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The Atlanta University Publications, No. 12
ECONOMIC
CO-OPERATION
AMONG
NEGRO AMERICANS
A Social Study made by Atlanta
University under the patronage
of the Carnegie Institution of
Washington, D. C.
PRICE, ONE DOLLAR
The Atlanta University Press
ATLANTA, dEORGIA
1907
I AM convinced myself that there is no more
evil thing in this present world than Race
Prejudice; none at all. I write deliberately—
it is the worst single thing in life now. It
justifies and holds together more baseness,
cruelty and abomination than any other sort
of error in the world. Thru its body runs the
black blood of coarse lust, suspicion, jealousy
and persecution and all the darkest poisons of
the human soul.
[H. G.WELLS in the New York Independent.]
ECONOMIC
COOPERATION
AMONG
NEQRO AMERICANS
Report of a Social Study made by Atlanta
University, under the patronage of the
Carnegie Institution of Washington, D.C.,
together with the Proceedings of the 12th
Conference for the Study of the Negro
Problems, held at Atlanta University, on
Tuesday, May the 28th, 1907
EDITED BY
W. E. BURGHARDT DU BOIS
CORRESPONDING SECRETARY OF THE CONFERENCE
The Atlanta University Press
ATLANTA, GEORGIA
1907
\V7ER ihnen (i. e. the Negroes of Africa) selbftan-
* dige Erfindung und Eigenen Geschmack in ihren
Arbeiten abspricht, der verschliesst sein Auge absicht-
lich den offenkundigen Thatsachen, oder Mangel an
Kenntniss derselben macht ihn unfahig zum competenten
Beurtheiler. Soyaux.
/V MONG the great groups of "natural" races, the
Negroes are the be£t and keenest tillers of the
ground. Ratzel.
1 I HE market is the center of all the more stirring life
A in [African] Negro communities, and attempts to
train him to culture have made the mo& effectual Start
from this tendency. Ratzel
Contents
Page
Resolutions of the Conference 4
Preface 5
Select Bibliography of Economic Co-operation among Negro Ameri¬
cans 6
Part I. The Background 10
Section 1. The Scope of this Study 10
Section 2. Africa 12
Section 3. The West Indies 18
Section 4. The Colonies 20
Part II. The Development of Co-operation 24
Section 5. An Historical Sketch 24
Section 6. The Underground Railroad 26
Section 7. Emancipation 32
Section 8. Migration 45
Part III. Types of Co-operation 54
Section 9. The Church 54
Section 10. Schools 73
Section 11. Beneficial and Insurance Societies .... 92
Section 12. Secret Societies 109
Section 13. Co-operative Benevolence 128
Section 14. Banks 134
Section 15. Co-operative Business 149
Section 16. The Group Economy 179
Section 17. The Twelfth Atlanta Conference . . 181
Resolutions of the Conference
The Conference regards the economic development of the Negro
Americans at present as in a critical state. The crisis arises not so
much because of idleness or even lack of skill as by reason of the fact
that they unwittingly stand hesitating at the cross roads—one way
leading to the old trodden ways of grasping fierce individualistic com¬
petition, where the shrewd, cunning, skilled and rich among them will
prey upon the ignorance and simplicity of the mass of the race and get
wealth at the expense of the general well being; the other way leading
to co-operation in capital and labor, the massing of small savings, the
wide distribution of capital and a more general equality of wealth and
comfort. This latter path of co-operative effort has already been
entered by many; we find a wide development of industrial and sick
relief, many building and loan associations, some co-operation of arti¬
sans and considerable co-operation in retail trade. Indeed from the
fact that there is among Negroes, as yet, little of that great inequality
of wealth distribution which marks modern life, nearly all their eco¬
nomic effort tends toward true economic co-operation. But danger
lurks here. The race does not recognize the parting of the ways, they
tend to think and are being taught to think that any method which
leads to individual riches is the way of salvation.
The Conference believes this doctrine mischievously false, we believe
that every effort ought to be made to foster and emphasize present
tendencies among Negroes toward co-operative effort and that the
ideal of wide ownership of small capital and small accumulations
among many rather than great riches among a few, should persistently
be held before them.
N. O. Nelson,
R. P. Sims,
W. E. B. DuBois.
Preface
This study, which forms the twelfth of the annual publications of
Atlanta University, and the second investigation of the new decade, is
a further carrying out of a plan of social study by means of recurring
decennial inquiries into the same general set of human problems. The
object of these studies is primarily scientific—a careful search for truth
conducted as thoroughly, broadly, and honestly as the material re¬
sources and mental equipment at command will allow; but this is not
our sole object: we wish not only to make the Truth clear but to present
it in such shape as will encourage and help social reform. Our financial
resources are unfortunately meagre: Atlanta University is primarily a
school and most of its funds and energy go to teaching. It is, however,
also a seat of learning and as such it has endeavored to advance knowl¬
edge, particularly in matters of racial contact and development which
seemed obviously its nearest field. In this work it has received unusual
encouragement from the scientific world, and the published results of
these studies are used in America, Europe, Asia and Africa. Scarcely
a book on the Negro problem or any phase of it has been published in
the last decade which has not acknowledged its indebtedness to our
work.
On the other hand, the financial support given this work has been
very small. The total cost of the twelve publications has been about
$13,000, or a little over $1,000 a year. The growing demands of the work,
the vast field to be covered and the delicacy and equipment needed in
such work call for far greater resources. We need, for workers, lab¬
oratory and publications, a fund of $6,000 a year, if this work is going
adequately to fulfill its promise. This year a small temporary grant
from the Carnegie Institution of Washington, D. C., has greatly helped
us.
In other years we have been able to serve the United States Bureau
of Labor, the United States Census, the Board of Education of the
English Government, many scientific associations, professors in nearly
all the leading universities, and many periodicals and reviews. May
we not hope in the future for such increased financial resources as will
enable us to study adequately this the greatest group of social problems
that ever faced America?
Select Bibliography of Economic Co-operation
Among Negro Americans
Alvord, J. W.—Letters from the South relating to the condition of the Freedmen,
addressed to General Major O. O. Howard. 42pp. "Washington, 1870.
Fifth Semi-Annual Report on Schools for Freedmen. 55 pp. Washington, 1868.
Allen, Walter.—Governor Chamberlain's Administration in South Carolina. 544 pp.
London and New York, 1888.
American Negro and his economic value. B.T. Washington. International Monthly,
2:672-86.
American Negro Artisan. T. J. Calloway. Cashier's Magazine, 25:435-45.
Allen, Richard.—First Bishop of the A. M. E. Church. The life, experience and gos¬
pel labors of the Rt. Rev. Richard Allen. Written by himself. Philadelphia,
1798. 69 pp., 8vo.
American Colonization Society. Annual reports of the American Society for the
colonizing of the Free People of color of the United States. Numbers 1-72, with
minutes of the meetings and of the board of directors. 1818-1889,8v., 8vo.
Anderson, Matthew.—Presbyterianism and its relation to the Negro. Philadelphia,
1897.
Arnett, B. W.—The Budget for 1881-1884. 651 pp.
The Centennial Budget. 1887-1888. 589 pp.
The Budget, containing annual reports of the general officers, etc., 1885-6. 575 pp.
The Budget, 1891. 241 pp.
The Budget, 1901. 78 pp.
The Budget of 1904. 373 pp. Philadelphia.
Bacon, Benjamin C.—Statistics of the colored people of Philadelphia. Phlla., 1856.
Ibid. Second Edition with statistics of crime. Phila., 1859. 2 (1), 3-24 pp., 8vo.
Blyden, Edward Wilmot.—Christianity, Islam, and the Negro Race. Introduction
by Samuel Lewis. London, 1887 (4), vii UK 423 pp., 12mo.
Boston, Mass., Grammar School Committee. Report of a special committee of the
grammar school board. Abolition of the Smith colored school. Boston, 1849.
71 pp., 8vo.
Brackett, Jeffrey Richardson.—The Negro in Maryland. A study of the institution
of slavery. Bait., 1889 (5), 268 pp. (Johns Hopkins University "Studies, extra
vol. 6), 8vo.
Buecher, Carl.—Industrial Evolution, translated by S. M. Wickett. 393 pp. New York,
1904.
Bradford, Sarah H.—Harriet, the Moses of Her People. 171 pp. New York, 1901.
Banks, Chas.—Negro Town and Colony. Mound Bayou, Miss. 10 pp.
Brooks, Chas. H.—(Grand Secretary of the Order). The Official History and Manual
of the Grand United Order of Odd Fellows in America. A Chronological Treat¬
ise, etc. 274 pp. Philadelphia, 1902.
Boas, Franz.—Commencement Address at Atlanta University, May, 1906. Atlanta
University Leaflet No. 19,15 pp.
Colored People's Blue Book and Business Directory of Chicago, 111. 1905.
Colored men as cotton manufacturers. J. Dowd. Guntoris Magazine, 28:254-6.
Condition of the people of color in Ohio. With interesting anecdotes. Boston, 1839.
48 pp., 12mo.
Constitution of National Association of Colored Women. Tuskegee, 7 pp., 1898.
Constitution of the National League of Colored Women of the United States. Wash¬
ington, 1892.
College-bred Negro, Atlanta University Publication, No. 5. 115 pp., 1900.
Bibliography
7
Gatto, W.T.—History of the Presbyterian Movement. Phila., 1857,8vo. A semi-cen¬
tenary discourse and history of the first African Presbyterian Church, Phila¬
delphia, May, 1857, from its organization, including a notice of its first pastor,
John Gloucester, also appendix containing sketches of all the colored churches
in Philadelphia.
Cincinnati convention of colored freedmen of Ohio. Proceedings, Jan. 14-19, 1852.
Cincinnati, 1852, 8vo.
Clark.—Negro Mason in Equity.
Cromwell, John W.—The Early Negro Convention Movement. The American Negro
Academy, Occasional Papers No. 9. 23 pp., Washington, 1904.
Campbell, Sir George.—White and Black in the United States. 482 pp., London, 1879.
Delaney, Martin R.—Condition, elevation, emigration and destiny of the colored
people of the United States. Phila., 1852. 215 pp., 12mo.
DuBois, W. E. B.—The Negro in the Black Belt: Some Social Sketches. In the Bul¬
letin of the Department of Labor, No. 22.
Philadelphia Negro. 520 pp. Philadelphia, 1899.
Denniker, J.—The Races of Man. 611 pp., New York, 1904.
Eaton, John.—Grant, Lincoln and the Freedmen. 331 pp., New York, 1907.
Edwards, Bryan.—History, civil and commercial, of the British Colonies in West
Indies. 3 vol. London, 1807.
The Economic Position of the American Negro. Reprinted from Papers and Pro¬
ceedings of the Seventeenth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Asso¬
ciation, December, 1904.
Fourth Annual Report of the Colored Woman's League. 13 pp. Washington, Janu¬
ary, 1897.
Freedmen's Saving Bank. Bankers' Magazine. 29:936 ; 86:14.
Freedmen at Port Royal. E.L.Pierce. Atlantic. 12:291.
Freedmen's Saving Bank. Old and New. 2:245.
Fletcher, Frank H.—Negro Exodus. 24 pp., 8vo.
Gaines, W. J.—African Methodism in the South. Atlanta, 1890.
Gannett, Henry.—Occupations of the Negroes. Balti., 1895. 16 pp., 8vo.
Garnett, Henry Highland.—The past and present condition and the destiny of the
colored race. Troy, 1848. 20 pp., 8vo. Plates.
Goodwin, M. B.—History of schools for the colored population in the District of
Columbia. U. S. Bureau of Education. Special Report on District of Columbia
for 1869, pp. 199-300.
Grimke, Archibald H.—Right on the Scaffold. Washington, 1901. 27 pp., 8vo.
Grimshaw, Wm. H.—Official History of Free Masonry, etc. New York, 1903. 392 pp.,
12mo.
Georgia State Industrial College for Negroes. L. B. Ellis. Ounton's Magazine,
25:218-26.
Gibbs, M. W.—Shadow and Light. 372 pp., Washington, 1902.
Garner, J. W.—Reconstruction in Mississippi. 422 pp. New York, 1901.
Georgia Equal Rights Convention. 16 pp. Macon, February, 1906.
Grand United Order of Odd Fellows. Journal and Proceedings of General Meeting.
48 Reports, 1843-1907.
Howard, O. O.—Autobiography. 2 vol. New York, 1907.
Hayford, Casely.—Gold Coast Native Institutions. 418 pp. London, 1903.
Hampton Conference Reports, Annually, 1897-1907.
Hickok, Chas. T.—The Negro in Ohio, 1802-1870. A Thesis, etc. 182 pp. Cleveland,
1896.
Hilyer, Andrew F.—The Twentieth Century Union League Directory. A Compila¬
tion of the Efforts of the Colored People of Washington for Social Betterment.
174 pp. Washington, 1901.
Jones, Robert.—Fifty years in the Lombard Street Central Presbyterian Church.
Phila., 1894, 170 pp.
Knights of Labor and Negroes. Public Opinion. 2:1.
Love, E. K.—History of the First African Baptist Church. Savannah, 1889.
McPherson, J. H. T.—History of Liberia. Balti., 1891. 61 pp., 8vo.
8
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Moore, J. J.—History of the A. M. E. Z. Church. York, Pa., 1880.
Moreau de Saint Mery.—Description Topographique, Physique, Civile, Politique, et
Historique, de la Partie Francaise, de L'isle Saint-Dominique. Vol. 2, 790 pp.
Philadelphia, 1798.
Mossell, N. F. Mrs.—Forerunners of the Afro-American Council. Howard Magazine.
Washington April, 1900.
Negro in Business, Atlanta University Publication, No. 4. 78 pp. 1899.
Negro Enterprise, B. T. Washington. Outlook. 77:115-8.
Negro as he really is, W. E. B. DuBois. World's Work. 2:848-66.
Negro Exodus, 1879, F. Douglass. American Journal of Social Science. 11:1.
Negro Exodus, 1879, R. T. Greener. American Journalof Social Science. 11:22.
Negro Exodus, 1879, J. B. Runnion. Atlantic. 44:222.
Negroes in Baltimore, J. R. Slattery. Catholic World. 66:519.
Negro Exodus, 1879, J. C. Hartzell. Methodist Quarterly Review. 39:722.
Negro as a mechanic, R. Lowry. North American Review. 156:472.
Negroes an industrial factor, O. B. Spahr. Outlook. 62:31.
Negro In Business, I. T. Montgomery. Outlook. 69:738-4.
The Negro in the cities of the North, charities. Vol. 15, No. 1. New York, October,
1905.
The Negro Common School, Atlanta University Publication, No. 6. 120 pp.. 1901.
The Negro Artisan, Atlanta University Publication, No. 7. 200 pp., 1902.
The Negro Church, Atlanta University Publication, No. 8. 212 pp., 1903.
The Negroes of Farmville, Va.—In Bulletin of the Department of Labor, No. 14.
Negroes of Xenia, Ohio.—In Bulletin of the Bureau of Labor, No. 48.
Negroes of Sandy Spring, Md.—In Bulletin of the Department of Labor, No. 32.
Negroes of Litwalton, Va.—In Bulletin of the Department of Labor, No. 37.
Negro Landholder of Georgia.—In Bulletin of the Department of Labor, No. 35.
National convention of Colored men and their friends. Troy, N. Y., 1847, 38 pp., 8vo.
National convention of Colored men. Syracuse, N. Y., October 4-7, 1864. Boston,
1864. 62 pp., 8vo.
National convention of Colored men of America, 1869. Proceedings, Wash., 1869. 42
pp., 8vo.
Ohio anti-slavery convention. Putnam, Ohio. Report on the condition of the peo¬
ple of color, etc. 1835. N. Y., 1835. 24 pp., 8vo.
Proceedings of the Select Committee of the United States Senate to Investigate the
Causes of the Removal of the Negroes from the Southern States to the North¬
ern States. 3 Parts, 1486 pp. Washington, 1879-1880.
Piatt, O. H.—Negro Governors. In Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical So¬
ciety. Vol. 6. New Haven, 1900.
Prospectus of the Coleman Manufacturing Co., of Concord, N. C. 17 pp. Richmond,
1897.
Proceedings of the National Negro Business League, annually, 1900-'06.
Proceedings of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, issued annually or
biennially, in the following states:
Alabama.
Michigan.
Arkansas.
Minnesota.
California.
Mississippi.
Colorado.
Missouri.
Connecticut.
New Jersey.
District of Columbia.
New York.
Delaware.
Ontario (B. 0.)
Florida.
Oklahoma.
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Pennsylvania.
Indiana.
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Kansas.
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Louisiana. Washington and Oregon.
Maryland. West Virginia.
Massachusetts.
Official Proceedings of the Biennial Session of the Supreme Lodge of Knights of
Pythias. 18 reports, 1879-1905.
Penn, 1. G., and J. W. E. Bowen, Editors.—The United Negro: His Problems and His
Progress. Containing the Addresses and Proceedings of the Negro Young Peo¬
ple's Christian and Educational Congress, held August 6-11,1602. 600 pp. At¬
lanta, 1902.
Pierce, Edward Lillie.—The Negroes at Port Royal. Report to S. B. Chase, Sec. of
Treas. Boston, 1862. 36 pp., 12mo.
Ratzel, F.—History of Mankind. 8 vol. New York, 1904.
Report of the Committee of Senate upon the Relations between Labor and Capital,
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Report of Major General O. O. Howard, Commissioner, Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen
and Abandoned Lands, etc. 80 pp. Washington, 1869,
Report of the Joint Select Committee to Inquire into the condition of affairs in the
late Insurrectionary States. t,Ku Klux Conspiracy). 13vol. Washington, 1872.
Social and Physical Condition of Negroes in Cities. Atlanta University Publication,
No. 2. 89 pp., 1897.
Some Efforts of Negroes for Social Betterment. Atlanta University Publication,
No. 3. 66 pp., 1898.
Social and Industrial Condition of the Negro in Massachusetts. 319pp. Boston, 1904.
Siebert, Wm. H.—Underground Railroad. 478 pp. New York, 1898.
Still, William.—Underground Railroad Records. Hartford, Conn., 1886.
Schneider, Wilhelm.—Die Culturfsehigkeit des Negers. 220 pp. Frankfurt, a. M.,
1885.
Smith, T. W.—The Slave in Canada. In the Collections of the Nova Scotia Historical
Society. Vol. 10. Halifax, N. S., 1889.
Second Annual Report of the Colored Woman's League. 23 pp. Washington, 1895.
The Southern Workman, monthly, 37 volumes. Hampton, Va.
Savings of Black Georgia, W. E. B. DuBois. Outlook. 69:128-30.
Smedley, R. C.—The Underground Railroad. Phila., 1833.
State Convention of colored men of South Carolina. Proceedings at Columbia, 1883.
Columbia, 1883. 6 pp., 8vo.
Statistical inquiry, A, into the condition of the people of color of the city and the
districts of Philadelphia, 1849. 44 pp., 8vo.
Tuskegee cotton planters in Africa, J. N. Calloway. Outlook. 70:772-6.
Tobin, Father.—A Model Catholic Community of Colored People.
Upton, Wm. H.—Negro Masonry. 264 pp. Cambridge, Mass., 1902.
Vass, S. N.—The Progress of the Negro Race. 31 pp. Raleigh, 1906.
Village improvement among the Negroes, R. L. Smith. Outlook. 64:733-6.
Walker, David.—Appeal, in Four Articles, together with a Preamble to the Colored
Citizens of the World, etc. 66 pp. Boston. Mass., 1829.
Williams, George W.—History of the Negro Race in America. 2 vol. in one, 481 pp.,
611pp. New York and London, 1882.
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Part 1. The Background
Section 1. The Scope of this Study
In 1898 the Atlanta Conference made a limited study entitled "Some
Efforts of American Negroes for their Own Social Betterment." The
present study is a continuation and enlargement of this initial study
made nearly ten years ago, with certain limitations and changes. The
question set before us in the present study is: How far is there and
has there been among Negro Americans a conscious effort at mutual
aid in earning a living? In answering this question we must first con¬
sider just how broad an interpretation we are giving to the phrase,
"earning a living." In a highly developed economic society like that
which surrounds us here in America and in other countries under the
lead of European civilization, the phrase "earning a living" is pretty
clear, because there are large numbers of persons engaged simply or
principally in that occupation; and all persons recognize the efforts
toward earning a living as a distinct set of efforts in their general life.
It must be remembered, however, that this situation is, to an extent,
abnormal; that neither in the undeveloped races nor in the fully devel¬
oped Race, when it comes, will earning a living as such, occupy the
large space that it does today in human endeavor. Among the semi-civ¬
ilized races the work of getting the material things necessary for life is
looked upon as incidental to a great many other larger and, in their
opinion, better things, such as hunting, resting, eating and perhaps
carousing. So, too, in an ideal community, we would expect that the
purely economic efforts to supply human beings at least with the
necessities of life would occupy a comparatively small part of the com¬
munity for short spaces of time.
All this is trite, but we must not forget it, as we are apt to do, when
we come to study a group like of the Negro American, which has not
reached the economic development of the surrounding nation, and
which perhaps never will surrender itself entirely to the ideals of the
surrounding group. We must not expect, for instance, to find a sepa¬
rately developed economic life among the Negroes except as they
became under compulsion a part of the economic life of the nation
before emancipation ; and except as they have become since the eman¬
cipation, a part of the great working force. So far as their own inner
economic efforts are concerned we must expect in looking over their
history to find great strivings in religious development, in political life
and in efforts at education. And so completely do these cultural
aspects of their group efforts overshadow the economic efforts that at
Scope of the Study
U
first a student is tempted to think that there has been no inner economic
co-operation, or at least that it has only come to the fore in the last two
or three decades. But this is not so. While to be sure the religious
motive was uppermost during the time of slavery, for instance, so far
as group action among the Negroes were concerned, even then it had
an economic tinge, and more so since slavery, has Negro religion had
its economic side; so, too, the political striving after the war was a
matter even more largely of economic welfare than it was of political
preferment so far as the great mass of the race was concerned. And
then and now the strife for education is, if not primarily, certainly to a
very large extent an effort at earning a living in some manner which
will satisfy the higher cravings of the rising classes of Negroes. When,
therefore, we take up under the head of economic co-operation such
institutions as the church, such movements as the Exodus of 1879 and
the matter of schools, etc., it is from the economic side that we are
studying these things, and because this economic side was really of
very great importance and significance.
Then again we are studying the conscious effort in economic lines
not, primarily, so far as individual effort is concerned, but so far as
these efforts are combined in some sort of effort for mutual aid, that is:
it is a matter of group co-operation that we have before us. Now this
brings certain difficulties because a race in the state of development in
which the Negro American is today must of necessity depend tremend¬
ously upon the individual leader. He is in the period of special indi¬
vidual development, and while the group development is going on rap-
idly, yet it is the individual as yet who stands forth. Consequently
very often we must touch upon individual effort and touch upon things
which strictly speaking are not co-operative, in the narrow sense, and
yet in the present state of Negro development they have a significance
which is co-operative, because the leader has been called forth by a
group movement and not simply for his own aggrandizement. In other
words, the kind of co-operation which we are going to find among the
Negro Americans is not always democratic co-operation; very often the
group organization is aristocratic and even monarchic, and yet it is co¬
operation, and the autocracy holds its leadership by the vote of the
mass, and even the monarch does the same, as in the case of the small
Baptist church.
