington is a greater general than Napoleon. For
the Tuskegee idea no Waterloo awaits. And as near as I can
judge, Booker Washington's most noisy critics are merely
camp-followers.
That the man is a tyrant and dictator there is no doubt. He is
a beneficent tyrant, but a tyrant still, for he always, in¬
variably, has his own way in weighty matters—in trivialities
others can have theirs. And as for dictatorship, the man who
advances on chaos and transforms it into cosmos, is perforce
a dictator and an egotist.
Booker Washington believes he is in the right, and he makes
no effort to conceal the fact that he is on earth. In him there
is no disposition to run and peep about, and find himself a dis¬
honorable grave. All live men are egotists, and they are
egotists just in proportion as they have life. Dead men are
not egotists. Booker Washington has life, and life in abun¬
dance, and thru him I truly believe runs the spirit of Divinity
if ever a living man had it. A man like this is the instrument
of Deity.
Tuskegee Institute has applications ahead all the time, from
all over America, for competent colored men and women who
25
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
can take charge of important work and do it. Dressmakers,
housekeepers, cooks, farmers, stockmen, builders, gardeners
are in demand. The world has never yet had enough people
to bear its burdens. <J Recently we have heard much of the
unemployed, but a very little search will show that the people
out of work are those of bad habits, which make them unre¬
liable and untrustworthy. The South, especially, needs the
willing worker and the practical man. And best of all the
South knows it, and stands ready to pay for the service.
A few years ago there was a fine storm of protest from
Northern Negroes to the effect that Booker Washington was
endeavoring to limit the Negro to menial service—that is,
thrust him back into servility. The first ambition of the Negro
was to get an education so that he might become a Baptist
preacher. To him, education meant freedom from toil, and of
course we do not have to look far to see where he got the idea.
Then when Tuskegee came forward and wanted to make
blacksmiths, carpenters and brick-masons out of black men,
there was a cry, " If this means education, we will none of it
—treason, treason!" It was assumed that the Negro who set
other Negroes to work was not their friend. This phase of the
matter requires neither denial nor apology. We smile and
pass on J-
In 1877 the Negro was practically disenfranchised throughout
the South, by being excluded from the primaries. He had no
recognized ticket in the field. For both the blacks and the
whites this has been well. To most of the blacks freedom
meant simply exemption from work. So there quickly grew up
26
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
a roistering, turbulent, idle and dangerous class of black men
who were used by the most ambitious of their kind for politi¬
cal ends. To preserve the peace of the community, the whites
were forced to adopt heroic measures, with the result that we
now have the disenfranchised Negro.
Early in the Eighties, Booker Washington realized that,
politically, there was no hope for his race. He saw, how¬
ever, that commerce recognized no color line. We would
buy, sell and trade with the black man on absolute equality.
Life insurance companies would insure him, banks would
receive his deposits, and if honest and competent, would
loan him money. If he could shoe a horse, we waived his
complexion; and in every sort and kind of craftsmanship he
stood on absolute equality with the whites. The only question
ever asked was, " Can you do the work?"
And Booker Washington set out to help the Negro win suc¬
cess for himself by serving society thru becoming skilled in
doing useful things. And so it became Head, Hand and
Heart. The manual was played off against the intellectual.
But over and beyond the great achievement of Booker
Washington in founding and carrying to a successful issue
the most complete educational scheme of this age, or any
other, stands the man himself. He is one without hate, heat
or prejudice. No one can write on the lintels of his door-post
the word, " Whim." He is half white, but calls himself a
Negro. He sides with the disgraced and outcast black woman
who gave him birth, rather than with the respectable white
man who was his sire.
27
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON
He rides in the Jim Crow cars, and on long trips, if it is
deemed expedient to use a sleeping-car, he hires the state¬
room, so that he may not trespass or presume upon those who
would be troubled by the presence of a colored man. Often in
traveling he goes for food and shelter to the humble home of
one of his own people. At hotels he receives and accepts, with¬
out protest or resentment, the occasional contumely of the
inferior whites—whites too ignorant to appreciate that one of
God's noblemen stands before them. For the whites of the
South he has only words of kindness and respect; the worst he
says about them is that they do not understand. His modesty,
his patience, his forbearance are sublime. He is a true Fabian
—he does what he can, like the royal roycroft opportunist
that he is. Every petty annoyance is passed over; the gibes
and jeers and the ingratitude of his own race are forgotten.
" They do not understand," he calmly says. He does his work.
He is respected by the best people of North and South. He
has the confidence of the men of affairs—he is a safe man.
28
VERY year Good Folks from all over
the World seek to come with us and
study the Art of Bookbinding. In the
past, lack of facilities formed natural
prohibitive barriers that were only re¬
moved this Spring. Our Furniture Shop has now
given to the Bindery an entire new floor's space
enabling us to start a
Roy croft Trad
With Mr. Louis Kinder and Mr. Lorenz Schwartz
as Chief Instructors.
Mr. Kinder and Mr. Schwartz have both made
Bookbinding their life-work. Each served a seven-
years' apprenticeship abroad, later visiting the
Bookbinding Centers of the World and working
with the Masters of the Art. Undoubtedly to-day
they lead the Craft. QNow that nearly every
Manual Training and High School has added
Bookbinding to its curriculum, the demand for
instructors far exceeds the supply ** Our Trades
School, being the only one of its kind in the
Country, aims to meet this demand in part. How¬
ever as Quality—not Quantity—has ever been our
watchword, we will accept only fifteen students at
a nominal tuition of Thirty Dollars per month.
Accommodations May Be Secured At The Roy croft Inn. Rates On Request.
