• 5.04 Compare and contrast the
African American political and
legal personalities of the time
period and their impact on
American society.
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Take notes on the right side of A1 in your
notebook.
• On the left side prepare for class discussion by
writing two paragraphs that answer the
Assessment Prompt.
• Should schools focus more on
vocational training or preparing
students for college?
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Booker T. Washington was
born in 1856-1858 nears Hales
Ford, Virginia
• Enslaved to James Burroughs
• His mother was a cook; his
father was an unknown white
man.
• Some people see Booker T.
Washington’s life as a search
for a father/father figure.
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Union victory brought
freedom
• Booker T., his mother, and
half-siblings walked to West
Virginia to reunite with
Washington Ferguson, his
mother’s husband.
• Ferguson worked in the coal
and salt mines; here BTW
learned to read
The Wizard of Tuskegee
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Walked to Hampton Normal and
Agricultural Institute in 1872
• Civil War general Samuel Chapman
Armstrong (a white man) was principal
• Armstrong believed that freed blacks
needed practical education and character
building
• After graduation from Hampton BTW
taught back in Malden, West Virginia
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Booker T. Washington
studied liberal arts at
Weyland Seminary in DC
then returned to Hampton
• At Hampton BTW was in
charge of the school’s
Native American students
• General Armstrong hired
BTW as principal for his
new school in Alabama
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• When Washington first
arrived at Tuskegee the
school had only $2000, no
buildings, no faculty, and no
students
• By 1888 the Institute had 500
acres of land and 400
students; by 1915 it had an
endowment of $2,000,000, a
staff of 200, and over 2000
students!
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Students in a Tuskegee history class
The Wizard of Tuskegee
The Atlanta Compromise
• In 1895 Washington’s
controversial speech at the
Cotton States and
International Exposition in
Atlanta brought national
attention.
• This was a ‘doctrine of
vocational training’ for blacks.
• Harvard soon gave BTW an
honorary master’s degree.
The Wizard of Tuskegee
The Wizard of Tuskegee
The Wizard of Tuskegee
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Booker T. Washington
would often blame AfricanAmericans for their own
limitations.
• Many black nationalists and
whites, like Andrew
Carnegie supported his
stance and funded Tuskegee.
• Washington secretly
funneled money to support
civil rights.
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Washington and Du Bois had
different views on the proper role
of education.
• Du Bois believed education was a
tool for blacks to fully integrate
into American society.
• Washington’s ideal was not full
integration; he viewed blacks as ‘a
nation within a nation.’
• To some Booker T. Washington’s
view supported segregation.
The Wizard of Tuskegee
Up From Slavery
• “Go out and be a center,
a life-giving center, as it
were to a whole
community, when the
opportunity comes,
when you may give life
where there is no life,
hope where there is no
hope, power where there
is no power………
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• “Begin in a humble way
and work up to build
institutions that will put
people on their feet.”
• Booker T. Washington was
an inspiration to
nationalists such as Marcus
Garvey and Malcolm X
and conservatives such as
Justice Clarence Thomas
and Thomas Sowell.
The Wizard of Tuskegee
• Booker T. Washington believed
in separate but equal.
• Du Bois believed blacks could
only achieve equality if racial
boundaries were torn down
through education.
• Washington sought ‘a place at
the table’ through vocational
work that would make blacks
irreplaceable in the U.S.
economy.
This presentation was prepared by Spencer
Swindler. The pictures were found on the
internet. Only one major source was used.
The bibliography for that source is below.
• ..\Video\Booker_T__Washington__Tuskegee_America.asf
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBi_rCGKqFs&feature=relat
ed
• Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., and Cornell
West. The African-American
Century, N.Y. The Free Press, 2000.
• 1. Where was Booker T. Washington born?
• 2. Here (what state?) Booker learned to read while
working in the mines.
• 3. General Samuel Chapman Armstrong was principal
at this school (name the school).
• 4. Booker was the principal of this Alabama HBCU
(name the school).
• 5. This billionaire friend of Washington left an
endowment to his school.
• 6. He disagreed with Washington’s 1895 speech in
Georgia and called it “the Atlanta Compromise.”
• 7. What does it mean, “to learn a trade?”