Finally a study like this must throw great light upon the develop¬
ment of all social classes. We are apt to say that in Economics and in
the Social Sciences we cannot segregate the class and make the "crucial
test," as we can in certain physical experiments. This is true in a great
many cases, but it is not universally true, as witness the present in¬
stance, where we have a segregation, and where we can study a class
by itself. Moreover the analogy goes still further: The rise of a lower
social class in any community is in no wise different from the develop¬
ment of a race; in fact, we realize in studying races, and particularly
primitive races as we have them today in contact with more highly de¬
veloped races, that what we have going on around us every day in civ-
12 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
ilized society is the same thing in microcosm which the world has seen
going on from the beginning: that whereas in the world we have sepa¬
rate large groups in varying degrees of civilization and development,
and they gradually rise and fall and sometimes even change their rela¬
tive positions, so, too, in any separate group or nation, we have smaller
groups with differing developments, and these classes into which the
group is divided, are coming forward or retrograding in the same way,
and with many of the same phenomena. Therefore, a study of the
Negro American in the United States today in his economic aspect, as
well as in other aspects, throws peculiar light upon the problems of all
social classes in a great modern nation.
Section 2. Africa
It used to be assumed in studying the Negro American that in any
development we might safely begin with zero so far as Africa is con¬
cerned; the later studies are more and more convincing us that this
former attitude has been wrong, and that always in explaining the de¬
velopment in America of the Negro we must look back upon a consid¬
erable past development in Africa. We have, therefore, first to ask
ourselves in this study, How far are there traces in Africa of economic
life and economic co-operation among Negroes?
Ratzel thoughtfully says: "Even in earlier days a deeper thinker
might not have agreed with our great, but in this respect short-sighted
historical philosophers, who held that Africa was only in the ante
chamber of universal history. The land which bore Egypt and Car¬
thage will always be of importance in the world's history; and even the
transplantation without their will of millions of Africans to America
remains an event having most important consequences. But since
Africa, both politically and economically, has been brought nearer to
us, the above mentioned idea has had altogether to give way. That
continent, the greatest portion of which longest remained a terra incog¬
nita., has suddenly been called on to play a great part in the history of
the expansion of the European races. In our days Africa has become
the scene of a great movement, which must fix its destiny in history
for thousands of years. While a century ago the great political and
trading powers were still merely hanging on like leeches to its out¬
skirts, today the "spheres of interest," domains of power of which the
extent is not yet known even to their owner, are meeting in the far
interior of the continent. Herewith for the first time Europeans are
coming into very close connections with the most vigorous shoot of the
dark branches of nations, on the soil most appropriate to it, but to them
in the first place by no means favorable. Now it will be decided
whether much or little of these, the oldest of all now living stocks, will
pass into mankind of the remoter future. And this is one of the
greatest problems of the history of the world, which must be the history
of mankind."
Not only is there this new attitude toward the meaning of Africa as a
whole, but we are also revising our ideas as to the exact status of Africa
Africa
13
in its development toward civilization. We are beginning to see that
the Africans, notwithstanding the fact that they have not reached
European culture, nevertheless have made great advances. In 1885 Dr.
Wilhelm Schneider summed up the cultural accomplishments of the
Negro by bringing together the testimonies of African travellers up to
that time. If we take from that excellent summing up the condition
of the African in economic organization we shall have a fairly trust¬
worthy picture. Schneider first takes up the matter of agriculture, and
says that the Negro pursues agriculture together with cattle raising
and dairying. Sheep, goats and chickens are domestic animals all over
Africa, and cows are raised in regions where grass grows. Von Fran-
zius considers Africa the home of the house cattle and the Negro as the
original tamer.
Northeastern Africa especially is noted for agriculture, cattle raising
and fruit culture. In the eastern Soudan and among the great Bantu
tribes extending from the Soudan down toward the south, cattle are
evidences of wealth, oiie tribe, for instance, having so many oxen that
each village had ten or twelve thousand head. Lenz (1884), Bouet-Wil-
laumez (1848), Hecquard (1854), Bosman (1805), and Baker (1868), all
bear witness to this, and Schweinfurth (1878), tells us of great cattle
parks with 2,000-3,000 head, and of numerous agricultural and cattle
raising tribes. Von der Decken (1859-61), describes the paradise of the
dwellers about Kilimanjaro—the bananas, fruit, beans, and peas, and
cattle raising with stall-feed, the fertilizing of the fields, and irriga¬
tion. The Negroid Gallas have seven or eight cattle to each inhabi¬
tant. Cameron (1877), tells of villages so clean, with huts so artistic,
that—save in book knowledge—the people occupied no low plane of civ¬
ilization. Livingstone bears witness to the busy cattle raising of the
Bantus and Kaffirs.
Hulub (1881), and Chapman (1868), tell of agriculture and fruit raising
in South Africa. Shiitt (1884), found the tribes in the Southwestern
basin of the Congo with sheep, swine, goats and cattle. The African
elephant, however, never was tamed by the natives in later years,
partly because he is much wilder than the Indian.
Schneider sums up the Africans' accomplishments in handwork and
industry by quoting Soyaux on Africans, as follows: "Whoever denies
to them independent invention and individual taste in their work,
either shuts his eyes intentionally before perfectly evident facts, or
lack of knowledge renders him an incompetent judge." Gabriel de
Mortillet (1883), declares them the only iron users among primitive
people, and at any rate they are far beyond others in the development
of iron industry, and their work bears strong resemblance to that of the
ancient Egyptians. Some would therefore argue that the Negro learned
it from other folk, but Andree declares that the Negro developed his own
"Iron Kingdom," and still others believe that from him it spread to
Europe and Asia.*
« Of. Boas, in our day.
14 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Various tribes have been described: Baker and Felkin tell of smiths
of wonderful adroitness, goat-skins prepared better than a European
tailor could do, drinking cups and kegs of remarkable symmetry and
polished clay floors. Schweinfurth says: "The arrow and spear heads
are of the finest and most artistic work; their bristle-like barbs and
points are baffling when one knows how few tools these smiths have."
Excellent wood-carving is found among the Bongo, Ovambo and
Makololo. Pottery and basketry and careful hut-building distinguish
many tribes. The Monbuttu work both iron and copper. "The mas¬
terpieces of the Monbuttu smiths are the fine chains worn as ornaments,
and which in perfection of form and fineness compare well with our
best steel chains." Such chains are hardened by hammering. Barth
found copper exported from central Africa in competition with Euro¬
pean copper at Kano.
Nor is the iron industry confined to the Soudan. About the great
lakes and other parts of central Africa it is widely distributed. Thorn¬
ton says: "This iron industry proves that the East Africans stand by
no means on so low a plane of culture as many travellers would have
us think. It is unnecessary to be reminded that a people who without
instruction and with the rudest tools do such skilled work, could do if
furnished with steel tools. Arrows made east of Lake Nyanza were
found to be nearly as good as the best Swedish iron in Birmingham.
From Egypt to the cape Livingstone assures us that the mortar and
pestle, the long handled axe, the goat skin bellows, etc., have the same
form, size, etc., pointing to a migration southwestward. Holub (1879),
on the Zambesi found fine workers in iron and bronze (copper and tin).
The Bantu huts contain spoons, wooden dishes, milk pails, calibashes,
handmills and axes. Kaffirs and Zulus, in the extreme south, are good
smiths and the latter melt copper and tin together and draw wire from
it, according to Kranz (1880). West of the Great Lakes, Stanley (1878),
found wonderful examples of smith work: figures worked out of brass
and much work in copper. Cameron (1878), saw vases made near Lake
Tanganyika which reminded him of the amphorae in the Villa of
Diomedes, Pompeii. Horn (1882), praises tribes here for iron and cop¬
per work. Livingstone (1871), passed thirty smelting houses in one
journey and Cameron came across bellows with valves, and tribes who
used knives in eating. He found tribes which no Europeans had ever
visited, who made ingots of copper in the form of St. Andrew's cross,
which circulated even to the coast. In the southern Congo basin iron
and copper are worked; also wood and ivory carving and pottery are
pursued. In equatorial west Africa, Lenz and Du Chaillu (1861), found
the iron workers with charcoal, and also carvers of bone and ivory.
Near Cape Lopez, Hubbe-Schleiden found tribes making ivory needles
inlaid with ebony, while the arms and dishes of the Osaka are found
among many tribes even as far as the Atlantic ocean. Wilson (1856),
found natives in West Africa who could repair American watches.
The Ashanti are renowned weavers and dyers, smiths and founders.
Gold coast Negroes make gold rings and chains, forming the metal into
Africa
15
all kinds of forms. Soyaux says: "The works in relief which natives of
Lower Guinea carve with their own knives out of ivory and hippopota¬
mus teeth, are really entitled to be called works of art, and many wooden
figures of fetiches in the Ethnographical Museum of Berlin show some
understanding of the proportions of the human body." Great Bassam
is called by Hecquard the "Fatherland of Smiths." The Mandingo in
the Northwest are remarkable workers in iron, silver and gold, we are
told by Mungo Park (1800), while there is a mass of testimony as to the
work in the northwest of Africa in gold, tin, weaving and dyeing.
Caill6 found the Negroes in Bam ban a manufacturing gunpowder
(1824-8), and the Haussa make soap; so, too, Negroes in Uganda and
other parts have made guns after seeing European models.
On the whole, as Herman Soyaux says: in art and industry the
accomplishment of the African Negro is in many respects far beyond
expectation and at least shows what they might do in more favorable
surroundings; and Lenz adds: "Our sharpest European merchants,
even Jews and Armenians, can learn much from the cunning of the
Negro in trade."*
Coming down to later writers, we find Ratzel testifying that:
Among all the great groups of the " natural" races, the Negroes are the best
and keenest tillers of the ground. A minority despise agriculture and breed
cattle; many combine both occupations. Among the genuine tillers, the
whole life of the family is taken up in agriculture; and hence the months are
by preference called after the operations which they demand. Constant clear¬
ings change forests to fields, and the ground is manured with the ashes of the
burnt thicket. In the middle of the fields rise the light watch-towers,from which
a watchman scares grain-eating birds and other thieves. An African cultivated
landscape is incomplete without barns. The rapidity with which, when
newly imported, the most various forms of cultivation spread in Africa says
much for the attention which is devoted to this branch of economy. Indus¬
tries, again, which may be called agricultural, like the preparation of meal
from millet and other crops, also from cassava, the fabrication of fermented
drinks from grain, or the manufacture of cotton, are widely known and sedu¬
lously fostered. +
Biicher says:
That travellers have often described the deep impression made upon them
when, on coming out of the dreary primeval forest, they happened suddenly
upon the well-tended fields of the natives. In the more thickly populated
parts of Africa these fields often stretch for many a mile, and the assiduous
care of the Negro women shines in all the brighter light when we consider the
insecurity of life, the constant feuds and pillages, in which no one knows
whether he will in the end be able to harvest what he has sown. Livingstone
gives somewhere a graphic description of the devastations wrought by slave
hunts; the people are lying about slain, the dwellings were demolished; in
the fields, however, the grain was ripening and there was none to harvest it. t
The economic organization thus indicated is moreover arranged for
purposes of trade. Biicher says:
* Schneider: Culturfaehigkeit des Negers.
+ Ratzel, II., 380-SJ81. JBuecher (Wickett), p. 47.
16 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Travellers have often observed this tribal or local development of *^U,S^gr
technique. "The native villages," relates a Belgian observer of t e o
Congo, "are often situated in groups. Their activities are based upon reci
procality, and they are to a certain extent the complements of one ano er.
Each group has its more or less strongly defined specialty. One carries on
fishing, another produces palm wine; a third devotes itself to trade an is
broker for the others, supplying the community with all products from ou
side; another has reserved to itself work in iron and copper, making weapons
for war and hunting, various utensils, etc. None may, however, pass beyond
the sphere of its own specialty without exposing itself to the risk of being
universally proscribed." From the Boango Coast, Bastian tells of a great
number of similar centres for special products of domestic industry. Loango
excels in mats and fishing baskets, while the carving of elephants' tusks is
specially followed in Chilungo. The so-called "Mafooka" hats with raised
patterns are drawn chiefly from the bordering country of Kakongo and May-
yumbe. In Bakunya are made potter's wares, which are in great demand,
in Basanza excellent swords, in Basundi especially beautiful ornamented cop¬
per rings, and the Zaire clever wood and tablet carvings, in Loango orna¬
mented clothes and intricately designed mats, in Mayumbe clothing of finely
woven mat-work, in Kakongo embroidered hats and also burnt clay pitchers,
and among the Bayakas and Mantetjes stuffs of woven grass.*
A recent native African writer thus describes the trade organiza¬
tion of Ashanti:
The king of Ashanti knew most of these merchant princes and His Majesty,
at stated times in the commercial year, sent some of his head tradesmen with
gold dust, ivory and other products to the coast to his merchant friends in ex¬
change for Manchester goods and other articles of European manufacture. In
one visit the caravan cleared off several hundred bales of cotton goods which
found their way into the utmost parts of Soudan.
It was a part of the state system of Ashanti to encourage trade. The king
once in every forty days, at the Adai custom, distributed among a number of
chiefs various sums of gold dust with a charge to turn the same to good
account. These chiefs then sent down to the coast caravans of tradesmen,
some of whom would be their slaves, sometimes some two to three hundred
strong, to barter ivory for European goods, or buy such goods with gold dust,
which the king obtained from the royal alluvial workings. Down to 1873 a
constant stream of Ashanti traders might be seen daily wending their way
to the coast and back again, yielding more certain wealth and prosperity to
the merchants of the Gold Coast and Great Britain than may be expected for
sometime yet to come from the mining industry and railway development put
together. The trade chiefs would, in due time, render a faithful account to
the king's stewards, being allowed to retain a fair portion of the profit In the
king's household, too, he would have special men who directly traded for him.
Important chiefs carried on the same system of trading with the coast as did
the king. Thus every member of the state from the king downwards, took
an active interest in the promotion of trade and in the keeping open of trade
routes into the interior.
Nor was the Fanti petty trader left in the lurch; for, while the merchant
princes drove magnificent trade with the caravans from Ashanti, the native
petty trader hawked his goods to great advantage in the intermediate towns
and villages, his customers being private speculators from the interior.
* Buecher's Industrial Evolution (Wickett), pp. 57-8.
Africa
17
Often the men in the coast towns acted as middlemen between men of the
interior tribes ooming down to trade with the merchant houses, and gained an
honest means of livelihood in that way.
Some of the chiefs in the intermediate districts would sometimes prove
obstreperous to the caravans coming down, which became a grievance to His
Majesty, the king of Ashanti, whose ruffled temper would often be smoothed
down by diplomatic messages and an exchange of presents. Thus all went
merrily and the country prospered until the dawn of that evil day when its
protectors, instead of letting well enough alone, began to meddle with un¬
scientific hands in the working of its state system.*
Ratzel describes further the market places:
. From the Fish river to Ivuka, and from Lagos to Zanzibar, the market is the
centre of all the more stirring life in Negro communities, and attempts to
train him to culture have made their most effectual start from this tendency.
Trade is a great implement of civilization for Africa; and this is as true of the
furthest interior whither Europeans or Africans seldom penetrate, as of the
places on the coast. In the larger localities, like Ujiji and Nyangwe, perma¬
nent markets of more than local importance are found. Everything can be
bought and sold here, from the commonest earthenware pots to the prettiest
girls from Usukuma. Hither flock from 1,000 to 3,000 natives of both sexes and
various ages. How like is the market traffic, with all its uproar and sound of
human voices, to one of our own markets! There is the same rivalry in
praising the goods, the violent, brisk movements, the expressive gesture, the
inquiring, searching glance, the changing looks of depreciation or triumph, of
apprehension, delight, approbation. So says Stanley. Trade customs are not
everywhere alike. If when negotiating with the Bangalas of Angola you do
not quickly give them what they want, they go away and do not come back.
Then perhaps they try to get possession of the coveted object by means of
theft. It is otherwise with the Songos and Kiokos, who let you deal with them
in the usual way. To buy even some small article you must go to the market;
people avoid trading anywhere else. If a man says to another: " Sell me this
hen," or " that fruit," the answer as a rule will be " Come to the market place."
The crowd gives confidence to individuals, and the inviolability of the visitor
to the market, and of the market itself, looks like an idea of justice consecra¬
ted by long practice. Does not this remind us of the old Germanic " market
place?"t
He adds, with regard to roads:
The permanent caravan roads call for special attention. They are of the
greatest importance to the culture of Africa at large, since they have long
formed the channels through which every stimulus to culture found its way
from foreign countries into the interior. The most important of all come
in from the east, since they lead directly into the heart of the Negro countries.
The south and west, too, are less favored in this respect; only the Portuguese
road to Cazembe's country had a certain importance here. The northern roads
throughout the desert to the Soudan, however, do not lead directly to the Ne¬
groes, but at first into the mixed states of the Canooris, Fulbes and Arabs,
whose intercourse with the Negroes to the south unhappily results, as in the
case of the old Egyptians, in slavery.
In the east, however, not foreigners but the Negroes themselves have been
active in the caravan trade. Here is the true seat of the trade in Negroes;
* Hayford, pp. 95-97.
+ Ratzel, p. 376.
18 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
here especially the porter system is organized. It was formerly far easier to
reach Uganda or Ujiji from Bagamoyo than Stanley Pool from the mouth of
the Congo. The Wanyamwesi, those talented, keen traders and colonists, have
made their roads to the coast from time immemorial. When one was closed
by war or a blood feud, they opened up another; but the caravans proper-
called Safari in Kiswaheli, Lugendo in Kinyamwesi—for long consisted only
of hired porters from the coast. Burton states that it was only shortly before
this time that the inhabitants of the coast began to go on this business *
As to money Ratzel says:
Where [African] trade with Arabs or Europeans begins, beads are almost
indispensable in any trade transactions. The quality in demand is not always
the same, but is in a certain degree governed by the fashion. Even in the
sixteenth century beads had a currency value among the inhabitants of the
Angola coast, and the old Venetian beads which are found, quite worn down,
in graves, point to the still greater antiquity of this tendency. But excessive
importation has everywhere caused a rapid fall in value. 'Glass beads depre¬
ciate more and more every year, and now serve only the object of feminine
vanity; it is long, says Schweinfurth, since they were hoarded as treasures
and buried like precious stones. The preference for cowries shows more per¬
sistence. These have spread, especially from east Africa, as money; but even
in the sixteenth century they were in use on the west coast. They were how¬
ever given up, as too heavy, in places where they no longer had a high value.
Cowries are also used as dice. In Nyangwe, besides the cowries, slaves and
goats were generally current in Cameron's time.
On the upper Nile copper and brass have commonly taken their place, and
in the form of rings have a money value throughout Equatorial Africa. Be¬
sides these iron—axes and rings—are in circulation, also pieces of iron shaped
like horse-shoes or hoes.
On Lake Bemba three iron hoes were the fare asked of Livingstone for put¬
ting ten persons across. Cotton cloth in uselessly narrow strips passes as
money in the Soudan to beyond Adamwa, while in Bornu money even takes
the form of " tobes " or shirts, never intended for wearing. Cattle are currency
among all pastoral races; but, with the exception of Abyssinia and many
parts of the Sahara and the Soudan, where sums are reckoned in Maria Theresa
dollars, coins have established themselves only in the most progressive and
prosperous districts,like Basutoland or the equatorial east coast; now,too,on
the Niger. +
Section 3. The West Indies
From such an environment as we have very imperfectly indicated,
the Negroes were suddenly snatched and brought first to the West In¬
dies and afterward to the American continent. In this change a great
deal of the past organization was destroyed. Still the transition
could not utterly break them from the past, and several institutions
remained. The first was, of course, the religious institution which
showed itself in the beginning of the Negro church. This was especially
manifest in the organization called Obe or Obeab worship; considera¬
ble collections were made of money and kind by the Obi or Voodoo
priests; still the organization was scarcely one which one could call
economic.
* Ratzel, II :S77.
+ Ratzel, 11:379.
The West Indies
19
A second survival .was that of political organization. This could be
seen, of course, in such revolts as that of the Maroons in Jamaica, who
set up apolitical organization and maintained themselves for years;
but it can be seen more instructively in the Negro governors of New
England. Most persons have looked upon this survival of political
organization among the Negroes as simply an imitation of the whites,
and a rather ludicrous one; but certain ones have noticed that it was
not wholly an imitation and we find moreover that the organization
had some political power. Senator Piatt, for instance, in his researches
tells us that the Negro governor and other officials in Connecticut had
no legal power, and yet exercised considerable control over the Negroes
throughout the state. The black governor directed the affairs of his
people and his directions were obeyed; the black justices tried cases
both civil and criminal, and rendered judgments and executed punish¬
ments. The idea of the Negroes doing this originated with the Negroes
themselves, it seems, for Piatt says: "They conceived the project of
imitating the whites by establishing a subordinate jurisdiction and
jurisprudence of their own. The old Negroes aided in the plan but not
without the approbation of their masters, who foresaw that a sort of
police managed wholly by the slaves would be more effectual in keep¬
ing them within the bounds of morality than if the same authority
was exercised by whites." He goes on to say that the judicial depart¬
ment of this government within a government consisted of the governor
who sometimes sat at judgment in cases of appeal; the other magis¬
trates and judges tried all charges brought against any Negro by an¬
other or by a white person; masters complained to the governor and
the magistrates of the delinquencies of their slaves, who were tried, con¬
demned and punished at the discretion of the court. The punishment
was sometimes quite severe, and what made it the more effectual was
that it was the judgment of their peers, people of their own rank and
color. Thus we find surviving in New England for a long time a system
of government which must have gone far enough to have some control
over the slave as a workman, and was to some extent economic in its
effects. *
It is, however, in the West Indies that we find the most direct
survival of African economic customs. In Jamaica, for instance, the
practice prevailed of giving the Negroes land to cultivate and expecting
them to maintain themselves from the product of these lands, giving
most of their labor, of course, to the master. The Negroes acquired,
therefore, some little property of their own and on holidays and Sundays
and on one week day each fortnight they went to market. They took
to market not only the things raised on their part of ground, but also
some of them made a few coarse manufactures, such as mats, bark,
ropes, wicket chairs and baskets, earthen jars, pans, etc. Of course
these things were relics of their African trade; they could not be as
well made because the Negroes did not have more than about sixteen
•Compare Papers of the New Haven Colony Hist. Soc., Vol. VI.
20 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
hours a week to cultivate their gardens and to do work of this sort.
Edwards says: ''Sunday is their market day and it is wonderful
what numbers are then seen hastening from all parts of the country
toward the towns and shipping places ladened with fruits and vegeta¬
bles, pigs, goats and poultry, their own property. In Jamaica it is
supposed that upwards of ten thousand assemble every Sunday morn¬
ing in the market of Kingston, where they barter their provisions, etc.,
for salted beef and pork or fine linens for their wives and children."*
We have here, then, a peculiar survival of African economic customs
in the new world, and we shall find that in the continental colonies
there were traces of the same thing.
