The Story of My Life & Work  by Booker T. Washington

Chapter: 22 Work of Tuskegee Inst.

The reader has doubtless noted that much space has been occupied in this volume in detailing the history of the Tuskegee Institute, and to the casual reader this may have appeared out of place in an autobiography. When it is borne in mind, however, that the whole of my time, thought and energy, for the past eighteen years, have been devoted to the building up of this Institute, it will be conceded that in any autobiography of mine, a history of the Tuskegee Institute is unavoidable and necessary. When the history of Tuskegee Institute, since its founding until now, shall be completely written, you will have also a history of my life for the same space of time. It shall be my purpose in this chapter, therefore, to give some definite idea of the extent to which the Institute has grown, and also to describe with some degree of accuracy the work that is being accomplished there in its various departments, agricultural, mechanical, domestic science, nurse training, musical, Bible training, and academic.

As has been said many times before, the school began in 1881 with only the State appropriation of $2,000 per annum, specifically for the payment of teachers' salaries, and for no other purpose. The method by which we have succeeded in securing the 2,500 acres of land which the school now owns has heretofore been described. This land is mainly comprised in two tracts. The tract that forms the site of the Institute is composed of 835 acres, and is known as the "home farm." The other large tract, which is about four miles southeast of the Institute, composed of 800 acres, is known as "Marshall farm."

Upon the home farm are located the fifty-two buildings, counting large and small, which make up the Tuskegee Institute. Of these fifty-two buildings, Alabama, Davidson, Huntington, Cassedy and Science Halls, the Agricultural, Trades and Laundry Buildings, Carnegie Library, Rockefeller Hall, Dorothy Hall and the Chapel are built of brick. There are also two large frame halls--Porter Hall, which was the first building built of the Tuskegee group, and Phelps Hall, a commodious and well appointed structure dedicated to the Bible Training department. The other buildings are smaller frame buildings and various cottages used for commissary, store rooms, recitation rooms, dormitories and teachers' residences. There are also the shop and saw mill, with engine rooms and dynamo in conjunction.
 

President McKinley and Party Watching the Parade.
 

Science Hall, Erected by Students at Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute.
 

The brickyard, where all the bricks that have been used in building our brick buildings were made, is also situated near the school. Last year alone the brickyard made 1,500,000 bricks. It is equipped with excellent and improved machinery for brickmaking, and is under the immediate supervision of Mr. William Gregory, a graduate of Tuskegee. The total valuation of the property, including the yards and all buildings, the home and the Marshall farms is placed at $300,000. This does not include the endowment fund.

The Agricultural Department of the school has at its head Prof. G. W. Carver, a graduate of the Iowa State University, and a man of experience as a scientific farmer and a scientist of no mean acquirements. He has eight assistants who help in looking after the divisions of dairying, stock-raising, horticulture and truck farming embraced in this department. The State of Alabama appropriates annually the sum of $1,500 for the maintenance of an agricultural experiment station in connection with our agricultural department. Some of the experiments of Prof. Carver have attracted much attention, and it is recognized that his conduct of the station is doing much to show what improvements upon the old methods of farming may be wrought by scientific agriculture. This department is well housed in a beautiful brick building, containing a well equipped chemical laboratory, erected at a cost of $10,000, adapted to the purposes of agricultural experiment, and other apparatus necessary for the dairy and other divisions.

It is through the direction of the Agricultural department that the vast amount of farm and garden products, used by the 1,200 people constituting the population of the school when in session, is grown. About 135 acres of the home farm are devoted to the raising of vegetables, strawberries, grapes, and other fruits. The Marshall farm, with 350 acres in cultivation, is utilized for the growing of corn, sugar cane (from which syrup is made), potatoes, grain, hay and other farm products.

Mr. J. N. Calloway is the manager of the Marshall farm. It is worked by student labor, from thirty to forty-five boys being employed on it constantly. There is also a night school upon this farm, for the accommodation of students who work there, which is a branch of the main night school at the Institute. At present the farm night school requires the services of two teachers.

The Marshall farm not only produces a large amount of the farm products that are used by the school and its 800 head of live stock, counting horses, mules, cows, oxen, sheep and hogs, but also furnishes opportunity for students to learn the art and science of farming, at the same time attending night school and making something above expenses to be used when the student enters day school.

