Booker T. Washington

In my early life I used to cherish a feeling of ill will toward any one who spoke in bitter terms against the Negro, or who advocated measures that tended to oppress the black man or take from him opportunities for growth in the most…

No man living had a harder task, and a task that called for more wisdom to do it right.

Such, in brief, were some of the views I advocated in this first address dealing with the broad question of the relations of the two races, and since that time I have not found any reason for changing my views on any important point.

On the contrary, the South was given credit for all the praiseworthy things that it had done.

It not only makes “a carpenter of a man; it makes a man of a carpenter.” In one sense, therefore, it is of greater value than any other institution for the training of men and women that we have, from Cambridge to Palo Alto.

Often as it happened, when during the week I had been disappointed in not getting a cent from the very individuals from whom I most expected help, and when I was almost broken down and discouraged, that generous help has come from some one…

As far as the science of what is called begging can be reduced to rules, I would say that I have had but two rules.

But Tuskegee is, nevertheless, a brand-new chapter in the history of the Negro, and in the history of the knottiest problem we have ever faced.

Time and time again I have been asked, by people who are trying to secure money for philanthropic purposes, what rule or rules I followed to secure the interest and help of people who were able to contribute money to worthy objects.

He said: “Give them an idea for every word.” I think it would be hard to improve upon this advice; and it might be made to apply to all public speaking.

To make the Negro work, that is what his master did in one way and hunger has done in another; yet both these left Southern life where they found it.

That is the only kind of people worth having.