Section 4. The Colonies
In the continental colonies the remembrance of the African organiza¬
tion and society was more and more lost sight of. The Negroes had
become Americans, speaking another language and forgetting much of
the past. The plot of ground which they cultivated for themselves still
remained in most cases, but it was supplemented by regular rations
from the store-house of the master. Tendencies toward political au¬
tonomy still showed themselves in the insurrections that took place
from time to time, but these were sternly suppressed and only in a few
cases did they gain a wide following. Religious institutions remained
and the church gained for itself a wide and ever wider following, but
its economic activities were still very much curtailed.
Beneficial and burial societies began to appear, however, even in the
time of slavery. We are told, for instance:
The history of the Negro insurance extends far beyond the days of his free¬
dom in this country. While there are no recorded data available, yet from
reliable sources we learn that more than seventy-five years ago there existed
in every city of any size in Virginia organizations of Negroes having as their
object the caring for the sick and the burying of the dead. In but few in¬
stances did the society exist openly, as the laws of the time concerning Negroes
were such as to make it impossible for this to be done without serious conse¬
quences to the participants. History shows that no matter how the oppressed
and enslaved may have been watched and hedged in, there was always found
a way by which they could get together, and this has been no less true of the
Negro in his attempt to combine for mutual protection from the results of
sickness and death. Although it was unlawful for Negroes to assemble with¬
out the presence of a white man, and so unlawful to allow a congregation
of slaves on a plantation without the consent of the master, these organiza¬
tions existed and held these meetings on the "lots" of some of the law-makers
themselves. The general plan seems to have been to select some one who
could "read and write" and make him the secretary. The meeting place
having been selected, the members would come by "ones and twos," make
their payments to the secretary, and quietly withdraw. The book of the sec¬
retary was often kept covered up on the bed. In many of the societies each
member was known by number and in paying simply announced his number.
The president of such a society was usually a privileged slave who had the
* Bryan Edwards: West Indies.
The Colonies
21
confidence of his or her master and could go and come at will. Thus a form of
communication could be kept up between all members. In event of death of
a member provision was made for decent burial, and all the members as far as
possible obtained permits to attend the funeral. Here and again their plan of
getting together was brought into play. In Richmond they would go to the
church by ones and twos and there sit as near together as convenient. At the
close of the service a line of march would be formed when sufficiently far
from the church to make it safe to do. It is reported that the members were
faithful to each other and that every obligation was faithfully carried out.
This was the first form of insurance known to the Negro from which his
family received a benefit.*
As soon as slaves began to be emancipated such beneficial societies
began to be openly formed. One of the earliest of these became, event¬
ually, the great African Methodist Church, and its articles of associa¬
tion, made AprQ 12, 1787, are of especial interest:
Preamble of the Free African Society
Philadelphia, 12th, 4th mo., 1787.
Whereas, Absalom Jones and Richard Allen, two men of the African race,
who, for their religious life and conversation have obtained a good report
among men, these persons, from a love to the people of their complexion
whom they beheld with sorrow, because of their irreligious and uncivilized
state, often communed together upon this painful and important subject in
order to form some kind of religious society, but there being too few to be
found under like concern, and those who were, differed in their religious sen¬
timents ; with these circumstances they labored for some time, till it was pro¬
posed, after a serious communication of sentiments, that a society should be
formed, without regard to religious tenets, provided the persons lived an
orderly and sober life, in order to support one another in sickness, and for the
benefit of their widows and fatherless children.
The following persons were the charter members: Absalom Jones, Richard
Allen, Samuel Boston, Joseph Johnson, Cato Freeman, Csesar Cranchell, James
Potter and William White.
Articles
17th, 5th mo., 1787.
We, the free Africans and their descendants of the City of Philadelphia, in
the state of Pennsylvania, or elsewhere, do unanimously agree, for the benefit
of each other, to advance one shilling in Pennsylvania silver currency, a
month; and after one year's subscription from the date thereof, then to hand
forth to the needy of this society, if any should require, the sum of three shill¬
ings and nine pence per week of the said money; provided, this necessity is
not brought on them by their own imprudence.
And it is further agreed, that no drunkard nor disorderly person be admit¬
ted as a member, and if any should prove disorderly after having been re¬
ceived, the said disorderly person shall be disjoined from us if there is not an
amendment, by being informed by two of the members, without having any
of his subscription returned.
And if any one should neglect paying his subscription for three months,
and after having been informed of the same by two of the members, and no
sufficient reason appearing for such neglect, if he do not pay the whole the
* Hampton Negro Conference, No. 8, pp. 43-14.
22 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
next ensuing meeting, he shall be disjoined from us by being informed by two
of the members as an offender, without having any of his subscription money
returned.
Also, if any person neglect meeting every month, for every omission he
shall have to pay three pence, except in case of sickness or any other com¬
plaint that should require the assistance of the society, then and in such case,
he shall be exempt from the fines and subscription during said sickness.
Also, we apprehend it to be just and reasonable, that the surviving widow
of the deceased member should enjoy the benefit of this society so long as she
remains his widow, complying with the rules thereof,excepting the subscrip¬
tions.
And we apprehend it to be necessary that the children of our deceased mem¬
bers be under the care of the society, so far as to pay for the education of their
children, if they can not attend the free school; also to put them out as ap¬
prentices to suitable trades and places, if required.
Also, that no member shall convene the society together; but it shall be the
sole business of the committee, and that only on special occasions, and to dis¬
pose of the money in hand to the best advantage for the use of the society,
after they are granted the liberty at a monthly meeting, and to transact all
other business whatsoever, except that of clerk and treasurer.
And we unanimously agree to choose Joseph Clarke to be our clerk and
treasurer; and whenever another should succeed him, it is always understood,
that one of the people called Quakers, belonging to one of the three monthly
meetings in Philadelphia, is to be chosen to act as clerk and treasurer of this
useful institution.
The following persons met, viz: Absalom Jones, Richard Allen, Samuel
Boston, Joseph Johnson, Cato Freeman, Caesar Cranchell and James Potter,
and also William White, whose early assistance and useful remarks were
found truly profitable. This evening the articles were read, and after some
beneficial remarks were made, they were agreed unto. *
In 1790 this society had £42 9s. Id. on deposit in the Bank of North
America.
At about this same time secret societies began to arise. The origin of
the Negro Masons was as follows: t
On March 6, 1775, an army lodge attached to one of the regiments
stationed under General Gage in or near Boston, Mass., initiated Prince
Hall and fourteen other colored men into the mysteries of Freemasonry.
From this beginning, with small additions from foreign countries,
sprang the Masonry among the Negroes in America. These fifteen
brethren were, according to a custom of the day, authorized to assem¬
ble as a lodge, "walk on St. John's Day" and bury their dead "in man¬
ner and form;" but they did no "work"—made no Masons—until after
they had been regularly warranted. They applied to the Grand Lodge
of England for a warrant March 2, 1784. It was issued to them as
"African Lodge, No. 459," with Prince Hall as Master, September 29,
1784, but—owing to various vexatious misadventures—was not received
until April 29, 1787. The lodge was organized under the warrant May
6, 1787. It remained upon the English registry—occasionally con¬
tributing to the Grand Charity Fjund—until, upon the amalgamation of
* Arnett's Budget, 1904, pp. 93-94.
-(•Upton: Negro Masonry.
Negro Masons
23
the rival Grand Lodges of the "Moderns" and the uAneients" into the
present United Grand Lodge of England, in 1813, it and the other Eng¬
lish lodges in the United States were erased.
Prince Hall, a man of exceptional ability, served in the Ameri¬
can Army during the Revolutionary War and, until his death, in 1807,
was exceedingly zealous in the cause of Masonry. As early as in
1792 he was styled "Grand Master," and from that date at least he ex¬
ercised the functions of a Grand Master or Provincial Grand Master.
In 1797 he issued a license to thirteen black men who had been made
Masons in England and Ireland to "assemble and work" as a lodge in
Philadelphia. Another lodge was organized by his authority in Provi¬
dence, Rhode Island, for the accommodation of members of African
Lodge who resided in that vicinity. This was in accordance with an
old usage, the validity of which had then but recently been confirmed
by the Grand Lodge of Scotland. In 1808 these three lodges joined in
forming the "African Grand Lodge" of Boston, subsequently styled the
"Prince Hall ,Lodge of Massachusetts." Masonry gradually spread
over the land.
The second colored Grand Lodge, called the "First Independent Afri¬
can Grand Lodge of North America in and for the Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania," was organized in 1815; and the third was the "Hiram
Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania." These three Grand bodies fully recog¬
nized each other in 1847 by joining in forming a National Grand Lodge,
and practically all the Negro lodges in the United States are descended
from one or the other of these.
The original warrant of Prince Hall Lodge reads:
To all and every our right Worshipful and loving Brethren, we, Thomas
Howard, Earl of Effingham, Lord Howard, etc., etc., acting Grand Master under
the authority of His Royal Highness, Henry Frederick, Duke of Cumberland,
etc., etc., Grand Master of the Most Ancient and Honorable Society of Free
and Accepted Masons, send greeting;
Know Ye, That we, at the humble petition of our right trusty and well be¬
loved Brethren, Prince Hall, Boston Smith, Thomas Sanderson and several
other Brethren residing in Boston, New England, in North America, do here¬
by constitute the said Brethren into a regular Lodge of Free and Accepted
Masons, under the title or denomination of the African Lodge, to be opened in
Boston aforesaid, and do further, at their said petition, hereby appoint the
said Prince Hall to be Master, Boston Smith, Senior Warden, and Thomas
Sanderson, Junior Warden, for the opening of the said Lodge and for such
further time only as shall be thought proper by the brethren thereof, it being
our will that this our appointment of the above officers shall in no wise affect
any future election of officers of the Lodge, but that such election shall be
regulated agreeable to such by-laws of said Lodge as shall be consistent with
the general laws of the society, contained in the Book of Constitutions; and we
hereby will and require you, the said Prince Hall, to take especial care that
all and every one of the said Brethren, are, or have been regularly made Ma¬
sons, and that they do observe, perform and keep all the rules and orders con¬
tained in the Book of Constitutions; and further, that you do, from time to
time, cause to be entered in a book kept for the purpose, an account of your
proceedings in the Lodge, together with all such rules, orders and regulations,
24 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
as shall be made for the good government of the same; that in no wise you
omit once in every year to send us, or our successors, Grand Master, or to Ro¬
land Holt, Esq., our Deputy Grand Master, for the time being, an account in
writing of your said proceedings, and copies of all such rules,orders and regu¬
lations as shall be made as aforesaid, together with a list of the members of
the Lodge, and such a sum of money as may suit the circumstances of the
Lodge and reasonably be expected towards the Grand Charity. Moreover, we
hereby will and require you, the said Prince Hall, as soon as conveniently
may be, to send an account in writing of what may be done by virtue of these
presents.
Given at London, under our hand and seal of Masonry, this 29th day of Sep¬
tember, A. L. 5784, A. D. 1784.
By the Grand Master's Command.
Witness: Wm. White, G.S. R. Holt, D. G. M.
Part 2. The Development of Co=operation
Section 5. An Historical Sketch
A sketch of co-operation among the Negro Americans begins natur¬
ally with the Negro church. The vast power of the priest in the Afri¬
can state was not fully overcome by slavery and transportation; it still
remained on the plantation. The Negro priest, therefore, early became
an important figure and "found his function as the interpreter of the
supernatural, the comforter of the sorrowing, and the one who expressed
rudely but picturesquely the longing, disappointment and resentment
of a stolen people. From such beginnings rose and spread with marvel¬
lous rapidity the Negro church in America, the first distinctively Negro
American social institution. It was not at first by any means a Chris¬
tian church, but rather an adaptation of those heathen rites which we
roughly designate by the term Obi worship or Voodooism. Association
and missionary effort soon gave these rites a veneer of Christianity
and gradually after two centuries the church became Christian with a
Calvinistic creed and with many of the old customs still clinging to the
services. It is this historic fact, that the Negro church of today bases
itself on one of the few surviving social institutions of the African
Fatherland, that accounts for its extraordinary growth and vitality.
We must remember that in the United States today there is a church
organization for every sixty Negro families." This institution there¬
fore naturally assumed many functions which the other harshly sup¬
pressed social organs had to surrender, and especially the church became
the center of economic activity as well as of amusement, education and
social intercourse.
It was in the church, too, or rather the organization that went by the
name of church, that many of the insurrections among the slaves from
the sixteenth century down had their origin; we must find in these in¬
surrections a beginning of co-operation which eventually ended in the
peaceful economic co-operation. A full list of these insurrections it is
impossible to make, but if we take the larger and more significant ones
Historical Sketch
25
they will show us the trend. The chief Negro insurrections are as fol¬
lows :
Revolt of the Maroons, Jamaica.
Uprising in Danish Islands.
New York, 1712.
Cato of Stono, South Carolina, 1734.
New York, 1741.
San Domingo, 1791.
Gabriel, Virginia, 1800.
Vesey, South Carolina, 1822.
Nat Turner, Virginia, 1831.
Both Vesey and Turner were preachers and used the church as a cen¬
ter of their plots; Gabriel and Cato may have been preachers, although
this is not known.
These insurrections fall into three categories: unorganized outbursts
of fury, as in the Danish Islands and in early Carolina; military organi¬
zations, as in the case of the Maroons; movements of small knots of
conspirators, as in New York in 1712 and 1741; and carefully planned
efforts at widespread co-operation for freedom, as in the case of San
Domingo, and the uprisings under Cato, Gabriel, Vesey and Turner.
It was these latter that in most cases grew out of the church organiza¬
tions.
It was the fact that the Negro church thus loaned itself to insurrec¬
tion and plot that led to its partial suppression and careful oversight in
the latter part of the seventeenth and again in the eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries. Nevertheless there arose out of the church in
the latter part of the eighteenth and early in the nineteenth centuries
the beneficial society, a small and usually clandestine organization for
burying the dead; this development usually took place in cities. From
the beneficial society arose naturally after emancipation the other co¬
operative movements: secret societies (which may date back even be¬
yond the church in some way, although there is no tangible proof of
this), and cemeteries which began to be bought and arranged for very
early in the history of the church. The same sort of movement that
started the cemeteries brought the hospital in the latter part of the
nineteenth century, and from the secret societies came the homes and
orphanages. Out of the beneficial society also developed late in the
nineteenth century the first attempts at co-operative business, and still
later the insurance societies, out of which came the banks in the last
ten years.
Meantime, however, the spirit of insurrection and revolt had found
outlet earlier than by this slower development.
There was early discovered an easier method of attaining freedom
than by insurrection and that was by flight to the free states. In the
West Indies this safety valve was wanting and the result was San Do¬
mingo. In America freedom cleared a refuge for slaves as follows:
Vermont, 1779.
Massachusetts, 1780.
26
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Pennsylvania, 1780.
New Hampshire, 1783.
Connecticut, 1784.
Rhode Island, 1784.
Northwest Territory, 1787.
New York, 1799.
New Jersey, 1804.
Consequently we find that the spirit of revolt which tried to co-oper¬
ate by means of insurrection led to widespread organization for the
rescue of fugitive slaves among Negroes themselves, and developed
before the war in the North and during and after the war in the South,
into various co-operative efforts toward economic emancipation and
land-buying. Gradually these efforts led to co-operative business,
building and loan associations and trade unions. On the other hand,
the Underground Railroad led directly to various efforts at migration,
especially to Canada, and in some cases to Africa. These migra¬
tions in our day have led to certain Negro towns and settlements; and
finally from the efforts at migration began the various conventions of
Negroes which have endeavored to organize them into one national
body, and give them a group consciousness. Let us now notice in de¬
tail certain of these steps toward co-operation. We have already spoken
of insurrections and can now take up the Underground Railroad and
the co-operative efforts during emancipation, and the various schemes
of migration.
Section 6. The Underground Railroad
From the beginning of the nineteenth century slaves began to escape
in considerable numbers from the region south of Mason and Dixon's
line and the Ohio to the North. Even here, however, they were not
safe from the fugitive slave laws, and soon after 1812 the Negro soldiers
and sailors discovered a surer refuge in Canada and the tide set thither.
Gradually between 1830 and 1850 there were signs of definite concerted
co-operation to assist fugitives which came to be known as the Under¬
ground Railroad. The organization is best known from the side of the
white abolitionists who aided and sheltered the fugitives and furnished
them means.
But it must not be forgotten that back of these helpers must have lain
a more or less conscious co-operation and organization on the part of
the colored people. In the first place, the running away of slaves was
too systematic to be accidental; without doubt there was widespread
knowledge of paths and places and times for going. Constant com¬
munication between the land of freedom and the slave states must be
kept up by persons going and coming, and there can be no doubt but
that the Negro organization back of the Underground Railroad was
widespread and very effective. Redpath, writing just before the war,
says: "In the Canadian provinces there are thousands of fugitive
slaves; they are the picked men of the Southern states, many of them
are intelligent and rich and all of them are deadly enemies of the South ;
Underground Railroad
27
five hundred of them at least annually visit the slave states, passing
from Florida to Harper's Ferry on heroic errands of mercy and deliv¬
erance. They have carried the Underground Railroad and the Under¬
ground Telegraph into nearly every Southern state. Here obviously is
a power of great importance for a war of liberation." Siebert says that
in the South much secret aid was rendered the fugitives by persons of
their own race, and he gives instances in numbers of border states
where colored persons were in charge of the runaways. Frederick
Douglass' connection with the Underground Railroad began long before
he himself left the South. In the North people of the African race
would be found in most communities, and in many cases they became
energetic workers.
It was natural that Negro settlements in the free states should be resorted
to by fugitive slaves. The colored people of Greenwich, New Jersey, the
Stewart settlement of Jackson county, Ohio, the Upper and Lower Camps,
Brown county, Ohio, and the colored settlement, Hamilton county, Indiana,
were active. The list of towns and cities in which the Negroes became co¬
workers with white persons in harboring and concealing runaways is a long
one. Oberlin, Portsmouth and Cincinnati, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; Phila¬
delphia, Pennsylvania, and Boston, Massachusetts, will suffice as examples.
Negro settlements in the interior of the free states, as well as along their
southern frontier, soon came to form important links in the chain of stations
leading from the Southern states to Canada.*
In the list of Underground Railway operators given by Siebert there
are 128 names of Negroes, and Negroes were on the vigilant commit¬
tees of most of the larger towns, including Boston, Syracuse, Spring¬
field and Philadelphia.
The largest number of abduction cases occurred through the activities of
those well disposed towards fugitives by the attachments of race. There were
many Negroes, enslaved and free, along the southern boundaries of New Jer¬
sey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa, whose opportunities were
numerous for conveying fugitives to free soil with slight risk to themselves.
These persons sometimes did scarcely more than ferry runaways across
streams or direct them to the home of friends residing near the line of free
states. In the vicinity of Martin's Ferry, Ohio, there lived a colored man who
frequented the Virginia shore for the purpose of persuading slaves to run
away. He was in the habit of imparting the necessary information and then
displaying himself in an intoxicated condition, feigned or real, to avoid sus¬
picion. At last he was found out, but escaped by betaking himself to Canada.
In the neighborhood of Portsmouth, Ohio, slaves were conveyed across the
river by one Poindexter, a barber of the town of Jackson. In Baltimore,
Maryland, two colored women who engaged in selling vegetables, were effi¬
cient in starting fugitives on the way to Philadelphia. At Louisville, Ken¬
tucky, Wash Spradley, a shrewd Negro, was instrumental in helping many of
his enslaved brethren out of bondage. These few instances will suffice to il¬
lustrate the secret enterprises conducted by colored persons on both sides of
the sectional line once dividing the North from the South.
Another class of colored persons that undertook the work of delivering some
of their race from cruel uncertainties of slavery may be found among the
* Siebert, 82,91.
28 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
refugees of Canada. Describing the early development of the movement of
slaves to Canada, Dr. Samuel G. Howe says of these persons: " Some, not con¬
tent with personal freedom and happiness, went secretly back to their old
homes and brought away their wives and children at much peril and cost."
It has been said that the number of these persons visiting the South annually
was about five hundred. Mr. D. B. Hodge, of Lloydsville, Ohio, gives the case
of a Negro that went to Canada by way of New Athens, and in the course of a
year returned over the same route, went to Kentucky, and brought away his
wife and two children, making his pilgrimage northward again after the
lapse of about two months. Another case, reported by Mr. N. C. Buswell of
Nefouset, Illinois, is as follows:'"A slave, Charlie, belonging to a Missouri
planter living near Quincy, Illinois, escaped to Canada by way of one of the
underground routes. Ere long he decided to return and get his wife, but
found that she had been sold South. When making his second journey east¬
ward he brought with him a family of slaves who preferred freedom to remain¬
ing as the chattels of his old master. This was the first of a number of such
trips made by the fugitive, Charlie. Mr. Seth Linton, who was familiar with
the work on a line of this road running through Clinton county, Ohio, reports
that a fugitive that had passed along the route returned after some months,
saying he had come back to rescue his wife. His absence in the slave state
continued so long that it was feared he had been captured, but after some
weeks he reappeared, bringing his wife and her father with him. He told of
having seen many slaves in the country and said they would be along as soon
as they could escape."*
The stations at Mechanicsburg were among the most widely known in
central and southern Ohio. They received fugitives from at least three regu¬
lar routes, and doubtless had " switch connections " with other lines. Passen¬
gers were taken northward over one of the three, perhaps, four roads, and as
one or two of these lay through pro-slavery neighborhoods a brave and expe¬
rienced agent was almost indispensable. George W. S. Lucas, a colored man
of Salem, Columbiana county, Ohio, made frequent trips with the closed car¬
riage of Philip Evans between Barnesville, New Philadelphia and Cadiz, and
two stations, Ashtabula and Painesville, on the shore of Lake Erie. Occa¬
sionally Mr. Lucas conducted parties to Cleveland and Sandusky and Toledo,
but in such cases he went on foot or by stage. His trips were sometimes a
hundred miles and more in length. George L. Burroughes, a colored man at
Cairo, Illinois, became an agent for the Underground Road in 1857 while act¬
ing as porter of a sleeping car running on the Illinois Central Railroad between
Cairo and Chicago. At Albany, New York, Stephen Myers, a Negro, was an
agent of the Underground Road for a wide extent of territory. At Detroit
there were several agents, among them George DeBaptiste and George Dolar-
son.f
The most celebrated of these abductors were Harriet Tubman and
Josiah Henson, who are said to have been the means of releasing many
hundreds of slaves from slavery.
Outside of this general co-operation there was, however, evidence of
real organization among the Negroes. Hinton says that John Brown
knew of this secret organization and sought to take advantage of it.
Gill also testifies to the same organization ; extracts from their writing
will show their knowledge of this more secret co-operation :
* Siebert, 151.
+ Siebert, TO.