A large portion of the Marshall farm, about 400 acres, is utilized as pasture for the dry cows and beef cattle. Everything grown upon the farm is sold to the school at market prices. The expenses of running the farm are also accurately kept. At the end of the year a balance is struck. Last year the Marshall farm come out over $500 ahead including in the expense account the salary of the manager.

The mechanical department of the institution is now housed in the well equipped trades building, recently completed at a cost of $36,000. This is known as the Slater-Armstrong Memorial Trades Building. It was dedicated and formally opened on Wednesday, January 10, 1900, and is the largest building on the Tuskegee Institute grounds. It stands between the Agricultural Building and the new chapel. The shape is that of a double Greek cross, having an open court 85x112 feet in the center. When completed, it will measure 283x300 feet, the main or central portion being two stories high, the wings one story. This measurement does not include a room for the sawmill, which is to come at the extreme rear end. Owing to the fact that sufficient money has not yet been obtained, the rear portion of the building, consisting of seven rooms, has not been completed. It is built entirely of brick, and contains twenty-seven rooms. In round numbers, it took ten hundred thousand bricks to construct the building thus far, and every one of these bricks was made by students under the instructor in brickmaking, and laid in the wall by students under the instructor of bricklaying. The plans and specifications of the building were drawn by Mr. R. R. Taylor, formerly in charge of the architectural and mechanical drawing department of the Institute. The general oversight of both the planning and construction was, of course, exercised by Mr. J. H. Washington, Director of Industries.

The interior arrangements of the building are well suited to the teaching of the trades. The rooms, while varying in size from 37x42, the smallest, to 37x85, the largest, will average 37x55, the ceiling being 13 feet high. On the first floor there are the director's office, reading room, exhibit room, wheelwright shop, blacksmith shop, tin shop, printing office, carpenter shop, repair shop, woodworking machine room, ironworking machine room, foundry, brickmaking and plastering rooms, general stock and supply room, and a boiler and engine room. The second floor contains the mechanical drawing room, harness shop, paint shop, tailor shop, shoe shop, and electrical laboratory, and a room for carriage trimming and upholstering. Each shop has a cloak and tool room connected with it. Better lighted rooms could scarcely be found in any building. Each shop receives light from two sides and end. The office, reading room, and exhibit room are finished with wainscoting to window sills, and plastered from there up and overhead. In the drawing rooms the walls are plastered, but overhead the ceiling of this room is of yellow pine, panelled so as to show design. This ceiling is painted white. The other rooms are not plastered or sealed, but have what is called a yellow ochre finish on the walls. The machinery in the building is run by a 125-horse power engine and 75-horse power boiler, both donated by Mr. C. P. Huntington, of New York.

Each division is well supplied with all of the tools, appliances and machinery necessary to its successful working and to the accurate teaching of the trades. The director of this large and important department is Mr. J. H. Washington, who has under him twenty-two instructors for the various divisions.

We believe it is wise to give our girls the most thorough training in all those occupations suitable and adapted to woman, without in the least neglecting those moral and intellectual powers which elevate any race. With this in view we have the following departments for the training of our young women.

The department for the teaching of the Domestic Sciences has for its directress Mrs. Booker T. Washington. This department embraces laundering, cooking, dressmaking, plain sewing, millinery, mattress making, horticulture, gardening, and poultry raising. It is in Dorothy Hall. Not only are the trades above named taught in this department, but the young women, under the motherly direction of Mrs. Booker T. Washington, are taught the duties of systematic and orderly housekeeping and duties pertaining thereto.

The nurse training department is conducted in connection with the school hospital and has for its instructors our resident physician and a competent trained nurse. It has not been constituted a separate department, but has formed one of the divisions under the Director of the Mechanical Department. The increasing demand for trained nurses in the South has necessitated the establishment of a regular Training School for Nurses in connection with the school hospital.

A complete course of three years has been laid out, two years of which consist of daily work and instruction in the hospital, and the third year of lectures and bedside instructions, while one or two days of each week are devoted to hospital work. There are special provisions for those who apply for this department only. The school is open also to those who do not wish to follow the work as a profession, but desire to know how to intelligently care for the sick.

