Booker T. Washington: “Now one great mistake that we make in striving to reach these things is that we keep putting off beginning.”

Despite superficial and temporary signs which might lead one to entertain a contrary opinion, there was never a time when I felt more hopeful for the race than I do at the present.

By it a race must rise or fall, succeed or fail, and in the last analysis mere sentiment counts for little.

Wherever our graduates go, the changes which soon begin to appear in the buying of land, improving homes, saving money, in education, and in high moral characters are remarkable.

What is equally important, they are exhibiting a degree of common sense and self-control which is causing better relations to exist between the races, and is causing the Southern white man to learn to believe in the value of educating the…