Underground Railroad
29
On leaving Boston, March 8th, he [i. e., John Brown] carried with him $500 in
gold and assurance of other support. He passed through New York on the
2d, preferring to go around rather than take the risk of being recognized in
western Massachusetts. On the 10th of March Frederick Douglass, Henry
Highland Garnett of New York, Stephen Smith and William Still of Phila¬
delphia, [all colored] with John Brown, Jr., met the captain in conference at
the dwelling of either Smith or Still. Of course the object of these was to find
out the Underground Railroad routes and stations, to ascertain the persons
who were actually to be relied upon, places to stop at, means of conveyance,
and especially to learn of the colored men who could be trusted. The Phila¬
delphia conference must have gone over this ground with the two Browns,
and the experience of those who were the most active of Underground Rail¬
road directors in that section, could not but have been useful John
Brown's purpose in calling and holding the convention at Chatham, Canada
West, was in harmony with the conception and plans he had evolved. There
was a large number of colored residents under the British flag. They were
mainly fugitive slaves, among whom were many bold, even daring men. In
the section of which Chatham was one of the centers, considerable direction
had been given to the settlement of these people. There were among them
(and still are) a good many farmers, mechanics, storekeepers, as well as labor¬
ers. It would not be correct to say that no prejudice existed against them,
but it was not strong enough, as in the land from which they fled, to prevent
industry and sobriety from having a fair chance, while intelligence, well di¬
rected, made its way to civic and business recognition. There were probably
not less than 75,000 fugitive residents in Canada West at the time of the
Chatham gathering. Their presence, well-ordered lives and fair degree of
prosperity, had brought also to live with them as doctors, clergymen, teachers,
lawyers, printers, surveyors, etc., educated freemen of their own race. Martin
Delany, a physician, editor, ethnologist and naturalist, was one of them. Mr.
Holden, a well-trained surveyor and civil engineer, at whose residence in
Chatham John Brown stayed, the Rev. William Charles Munroe, Osborne
Perry Anderson and others, were among these helpers. But it was not simply
the presence of these forces which took John Brown to Chatham. As one may
naturally understand, looking at conditions then existing, there existed some¬
thing of an organization to assist fugitives and for resistance to their masters.
It was found all along the borders from Syracuse, New York, to Detroit, Michi¬
gan. As none but colored men were admitted into direct and active member¬
ship with this " League of Freedom," it is quite difficult to trace its workings
or know how far its ramifications extended. One of the most interesting
phases of slave life, so far as the whites were enabled to see or impinge upon
it, was the extent and rapidity of communication among them. Four geo¬
graphical lines seem to have been chiefly followed. One was that of the coast
south of the Potomac, whose almost continuous line of swamps from the vi¬
cinity of Norfolk, Ya,, to the northern border of Florida afforded a refuge for
many who could not escape and became "marooned" in their depths, while
giving facility to the more enduring to work their way out to the North Star
Land. The great Appalachian range and its abutting mountains were long a
rugged, lonely, but comparatively safe route to freedom. It was used, too, for
many years. Doubtless a knowledge of that fact, for John Brown was always
an active Underground Railroad man, had very much to do, apart from its
immediate use strategically considered, with the captain's decision to begin
operations therein. Harriet Tubman, whom John Brown metforthe first time
at St. Catherine's in March or April, 1858, was a constant user of the Appalach-
30 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
ian route in her efforts to aid escaping slaves. " Moses," as Mrs. Tubman was
called by her own people, was a most remarkable black woman, unlettered
and very negrine, but with a great degree of intelligence and perceptive in¬
sight, amazing courage and a simple steadfastness of devotion which lifts her
career into the ranks of heroism. Herself a fugitive slave, she devoted her
life after her own freedom was won, to the work of aiding others to escape.
First and last Harriet brought out several thousand slaves. John Brown
always called her "General," and once introduced her to Wendell Phillips by
saying, " I bring you one of the best and bravest persons on this continent—
General Tubman, as we call her." William Lambert, who died in Detroit a
few years since, being very nearly one hundred years old, was another of those
of the race who devoted themselves to the work for which John Brown hoped
to strike a culminating blow. Between 1829 and 1862—thirty-three years—Wil¬
liam is reported to have aided in the escape of 30,000 slaves. He lived in De¬
troit, and was one of the foremost representatives of his people in both Michi¬
gan and Ontario. Underground Railroad operations culminating chiefly at
Cleveland, Sandusky and Detroit, led by broad and defined routes through
Ohio to the border of Kentucky. Through that state in the heart of the Cum¬
berland mountains, northern Georgia, east Tennessee and northern Alabama,
the limestone caves of the region served a useful purpose. And it is a fact that
the colored people living in Ohio were often bolder and more determined than
was the rule elsewhere. The Ohio-Kentucky routes probably served more
fugitives than others in the North. The valley of the Mississippi was the most
westerly channel until Kansas opened a bolder way of escape from the South¬
west slave section. John Brown knew whatever was to be known of all this
unrest, and he also must have known of the secret organization which George
B. Gill mentions in his interesting paper. This organization served a purpose
of some value to the government in the earlier parts of the Civil War, a fact
that lies within my own knowledge, and then fell into disuse as the hours
moved swifter to the one in which the gateway of the Union swung aside,
and the pathway of the law opened, to allow the colored American to reach
emancipation and citizenship.
Dr. Alexander Milton Ross, in a letter January 21st, 1893, says: *
Now in reference to the "Liberty League," I was one of their members at
large; Gerrit Smith and Lewis Tappan were the others. As to the actual
members I'had very little acquaintance. I knew of George J.Reynolds of
Hamilton (Sandusky, also), George W. Brown and Glover Harrison of this
city (Toronto). The branch of the League in Upper Canada had no connection
with the armed and drilled men along the United States border, whose duty
it was to help the slaves to escape to Canada. Of course I knew many of them—
Liberators, as they were called,—from Erie to Sandusky and Cleveland.
The list of the men who met John Brown in the celebrated Chatham
convention also shows the large number of co-workers, whom he tried
to get to help him at Harper's Ferry. The names of the members of
the Chatham convention were: William Charles Monroe, G. J. Rey¬
nolds, J. C. Grant, A. J. Smith, James Monroe Jones, George B. Gill,
M. F. Bailey, William Lambert, S. Hunton, John J. Jackson, Osborne
P. Anderson, Alfred Whipper, C. W. Moffett, James M. Bell, W. H.
Lehman, Alfred M. Ellsworth, John E. Cook, Steward Taylor, James
"Hinton: John Brown and His Men.
Underground Railroad
31
IF. Purnell, George Akin, Stephen Dettin, Thomas Hickerson, John
Cannel, jRobinson Alexander, Richard Realf, Thomas F Gary, Richard
Richardson. Luke F. Parsons, Thos. M. Kennard, Jeremiah Anderson,
J". H. Delaney, Robert Van Vauken, Thos. M. Stringer, Charles P. Tidd,
Jo/m ^4. Thomas, C. Whipple, Alias Aaron D. Stevens, «/. Z>. Shadd,
Robert Newman, Owen Brown, John Brown, J". _H\ Harris, Charles
Smith, Simon Fislin, Isaac Uolden, James Smith, John H. Kagi; the
secretary, Dr. iLT. _R. Delaney, was a corresponding member. The mem¬
bers whose names are in italics were colored men.
In addition to the educational facilities the colored folk of Chatham
had churches of their own, a newspaper conducted in their interest by
Mr. I. D. Shadd, an accomplished colored man, and societies for social
intercourse and improvement, in which their affairs were discussed,
mutual wants made known and help provided. But there were also
here and elsewhere, at each center of colored population, meetings and
discussions of a more earnest character: Conductors of the "Under¬
ground Railroad," an organization whose influence in aid of the fleeing
slaves was felt from the lakes and St. Lawrence river to the center of
the slave populations, were often seen here.
The League of Gileadites formed by John Brown in Springfield,
Mass., just after the passing of the Fugitive Slave Law also became
undoubtedly an effective organization, and was carried on largely by
the colored people themselves. The co-operation in rescuing fugitive
slaves just before the war was due in considerable degree to this organ¬
ization and others like it in different places. Siebert says:
Soon after the Fugitive Slave Law was passed John Brown visited Spring¬
field, Massachusetts, where he had formerly lived. The "Valley of Connecticut
had long been a line of underground travel and citizens of Springfield, colored
and white, had become identified with operations on this line. Brown at once
decided that the new law made organization necessary, and he formed, there¬
fore, the League of Grileadites to resist systematically the enforcement of the
law. The name of this order was significant in that it contained a warning to
those of its members that should show themselves cowards: "Whosoever is
fearful or afraid let him return and depart from Mount Gilead." In the
"Agreement and Rules" that John Brown drafted from the order, adopted
January 15, 1851, the following directions for action were laid down: "Should
one of your number be arrested, you must collect together as (fuickly as possi¬
ble so as to outnumber your adversaries Let no able bodied man
appear on the ground unequipped or with his weapons exposed to view.
Your plans must be known only to yourselves and with the under¬
standing that all traitors must die wherever caught and proven guilty.
Let the first blow be the signal for all to engage Make
clean work with your enemies, and be sure you meddle not with any others.
After effecting a rescue, if you are assailed, go into the houses of
your most prominent and influential white friends with your wives, and that
will effectually fasten upon them the suspicion of being connected with you,
and will compel them to make a common cause with you You
may make a tumult in the court-room where the trial is going on by burning
gunpowder freely in paper packages But in such case the pris¬
oner will need to take the hint at once and bestir himself; and so should his
32 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
friends improve the opportunity for a general rush Stand by one
another and by your friends while a drop of blood remains; and be hanged, i
you must, but tell no tales out of school. Make no confessions." By adopting
the Agreement and Rules, forty-four colored persons constituted themselves
"A branch of the United States League of Gileadites," and "agreed to have no
officers except a treasurer and secretary pro tem. until after some trial of
courage," when they could choose officers on the basis of "courage efficiency
and general good conduct." Doubtless the Gileadites of Springfield did effi¬
cient service, for it appears that the importance of the town as a way station
on the Underground Road increased after the passage of the Fugitive Slave
Bill. *
That slaves should run away from slavery is, of course, perfectly nat¬
ural, but there is also a further development of this idea in the desire
of free Negroes to move either to different parts of the country or out of
the country for the sake of having better chances for development.
These movements were in some cases encouraged by the American Col¬
onization Society, but in most cases the Negroes were suspicious of that
organization, and the first efforts in the line of migration began among
themselves. These efforts commenced as early as 1815, and lasted down
to 1880. In the midst of them came the war and emancipation. Let us,
therefore, first take up the economic co-operation consequent on eman¬
cipation and then the efforts toward migration.
Section 7. Emancipation
The first thing that vexed the Northern armies on Southern soil was
the question of the disposition of the fugitive slaves. Butler confiscated
them, Fremont freed them and Halleck caught and returned them,
but their numbers swelled to such proportions that the mere economic
problem of their presence overshadowed everything else, especially
after the Emancipation proclamation. Lincoln was glad to have them
come after once he realized their strength to the Confederacy. In 1864,
The President's heart yearned for peace; his mind sought out every means
of stopping the bloodshed. He referred to the really astonishing extent to
which the colored people were informed in regard to the progress of the war,
and remarked that he wished the "grapevine telegraph" could be utilized to
call upon the Negroes of the interior peacefully to leave the plantations and
seek protection of our armies. This as a war-time measure he considered le¬
gitimate. Apart from the numbers it would add to our military forces, he
explained the effect such an exodus would have upon the industry of the
South. The Confederate soldiers were sustained by provisions raised by Ne¬
gro labor; withdraw that labor, and the young men in the Southern army
would soon be obliged to go home to " raise hog and hominy," and thus pro¬
mote the collapse of the Confederacy, t
Meantime, as Howard writes, the economic problem of these massed
freedmen was intricate:
In North Carolina, Chaplain Horace James of the Twenty-fifth Massachu¬
setts Volunteers became Superintendent of Negro Affairs for North Carolina,
and other officers were detailed to assist him. These covered the territory
* Slebert, pp. 78-75.
f Eaton, p. 173.
Emancipation
33
gradually opened by the advance of onr armies in both Virginia and North
Carolina. Becoming a quartermaster with the rank of captain in 1864, he, for
upward of two years, superintended the poor, both white and black, in that
region. He grouped the refugees in small villages, and diligently attended to
their industries and to their schools. Enlisted men were his first teachers ;
then followed the best of lady teachers from the North, and success crowned
his efforts.
In February, 1864, there were about two thousand freed people in the villages
outside of the New Berne, North Carolina, intrenchments Lots were
now assigned and about eight hundred houses erected, which at one time
sheltered some three thousand escaped slaves. *
June 28,1862, Brigadier General Rufus Saxton, with headquarters at Beau¬
fort, South Carolina, assumed the government and control of all places and
persons in the Department of the South which were not embraced in the op¬
erations of General Quincy A. Gilmore, commanding the department. General
Saxton, as military governor, appointed three division superintendents, each
having charge of several of the Sea Islands. Market houses were established
at Hilton Head and Beaufort for the sale of the produce from the plantations,
and Negroes put to work, the larger settlement being Port Royal Island and
near the town of Beaufort.
Colored men in that vicinity were soon enlisted as soldiers and an effort was
made to cause the laborers left on each plantation, under plantation superin¬
tendents appointed for the purpose, to raise sufficient cotton and corn for their
own support, rations being given from the Commissionary Department only
when necessary to prevent absolute starvation. These conditions were, with
hardly an interruption, continued until the spring of 1865.
Grant's army in the West occupied Grand Junction, Miss., by November,
1862. The usual irregular host of slaves then swarmed in from the surround¬
ing country. They begged for protection against recapture, and they, of
course, needed food, clothing and shelter. They could not now be re-enslaved
through army aid, yet no provision had been made by anybody for their sus¬
tenance. A few were employed as teamsters, servants, cooks and pioneers,
yet it seemed as though the vast majority must be left to freeze and starve;
for when the storms came with the winter months the weather was of great
severity.
General Grant, with his usual gentleness toward the needy and his fertility
in expedients, introduced at once a plan of relief. He selected a fitting super¬
intendent, John Eaton, chaplain of the Twenty-seventh Ohio Volunteers, who
was soon promoted to the colonelcy of a colored regiment, and later for many
years was a Commissioner of the United States Bureau of Education. He was
then constituted Chief of the Negro Affairs for the entire district under
Grant's jurisdiction. The plan which Grant conceived, the new superintend¬
ent ably carried out. They were all around Grand Junction, when our opera¬
tions opened, large crops of cotton and corn ungathered. It was determined
to harvest these,send them North for sale, and place the receipts to the credit
of the Government. The army of fugitives, willingly going to work, produced
a lively scene. The children lent a hand in gathering the cotton and corn.
The superintendent, conferring with the general himself, fixed upon fair wages
for this industry. Under similar remuneration woodcutters were set at work
to supply with fuel numerous government steamers on the river. After in¬
spection of accounts, the money was paid for the labor by the quartermaster,
* Howard: Vol. 2,176-7.
34 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
but never directly to the fugitives. The superintendent, controlling this
money, saw to it first that the men, women and children should have sufficient
clothing and food, then Colonel Eaton built for them rough cabins and pro¬
vided for their sick and aged, managing to extend to them many unexpected
comforts. General Grant in his memoirs suggests this as the first idea of a
" Freedmen's Bureau."
Even before the close of 1862 many thousands of blacks of all ages, clad in
rags, with no possessions except the nondescript bundles of all sizes which
the adults carried on their backs, had come together at Norfolk, Hampton,
Alexandria and Washington. Sickness, want of food and shelter, sometimes
resulting crime, appealed to the sympathies of every feeling heart. Landless,
homeless, helpless families in multitudes, including a proportion of wretched
white people, were flocking northward from Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas
and Missouri. They were, it is true, for a time not only relieved by army ra¬
tions, spasmodically issued, but were met most kindly by various volunteer
societies of the North—societies which gathered their means from churches
and individuals at home and abroad.
During the spring of 1863 many different groups and crowds of freemen and
refugees, regular and irregular, were located near the long and broken line of
division between the armies of the North and South, ranging from Maryland
to the Kansas border and along the coast from Norfolk, Ya., to New Orleans,
La. They were similar in character and condition to those already described.
Their virtues, their vices, their poverty, their sicknesses, their labors, their
idleness, their excess of joy and their extremes of suffering were told to our
home people by every returning soldier or agent or by the missionaries who
were soliciting the means of relief. Soon in the North an extraordinary zeal
for humanity, quite universal, sprang up, and a Christian spirit which was
never before exceeded began to prevail. The result was the organizing of
numerous new bodies of associated workers whose influence kept our country
free from the ills attending emancipation elsewhere; it saved us from Negro
insurrection, anarchy and bloody massacre, with which the proslavery men
and even the conservative readers of history had threatened the land.
The secretary of the treasury, Salmon P. Chase, always anxious for success¬
ful emancipation, had had brought to his attention early in 1862 the accumu¬
lations of the bestcotton on abandoned sea island plantations; there was the
opportunity to raise more, and the many slaves in the vicinity practically set
free and under governmental control could be worked to advantage. The
cotton was to be collected by treasury agents and the freedmen benefited.
During the summer of 1864 Wm. Pitt Fessenden, who had replaced Mr.
Chase as secretary of the treasury, inaugurated a new plan for the freedmen
and abandoned lands. He appointed and located supervising special agents
of his department in different portions of the South which were now free from
Confederate troops. These agents had charge of the freedmen. Each was to
form here and there settlements on abandoned estates, each dominated a
"Freedman's Home Colony," and situated in his own district, and he must
appoint a supervisor for such colonies as he should establish. A number of
such colonies were formed. The supervisor provided buildings, obtained work
animals and implements of husbandry and other essential supplies; he kept
a book of record which mentioned the former owner of the land, the name, age,
residence and trade or occupation of each colonist; all births, deaths and mar¬
riages; the coming and going of each employee and other like data. These
agents and supervisors were sometimes taken under military control by the
local commander and sometimes operated independently.
Emancipation
35
Under this plan the freed people were classified for fixed wages varying
from $10 to $25 per month, according to the class, and whether male or female.
There was a complete and detailed system of employment. Food and cloth¬
ing were guaranteed at cost, and all parties concerned were put under written
contracts. For a time in some places this system worked fairly well. It was
a stepping-stone to independence. The working people usually had in the
supervisors and treasury agents friendly counselors; and when courts of any
v^ort were established under them for hearing complaints of fraud or oppres¬
sion, these officials reviewed the cases and their decisions were final. These
were rather short steps in the path of progress! They were experiments.
From the time of the opening of New Orleans in 1862 till 1865, different sys¬
tems of caring for the escaped slaves and their families were tried in the
Southwest. Generals Butler and Banks, each in his turn, sough t. to provide
for the thousands of destitute freedmen in medicines, rations and clothing.
Colonies were soon formed and sent to abandoned plantations. A sort of gen¬
eral poor farm was established and called " The Home Colony." Mr. Thomas
W. Conway, when first put in charge of the whole region as " Superintendent
of the Bureau of Free Labor," tried to impress upon all freedman who came
under his charge in these home colonies that they must work as hard as if
they were employed by contract on the plantation of a private citizen. His
avowed object, and indeed that of every local superintendent, was to render
the freedmen self-supporting. One bright freedman said: "I always kept
master and me. Guess I can keep me."
Two methods at first not much in advance of slavery were used : one was to
force the laborers to toil; and the second, when wages were paid, to fix exact
rates for them by orders. Each colony from the first had a superintendent, a
physician, a clerk and an instructor in farming. The primary and Sunday
schools were not wanting, and churches were encouraged.
Early in 1863, General Lorenzo Thomas, the adjutant general of the army,
was organizing colored troops along the Mississippi river. After consulting
various treasury agents and department commanders, including General
Grant, and having also the approval of Mr. Lincoln, he issued from Milliken's
Bend, La., April 15th, a lengthy series of instructions covering the territory
bordering the Mississippi and including all the inhabitants.
He appointed three commissioners, Messrs. Field, Shickle and Livermore,
to lease plantations and care for the employees. He adroitly encouraged pri¬
vate enterprise instead of government colonies; but he fixed the wages of
able-bodied men over fifteen years of age at $7 per month, for able-
bodied women $5 per month, for children twelve to fifteen years half
price. He laid a tax for revenue of $2 per 400 pounds on cotton, and five cents
per bushel on corn and potatoes.
This plan naturally did not work well, for the lessees of plantations proved
to be for the most part adventurers and speculators. Of course such men took
advantage of the ignorant people. The commissioners themselves seem to
have done more for the lessees than for the laborers; and, in fact, the wages
were from the beginning so fixed as to benefit and enrich the employer. Two
dollars per month was stopped against each of the employed, ostensibly for
medical attendance, but to most plantations thus leased no physician or medi¬
cine ever came, and there were other attendant cruelties which avarice con¬
trived.
On fifteen plantations leased by the Negroes themselves in this region there
was a notable success; and also a few instances among others where humanity
and good sense reigned, the contracts were generally carried out. Here the
36 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Negroes were contented and grateful and were able to lay by small gains.
This plantation arrangement along the Mississippi under the commissioners
as well as the management of numerous infirmary camps passed, about the
close of 1863, from the war to the treasury department. A new commission or
agency with Mr.W. P. Mellen of the treasury at the head, established more
careful and complete regulations than those of General Thomas. This time
it was done decidedly in the interest of the laborers.
Then came another change of jurisdiction. On March 11, 1865, General Ste¬
phen A. Hurlbut at New Orleans assumed the charge of freedmen and labor
for the state of Louisana. He based his orders on the failure of the secretary
of the treasury to recognize the regulations of that secretary's own general
agent, Mr. Mellen. Mr. Thomas W.Conway was announced as " Superintend¬
ent of Home Colonies," the word having a larger extension than before. A
registry of plantations, hire and compensation of labor, with a fair schedule
of wages, penalties for idleness and crime, time and perquisites of labor, the
poll tax of $2 per year, liens and security for work done, were carefully pro¬
vided for by General Hurlbut's specific instructions.
General Edward R. S. Canby, a little later, from Mobile, Ala., issued similar
orders, and Mr. Conway was also placed over the freedmea's interests in his
vicinity. Thus the whole freedmen's management for Alabama, Southern
Mississippi and Louisiana was concentrated under Mr. Conway's control. He
reported early in 18B5 that there were about twenty colored regiments in
Louisiana under pay and that they could purchase every inch of confiscated
and abandoned lands in the hands of the government in that state. All the
soldiers desired to have the land on the expiration of enlistment. One regi¬
ment had in hand $50,000 for the purpose of buying five of the largest planta¬
tions on the Mississippi. It was at the time thought by many persons inter¬
ested in the future of the freedmen that the abandoned and confiscated lands
if used for them would afford a wholesome solution to the Negro problem
A few days after the triumphal entrance. Secretary of War Stanton came in
person from Washington to convey his grateful acknowledgement to General
Sherman and his army for their late achievements. While at Savannah he
examined into the condition of the liberated Negroes found in that city. He
assembled twenty of those who were deemed their leaders. Among them
were barbers, pilots and sailors, some ministers, and others who had been
overseers on cotton and rice plantations. Mr. Stanton and General Sherman
gave them a hearing. It Avould have been wise if our statesmen could have
received, digested and acted upon the answers these men gave to their ques¬
tions.