The division of music is under the supervision of the Director of the Academic Department, and like the nurse training department it has not been constituted an independent department. While the study of music has always been encouraged at Tuskegee, and considerable work has been done, we have been able only within the last few years to furnish a systematic and thorough course of study. The course in pianoforte embraces four years. The institution owns eight pianos, two cabinet organs and a library of music. Vocal music is taught to the classes in the academic department throughout the entire course.

Tuskegee students are famous for their fine singing of plantation melodies, and it is the object of the Institute to make these old, sweet, slave songs a source of pride and pleasure to the students.

There are at Tuskegee the following musical organizations: A choir, consisting of seventy-five voices; a choral society, consisting of one hundred and fifty voices, organized for the study of music from the masters; glee club, consisting of forty male voices; glee club, consisting of twenty female voices; and a male quartette, whose work is to travel in the North. The institution maintains an excellent brass band of thirty pieces, which is instructed by a competent director, employed by the school. Any student possessing knowledge of wind instruments, will be given a chance to enter the band; but this knowledge is not essential to membership. The band plays every school day morning for inspection and drill.

One of the most important branches of the Music Department is the orchestra, which consists of fourteen pieces. The same rule regarding membership in the band holds good for the orchestra. The orchestra plays every week night at evening devotions. Many students who have played in the orchestra have developed into competent musicians. The director of the band has charge of the orchestra. All students belonging to the orchestra are subject to certain rules governing this organization.

The Bible Training Department was established in 1893. The desire for increased opportunities for those who wish to fit themselves for the ministry, or other forms of Christian work in the South, had been long felt. To meet this need, a generous lady in New York erected at Tuskegee a building called Phelps Hall, a picture of which is herewith given, containing a chapel, library, reading room, office, three recitation rooms and forty sleeping rooms, to be used as a Bible School. The donor of this building furnished each room in a comfortable and convenient manner, making it one of the most beautiful and desirable buildings on the school grounds. The instruction is wholly undenominational. It is the aim of this new department to help all denominations, and not to antagonize any. The Bible School is not in opposition to any other theological work now being done, but it is simply a means of helping. The faculty is composed of some of the strongest men in the country. Rev. Edgar J. Penney is in charge of the work, assisted by Rev. B. H. Peterson. Rt. Rev. B. T. Tanner, Rev. C. O. Boothe, D. D., and Rt. Rev. George W. Clinton have been engaged to give a regular course of lectures during each term.

The members of the Bible School are required to do mission work on the Sabbath in the neighboring churches--preaching and teaching in the Sunday Schools whenever their services are needed--and to make weekly reports in writing of the work done.

It is not necessary to have a special call to the ministry to enter the Bible School at Tuskegee. Many who desire to do only missionary work or to become intelligent teachers of the Bible in the Sunday Schools, will be greatly benefited and helped; indeed, quite a few of those who are now members of this department are fitting themselves for this kind of work.

The demand for an educated ministry is growing throughout the South, and those who expect to preach must prepare themselves for the work.

This department was established for the express purpose of giving colored men and women a knowledge of the English Bible; implanting in their hearts a noble ambition to go out into the dark and benighted districts of the South and give their lives for the elevation and Christianizing of the South. Last year eighty-three students attended this department. This was the largest attendance since the department was founded.

Last, but not least, I mention the Academic Department, which offers a thorough course of instruction, nearly, if not quite, equal to the high school courses of the Northern and Western States. No language, however, except English, is taught. It is our aim to correlate the work of the Academic Department with the Industrial Departments, and it is the policy of the school not to give any student a diploma of graduation who has not completed the course in at least one division of one or another of the industrial departments.

Last year, of the 1,164 students who attended the Institute, except a part of those in the Bible Training School, all were talking studies in this department, either in the night or day school, they being about equally divided between the night and the day school.

The night school course is so arranged that a student is enabled to do just half the amount of work in night school as in day school. A student in night school will therefore cover a year's work, as laid out for day school students, in two years.

In 1899 there were seventy-seven graduates from all of the departments.