Roy croft Trades School, East Aurora, N. Y.
Top O' The Morning, ElbertHubbard
OW from East Aurora cometh a new maga=
zine, THE FRA, (not for mummies) edited
in all kinds of glory by Elbert Hubbard—
Optimist. I was idly dawdling (as we country
critics do, you know,) in a book store, mus=
sing all the magazine shelves, when I hap=
pened to see a new, queer looking "bibliozone," which I
thought at first was some German thing on kindergartens.
But oh, luck for me! Oh! happy day! I found a prize! <&
THE FRA (magazine) is twice as long and twice as wide
as "The Philistine"—the front has pretty curleques. The
Roycrofters give us white paper this time A Avaunt the
meat wrappers! Inside is legible type—but I need not tell
you of the mechanical side, because you know it must be
a magazine de luxe. Do you like advertising ? Here is the
best in America. Really interesting, you know. And then
on the front is an etching of some one or other—Walt
Whitman, Ben Lindsey, William Morris, Luther Burbank,
Tom Johnson, William Marion Reedy, and the like.
I will not go on and tell you all about THE FRA. Better
find out for yourself. There are a lot of our foremost writers
contributing to the "Journal of Affirmation." I do not
know who else might be included in the list—seems they
are all there.
Scattered in amongst the articles and advertising (I wish I
could invent a new name, for this is truly >super=advertis=
ing) are masses of apothegms, aphorisms and apocalyses—
whatever they are.
Elbert Hubbard has done a lot of pounding, there is no
mistake about that. And doubtless he has set a lot of people
thinking. But in THE FRA he pounds in another way—
he "boosts." Long live Elbert Hubbard!—Mark Mattoon,
Literary Editor, in "The Treasure State," Helena, Mont.
EARNED men are those who know
the classics. QWise men are those who
know humanity. QElbert Hubbard
knows every kind of man, including
learned men, better than any other living man
who writes. QHe gets his wonderful effects by
using as symbol the thousand and one things that
a learned man would never think to mention,
nor care to mention, even if he knew them &
Hubbard is learned, and he is also wise. Common
people understand him, and very naturally the
pedants fear him, for he knows that they know
nothing—a thing that wise men admit, but fools
never do. We use the foreign phrase to impress the
reader, not to enlighten him. And doctors write
prescriptions in Latin for the same reason. Health
is a form of truth, and is so simple that to save
our big-wigs we would keep it secret and make it
complex. The sciolist clings to his dead languages
and his dead dignity, as Lawyer Marks did to his
umbrella in time of war.
Hubbard is so big he can afford to shed his dignity
and be natural, and acting naturally, of course
the pretenders call him a poseur This is the
tribute that pretense pays to power.
—(Dr.) J. H, Tilden
HAVE YOU SEEN
THE F R A ?
THE FRA is the Magazine that is
never thrown away! It contains no Mental
Ptomaine nor is it a Pudding Publication
for the Publican: rather a Message direct
from Thinker to Thinker.
THE ROYCROFTERS, East Aurora, New York
IMEa
b y
ELBERT
U B B
v; h . Y s
L. 1 »*.
A R D
One Hundred and Sixty-Two Separate Biographies of Men and
Women Who Have Transformed the Living Thought of the World-
BOUND VOLUMES I Yo XXII INCLUSIVE
Vol. I. ' To the Homes of Good Men and Great
Vol. H. To the Hbmes of American Authors
Vol. UI. To the Homes of Famous Women
Vol. IV. To the Hornet? of American Statesmen
Vol. V. To the Homes of Eminent iPainters
LITTLE JOURNEYS: up to Volume V«, inclusive, contain twelve
numbers ro the Volume and they were printecI by G. P. Put n m's Sons,
but bound by The Roycrofters' Gilt top, Uncut edges, title inlaid, in
limp leather, silk lined, Three Dollars a Volume. A few bound specially
and solidly in boards, ooze calf back and corners at Five Dollars a
Volume. p !
Vol. Vl. To the Homes of £&glish Authors
Vol. VII. To the Homes of English Authors
Vol. VHI. To the Homes of Great Musicians
Vol. IX. To the Homes of Great Musicians
Vol. X, To the Hom^s of Eminent Artists
Vol. XI. To the Homes of Eminent Artists
Vol. XH. To the Homes of Eminent Orators
Vol. XHI. To the Homes of Eminent Orators
Vol. XIV. To the Homes of Great Philosophers.
Vol. XV. To the Homes of Great Philosophers
Vol. XVI. To the Homes of Great Scientists
Vol. XVH. To the Homes of Great Scientists
Vol. XVHI. To the Homes of Great Lovers
Vol. XIX. To the Homes of Great Lovers
Vol. XX. To the Homes of Great Reformer*
Vol. XXI. To the Homes of Great Reformers
Vol. XXH. To the Homes of Great Teachers
Beginning with Volume VI.: Printed on Roycroft water-mark, hand¬
made paper, hand-illumined, frontispiece portrait ol each subject,
bound in limp leather, silk lined, gilt top, at Three Dollars a Volume,
or for the Complete Set of Twenty-two Volumes, Sixty-six Dollars.
Specially bound in boards, ooze calf back and corners, at Five Dollars
per Volume, or One Hundred and Ten Dollars for the Complete Set.
Sent to the Elect on suspicion.
THE ROYCROFTERS, EAST AURORA NEW YORK
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-HE TRUE EPIC
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OF OUR TIMES
IS NOT "ARMS
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"TOOLS AND THE
MAN," AN INFINITELY
WIDER KIND OF EPIC
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