As a result of this investigation and after considerable meditation upon the
perplexing problem as to what to do with the growing masses of unemployed
Negroes and their families, and after a full consultation with Mr. Stanton,
General Sherman issued his Sea Island Circular January 16, 1865. In this pa¬
per the islands from Charleston south, the abandoned rice fields along the
livers for thirty miles back from the sea and the country bordering the St.
Johns river, Florida, were reserved for the settlement of the Negroes made
free by the acts of war and the proclamation of the President.
General Rufus Saxton, already on the ground, was appointed Inspector of
Settlements and Plantations; no other change was intended or desired in the
settlements on Beaufort Island which had for three years been established.
The inspector was required to make proper allotments and give possessory
titles and defend them till Congress should confirm his actions. It was a bold
move. Thousands of Negro families were distributed under this circular, and
Emancipation 37
the freed people regarded themselves for more than six months as in perma¬
nent possession of these abandoned lands. *
Taxes on the freedmen furnished most of the funds to run these first
experiments, and also, later, the Freedmen's Bureau:
On all plantations, whether owned or leased, where freedmen were em¬
ployed a tax of one cent per pound on cotton and a proportional amount on all
other products was to be collected as a contribution in support of the helpers
among the freed people. A similar tax, varying with the value of the property,
was levied by the government upon all leased plantations in lieu of rent.f
Eaton explains many details of the operations under him:
As to the management of property, both government and private, the regu¬
lation of wages and all general disciplinary measures, the following state¬
ments should be made: One of my officers, Lieutenant B. K. Johnson, was
assigned to duty as acting assistant quartermaster and acting commissary of
subsistence of freedmen. He accomplished much for the economical manage¬
ment of property, rendering satisfactory reports to Washington, as usually
required of officers of those departments. All officers handling supplies re¬
ceived from the government adjusted their methods of business, forms of
reports, vouchers, etc., to army regulations, which required them to keep
careful records of every transaction. Not a cent of money was ever drawn
from the government for the freedmen on any account.
For the support of the sick and those otherwise dependent a tax was temp¬
orarily required, (.by Orders No. 63) on the wages of the able-bodied. It was
thought at first that the Negroes would submit with reluctance to the collec¬
tion of such a tax. But in this we were mistaken. Being a tax on wages, it
compelled the employer and the employed to appear, one or both, before the
officer charged with its collection, and this officer allowed no wages to go un¬
paid. The Negro soon saw in the measure his first recognition by govern¬
ment, and although the recognition appeared in the form of a burden, he re¬
sponded to it with alacrity, finding in it the first assurance of any power pro¬
tecting his right to make a bargain and hold the white man to its fulfilment.
This comprehension of the affair argued a good sense of economic justice to a
people entirely unused to such responsibilities. It was most interesting to
watch the moral effect of the taxing ex-slaves. They freely acknowledged
that they ought to assist in bearing the burden of the poor. They felt enno¬
bled when they found that the government was calling upon them as men to
assist in the process by which their natural rights were to be secured. Thous¬
ands thus saw for the first time any money reward for their labor. The places
where the tax was least rigidly collected were farthest behind in paying the
colored man for his services. This tax, together with funds accruing from
the profits of labor in the department, met all the incidental expenses of our
widespread operations; paid $5,000 for hospitals; the salaries of all hospital
stewards and medical assistants (as per Orders No. 94), and enabled us to supply
implements of industry to the people, in addition to abandoned property. The
same funds secured to the benefit of the Negroes, clothing, household utensils,
and other articles essential to their comfort, to the amount of $103,000. The
Negroes could not themselves have secured these commodities for less than
$350,000. The management of these funds and supplies was regulated by the
exigencies of the people's condition, and was adapted as far as necessary to
army methods, requiring a rigid system of accounts, monthly reports covered
* Howard: Vol. 2, 178-80, 183-92.
+ Eaton, p. 147.
38 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
by certificates and vouchers, followed by careful inspections, not only from
my office, but from the generals commanding.
According to Orders No. 9, issued by General L. Thomas, certain officers
known as provost marshals were selected from the men of the Freedmen's
Department to discharge toward the Negroes scattered on plantations the du¬
ties of superintendent of freedmen. These officers were appointed by the
commanding generals, and themselves appointed assistant provost marshals,
who patrolled the districts assigned to them, correcting abuses on plantations
and acting as the representatives of the law as upheld by the military power.
There was some difficulty in maintaining the incorruptibility of these officers,
and the territory which had to be covered by each individual was too extended,
but the system, nevertheless, worked extremely well.*
In 1864, July 5, Eaton reports:
These freedmen are now disposed of as follows: In military service as sol¬
diers' laundresses, cooks, officers' servants and laborers in the various staff
departments, 41,150; in cities, on plantations and in freedmen's villages and
cared for, 72,500. Of these, 62,300 are entirely self-supporting—the same as any
individual class anywhere else—as planters, mechanics, barbers, hackmen,
draymen, etc., conducting on their own responsibility or working as hired
laborers. The remaining 10,200 receive subsistence from the government.
Three thousand of them are members of families whose heads are carrying on
plantations and have under cultivation 4,000 acres of cotton. They are to
pay the government for their subsistence from the first income of the crop.
The other 7,200 include the paupers, that is to say, all Negroes over and under
the self-supporting age, the crippled and sick in hospital, of the 113,650, and
those engaged in their care. Instead of being unproductive this class has now
under cultivation 500 acres of corn, 790 acres of vegetables and 1,500 acres of
cotton, besides working at wood-chopping and other industries. There are
reported in the aggregate over 100,000 acres of cotton under cultivation. Of
these about 7,000 acres are leased and cultivated by blacks. Some Negroes are
managing as high as 300 or 400 acres, t
This same year a report from Chaplain A. S. Fiske says:
This inspection has covered ninety-five places leased by whites and fifty-six
plats of land worked by the blacks for themselves, in the districts of Natchez,
Yicksburg and Helena. In these districts I have left but few places without
examination. J
The experiment at Davis Bend, Miss., was of especial interest:
Late in the season—in November and December, 1864,—the Freedmen's De¬
partment was restored to full control over the camps and plantations on Presi¬
dent's Island and Palmyra or Davis Bend. Both these points had been orig¬
inally occupied at the suggestion of General Grant, and were among the most
successful of our enterprises for the Negroes. With the expansion of the les¬
see system, private interests were allowed to displace the interests of the Ne¬
groes whom we had established there under the protection of the government,
but orders issued by General N. J. T. Dana, upon whose sympathetic and in¬
telligent co-operation my officers could always rely, restored to us the full
control of these lands. The efforts of the freedmen on Davis Bend were par¬
ticularly encouraging, and this property under Colonel Thomas' able direction,
became in reality the "Negro Paradise" that General Grant had urged us to
* Eaton, pp. 126-9.
+ Eaton, p. 134.
t Eaton, p. 157.
Emancipation
39
make of it. Early in 1865 a system was adopted for their government in which
the freedmen took a considerable part. The Bend was divided into districts,
each having a sheriff and judge appointed from among the more reliable and
intelligent colored men. A general oversight of the proceedings was main¬
tained by our officers in charge, who confirmed or modified the findings of the
court. The shrewdness of the colored judges was very remarkable, though it
was sometimes necessary to decrease the severity of the punishments they pro¬
posed. Fines and penal service on the Home Farm were the usual sentences
imposed. Petty theft and idleness were the most frequent causes of trouble,
but my officers were able to report that exposed property was as safe on Davis
Bend as it would be anywhere. The community distinctively demonstrated
the capacity of the Negro to take care of himself and exercise under honest
and competent direction the functions of self-government.*
Finally came the Freedmen's Bureau. Its work was thus summar¬
ized by General O. O. Howard, its chief, in 1869:
One year ago there were on duty in this bureau one hundred and forty-one
(141) commissioned officers, four hundred and twelve civilian agents, and three
hundred and forty-eight (348) clerks. At present there are fifteen (15) com¬
missioned officers, seventy-one (71) civilian agents, and seventy-two clerks.. . .
The law establishing a Bureau committed to it the control of all subjects re¬
lating to refugees and freedmen under such regulations as might be prescribed
by the head of the Bureau and approved by the President. This almost unlim¬
ited authority gave me great scope and liberty of action, but at the same time
it imposed upon me very perplexing and responsible duties. Legislative, ju¬
dicial and executive powers were combined in my commission, reaching all
the interests of four millions of people, scattered over a vast territory, living
in the midst of another people claiming to be superior, and known to be not
altogether friendly. It was impossible at the outset to do more than lay down
general principles to guide the officers assigned as assistant commissioners in
the several states
The first information received from these officers presented a sad picture of
want and misery. Though large sums of money had been contributed by
generous Northern people; though many noble-hearted men and women, with
the spirit of true Christian missionaries, had engaged zealously in the work
of relief and instruction; though the heads of the departments in Washing¬
ton and military commanders in the field had done all in their power, yet the
great mass of the colored people, just freed from slavery, had not been reached.
In every state many thousands were found without employment, without
homes, without means of subsistence, crowding into towns and about military
posts, where they hoped to find protection and supplies. The sudden collapse
of the rebellion, making emancipation an actual, universal fact, was-like an
earthquake. It shook and shattered the whole previously existing social sys¬
tem. It broke up the old industries and threatened a reign of anarchy. Even
well-disposed and humane landowners were at a loss what to do, or how to
begin the work of reorganizing society, and of rebuilding their ruined for¬
tunes. Very few had any knowledge of free labor, or any hope that their for¬
mer slaves would serve them faithfully for wages. On the other hand, the
freed people were in a state of great excitement and uncertainty. They could
hardly believe that the liberty proclaimed was real and permanent. Many
were afraid to remain on the same soil that they had tilled as slaves lest by
* Eaton, p. 1(55.
40 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
some trick they might find themselves again in bondage. Others supposed
that the Government would either take the entire supervision of their labor
and support, or divide among them the lands of the conquered owners, and
furnish them with all that might be necessary to begin life as independent
farmers.
In such an unsettled state of affairs it was no ordinary task we undertook
to inspire hostile races with mutual confidence, to supply the immediate
wants of the sick and starving, to restore social order, and to set in motion all
the wheels of industry
Surely our government exercised a large benevolence. We have under our
care no less than five hundred and eighty-four thousand one hundred and
seventy-eight (584,178) sick and infirm persons, for whom no provision was
made by local authorities, and who had no means themselves of procuring the
attendance and comforts necessary to health and life. It has not been possi¬
ble to provide for the proper treatment of the insane. For some of this un¬
fortunate class admission has been gained by earnest correspondence to state
asylums, but the majority have been of necessity retained in the bureau hos¬
pitals, and all that could be done for them was to supply them with food and
clothing and prevent them from doing injury.
For more than a year our principal aim has been to relieve the general Gov¬
ernment by transferring to the civil authorities all these dependent classes
for future cure and treatment. To this end medicine and hospital stores have
been furnished as an outfit where state or municipal governments have con¬
sented to assume charge of destitute sick and disabled freedmen within their
borders. By means of this aid, and by patient and persistent effort on the part
of my officers, the hospitals, at one time numbering fifty-six (56), have been
reduced to two (2), and one (1) of these is about to be closed.
In addition to the sick, many others were destitute and required aid. To re¬
lieve this destitution without encouraging pauperism and idleness was at all
times a difficult problem
The wonder is not that so many, but that so few, have needed help; that of
the four millions of people thrown suddenly upon their own resources only
one in about two hundred has been an object of public charity; and nearly all
who have received aid have been persons who, by reason of age, infirmity or
disease, would be objects of charity in any state at any time.
It would have been impossible to reach such satisfactory results and reduce
the issue of supplies to so small proportions had not employment been found
for a great multitude of able-bodied men and women, who, when first free,
knew not where to look for remunerative labor
They were uniformly assisted by us in finding good places and in making
reasonable bargains. To secure fairness and inspire confidence on both sides,
the system of written contracts was adopted. No compulsion was used, but
all were advised to enter into written agreements and submit them to an offi¬
cer of the Bureau for approval. The nature and obligations of these contracts
were carefully explained to the freedmen, and a copy filed in the office of the
agent approving it; this was for their use in case any difficulty arose between
them and their employers. The labor imposed upon my officers and agents
by this system was very great, as evinced by the fact that in a single state not
less than fifty thousand (50,000) such contracts were drawn in duplicate and
filled up with the names of all the parties. But the result has been highly
satisfactory. To the freedmen, the Bureau office in this way became a school
in which he learned the first practical business lessons of life, and from year
to year he has made rapid progress in this important branch of education.
Emancipation
41
Nor can it be doubted that much litigation and strife were prevented. It
could not be expected that such a vast and complicated machinery would work
without friction. The interests of capital and labor very often clash in all
communities. The South has not been entirely exempt from troubles of this
kind. Some employers have been dishonest and have attempted to defraud
the freedmen of just wages. Some laborers have been unfaithful and unreas¬
onable in their demands. But in the great majority of cases brought before
us for settlement, the trouble and misunderstanding have arisen from vague
verbal bargains and a want of specific written contracts
In spite of all disorders that have prevailed and the misfortunes that have
fallen upon many parts of the South, a good degree of prosperity and success h as
already been attained. To the oft-repeated slander that the Negroes will not
work, and are incapable of taking care of themselves, it is a sufficient answer
that their voluntary labor has produced nearly all the food that supported the
whole people, besides a large amount of rice, sugar and tobacco for export,
and two millions of bales of cotton each year, on which was paid into the
United States treasury during the years 1866 and 1867 a tax of more than forty
millions of dollars ($40,000,000). It is not claimed that this result is wholly due
to the care and oversight of this Bureau, but it is safe to say, as it has been
said repeatedly by intelligent Southern white men, that without the Bureau
or some similar agency, the material interests of the country would have
greatly suffered, and the Government would have lost a far greater amount
than has been expended in its maintenance
Of the nearly eight hundred thousand (800,000) acres of farming land and
about five thousand (5,000) pieces of town property transferred to this Bureau
by military and treasury officers, or taken up by assistant commissioners,
enough was leased to produce a revenue of nearly four hundred thousand dol¬
lars ($400,000). Some farms were set apart in each State as homes for the des¬
titute and helpless, and a portion was cultivated by freedmen prior to its
restoration
Notice the appropriations by Congress:
For the year ending July 1, 1867 $ 6,940,450.00
For the year ending July 1,1868 3,936,300.00
For the relief of the destitute citizens in District of Co¬
lumbia 40,000.00
For relief of the destitute freedmen In the same 15,000.00
For expenses of paying bounties in 1869 214,000.00
For expenses for famine in Southern states and trans¬
portation 1,865,615.40
For support of hospitals 50,000.00
Making a total, received from all sources,of $12,961,395.40
Our expenditures from the beginning (including assumed accounts of the
"Department of Negro Affairs"), from January 1,1865, to August31, 1869, have
been eleven million two hundred and forty-nine thousand and twenty-eight
dollars and ten cents ($11,249,028.10). In addition to this cash expenditure the
subsistence, medical supplies, quartermaster stores, issued to the refugees and
freedmen prior to July 1, 1866, were furnished by the commissionary, medical
and quartermaster's department, and accounted for in the current expenses of
those departments; they were not charged to nor paid for by my officers-
They amounted to two million three hundred and thirty thousand seven hun¬
dred and eighty-eight dollars and seventy-two cents ($2,330,788.72) in original
cost; but a large portion of these stores being damaged and condemned as unfit
for issue to troops, their real value to the Government was probably less than
42 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
one million of dollars ($1,000,000). Adding their original cost to the amount
expended from appropriations and other sources, the total expenses of our
Government for refugees and freedmen to August 31,1869, have been thirteen
millions five hundred and seventy-nine thousand eight hundred and sixteen
dollars and eighty-two cents ($13,579,816.82). And deducting fifty thousand dol¬
lars ($50,000) set apart as a special relief fund for all classes of destitute people
in the Southern states, the real cost has been thirteen millions twenty-nine
thousand eight hundred and sixteen dollars and eighty-two cents ($13,-
029,816.82). *
That the economic co-operation of the freedmen under outside lead¬
ership made the Freedmen's Bureau thus possible goes without saying.
Not only that, but there is much testimony as to independent co-opera¬
tion on their part:
In a few instances freedmen have combined their means and purchased
farms already under cultivation. They have everywhere manifested a great
desire to become landowners, a desire in the highest degree laudable and
hopeful for their future civilization.
The Negroes were also showing their capacity to organize labor and apply
capital to it. Harry, to whom I referred in my second report as "my faithful
guide and attendant, who had done for me more service than any white man
could render," with funds of his own and some borrowed money, bought at
the recent tax sales a small farm of three hundred and thirteen acres for
three hundred and five dollars. He was to plant sixteen and a half acres of
cotton, twelve and a half of corn, one and a half of potatoes. I rode through
his farm on the tenth of April, my last day in the territory, and one-third of
his crop was then in Harry lives in the house of the former over¬
seer, and delights, though not boastingly, in his position as a landed proprie¬
tor. He has promised to write me, or rather to dictate a letter, giving an ac¬
count of the progress of his crop. He has had much charge of Government
property, and when Captain Hooper and General Saxton's staff was coming
North last autumn, Harry proposed to accompany him; but at last, of his
own accord, gave up the project, saying, " It'll not do for all two to leave to¬
gether."
Another case of capacity for organization should be noted. The Government
is building twenty-one houses for the Edisto people, eighteen feet by fourteen,
with two rooms, each provided with a swinging-board window, and the roof
projecting a little as a protection from rain. The journeymen carpenters are
seventeen colored men who have fifty cents per day without rations, working
ten hours. They are under the direction of Frank Barnwell, a freedman, who
receives twenty dollars a month. Rarely have I talked with a more intelli¬
gent contractor. It was my great regret that I had not time to visit the village
of improved houses near the Hilton Head camp, which General Mitchell had
extemporized, and to which he gave so much of the noble enthusiasm of his
last days.
Next as to the development of manhood. This has been shown in the first
place, in the prevalent disposition to acquire land. It did not appear upon our
first introduction to these people, and they did not seem to understand us
when we used to tell them that we wanted them to own land. But it is now
an active desire. At the recent tax sales, six out of forty-seven plantations
sold were bought by them,comprising two thousand five hundred and ninety-
* Howard, Vol. 2, 861-7, 871-2.
Emancipation
43
five acres, sold for twenty-one hundred and forty-five dollars. In other cases
the Negroes had authorized the superintendent to bid for them, but the land
was reserved by the United States. One of the purchases was that made by
Harry, noted above. The other five were made by the Negroes on the planta¬
tions combining the funds they had saved from the sale of their pigs, chickens
and eggs, and from the payments made to them for work, they then dividing
off the tract peaceably among themselves. On one of these, where Kit, before
mentioned, is the leading spirit, there are twenty-three field hands. They
have planted and are cultivating sixty-three acres of cotton, fifty of corn, six
of potatoes, with as many more to be planted, four and a half of cowpeas,
three of peanuts, and one and a half of rice. These facts are most significant.
The instinct for land—to have one spot on earth where a man may stand and
whence no human can of right drive him—is one of the most conservative
elements of our nature; and a people who have it in any fair degree will never
be nomads or vagabonds. *
Some relief and compensation were given by the act of Congress approved
June 21,1866, which opened for entry, by colored and white men without dis¬
tinction, all the public lands in the states of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana,
Arkansas and Florida. Information was published through my officers and
agents respecting the location and value of these lands, and the mode of pro¬
cedure in order to obtain possession of them. Surveys were made and some
assistance granted in transporting families to their new homes. Want of
teams and farming implements, as well as opposition from their white neigh¬
bors, prevented many from taking the benefit of this homestead act; but
about four thousand families have faced and overcome these obstacles, have
acquired homes of their own and commenced work with energy, building
houses and planting. In a few instances freedmen have combined their means
and purchased farms already under cultivation. They have everywhere
manifested a great desire to become landowners, a desire in the highest degree
laudable and hopeful for their future civilization. Next to a proper religious
and intellectual training, the one thing needful to the freedmen is land and a
home. Without that a high degree of civilization and moral culture is
scarcely possible. So long as he is merely one of a herd working for hire, and
living on another's domain, he must be dependent and destitute of manly in¬
dividuality and self-reliance.f
South Carolina appropriated last year $200,000 to buy land in the upper part
of the state which has been sold to freedmen for homesteads. Upwards of
40,000 acres of this land have been actually sold during the year to poor men
of all colors. The Governor says he intends this year to recommend for the
same purpose an appropriation of $40,000.
The freedmen are very eager for land. The savings they have placed in our
banks, and the profits of cotton this year, are enabling them to make large
purchases. In Orangeburg county, South Carolina, hundreds of colored men
have bought lands and are building and settling upon them. In a single day,
in our Charleston Savings Bank, I took the record of seventeen freedmen who
were drawing their money to pay for farms they had been buying, generally
forty or fifty acres each, paying about $10 per acre. I met at a cotton mer¬
chant's in that city, ten freedmen who had clubbed together with the proceeds
of their crop and bought a whole sea island plantation of seven hundred acres.
The merchant was that day procuring their deed. He told me that the entire
» Freedmen at Port Royal, pp. 809-10.
-{•Report of Brevet Major General O. O. Howard, October 20, 1869, p. 10.
44 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
purchase price was paid ill cash from the balance due them on the crop of the
season. Here, then, besides supporting their families with provisions raised,
these men had each, by the profits of a single year bought a farm of seventy
acres. What northern laborer could do better ?
I found on the islands other clubs forming to do the same thing, and this in
a season when the caterpillar had destroyed one-half their cotton. A leading
cotton broker in Charleston told me that he thought nearly half the cotton on
the islands belonged to the colored men. He had himself already 126 consign¬
ments for them, and the amount of his sales on their account had reached
over $30,000. As I learned, the average of the freedmen's crop, or share of
crop, of Sea Island cotton is from three to six hundred pounds
Just out of the city is a settlement of about one hundred families—something
like the Barry farm at Washington—where small homesteads have been pur¬
chased and are being paid for; average value of each from $100 to $500. These
families are joyously cultivating their own gardens and provision grounds,
also finding work in the city. The Bureau has erected for them a convenient
house, now used for a school and chapel.
Further in the interior the freedmen are buying or renting land and raising
their own crops. A community of such families, about thirty miles out (in
South Carolina), came in, a few days since, to market their crops for the sea¬
son. They had chartered a railroad car for $140 the round trip, and loading it
with cotton, corn, etc., exchanged the same for clothing, furniture, implements
of husbandry and supplies for putting in their next crop. They came to us on
returning and begged very hard that a teacher might be sent to their settle¬
ment, promising to pay all expenses. These are the indications of the drift of
these people towards independent home life and profitable labor. Although
the savings bank here is one of the most recently established, it has had de¬
posited over $60,000, of which $31,000 is still to their credit
I find the following history of the Freedmen's labor:
The first year they worked for bare subsistence; second year they bought
stock—mules, implements, etc.; third year many rented lands; and now, the
fourth year, large numbers are prepared to buy. This is the record of the
most industrious, others are following at a slower pace. In this process diffi¬
culties have been encountered—low wages, fraud, ill treatment, etc., some be¬
coming discouraged, but the majority are determined to rise. As illustrations:
Several freedmen in Houston county have bought from 100 to 600 acres of land
each. One man is now planting for fifty bales of cotton. A colored company
(called Peter Walker's) own 1,500 acres. Two brothers (Warren) saved in the
bank $600 and with it obtained a title to 1,500 acres, having credit for the bal¬
ance, and both are now building houses and preparing to make a crop which
they expect will clear off their whole debt. In Americus fully one hundred
houses and lots belong to the colored people.*
Last spring 1(50 Negroes banded together, chose one of the smartest of their
number as superintendent and commenced work. Now they show you with
pride 250 acres of rice, 250 acres of corn, nearly the same amount of peas (beans
we should call them), besides many acres of smaller crops. This joint stock
company is working not only with energy but with perfect harmony.