We received twenty thousand dollars from Mr. Andrew Carnegie for a new library building. Our first library and reading-room were in a corner of a shanty, occupying a space of about five by twelve feet. It was ten years from my first effort before I was able to secure Mr. Carnegie's interest and help. The first time I saw him, ten years before, he seemed to take but little interest in our school, but I was determined to show him that we were worthy of his help. The following letter will explain itself:

December 15, 1900.

MR. ANDREW CARNEGIE,
5 W. Fifty-first Street, New York.

DEAR SIR: Complying with the request which you made of me when I saw you at your residence a few days ago, I now submit in writing an appeal for a library building for our institution.

We have 1,100 students, 86 officers and instructors, together with their families, and about 200 colored people living near the school, all of whom would make use of the library building.

We have over 12,000 books, periodicals, etc., gifts from our friends, but we have no suitable place for them, and we have no suitable reading-room.

Our graduates go to work in every section of the South, and whatever knowledge might be obtained in the library would serve to assist in the elevation of the Negro race.

Such a building as we need could be erected for about $20,000. All of the work for the building, such as brickmaking, brick masonry, carpentry, blacksmithing, etc., would be done by the students. The money which you would give would not only supply the building, but the erection of the building would give a large number of students an opportunity to learn the building trades, and the students would use the money paid to them to keep themselves in school. I do not believe that a similar amount of money often could be made to go so far in uplifting a whole race.

If you wish further information, I shall be glad to furnish it.

Yours truly,

BOOKER T. WASHINGTON, Principal.

The next mail brought the following reply: "I will be very glad to pay the bills for the library building as they are incurred, to the extent of twenty thousand dollars, and I am glad of the opportunity to show the interest I have in your noble work."
 

The party that went to Africa in the employ of the German Government
to teach cotton raising in the German colony of Toga.
 

Carnegie Library Building.
 

As illustrating the value of the work which we are doing at Tuskegee, I am glad to add that I was agreeably surprised during the summer of 1900 to receive a letter from the German Consul at Washington, asking me to meet him for a conference. In the conference it developed that his government had heard of the value of the agricultural work being done at Tuskegee, and that he was commissioned by the Committee of Agriculture of the German Government to secure four persons from Tuskegee to go to Africa to introduce cotton raising into the German colony of Togo. After considering the matter in all its details, Messrs. John W. Robinson, Allen L. Burks, Shepard L. Harris as graduates of the institution were selected, and with them Mr. J. N. Calloway, who for a number of years, had been in charge of one of the school farms, went to serve as superintendent and executive manager of the enterprise. This experiment is being watched with the greatest interest throughout this country. Germany has an African dominion amounting to 925,000 square miles, which is a third larger than the total area of the American cotton producing states. It has been found that this territory is fertile, fairly well watered, and not too hot for cotton. Togo, in which the experiment is being tried, is north of the Gulf of Guinea and four hundred miles north of the Equator. It is a little larger than South Carolina and has an estimated Negro population of two and one-half millions.

The party sailed from New York, November 3, 1900, carrying with them plows, hoes, cotton gin and press, ties and several varieties of cotton seed.

The German government has enjoined secrecy upon those interested in the experiment and so no detailed information can be published aside from the fact that the experiment is succeeding admirably.

Messrs. Robinson and Burks are graduates of the academic and agricultural departments of the school; Mr. Harris is a graduate of the academic and mechanical departments. The latter has charge of the matter of building gin houses and such other structures as my be needed.

It is true that the action is experimental, but those engaged in it are most hopeful. The young men under the careful guidance of Mr. Calloway are perhaps the pioneers in a movement which may mean much in the economic history of the world. The German government in committing this experiment to the hands of graduates of Tuskegee has shown a breadth of view which is appreciated. If any people can make a success in cotton raising in West Africa, we believe that the graduates sent out from Tuskegee will do it.

I cannot close this chapter without making some special reference to the chapel at Tuskegee, since this is regarded as the architectural gem of the Tuskegee group of buildings. It was planned by Mr. R. R. Taylor, who was then our teacher in architecture and mechanical drawing. The work of construction, even to the making of the bricks, was done wholly by students. The cost of erection of the building was valued at $30,000.

