Booker T. Washington, Builder o - African American History

Booker T. Washington, Builder of a Civilization. 107
24.03.2006
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of them, etc. Like all great preachers, teachers, and leaders of men he seized
upon the names, incidents, and conditions immediately about him and from
them drew lessons of fundamental import and universal application.
The efforts of the Negro farmers on these trips to get a word of approval from
their great leader were often pathetic. One old man had a good breed of pigs of
which he was particularly proud. He contrived to be found feeding them beside
the road just as the great man and his party were passing. The simple ruse
succeeded. Mr. Washington and his companions stopped and everyone admired
the proud and excited old man's pigs. And then after the pigs had been duly
admired, he led them to a rough plank table upon which he had displayed in
tremulous anticipation of this dramatic moment a huge pumpkin, some perfectly
developed ears of corn, and a lusty cabbage. After these objects had also been
admired the old man decoyed the party into the little whitewashed cottage where
his wife had her hour of triumph in displaying her jars of preserves, pickles,
cans of vegetables, dried fruits, and syrup together with quilts and other
needlework all carefully arranged for this hoped-for inspection.
The basic teaching of all these tours was: "Make your own little heaven right
here and now. Do it by putting business methods into your farming, by growing
things in your garden the year around, by building and keeping attractive and
comfortable homes for your children so they will stay at home and not go to the
cities, by keeping your bodies and your surroundings clean, by staying in one
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place, by getting a good teacher and a good preacher, by building a good school
and church, by letting your wife be your partner in all you do, by keeping out of
debt, by cultivating friendly relations with your neighbors both white and
black."
Mr. Washington was constantly bringing up in the Tuskegee faculty meetings
cases of distress among the colored people of the county, which he had
personally discovered while off hunting or riding, and planning ways and means
to relieve them. Apparently it never occurred to him that technically, at least, the
fate of these poor persons was not his affair nor that of his school. At one such
meeting he told of having come upon while hunting a tumbledown cabin in the
woods, within it a half-paralyzed old Negro obviously unable to care for his
simple wants. Mr. Washington had stopped, built a fire in his stove, and