Thus it was that the Negro emerged to a semblance of economic free¬
dom only to be met by the Black Codes and political revolution.
We will now turn back to the alternate way in which both the slave
* J. W. Alford: Letters from the South, etc., pp. 5, 0,10,15 and 19.
Migration
45
and the freedman sought a broader chance to live and develop, namely,
migration.
Section 8. Migration
As early as 1788 the Negro Union of Newport, R. I., wrote to the free
African Society of Philadelphia proposing a general exodus of Negroes
to Africa. To this the Free African Society soberly replied: "With
regard to the immigration to Africa you mention, we have at present
but little to communicate on that head, apprehending every pious man
is a good citizen of the whole world." But the desire to better their
condition by going to some other country had taken root among the
best New England Negroes. The Cuffes, for instance, John and Paul,
petitioned for the right to vote in 1780, and in 1815 we find that Paul
Cuffe, the younger, who was a merchant between America and Africa,
had started to take a colony to Africa. Thus an early attempt at African
colonization by a band of New England Negroes started the year before
the American Colonization Society was organized:
It was conducted by Paul Cuffe, who was born in New Bedford, Mass., of an
African father and an Indian mother. He had risen from abject poverty to
wealth and respectability, and was largely engaged in navigation. He be¬
lieved that only in Africa could his people find civil and religious liberty. At
a cost to himself of four thousand dollars, and in his own vessel, he took out
from Boston a colony of thirty-eight persons, which landed at Sierra Leone,
and might have resulted in something permanent and valuable but for the
death of Cuffe in the following year, and the exclusion of American vessels
from British colonies. The next year the Colonization Society began its work.
The first important movement of the Colonization Society was to send out, on
borrowed money, Samuel J. Mills and Ebenezer Burgess to select a suitable
site for a colony. They sailed November 16,1817, and arrived the 22d of the
following March. They passed down the coast some one hundred and twenty
miles to the island Sherbro, at the mouth of a river of the same name. Here
they found a small but prosperous colony under the direction of John Kizzel,
who had built a church on the island and was preaching to the people. Kizzel
had been carried from Africa when a child and sold as a slave in South Caro¬
lina, but had joined the British during the Revolutionary war, and at its close
had sailed from Nova Scotia with a company of colored people to reside in
Africa.*
The first ten years witnessed the struggles of a noble band of colored people,
who sought a new home on the edge of a continent given over to the idolatry
of the heathen. The funds of the Society were not as large as the nature and
scope of the work demanded. Emigrants went slowly, not averaging more
than 170 per annum—only 1,282 in ten years: but the average from the first of
January, 1848, to the last of December, 1852, was 540 yearly; and, in the single
year of 1858, 782 emigrants arrived at Monrovia. In 1855 the population of
Monrovia and Cape Palmas had reached about 8,000.
The Colonization Society found many eminent Negroes to help them and
Liberia was in its very foundation an example of Negro co-operation. One was
Lott Carey, who was born a slave in Virginia, about 1780. His father was a
Baptist. In 1804 Lott removed to Richmond, where he worked in a to-
♦Arnett's Budgett, 1885-6, pp. 164-5.
46 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
bacco factory and from all accounts was very profligate and wicked. In
1807, being converted, he joined the first Baptist Church, learned to read, made
rapid advancement as a scholar, and was shortly afterwards licensed to
preach.
After purchasing his family, in 1813, he organized, in 1815, the African Mis¬
sionary Society, the first missionary society in the country, and within five
years raised $700 for African missions.
That Lott Carey was evidently a man of superior intellect and force of char¬
acter is to be evidenced from the fact that his reading took a wide range—
from political economy, in Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, to the voyage of
Captain Cook.
That he was a worker as well as a preacher is true, for when he decided to
go to Africa his employers offered to raise his salary from $800 to $1,000 a year.
Remember that this was over eighty years ago. Carey was not seduced by
such a flattering offer, for he was determined. His last sermon in the old First
Baptist Church in Richmond must have been exceedingly powerful, for it was
compared by an eye witness, a resident of another state, to the burning, elo¬
quent appeals of George Whitefield. Fancy him as he stands there in that
historic building ringing the changes on the word "freely," depicting the
willingness with which he was ready to give up his life for service in Africa.
He, as you may readily know, was the leader of the pioneer colony to Libe¬
ria, where he arrived even before the agent of the Colonization Society. In
his new home his abilities were recognized, for he was made vice governor
and became governor, in fact, while Governor Ashmun was absent from the
colony in this country. Carey did not allow his position to betray the cause
of his people, for he did not hesitate to expose the duplicity of the Coloniza¬
tion Society and even to defy their authority, it would seem, in the interests
of the people.
While casting cartridges to defend the colonists against the natives in 1828,
the accidental upsetting of a candle caused an explosion that resulted in his
death.
Carey is described as a typical Negro, six feet in height, of massive and erect
frame, with the sinews of a Titan. He had a square face, keen eyes and a
grave countenance. His movements were measured; in short, he had all the
bearings and dignity of a prince of the blood. *
The first Negro college graduate also went to Liberia:
John Brown Russwuric was born in 1799 at Port Antonio in the island of
Jamaica of a Creole mother. When 8 years old he was put at school in Quebec.
His father meanwhile came to the United States and married in the District
of Maine. Mrs. Russwurm, true wife that she was, on learning the relation¬
ship, insisted that John Brown (as hitherto he had been called) should be sent
for and should thenceforth be one of the family. Through his own exertions,
with some help from others, he was at length enabled to enter college and to
complete the usual course. It should be remembered, to the credit of his fel¬
low students in Brunswick, that peculiar as his position was among them,
they were careful to avoid everything that might tend to make that position
unpleasant. From college he went to New York and edited an abolition pa¬
per. This did not last long. He soon became interested in the colonization
cause, and engaged in the service of the society. In 1829 he went to Africa as
superintendent of public schools in Liberia, and engaged in mercantile pur¬
suits in Monrovia. From 1830 to 1834 he acted as colonial secretary, superin-
* Cromwell, In The Negro Church.
Migration
47
tending at the same time and editing with decided ability the Liberia Herald.
In 1886 he was appointed Governor of the Maryland Colony at Cape Palmas,
and so continued until his death in 1851. With what fidelity and ability he
discharged the duties of this responsible post may be gathered from the fol¬
lowing remarks of Mr. Latrobe, at the time the president of the Maryland
Colonization Society. He was addressing the Board of Managers: "None
knew better," he said, "or so well as the Board under what daily responsibili¬
ties Governor Russwurm's life in Africa was passed, and how conscientiously
he discharged them; how, at periods when the very existence of the then in¬
fant colony depended upon its relations with surrounding tribes of excited
natives, his coolness and admirable judgment obviated or averted impending
perils; how, when the authority and dignity of the colonial government were
at stake in lamentable controversies with civilized and angry white men, the
calm decorum of his conduct brought even his opponents to his side; how,
popular clamor among the colonists calling upon him as a judge to disregard
the forms of law and sacrifice of offending individuals in the absence of legal
proof, he rebuked the angry multitude by the stern integrity of his conduct;
and how, when on his visit to Baltimore in 1848 he was thanked personally by
the members of the board, he deprecated the praise bestowed upon him for
the performance of his duty, and impressed all who saw him with the modest
manliness of his character and his most excellent and courteous bearing."*
Most of the thinking Negroes of the United States were, however,
opposed to emigration to Africa. - Bishop Allen wrote a strong letter
against it in 1827 to the Freedmeri's Journal.
In the first Negro convention held at Philadelphia in 1831,
The question of emigration to Canada West, after an exhaustive discussion
which continued during the two days of the convention's sessions, was recom¬
mended as a measure of relief against the persecution from which the colored
American suffered in many places in the North. Strong resolutions against
the American Colonization Society were adopted. The formation of a parent
society with auxiliaries in the different localities represented in the conven¬
tion, for the purpose of raising money to defray the object of purchasing a
colony in the province of upper Canada, and ascertain more definite informa¬
tion, having been effected, the convention adjourned to reassemble on the
first Monday in June, 1831, during which time the order of the convention re¬
specting the organization of the auxiliary societies had been carried into
operation. +
Again at a second convention in 1832,
The question exciting the greatest interest was one which proposed the pur¬
chase of other lands for settlement in Canada; for 800 acres of land had already
been secured, two thousand individuals had left the soil of tlieir birth, crossed
the line and laid the foundation for a structure which promised an asylum for
the colored population of the United States. They had already erected two
hundred log houses and five hundred acres of land had been brought under
cultivation. But hostility to the settlement of the Negro in that section had
been manifested by Canadians, many of whom would sell no land to the Ne¬
gro. This may explain the hesitation of the convention and the appointment
of an agent, whose duty it was to make further investigation and report to the
subsequent convention.
♦Atlanta University Publication, No. 5, pp. 32-3.
+ American Negro Academy, occasional papers, No. 9, p. 6.
48 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Opposition to the colonization movement was emphasized by a strong pro¬
test against any appropriation by Congress in behalf of the American Coloni¬
zation Society. Abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia was also
urged at the same convention. This was one year before the organization of
the American Anti-Slavery Society.
A convention at Rochester, N. Y., in 1858 pronounced against emigra¬
tion,
But those who saw only in emigration the solution of the evils with which
they were beset, immediately called another convention to consider and decide
upon the subject of emigration from the United States. According to the call,
no one was admitted to the convention who would introduce the subject of
emigration to any part of the eastern hemisphere, and opponents of emigra¬
tion were also to be excluded.
Bishop Holly of Hayti, writes: " The convention was accordingly held. The
Rev. William Munroe was president, the Rt. Rev. (William) Paul Quinn, vice-
president, Dr. Delaney, chairman of the business committee, and I was the
secretary
"There were three parties in that emigration convention,ranged according
to the foreign fields they preferred to emigrate to. Dr. Delaney headed the
party that desired to go to the Niger Valley in Africa, Whitfield the party
which preferred to go to Central America, and Holly the party which pre¬
ferred to go to Hayti.
"All these parties were recognized and embraced by the convention. Dr.
Delaney was given a commission to go to Africa, in the Niger Valley, Whit¬
field to go to Central America, and Holly to Hayti, to enter into negotiations
with the authorities of these various countries for Negro emigrants and to re¬
port to future conventions. Holly was the first to execute his mission, going
down to Hayti in 1855, when he entered into relations with the Minister of the
Interior, the father of the late President Hyppolite, and by him was presented
to Emperor Faustin I. The next emigration convention was held at Chatham,
Canada West, in 1856, when the report on Hayti was made. Dr. Delaney went
off on his mission to the Niger Valley, Africa, via England in 1858. There he
concluded a treaty signed by himself and eight kings, offering inducements
for Negro emigrants to their territories. Whitfield went to California, intend¬
ing to go later from thence to Central America, but died in San Francisco
before he could do so. Meanwhile (James) Redpath went to Hayti as a John
Brownist after the Harper's Ferry raid, and reaped the first fruits of Holly's
mission by being appointed Haytian Commissioner of Emigration in the
United States by the Haytian Government, but with the express injunction
that Rev. Holly should be called to co-operate with him. OnRedpath's arrival
in the United States, he tendered Rev. Holly a commission from the Haytian
Government at $1,000 per annum and traveling expenses to engage emigrants
to go to Hayti. The first shipload of emigrants went from Philadelphia in
1861.
"Not more than one-third of the 2,000 emigrants to Hayti received through
this movement permanently abided there. They proved to be neither intel¬
lectually, industrially nor financially prepared to undertake to wring from
the soil the riches that it is ready to yield up to such as shall be thus prepared;
nor are the Government and influential individuals sufficiently instructed in
social, industrial and financial problems which now govern the world, to turn
to profitable use willing workers among the laboring class.
"The Civil war put a stop to the African emigration project by Dr. Delaney
Migration
49
taking the commission of major from President Lincoln, and the Central
American project died out with Whitfield, leaving the Hay tian emigration as
the only remaining practical outcome of the emigration convention of 1854" *
Nothing more was heard of emigration from the Negroes themselves
until after the war. With the overthrow of the Negro suffrage in 1876
and the consequent reign of terror, the project was revived.
Simultaneously the movement arose in several states. The first
leader was Benjamin Singleton, a Negro undertaker of Tennessee, who
began in 1869 and brought in all two colonies of 7,432 Negroes to Kansas.
A corporation was formed as follows:
Certificate of Incorporation
The Singleton Colony
I
The name of this corporation shall be "The Singleton Colony of Morris and
Lyon Counties, State of Kansas."
II
The purpose for which this corporation is formed is to promote emigration
and the encouragement of agriculture and the acquisition of homes for colored
people.
III
The place where its business is to be transacted is at Dunlap, in the county
of Morris, state of Kansas.
IY
The term for which this corporation is to exist is fifty years.
V
The number of directors or trustees of this corporation shall not be more
than thirteen. f
Henry Adams started an even greater movement in Louisiana. He
said to the Senate committee:
In 1870,1 believe it was, or about that year, after I had left the army—I went
into the army in 1866, and came out the last of 1869—and went right back home
again, where I went from, Shreveport; I enlisted there, and went back there.
I enlisted in the regular army, and then I went back after I had come out of
the army. After we had come out a parcel of we men that was in the army
and other men thought that the way our people had been treated during the
time that we were in service—we heard so much talk of how they had been
treated and oppressed so much and there was no help for it—that caused me
to go into the army at first, the way our people was opposed. There was so
much going on that I went off and left it; when I came back it was still going
on, part of it, not quite so bad as at first. So a parcel of us got together and
said that we would organize ourselves into a committee and look into affairs
and see the true condition of our race, to see whether it was possible we could
stay under a people who had held us under bondage or not. Then we did so
and organized a committee. Some of the members of the committee was
ordered by the committee to go into every state in the South where we had
been slaves there, and post one another from time to time about the true con¬
dition of our race, and nothing but the truth.
•American Negro Academy: Occasional papers,No. 9, pp. 20-1.
+ Negro Exodus from the Southern States, Vol. 8, pp. 387-8,3rd part.
50 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Then came increasing outrages. This organization appealed to the
President and Congress in September, 1874. By 1877, however, the
organization lost hopes of peace and justice in the South.
We found ourselves in such condition that we looked around and we seed
that there was no way on earth, it seemed, that we could better our condition
there, and we discussed that thoroughly in our organization along in May.
We said that the whole South—every state in the South—had got into the
bands of the very men that held us slaves—from one thing to another—and we
thought that the men that held us slaves was holding the reins of govern¬
ment over our heads in every respect almost, even the constable up to the
governor. We felt we had almost as well be slaves under these men. In re¬
gard to the whole matter that was discussed, it came up in every council.
Then we said there was no hope for us and we had better go We
had several organizations; there were many organizations; I can't tell you
how many immigration associations, and so forth, all springing out of our
colonization council. We had a large meeting, some five thousand people
present, and made public speeches in 1877 on immigration.
The convention met April 17, 1879, and it declared:
The fiat to go forth is irresistible. The constantly recurring, nay, ever pres¬
ent,fear which haunts the minds of these our people in the turbulent parishes
of the state is, that slavery in the horrible form of peonage is approaching;
that the avowed disposition of the men now in power is to reduce the laborer
and his interest to the minimum of advantages as freemen and to absolutely
none as citizens, has produced so absolute a fear that in many cases it has
become a panic. It is flight from present sufferings and from the wrongs to
come. The committee finds that this exodus owes its effectiveness to society
organizations among plantation laborers; that it began with the persecutions
and the political mobs of the years 1874 and 1875, and was organized as a coloni¬
zation council in August, 1874, for emigration. This organization beginning
in Caddo Parish, spread rapidly from parish to parish until it had permeated
the state, and in sections particularly known as the cotton belt, where law¬
lessness and outrages upon black persons are most frequent, the society has
been most active.
Today this organization, as your committee has definitely learned, numbers
on its rolls 92,800 names of men, women and children over twelve years of age,
in Louisiana, Northwestern Texas, Arkansas,Mississippi and Alabama; 69,000
of these are represented in the different parishes of this state. The cohesive-
ness of this organization in its secrecy and management being entirely com¬
mitted to the plantation laborers and their direct representatives, has secured
its potency. The representative political leader was neither intrusted with
nor informed of its existence. Year by year since 1874 the organization, as
encroachment after encroachment was made on the rights of the colored peo¬
ple, grew and strengthened, and now when reduced to virtual peonage and
the threatened deprivation of all rights as freemen and citizens is imminent,
the exodus has ensued and its consequences are manifest.*
Actual movement of immigrants began in 1879. In Alabama the
movement took shape in a labor convention, at Montgomery in 1872,
which listened to a report from an agent sent to Kansas. The commit¬
tee on labor and wages declared :
•Negro Exodus from Southern States, Vol. 8, part 2, pp. 89,101,108-9.
Migration
51
It will be seen from the above figures that the laborer is compelled to pay,
in round numbers, 40 per cent for all the capital borrowed. We submit this is
usury; the capitalist charging just five times the lawful interest:
Recapitulation of a Laborer's Account
Total from all sources $387.31
Total outlay 306.20
Profits $ 81.11
Out'of this amount ($81.11), the laborer must clothe himself and family, feed
the little ones, and furnish medical attendance for the same. Hence his ina¬
bility to accumulate property. Mr. McKiel then introduced the following
resolution, which was adopted:
Whereas, the report of the committee on labor and wages shows a sad con¬
dition of affairs amongst the colored citizens of Alabama, owing in a great
part to the fact that we are landless: Therefore,
Be it resolved, That this convention memorialize the Congress of the United
States to pass the bill now pending before that honorable body, known as "A
bill to incorporate the Freedmen's Homestead Company," thinking as we do
that such a company would do much good by assisting many poor men to ob¬
tain homes, thereby rendering him a free and independent citizen.*
On December 2, 1874, another convention met in Montgomery and
sent a long memorial to President Grant. The convention declared :
We have, therefore, organized an emigration association to give to them
authority to take steps as will best effect the early settlement of a colony of
colored families in the far West, which, in case of success, may be a nucleus
around which many thousands of the hard-working colored families of Ala¬
bama may build for themselves happy homes.f
In Texas we are told this story:
Last July we held a state conference; that is, I mean the delegates, of whom
I was one. This conference was held in the city of Houston for the purpose
of consulting the best steps to be taken with regard to the migration of col¬
ored people, and also to their future elevation. I had the honor of being
elected one of the commissioners on migration from the sixth Congressional
district. I have been traveling over the counties of my district ever since,
lecturing to my people. Since last July I have gone through the following
counties, and received the following amounts from each county: Hays county,
$4.40; Caldwell county, $16.50; Guadalupe county, $8.90; Comal county, $3.20;
Blanco county, $1.50; Kendall county, $2.75; Kerr county,$2.55; Wilson county,
$6.85; Gonzales county, $14,354 DeWitt county, $2&95; Victoria county, $21.20;
Goliad county, $13.40, the total amounting to $122.55. In many counties I have
walked from thirty to forty miles, because the people were so poor they could
not help me.J
North Carolina had a movement in 1878:
We, the undersigned colored people of the second Congressional district of
North Carolina, having labored hard for several years, under disadvantages
over which we had no control, to elevate ourselves to a higher plane of Chris¬
tian civilization; and, whereas, our progress has been so retarded as to nearly
♦ Negro Exoclus from Southern States, Vol. 8, p. 140,3rd part.
+Negro Exodus from Southern States, Vol. 8, 2nd part, p, 401.
t Negro Exodus from Southern States, Vol. 7, pp. 430.
52 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
nullify all our efforts, after dispassionate and calm consideration, our deliber¬
ate conviction is, that emigration is the only way in which we can elevate
ourselves to a higher plane of true citizenship.*
This was signed bjr 168 Negroes. South Carolina had a Charleston
Colored Western Emigration Society, which endorsed the Nashville
convention in 1879.
Finally all the movements culminated in a great convention at
Nashville, Tenn., May 6-9, 1879. Here were gathered 139 representatives
from Alabama, Arkansas,Georgia, Illinois, Indiana,Kansas, Kentucky,
Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, Oregon,
Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and the
District of Columbia. Many noted Negro leaders were there: a former
lieutenant-governor of Louisiana, a future bishop, and United States
paymaster, and such men as Gibbs of Arkansas, Pledger and R. R.
Wright of Georgia, Council of Alabama, Knox of Indiana, T. W. Hen¬
derson of Kansas, Lewis of Louisiana, Lynch of Mississippi, Loudin of
Ohio, Still of Pennsylvania., Rainey of South Carolina, Burrus and
Napier of Tennessee, Cuney of Texas, and Cromwell of the District of
Columbia. This, the most representative Negro convention ever as¬
sembled in the South, said in its address:
Fifteen years have elapsed since our emancipation, and though we have
made material advancement as citizens, yet we are forced to admit that ob¬
stacles have been constantly thrown in our way to obstruct and retard our
progress. Our toil is still unrequited, hardly less under freedom than slavery,
whereby we are sadly oppressed by poverty and ignorance, and consequently
prevented from enjoying the blessings of liberty, while we are left to the
shame and contempt of all mankind. This unfortuate state of affairs is
because of the intolerant spirit exhibited on the part of the men who control
the state governments of the South today. Free speech in many localities is
not tolerated. The lawful exercise of the rights of citizenship is denied when
majorities must be overcome. Proscription meets us on every hand; in the
school-room, in the church that sings praises to that God who made of one
blood all the nations of the earth ; in places of public amusement, in the jury
box, and in the local affairs of government we are practically denied the
rights and privileges of freemen.
We can not expect to rise to the dignity of true manhood under the system
of labor and pay as practically carried out in some portions of the South today.
Wages are low at best, but when paid in scrip having no purchasing power
beyond the prescribed limits of the landowner, it must appear obviously plain
that our condition must ever remain the same; but with a fair adjustment
between capital and labor, we as a race, by our own industry, would soon be
placed beyond want and in a self-sustaining condition
Resolved, That it is the sense of this conference that the great current of
migration which has for the past few months taken so many of our people
from their homes in the South, and which is still carrying hundreds to the
free and fertile West, should be encouraged and kept in motion until those
who remain are accorded every right and privilege guaranteed by the consti¬
tution and laws.
Resolved, That we recommend great care on the part of those who migrate.
• Negro Exodus from Southern States, Vol. 7, p. 281,1st part.