The following is a description of the building, a cut of which is also given in this volume: The plan of the chapel is that of a Greek cross, the main axis extending from northeast to southwest. The extreme dimension from northeast to southwest, extending through nave and choir, is one hundred and fifty-four feet six inches. The dimension from northwest to southeast, through transepts, is one hundred and six feet. The roof is of the hammer beam construction. The clear span of the main trusses is sixty-three feet, which is the width of the nave and transept. The angle trusses have a clear span of eighty-seven feet, projections from the walls under trusses slightly decreasing the span. The gallery on back is thirty feet wide, extending over girls' cloak room and twelve feet into main auditorium.

In the rear are choir room, study for minister, and two small vestibules, one on either side of chapel, giving entrance to choir room, study and main auditorium. A large basement is provided, and in this the steam heating plant is located. At the northeast end of the auditorium is the pulpit platform, which is large enough to seat the entire faculty of eighty-eight members. This platform is two feet six inches above the main floor. Immediately behind this and elevated three feet above it, is the choir stand, with seating capacity for one hundred and fifty persons. The chapel is sufficiently supplied with windows to give abundant light and ventilation, a very pretty effect being secured by the use of delicately tinted colored glass.

The woodwork is all of yellow pine with hard oil finish, except the floor, which is of oak. The seating capacity of the auditorium is 2,400. One million two hundred thousand bricks were used in the construction, all made and laid by students. All the mouldings, casings and caps used were made by students. The floor is bowled. The height of the walls from top of floor is twenty-four feet six inches; from floor line to highest point of ceiling, forty-eight feet six inches. The height of tower from line of ground to top of cross which terminates it, is one hundred and five feet. The electric lighting is from three main chandeliers, with thirty lights each, ten of two lights each, twelve of one light each, and from a reflecting disc of forty lights over the choir stand.
 

A View of the Machine Shop. Students at Work. Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Intitute.
 

Harness Making and Carriage Dressing at Tuskegee Institute.
 

Gradually, by patience and hard work, we have brought order out of chaos, just as will be true of any problem if we stick to it with patience and wisdom and earnest effort.

As I look back now over our struggle, I am glad that we had it. I am glad that we endured all those discomforts and inconveniences. I am glad that our students had to dig out the place for their kitchen and dining-room. I am glad that our first boarding place was in that dismal, ill-lighted, and damp basement. Had we started in a fine, attractive, convenient room, I fear we would have "lost our heads" and become "stuck up." It means a great deal, I think, to build on a foundation which one has made for himself.

When our students return to Tuskegee now, as they often do, and go into our large, beautiful, well ventilated, and well lighted dining-room, and see tempting, well-cooked food--largely grown by the students themselves--and see tables, neat tablecloths and napkins, and vases of flowers upon the tables, and hear singing birds, and note that each meal is served exactly upon the minute, with no disorder and with almost no complaint coming from the hundreds that now fill our dining-room, they, too, often say to me that they are glad that we started as we did, and built ourselves up, year by year, by a slow and natural process of growth.

The school is regularly incorporated under the name of "The Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute." The charter was granted by special act of the Legislature of Alabama. It provides for a board of nineteen trustees. As now constituted (October, 1901), their names are:

George W. Campbell, President, Tuskegee, Ala.; Rev. G. L. Chaney, Vice-President, Leominster, Mass.; Rev. R. C. Bedford, Secretary, Beloit, Wis.; Warren Logan, Treasurer, Tuskegee, Ala.; Lewis Adams, Tuskegee, Ala.; Charles W. Hare, Tuskegee, Ala.; Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee, Ala.; George Foster Peabody, New York; Robert C. Ogden, New York; John C. Grant, LL. D., Chicago, Ill.; J. W. Adams, Montgomery, Ala.; Rev. George A. Gordon, D. D., Boston, Mass.; Rev. Charles F. Dole, Boston, Mass.; J. G. Phelps Stokes, New York; S. C. Dizer, Boston, Mass.; Wm. H. Baldwin, Jr., New York; R. O. Simpson, Furman, Ala.; Hugh H. Hanna, Indianapolis, Ind.

Mr. Campbell has been president of the board from the beginning and, in the twenty years of its history, has never missed a meeting.