Booker T. Washington

I repeat my belief that the world is growing in the direction of giving.

Now they gradually threw off the mask, and were not afraid to let it be known that the “freedom” in their songs meant freedom of the body in this world.

I have always looked upon fame as something to be used in accomplishing good.

To some it seemed that, now that they were in actual possession of it, freedom was a more serious thing than they had expected to find it.

I determined, when quite a small child, that, if I accomplished nothing else in life, I would in some way get enough education to enable me to read common books and newspapers.

Though she was totally ignorant, she had high ambitions for her children, and a large fund of good, hard, common sense, which seemed to enable her to meet and master every situation.

Few people who were not right in the midst of the scenes can form any exact idea of the intense desire which the people of my race showed for an education.

I have always been made sad when I have heard members of any race claiming rights or privileges, or certain badges of distinction, on the ground simply that they were members of this or that race, regardless of their own individual worth…

It is seldom that anything is permanently gained by holding back a fact.

I have always felt proud, whenever I think of the incident, that my mother had strength of character enough not to be led into the temptation of seeming to be that which she was not—of trying to impress my schoolmates and others with the…

The history of the world fails to show a higher, purer, and more unselfish class of men and women than those who found their way into those Negro schools.

I was determined from the first to make my work as janitor so valuable that my services would be indispensable.