Migration
53
They should leave home well prepared with certain knowledge of localities to
which they intend to move; money enough to pay their passage and enable
them to begin life in their new homes with prospect of ultimate success.*
On the Northern side both Negroes and whites organized immigra¬
tion aid societies. Some of them simply spent money furnished by
others. Others were more extensive organizations. In Indianapolis,
for instance:
On Wednesday evening, December 3, 1879, a meeting was held in the lecture
room of the Second Baptist Church to organize a relief society to care for the
colored emigrants, as we learned that some of them were on their way here
from North Carolina, and that they would arrive here destitute. After the
preliminary organization of the meeting, the object of the same being stated,
on motion it was voted that a society be organized tonight for the purpose of
helping and caring for those people when they arrive" here, similar to and in
co-operation with the relief society which was organized at the A. M. E.
Church, November 24.+
This committee collected $296.85.
Two similar societies worked in St. Louis:
The colored men of ikhis city, who have been active in the organization of
the above named society to assist the colored immigrants from the South in
finding local habitation in the rich and growing West, have just perfected that
organization, with the above named as president, secretary, treasurer and di¬
rectors. These names include some of the leading colored men of the place
and an advisory board, to be composed of some of the most public-spirited and
benevolent of our citizens, and these are a guaranty to all who know them of
perfect good faith, integrity and trustworthiness in the distribution of such
funds as may be contributed to them for the purposes indicated.
The Colored Refugee Relief Board committee
Found 2,000 emigrants half clad, without food or means, filling the colored
churches, halls and houses, and began at once an active canvass for funds, and
for weeks liberal hands administered to their every want, and boxes of cloth¬
ing and baskets of food were given without stint; but still they came upon
every bo^,t from the lower Mississippi, until the movement assumed stupen¬
dous proportions, and the original committee felt the necessity of extending
their appeal. Already the committee, through solicitations, have issued 50,000
rations and clothing and transportation for 4,004 persons.
The second society raised $8,341.42.
The result of this great movement was thus reported:
During the first year in Kansas the fr.eedmen entered upon 20,000 acres of
land and plowed and fitted for grain-growing 8,000 acres. They built 300 cabins
and dugouts, and accumulated $30,000.
In the month of February, 1880, John M. Brown, Esq., general superintend¬
ent of the Freedmen's Relief Association, read an interesting report before the
Association, from which the following extract is taken:
The great exodus of the colored people from the South began about the first
of February, 1879. By the first of April 1,300 refugees had gathered around
Wyandotte, Kans. Many of them were in a suffering condition. It was then
* Negro Exodus from Southern States. Vol. 8, 2nd part, pp. 244-5.
-j- Negro Exodus from the Southern States, Vol. 7, p. 355.
54 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
that the Kansas Relief Association came into existence for the purpose of
helping the most needy among the refugees from the Southern states. Up o
date about 60,000 refugees have come to the state of Kansas to live. Nearly
40,000 of them were in a destitute condition when they arrived, and have been
helped by our association. We have received to date $68,000 for the relief of
the refugees. About 5,000 of those who have come to Kansas have gone to
other states to live, leaving about 55,000 yet in Kansas. About 30,000 of that
number have settled in the country, some of them on lands of their own or
rented lands; others have hired out to the farmers, leaving about 25,000 in and
around the different cities and towns of Kansas.*
The census shows the following Negroes in Kansas:
I860 627
1870 17,108
1880 4 " 43,107
1890 49,710
1900 52,008
Since 1880 immigration to the North has gone on steadily, but there
has been no large co-operative movement.
Part 3. Types of Co=operation
Section 9. The Church
The development of the Negro American has been as follows (see
diagram): The Christian Church did but little to convert the slaves
from their Obeah worship and primitive religion until the establish¬
ment of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts
in 1701; this society and the rising Methodists and Baptists rapidly
brought the body of slaves into nominal communion with the Christian
Church. No sooner, however, did they appear in the Church than dis¬
crimination began to be practiced which the free Negroes of the North
refused to accept. They, therefore, withdrew into the African Metho¬
dist and Zion Methodist Churches. The Baptists even among the
slaves early had their separate churches, and these churches in the
North began to federate about 1836. In 1871 the Methodist Church,
South, set aside their colored members into the Colored Methodist
Episcopal Church, and the other Southern churches drove their mem¬
bers into the other colored churches. The remaining Northern denom¬
inations retained their Negro members, but organized them for the
most part into separate congregations.
Practically, then, the seven-eighths of the whole Negro population
is included in its own self-sustaining, self-governing church bodies.
Nearly all of the other eighth is economically autonomous to a
very large degree. Consequently a study of economic co-operation
among Negroes must begin with the Church group. The most compact
and powerful of the Negro churches is the African Methodist Episcopal
Church. Its membership has grown as follows:
•Williams,Vol. II, pp. 586-7.
The Church
A. M. E. Church
57
Members
Ministers
1787
42
2
1818
6,778
7
1822
9,888
15
1826
7,937
17
1836
7,594
27
1846
16,190
67
1856
19,914
165
1866
73,000
265
1876
206,331
1,418
1886
403,550
2,857
1888
452,782
3,569
1890
466,202
3,809
1895
497,327
4,125
1896
618,854
4,680
1900
663,746
5,659.
1903
' 759,590
5,838
The property held is reported as follows:
No. of
Churches
Valuation of
Property*
Annual
Oonfer'n's
No.
Bishops
1787
1
$ 2,500.00
15,000.00
75,000.00
125,000.00
225,000.00
425,000.00
825,000 00
3,164,911.00
5,341,889.00
6,391,577.00
7,772,284.00
8,650,000.00
1816
7
2
1
1826
33
86
3
1
1836
4
2
1846
198
6
4
1856
210
286
7
6
1866
10
3
1876
1,833
8,394
4,009
4,069
25
6
1886
44
7
1888
48
10
1890
48
9
1896
4,850
5,775
5,831
52
9
1900
9,043,341.00
9,404,675.00
64
9
1903
69
13
•Churches and Parsonages.
The property of 1903 was divided as follows:
Total churches, 5,321 $^620,7(^.51
Total parsonages, 2,527 783,973 41
Total schools, 25 638,000.00
Grand total valuation of property $10,042,675.92
The total income has been as follows:
1822
1826.
1836.
1846
1856
1866
1876
1886
1888
1890.
1895
1896.
1900
1903
Pastors'
support
; 1,000.00
1,017.00
1,126.00
6,267.00
18,040.00
85,593.00
201,984.96
583,557.79
601.785.00
619,547.00
682,421.00
956,875.00
935,425.58
Av'g'eper
pastor
$ 66.60
63.35
41.70
93.50
109.33
322.99
142.44
204.25
168.61
158.49
141.19
204.00
204.00
168.00
Adding in traveling expenses, we have for the last four-year period:
58 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Ministerial Support
Total support and traveling expenses per year $1,046,858.00, divided as follows:
Per year Quadrennium
Bishops $ 26,000.00 $ 104,00.00
General officers 12,300.00 49,200.00
Bishops' widows 1,200.00 4,800.00
Presiding elders 176,868.00 707,472.00
Ministers 830,490.00 3,321,960.00
Grand totals $ 1,046,858.00 $ 4,187,432.00
Total amounts of money raised for all purposes other than reported above is:
Per year % 2,632,613.06
Per quadrennium 10,580,452.24
General Fund ("Dollar Money")
(Raised by a tax of $1.00 per member.)
1872-1876 $ 95,553.93
1876-1880 99,999.42
1880-1884 175,252.45
1884-1888 229,013.85
1888-1892 313,341.44
1892-1896 357,942.00
1896-1900 403,407.88
1900-1903 379,368.55
Grand total $2,053,879,52
The dollar money, or general fund, is divided as follows:
Forty-six per cent to the financial secretary, Washington, D.C.
Ten per cent to the secretary of Church Extension, Philadelphia, Pa.
Eight per cent to the secretary of Education, Kittrell, N. C.
Thirty-six per cent retained by each Annual Conference and used for local
purposes. *
Raised
Received from
dollar money
Total
expended
1864-1868
$ 5,425.65
9,317.32
12,504.22
34,811.83
19,001.09
25,675.47
66,819.27
58,876.36
80,815.66
$ 5,425.65
9,317.32
40,417.78
89,322.34
92,228.27
213,447.92
212,869.51
204,103.07
217,620.81
1868-1872
1872-1880
1880-1884
1884-1888
1888-1892
1892-1896
1896-1900
1900-1903
Total
$ 27.913.56
54,510.51
73,227.18
187,772.45
146,050.24
145,226.71
136,805.15
$813,246.87
$ 771,505.80
$1,084,752.67
The African Methodists had but a few posts in slave territory outside of
Maryland and Delaware. William Paul Quinn, the pioneer of the West,
blazfid a path from Pittsburg to St Louis, including Louisville, Ky. Good,
substantial buildings were erected on slave territory at St. Louis, Louisville
and New Orleans, La., in the early 5(?&.
In the wake of the army the banner of African Methodism was firmly
planted under the leadership of Chaplains Turner and Hunter in the East and
Southeast, followed by Carr and others in South Carolina, Bradwell and
Gaines in Georgia, Pierce and Long in Florida, Handy and John Turner in
Louisiana, Brook, Murray, Early, Page and Tyler in Kentucky and Tennessee,
Carter and Jenifer in Arkansas, JRivelo and Stringer in Mississippi, Gardner
•Arnett's Budgett, 1900, pp. 142-4,172-4.
The Church
59
and Bryant in Alabama, Wilhite and Grant in Texas, Ward on the Pacific
coast, Wilkerson in Kansas and the Rocky Mountains, Dove and Embry in
Missouri, Jameson in Virginia, Hunter and others in North Carolina. All
this will give some idea of the spirit, and the territory covered will show the
scope of their endeavor. * ' .
This department has thus planted the church throughout this coun¬
try, besides establishing 180 missions and 12,000 members in Africa and
some work in the West Indies:
South Africa West Africa
2 Conferences. 2 presiding elders.
9 presiding elders. 39 preachers.
56 ministers. West Indies
12,000 members. j presiding elder>
Canada 15 preachers.
1 presiding elder South America
8 preachers. 8 preachers.
346 members. 350 members.
Publication Department
1836-1848 $ 12,530.69
1848-1852 11,585.47
1854-1864 17,655.63
1864-1872 54,425.33
1872-1876 41,368.69
1876-1880 50,142.27
1880-1884 63,139.65
1884-1888 49,123.49
1888-1892 55,597.86
1892-1896 67,876.46
1896-1900 65,876.57
1900-1903 46,944.92
Total business 1836-1903 $ 536,267.03 t
In a report to the General Conference of 1900 at Columbus, O., Rev. T. W.
Henderson then the manager, gave the following valuation of the property:
Recorder and Review $ 25,000.00
Building and grounds 17,500.00
Steam and power plant 1,800.00
Presses, folders, stitchers, etc.. 4,240.00
Type, plates and fixtures 6,000.00
Stock on hand, etc 6,400.00
Paper, ink, etc 500.00
Total $ 61,440.00
This valuation does not include the amounts due for merchandise, printing
and subscriptions to the Recorder and Review, which would be $5,659.24 more.
This added to the actual valuation would make the amount $67,099.24. The
liabilities then were $11,263.60; assets over liabilities $55,835.64. %
The history of this department is thus given officially:
The first book of Discipline was published in 1817 by Richard Allen, in ad¬
vance of this action of General Conference, and contained the articles of re¬
ligion, government of the church, confession of faith, ritual, etc. A Hymn
Book, for the use of the church, was compiled and published. Aside from this
and the publishing of the Conference Minutes, but little was accomplished
♦United Negro, pp. 305-6.
t United Negro, pp. 540-41.
+ Arnett's Budgett, 1900, p. 139.
60 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
until the year 1841, when in the New York Conference a resolution was made
that a magazine be published monthly; but for the want of proper funds
could only be published quarterly. This gave promise of some considerable
success for nearly eight years.
In 1848 the General Conference elected Rev. A. R. Green general book stew¬
ard and authorized him to purchase a newspaper called the "Mystery," edited
by Martin R. Delany, and to change its name to the " Christian Herald," also
to move the Book Concern from Philadelphia to Pittsburg; which he did and
continued the publication of the paper until the General Conference in 1852.
The name of the paper was then changed to the " Christian Recorder
This paper was looked upon by the slaveholders of the South and pro-
slavery people of the North as a very dangerous document or sheet, and was
watched with a critical eye. It could not be circulated in the slave-holding
states by neither our ministers nor members. Hence its circulation was pro¬
scribed until the breaking out of the war in 1860, when through the aid of the
Christian Commission it did valuable service to the freedmen throughout the
South. It followed the army, went into the hovels of the freedmen and also
the hospitals, placed in the hands of soldiers, speaking cheer and comfort to
the law-abiding and liberty-loving slave whose manacles were about to fall
off. *
The Review and Recorder are still published.
Church Extension
The Department of Church Extension of the African Methodist Episcopal
Church was organized in 1892 by the Annual Conference at Philadelphia. The
revenue coming into this society consists principally of savings from funds
that were hitherto collected and spent without definite purpose. In 1872 the
General Conference adopted what is known as the Dollar Money law. It was
the intention that one dollar from or for each member of the church should
cover all the expenses of the general connection for missionary and educa¬
tional work, the supportof bishops, general officers, superannuated preachers,
and help the Conferences to help the widows of deceased preachers, and assist¬
ing in making up the support of pastors on poor fields.
In one year we have secured through the efforts of our resident bishop
$50,000 of church property in South Africa alone, while word from one of our
presiding elders in Liberia to the secretary of Church Extension is, " We are
pushing into the interior; stand by us." 1 1 :
The constitution provided the revenues without extra taxation on the gen¬
eral church, as follows:
Ten per cent of the Dollar Money; fifty per cent of the Children's Day; ad¬
mission fees and annual dues to the Women's Department of Church Exten¬
sion : special collections, gifts and bequests, etc.
We herewith submit the result of our savings for ten years, or the moneys
handled by this department.
Fifty per cent of (Children's Day to April 28,1902 $ 29,8t>2.32
Ton'per cent of Dollar Money to April 23,1902 89,122.58
Loans returned to the Department 14,883.92
Interest returned to the Department 8,817.90
Grand total $145,728.61
We have disbursed In loans to ehurches - 97,751.71
Have donated to needj' churches 12,119.79
Total $109,871.50
•Arnett's Budgett, 1900, p. 138.
The Church 61
Our assets in notes and mortgages up to April 23,1902, and other securities.. 97,630.34
Property belonging to the Department 30,500.00
Total* $128,130.34
Liabilities 6,390.00
The following number of loans have been made during the quadrennium :f
1896-1897 . tl77
1897-1898 70
1898-1899 80
1900 94
Total ^
Donations • 79
Grand total churches, schools and Departments helped by this Department
this quadrennium $540
Church Extension
Receipts
1892-1893 $ 4,817.07
1893-1894 11,896.56
1894-1895 11,568.12
1895-1896 12,119.55
1896-1897 14,426.60
1897-1898 17,252.99
1898-1899 15,403.25
1899-1900 17,391.14
Grand total $ 104,875.28
Loans
Donations
Total
1897
$ 10,407.17
11,614.30
11,150.25
9,070.96
$ 1,149.48
719.00
656.98
1,142.83
$ 11,556.66
12,433.80
11,807.23
10,213.79
1898
1899
1900
$ 42,242.69
$ 3,668.29
$ 45,910.98
Sunday School Union
Receipts
1882-1888 $ 40,271.72
1888-1892 82,623.26
1892-1896 69,714.62
1896-1900 72,835.42
1900-1903 68,814.05
Total $ 334,259.07
The secretary reports in 1907:
Our real estate line is valued at $15,000.00. Machinery, type, fixtures, etc., is
about $37,000.00. We circulate about two million periodicals per annum, con¬
sisting of teachers' and scholars' quarterlies, Gems, Juveniles, Little Bible
Seekers and primaries for beginners, the Sunday School Monitor, books and
pamphlets, etc. Our receipts are about $40,000 per annum; our pay-roll is
about $1,000 per month.
* United Negro, pp. 306-7.
+Arnett's Budgett, 1900, pp. 152-153.
62 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Educational Department*
Amount of Money for Education by A.M. E. Church
1847-1903, Union Seminary $ 20,000.00
1863-1903, Wilberforce University 440,164.77
1891-1903, Payne Seminary 44,800.00
Grand total for Wilberforce plant $ 504,964.77
1891-1903, connectional money $1,021,558.49
1900-1904, by endowment 48,000.00
1900-1904, by 8 per cent 40,000.00
Grand total connectional $1,109,558.49
Grand total for education 1,614,523.26
Some figures follow showing the total amounts raised for the church in cer¬
tain years.
The receipts of the church in 1876 were as follows:
Amount of contingent money raised $ 2,976.85
Amount raised for the support of pastors 201,984.06
Amount raised for the support of presiding elders 23,896.66
Amount of Dollar Money for general purposes, etc 28,009.97
Amount raised to support Sunday Schools for the year 1876.. 17,415.38
Amount raised for the missionary society 3,782.72
Amount raised in one year for building churches 169,558.60
Total amount raised for all purposes $ 447,624.19
The receipts of four departments of the church, 1880-1884, were:
Financial department $ 179,854.30
Publication department 63,139.60
Missionary department 34,500.00
Sunday school department 2,341.61
Total $ 279,835.56
The total income of the church in this same period, 1880-1884, was:
General departments $ 279,835.56
Support of pastors 1,611,189.01
Presiding elders' support 177,275.26
All other purposes 1,718,129.89
Grand total $3,786,429.72
The total income for the one year, 1884, was:
Contingent money $ 4,634.09
Presiding eldership 50,580.22
Pastors' support 393,789.23
Church extension 144,669.91
Missionary 5,358.04
Bishops' traveling expenses 1,002.51
Pastors'traveling expenses ; 16,899.78
Presiding elders' traveling expenses — 6,059.09
Educational money 8,139.48
Haytlan mission 942.90
Charity 7,223.40
Incidental expenses of the trustees 180,446.25
Church debts 33,962.93
Delegate money 2,159.01
Dollar Money 49,400.00
Sunday school money 27,400.00
Total $ 814,647.79
The income for 1900 is thus reckoned up by the church statistician:
For the year $1,777,948.20
End month 148,162.35
End day
End hour
End minute 48.18
End second 80
• For details see Schools infra.
The Church 63
Financial Support of Ministry, 1900
Presiding elders support, per annum .* $ 145,735.37
Ministers1 support, per annum 835,796.21
Traveling expenses, per annum 29,594.00—$1,011,125.58
Bishops' support, per annum 26,000.00
General officers support, per annum 5,400.00— 31,400.00
Grand total for ministerial support for one year $1,042,525.58
The next largest Negro church is that of the
Baptists
The growth in numbers of this sect is not accurately known. They
are primarily small disassociated groups of worshippers whose economic
activities were small, except in large cities, until the individual groups
united into associations. The first of these associations was formed in
Ohio in 1836, followed by another in Illinois in 1838. The growth of
these associated Baptists has been as follows:
Negro Baptist
Members
Ministers
Churches
1850
150,000
1,071,902
1,399,198
1,604,310
1,975,538
2,038,427
2,110,269
1885
4,590
8,637
10,119
14,861
16,080
9,097
11,987
13,138
15,654
16,440
16,996
1891
1894
1901
1902
1905
Value of Property
1894 $ 11,271,651
1901 11,605,891
1802 12,196,130
1905 14,376,372
Total Income
1891
Contributions for salaries and expenses $ 688,856.14
Contributions for missions 38,051.04
Contributions for education 14,958.07
Contributions for miscellaneous 79,260.46
Total contributions reported $ 821,125.71
1901
Total raised ~ . 1,816,442.72
1902
Church expenses 3,090,190.71
Sunday school expenses 107,054.00
State missions 9,954.00
Foreign missions 8,725.00
Home missions and publications 81,658.40
Education 127,941.00
Total $3,425,523.11
The most remarkable department of the Baptist Church is the
National Baptist Publication Board
This organization is so unique that a careful history is necessary.
The proposition to establish a publishing house was adopted at the
Savannah Convention in 1893.
In 1894 at Montgomery, Ala., the question was again discussed, but many
obstacles were found in the way. Rev. R. H. Boyd of San Antonio, Texas,
64 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
offered a set of resolutions, setting forth that this publishing committee, board,
or concern should proceed at once to the publication of Sunday Schoo 1
ture, consisting of the International Lessons in either newspaper, magazine
or pamphlet form for the benefit of their own schools, which was adopted.
On the 15th of December, 1896, Rev. R. H. Boyd, secretary and manager,
opened his office in Nashville, Tenn., and secured copies of the electrotype
plates from the Sunday Schools of the Southern Baptist Convention and em¬
ployed the Brandon Printing Company, the University Printing Press of
Nashville, TenD., to publish for him ten thousand copies of the Advanced
Quarterly, ten thousand Intermediate Quarterlies, ten thousand Primary
Quarterlies and two thousand copies of the Teachers? Monthly, thus launching
the long-talked of Negro Publishing Concern. At the next meeting of the
National Baptist Convention in Boston, Mass., Secretary Boyd reported having
sent out during the year 700,000 copies of the periodicals, together with song
books, Bibles and other religious literature. *
The Publishing Board is an incorporated publishing institution, incorpora¬
ted in 1898, under the special provision granted by the legislature of Tennessee,
with headquarters at Nashville, domiciled in the Publishing House,523 Second
avenue, North, or on the corner of Second avenue and Locust street. This
Publishing Board owns or holds in trust for the National Baptist Convention
three lots with four brick buildings thereon. Besides this it rents or leases
two other brick buildings. These make up the domicile of the Publishing
Board, and is known as the National Baptist Publishing House.
All the work of the Publishing Board is operated under the supervision of a
general secretary, assisted by a local Board of management, consisting of nine
members. These nine members hold monthly meetings, the second Tuesday
in each month. In these meetings they hear and pass upon the reports, rec¬
ommendations, etc., of the general secretary, and up to this time make quar¬
terly reports to the Executive Committee of the Home Mission Board located
at Little Rock, Ark. In this way the Home Mission Board has been a kind of
clearing house through which this local committee of management, better
known and styled as Board of Directors of the National Baptist Publishing
Board, could clear itself and make its reports.
The clerical work of the Publishing Board is operated in three divisions:
First—The Corresponding Department. This part of the clerical work con¬
sists of the work of reading and answering all letters, sending out general in¬
formation to Sunday schools, churches and missionaries. In order to do this
work with any degree of success, it requires the greater part of the time of the
general secretary, his chief clerk and a corps of six stenographers. A great
deal of this correspondence arises from the fact that the Baptists throughout
the country have learned to make the National Baptist Publishing Board a
bureau of information; hence they ask and expect answers to great and grave
questions and issues that arise among our denomination from time to time.
Second—The Bookkeeping and Counting Department. This department
consists of a bookkeeper and from four to five assistants, according to the
accumulation of work. In this department an accurate account must be kept,
first, of the invoices of all material purchased, the time of the clerks and em¬
ployees who earn salaries here, receipts and disbursements of all moneys
coming into the institution for job work done for others, receipts from sales,
donations, gifts and bequests and other receipts or disbursements.
