While Mr. Washington has achieved wonders, in his own recognition as a leader and by his thoughtful addresses, his largest work has been the founding and the building up of the Normal and Industrial Institute, at Tuskegee, Alabama. That institution illustrates what can be accomplished under the supervision, control, and teaching of the colored people, and it stands conspicuous for industrial training, for intelligent, productive labor, for increased usefulness in agriculture and mechanics, for self-respect and self-support, and for the purification of home-life. A late Circular of the Trustees of Hampton Institute makes the startling statement that “six millions of our Negroes are now living in one-room cabins.” Under such conditions morality and progress are impossible. If the estimate be approximately correct, it enforces the wisdom of Mr. Washington in his earnest crusade against “the one-room cabin”, and is an honorable tribute to the revolution wrought through his students in the communities where they have settled. Every student at Tuskegee, in the proportion of the impression produced by the Principal, becomes a better husband, a better wife, a better citizen, a better man or woman. A series of useful books on the “Great Educators” has been published in England and the United States. While Washington cannot, in learning and philosophy, be ranked with Herbart, Pestalozzi, Froebel, Hopkins, Wayland, Harris, he may be truly classed among those who have wrought grandest results on mind and character.
Author’s Reasons for Writing Autobiography--Ancestry--Mother--Author’s Early Recollections and Impressions of Her--Father--Who He Was--When and Where Author Was Born--A Description of the Cabin Where Born--Dress of the Author in Early Childhood--The “Tow Shirt"--Early Services of Author at Holding Horses and Going to the Mill--Name of Author’s Owner--His Treatment of His Slaves--Author First Hears of the War from the Slaves in the “Quarters"--He Assembles with His Mother at the “Big House” and Hears Freedom to the Slaves Announced--Removal of Author’s Family to West Virginia--Incidents of the Journey--Of Whom the Family Consisted at That Time.
Beginning Life in West Virginia--Author Sees a Negro Reading a Newspaper in Malden which Kindles His First Ambition--He Learns His Letters while Working in Coal Mines and Salt Furnaces--Attends His First School--Author Gives Himself a Surname--He Turns Forward the Hands of the Clock to Enable Him to Get to School on Time--Author Learns of Sunday School from an Old Man and Becomes a Regular Attendant--Some Experiences in the Coal Mines--Author Goes to Live with the Family of Gen. Lewis Ruffner--He Runs Away, but Returns--Some Experiences as a Market Boy while Working for Mrs. Ruffner--Mrs. Ruffner, Author’s Estimate of Her--Author Hears of the Hampton Institute while Working in the Coal Mines and Resolves to go There--Joins the Baptist Church in Malden Before Leaving for Hampton--Still a Member of This Church.