Third—Shipping and Mailing Department. This department includes the
* United Negro, p. 526.
The Church
65
shipping by freight or express and by mail. This labor is performed under
the supervision of a chief mailing and shipping clerk with a corps of from
twelve to fifteen assistant clerks.
The Editorial Department
The editorial department consists of one editorial secretary and his stenog¬
rapher, five associate editors and thirty-six contributors. The editorial secre¬
tary has the general oversight of all matter which goes to make up the various
periodicals that are published by the institution, lays oat the work to be per¬
formed by his associate editors, names the subjects upon which the thirty-six
contributors are to prepare special articles.
The Printing or Manufacturing Department of the Publishing Board
The National Baptist Publishing Board is a threefold institution. It is a
publishing, printing and missionary institution; and, therefore, acts in a
threefold capacity. We consider that the first and greatest work of the Na¬
tional Baptist Publishing Board is its missionary, Sunday school and col-
porterage work. All other labors or efforts put forth by the Board are simply
the means to the end of doing missionary work.
The Printing or Manufacturing Department is divided into three divisions,
and is operated under the supervision of one general foreman assisted by three
under foremen.
The first is known as the Composing Department. In this department all
type is set, proof is read, pages are made up, stereotyping, and engraving is
done; also all imposing or making up forms ready for the press room are
completed here.
2. The Press Department. We have seven machines in this department;
some of these cost us in the neighborhood of $4,000 to $5,000.
3. The Bindery Department. Negro bookbinders were a nonentity nine
years ago when the Publishing Board began its operations in binding books.
We made inquiries from Maine to California, and from the Lakes to the Gulf,
but failed to find one all-round Negro bookbinder. The white bookbinding
establishments persistently refused to take Negro boys as bookbinding ap¬
prentices, and our schools of technology have failed to produce any. Hence
there was nothing left for us to do but to undertake the tedious and expensive
task of manufacturing bookbinders before we could manufacture books by
Negro artisans.
After ten years of patient, arduous and expensive toil, we boast of being
prepared to turn out of our bookbindery, with our bookbinding machinery
and bookbinding Negro artisans, well bound books that will take a place of
merit among the work of the best book publishers of the country. This de¬
partment turns out all grades of work from a common, wire-stitched, paper
covered pamphlet to a fine machine-sewed, morocco covered, gilt edged, gold
embossed volume of any size—from a vest pocket book to a fifteen hundred
page folio book.
In giving these three divisions of the manufacturing department, it is nec¬
essary here to say that besides the above named skilled laborers, the Publish¬
ing Board is required to operate both a steam and electric plant, and must,
therefore, keep on hand a corps of firemen, engineers, machinists and elec¬
tricians.
This institution has been able in the last ten years to husband and organize
all these skilled laborers, composed exclusively of Negro artisans, into a har¬
monious, well drilled working force.
66 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
The Publishing Department of the National Baptist Publishing Board
This institution is not only a manufacturing and printing plant, but is also
a publishing institution. It publishes millions of periodicals, tracts, pamph¬
lets, booklets and books from the pens of the ablest and best and most noted
Negro Baptist authors and editors the country has produced. It is scattering
them broadcast throughout the length and breadth of the American continent,
in the islands, and across the great waters, in the dark continent of Africa,
Asia and Europe.
We are supplying more than 15,000 Negro Baptist Sunday schools with their
literature, and nearly, if not quite, a million of young and old Negro Baptists
are reading from the pens and press of Negro Baptists.
To give some idea of the circulation of our religious literature we present
the following figures of our Sunday school periodicals:
NAMES OF PERIODICALS
Number
circulated
this year
Last
year
Teacher (monthly)
Senior Quarterly
Advanced Quarterly
Intermediate Quarterly
Primary Quarterly
Lesson Leaflets, etc
Lesson Cards (weekly)
Bible Picture Lesson Weekly
Baptist Sunday School Catechisms
Child Bible Question Books
National Baptist Easy Lesson Primers.
National Baptist Concert Quarterly
Total
200,500
45,000
800,000
500,000
600,000
900,000
3,852,200
96,85(5
75,000
150,900
2*6,300
1,500,000
9,006,815
182,200
' 795,666"
430,800
564,724
896,000
3,439,800
86,424
60,000
135,000
250,000
1,100,000
7,938,648
The Book and Tract Department
Besides the circulation of these 9,000,000 copies of Sunday school periodicals
annually among the 15,000 Negro Baptist Sunday schools, we send out 170,617 re¬
ligious circulars, 178,559 religious tracts and booklets, the $3,766.42 worth of books
and Bibles distributed free of charge by missionaries, the $5,937.88 worth of books
and Bibles distributed by us, through the sixty-six field men that this institu¬
tion is employing. Take a glance at the dividends arising from the sale of
thousands of song books, Bibles and other standard religious books that are
being sold and distributed by the thousands throughout the length and
breadth of this country, and some faint idea can be had of the magnitude of
the work that is being performed by this National Baptist Publishing Board,
starting ten years ago from nothing—nothing but faith in God and the justice
of its cause, going forth as a great giant strengthened with new wine to battle
against the opposition that is hurled against the Bible, the Christian religion
and the true Baptist doctrine.
Letters received and answered during the first ten years:
Year Letters
1897 18,570
1898 48,160
1899 64,816
19(H) 99,886
1901 116,504
lti()2 139,912
1903 149,914
1904 177,134
1005 204,864
1906 196,258
Total
1,206,018
The Church
67
Money collected and expended fof the National Baptist Publishing Board in
the last ten years and reported to the Convention:
Year
Business
Department
For
Missions
Total
1897
$ 4,864.29
16,869.23
27,330.97
40,388.96
51.426.67
58,666.36
67,945.46
80.319.68
87,196.04
102,490.68
$ 1,000.00
2,557.41
4,352.25
8,920.41
10,997.17
15,741.26
19,824.49
27,520.43
33,227.76
49,621.90
$ 5,864.29
19,426.64
31,683.22
49,309.37
62,423.84
74,407.62
87,769.95
1OT,840.11
120,533.80
152,112.58
1898
1899
1900
1901
1902
1903
1904
1905
1906
Total .
$ 537,498.34
$ 173,873.08
$ 711,371.42
Receipts and Disbursements
September 1, 1905, to August 31,1906.
Receipts by Months
September 1,1905, balance on hand $ 3,492 81
September, 1905 $ 11,488 87
October, 1905 6,752 84
November, 1905 3,187 69— 21,379 50
December, 1905 8,110 61
January, 1906 9,250 74
February, 1906 3,121 46— 20,482 81
March, 1906 16,217 66
April, 1906 8,367 27
May, 1906 4,148 08— 28,733 01
June, 1906 17,699 99
July, 1906 7,873 29
August, 1906 2,829 27— 28,402 55
Grand total from Business Department $102,490 68
Brought forward from Missionary report on page 14 49,621 90
Grand total from receipts and balance on hand $ 152,112 58
Disbursements
1. For salary, wages, printing material and other incidental
expenses in this department from September 1, 1905, to
August 31,1906 $ 54,666 55
2. For merchandise, special material, freight and other in¬
cidental expenses of this department from September 1,
1905, to August 31, 1906 23,445 33
3. Stamps, postage, telegrams, telephone and other incidental
expenses from September 1,1905, to August 31,1906 6,530 98
4. For editorial work, advertising, traveling and other inci¬
dental expenses of this department from September 1,
1905, to August 31,1906 2,227 14
5. On real estate notes, rents, legal advice, interest and other
incidental expenses of this department from September
1,1905, to August 31,1906 6,140 69
6. Machinery, repairs, insurance and other incidentals from
September 1,1905, to August 31,1906 2,860 44
7. Coal, fuel, electricity, gas, ice, horse feed, water tax and
other Incidentals from September 1,1905, to August 31,1906 . 2,960 29
To balance on hand 3,650 26
Total S 102,490 68
Brought forward from Missionary disbursements 49,621 90
Grand total $ 152,112 58
Report of Periodicals Published by the National Baptist Publishing Board, 1897=1906
O
00
Names of Periodicals
1897
1898
1899
1900
1901
1902
1903
190 k
1905
1906
Total
The Teacher, a monthly
magazine, fri pages
Lesson Leaflet, a 2-page
folio, weekly . ..
Child's Gem, 4-page
weekly e
21,000
165,000
53,000
327,000
3,300
728,000
65,000
505,000
5,000
1,240,000
84,800
557,000
6,000
1,500,000
136,000
139,000
585,000
162,100
762,800
172,200
856,000
182,200
896,000
200,500
900,000
1,215,800
5,553,800
542,300
22,070,000
45,000
4,955,300
2,492,400
3,506,324
6,704,000
492,755
896,300
595,900
370,000
528,000
2,340,000
Picture Lesson Cards, 2-
page, weekly
HSO,000
2,500,000
3,000,000
3,250,000
3,439,800
3,852,200
45,000
800,000
500,000
600,000
1,500,000
96,856
286,300
150,900
75,000
8 page0/ Quarterly' 48
Apages ed Quarterly> 32
Ins^epSiatequarterly'
65,000
35,000
45,000
20,000
4,500
190,000
85,000
123,000
75,000
10,K50
177,000
141,000
190,000
150,000
20,800
416,000
175,000
275,000
259,000
33,800
444,000
244,000
888,000
800,000
41,600
543,000
250,000
332,000
850,000
50,000
90,000
85,000
85,000
691,800
304,600
458,600
950,000
67,925
120,000
100,000
100,000
733,500
327,000
530,000
1,000,000
80,000
150,000
125,000
50,000
795,000
430,800
564,724
1,100,000
86,424
250,000
135,000
60,000
Ppagesy Quarterly- 32
°SS? Quarteny, 16
Bible Lesson Pictures..
Easy Lesson Primer
Child's Bible Questions.
BSatechfsm day 8ch°o1
Total...
515,500
1,595,150
2,593,800 j
3,366,600
4,921,600
5,609,000
6,717,825
7,273,700
7,939,948
9,006,756
49,439,879
The Church 69
Home Mission Department, 1906
Number of missionaries, colporters, Sunday school and Bible
workers working in co-operation with our Board during year 66
Number of churches helped to organize 89
New Sunday schools organized 53
Missionary societies formed or organized 157
Number of Conventions, Associations and other State and Dis¬
trict meetings attended 780
Missionary and Bible Conferences held 990
Letters and postal cards written 17,617
Number of religious tracts, pamphlets and booklets distributed.. 178,559
Miles traveled to perform this labor 277,084
Money collected and applied to missionary work in communities
where collected $ 14,998 19
Value of tracts, pamphlets and booklets distributed 1,632 89
Value of Bibles and books that were donated by missionaries to
needy individuals and communities 1,380 88
Money collected by missionaries and colporters and applied to
their salaries 6,844 61
Money donated by Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist
Convention on salaries of missionaries 8,603 83
Value of Bibles and books donated by the Publishing Board and
applied to missionary operations 3,766 42
Money collected by missionaries and applied to their traveling
expenses 5,937 58
Value of Bibles, books, booklets, etc., sent to missionaries and
colporters to be sold and applied to their salaries 4,200 00
Salaries of general female missionaries working under the Wo¬
man's Auxiliary Board in co-operation with our Board and
the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention 600 00
Cash supplement on missionaries' salaries 457 50
Salary of Field Secretary 1,200 00
Foreign Mission Department
The Baptists were the first Negro missionaries:
From Georgia, where he preached the gospel in 1777, during the Revolution,
George Lisle, a Negro Baptist, went to Jamaica in 1783. He preached the gos¬
pel to his own race of people at the race course and in his own hired house or
room. He gathered a cftiurch of four and supported himself by his own labor.
He spread the gospel among bond and free on .neighboring plantations and to
distant parts of the island, personally and by his own converts, so that in
about seven years he had baptized 500 believers.
Rev. Lot Carey, who was a slave in Richmond, Ta., purchased his freedom
in 1813, raised $700 for missions in Africa, and was the first missionary from
America to Africa. From the days of Lisle and Carey the Negro Baptists of
America have been prosecuting missionary work in the West India Islands
and in Africa. They have four general organizations of their own through
which they are doing missionary work in this and in other lands, besides
many Negro churches contribute to both Home antl Foreign Missions through
the missionary organizations of their white Baptist brethren.*
The figures of Negro Baptist mission work for 1907 were:
Summary by Months
September $ 1,858 50
October 634 10
November 3,014 77
December 653 37
January 634 74
February 1,589 78
March 436 79
April 4,197 69
May 1,671 73
June 736 26
July 1.151 33
August 2,273 60
Total $ 18,727 96
* De Baptlste, 1896.
70
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Baptist Property
South Africa
One hundred acres of land, Grand Oape Mound $
Home for Dr. Bouey, worth W
Other buildings reported by him ™
Chapel organ
Lot, foundation and church furnishings in Oape Town 1,0^0 00
Middledrift church building 500 00
Mission home for Rev. Buchanan 300 00
School houses reported by him 600 00
Two bells 50 00
Queenstown school house, worth 2,000 00
One organ 40 00
One bell 25 00
Two typewriters 65 00
Desks, carpenter tools and books 150 00
Boksburg, Transvaal, church building 500 00
Central Africa
Ninety-three acres of land valued at 300 00
Substantial brick church house i 200 00
Two four-room houses for missionaries 1 200 00
Organ 40 00
Holdings under Dr. Majola Agbebi reach quite 3)000 00
South America
Georgetown—Bethel Baptist Ohurch 1 800 qq
Georgetown—Nazareth Baptist Ohurch, in course of erection, on which we
have paid about 200 00
Oi'gans and bells worth 150 00
West Indies
Mission House in St. John's, Barbados 150 00
We give here only what is in the name of the Board.
Liabilities
To Edwards Bros., Liverpool, England 600 00
To Mayer & Tinsley, Kentucky 62 20
To Hayti Fund 145 35
Messrs. E. H. Darrell & Co., New York, for shipping goods to missionaries.. 11 47
African Lakes Corporation, Glasgow, Scotland, to draft drawn by L. N.
Cheeh 1,800 00
Total | 2,619 02
The cash account of a single Baptist church is of interest:
The Mt. Olive Baptist, Nashville, Tenn., 1902
Members contributing specified sums during the year:
$4 50.
8 50.
3 OtS.
8 00.
2 75.
2 50.
2 25.
2 10.
2 00.
1 HO.
1 75.
1
$ 4 50
$1 56
1
3 50
1 50
1
3 06
1 85
106
318 00
1 80
16
44 00
1 25
28
70 (X)
1 15
19
42 75
1 10
1
2 10
1 05
32
64 00
1 00
2
3 60
Under $1.00
31
54 25
Total
$ 1 56
69 00
1 35
1 30
42 50
1 15
1 10
1 05
34 00
68 00
830 77
Received from members $ 830 77
Received from regular Sunday collections 1,976 89
Received from Sunday school 107 55
Received from Woman's Mission Society 94 47
Received from Young People's Society 40 71
Miscellaneous 36 24
Total $ 3,086 63
The Church
Paid pastor
Paid Landis Banking Company .'"!!!
Paid janitors
Paid Sunday School Department
Paid Missionary Department
Paid B. Y. P.U '.'."'.'.i;;!'.".'.
Paid poor saints
Paid insurance
Paid Phillips & Buttorff
Paid Ryan & Shea
Paid incidentals, repairs, coal, printing, conventions, missions,
traveling ministers, sick members and appliances
Total paid out
Balance on hand
The next largest church is that of the Zion Methodists. This church
started in New York, withdrawing gradually from the white church,
leaning for a time toward the African Methodists of Philadelphia, but
at last becoming fully independent and autonomous in 1822.
Zion Methodists
The growth of the Zion Methodists has been as follows:
Ministers
Members
1821
1,500
13,340
425,000
409,441
551,591
575,271
1864
375
1891
1896
2,473
2,602
1900
1902
Finance
Property Income
1821 $ 618,100.00 $11,966.02
1900 4,865,372.00
1905 5,094,000.00
The income of this church is not easy to estimate. Some of its own
estimates make the annual income over $2,000,000, but this is an exag¬
geration.
The known items are:
1896-1900— Four Yean
Bishops $ 64,378.78
Education 11,421.53
General officers 5,077.07
Publication 5,114.37
Miscellaneous 6,168.14
Four years $ 92,159.91
One year 23,014,97
To this must be added the following estimates:
Pastors' salaries $ 600,000.00
Building 400,000.00
Current expenses 153,700.00
General fund 23,014.97
Total. $.986,714.97
It seems safe to say that the church raises not less than a million
dollars a year. Missions are maintained in Africa, the West Indies and
Canada, and a report on publishing says:
71
$ 1,029 62
280 00
150 00
106 55
94 47
40 71
50 55
240 00
100 00
79 00
855 81
$ 3,026 61
$ 60 02
72 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
We publish and send out The Star of Zion to about 5,000 annual subscribers,
Rev. John W. Smith, editor. We publish and send out our own Sunday school
literature to about 4,000 Sunday schools. The literature published and sent
out from the Publication House each quarter consists of Teachers' Journals,
Scholars' Senior Quarterly, Scholars' Intermediate Junior Quarterly, Picture
Lesson Cards for our little people, Historical Catechism and Commandment
Cards. We publish and send out the A. M. E. Zion Quarterly Review to about
1,000 subscribers. *
In 1866 the Methodist Church South erected its colored members into
a separate and independent church called the Colored Methodist Epis¬
copal Church:
The Colored Methodists
This church, started in 1866, has grown as follows:
Ministers
Members
1866
80,000
67,889
200,000
214,987
1872
635
1,400
2,000
1896
1906
Its property was reported in 1906 as $1,715,566. Its general church
income was $145,707 for the four years, 1898-1902. It probably raised at
least $350,000 a year in all.
The Methodists
(Colored Conferences)
1902
Churches 2,357 I Value of churches $4,566,951
Members 245,954 | Money raised 717,400
In 1906 the membership had grown to 327,000.
Other Denominations
The following figures for other denominations are given by Vass:
Baptists-
Free Will
Primitive
Old Two Seed
A. U. M. E
Congregational Methodist.
U. A. M. E
M. E. Protestant
Presbyterians
Cumberland
Afro-American
Protestant Episcopal
Congregationalists
Christians
Lutherans
Disciples of Christ
Evangelist Missionary
Reformed Episcopal
Catholics, Roman
Total
Churches
5
323
15
90
9
42
54
353
558
43
200
230
150
20
277
11
37
31
2,438
Members
271
18,162
265
3,887
319
2,279
3,183
21,341
42,000
1,883
15,000
12,155
16,000
a>5
18,587
951
1,723
14,517
166,828
Value of
Property
13,300
135,427
930
54,440
525
187,600
35,445
850,000
195,000
22,200
192,750
246,125
135,825
15,150
176,795
2,000
1 18,401
237,400
$ 2,519,313
* United Negro, p. 532.
Schools
73
The total income of these churches is unknown, but may be estimated
at not. less than $200,000 a year.
Wp may make, therefore, the following table which is based for the
most part on reliable data, but partially on estimate:
Denomination
Property
Income per Yr.
A. M. E
Baptist
Zion
O. M. E
M. E
Others
Total
$ 11,675,256
14,376,372
5,094,000
1,713,366
4,566,951
2,519,313
$ 1,777,948 20
3,425,523 11
986,714 97
350,000 00
717,400 00*
200,000 00*
$ 40,245,258
$ 7,457,586 28
* Raised by the Negroes themselves.
One other religious organization should be mentioned—the Young
Men's Christian Association. There are now three International Secre¬
taries for this work, 67 college associations and 34 city associations.
These associations hold property worth at least $250,000.
Section 10. Schools
Out of the churches sprang two different lines of economic co-opera¬
tion:
1. Schools.
2. Burial societies.
From the burial societies developed sickness and death insurance, on
the one hand, and cemeteries, homes and orphanages, on the other.
From the insurance societies" came banks and co-operative business.
We will first notice the schools, for they stood back of the larger eco¬
nomic development by means of the burial society.
Church contributions to schools are estimated by Vass as follows:
Denomination
Schools
Teachers
Pupils
Value
plants
Yearly
expenses
Baptist
A. M. E
A. M. E. Zion
Total
88
24
10
440
160
70
8,947
6,685
2,500
$ 600,000
750,000
200,000
$ 157,324
125,000
50,000
122
670
18,132
$ 1,550,000
$ 332,324
The early interest of the Negroes in education and their willingness
to work and pay for it is attested to in many ways. In Philadelphia in
1796 we have the following minutes:
To the Teachers of the African School for Free Instruction of the Black
People: We, the Trustees of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, called
Bethel, . . . being convened on matters of importance relative to the edu¬
cation of the people of color, are desirous of a First Day school being held in
our meeting house in such manner that it shall not interfere with the time of
our meeting or worship. There has been a school kept in said meeting house
last summer which was orderly attended by about sixty scholars, under the
care of Thomas Miller, deceased, and having seen the good effects of the said
74 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
school, are anxious to have a permanent school kept in the said house so long
as it may be convenient or agreeable. Signed by order of the Board of Trus¬
tees, Richard Allen, March, 1796.
We, the overseers and teachers of the First Day school, being present, it was
then concluded that a night school be opened for the further utility of the
people of color, and a solemnity attending, it was unanimously agreed that an
orderly night school should commence in the next month, beginning at the
sixth hour on the first, or second day in the said month. And it is fully agreed
that no disorderly person be admitted into said school. *
In the city of Washington it was announced in 1818 that
"A School,"
Founded by an association of free people of color of the city of Washington*
called the Resolute Beneficial Society, situated near the Eastern Public
School and the dwelling of Mrs. Tenwick, is now open for the reception of
children of free people of color and others, that ladies or gentlemen may think
proper to send to be instructed in reading, writing, arithmetic, English gram¬
mar or other branches of education apposite to their capacities, by a steady,
active and experienced teacher, whose attention is wholly devoted to the pur¬
poses described. It is presumed that free colored families will embrace the
advantages thus presented to them, either by subscribing to the funds of the
society or by sending their children to the school. An improvement of the
intellect and morals of colored youth being the object of this institution, the
patronage of benevolent ladies and gentlemen, by donation or subscription, is
humbly solicited in aid of the fund, the demands thereon being heavy and the
means at present much too limited. For the satisfaction of the public, the
constitution and articles of association are printed and published, and to avoid
disagreeable occurrences no writings are to be done by the teacher for a slave,
neither directly nor indirectly, to serve the purpose of a slave on any account
whatever. Further particulars may be known by applying to any of the
undersigned officers.
"William Costin, President
"George Hicks, Vice-President.
"James Harris, Secretary.
"George Bell, Treasurer.
"Archibald Johnson, Marshal.
"Fred Lewis, Chairman of the Committee.
"Isaac Johnson, ) „ „ ...
"Scipio Beens, i Committee." t
In Ohio a hard fight was made for schools. In earlier times a few
Negroes attended the public schools:
Whatever privileges they may have enjoyed in the schools wqre cut off in
JSlif? by a law passed that year that "the attendance of black or mulatto per¬
sons be specifically prohibited, but all taxes assessed upon the property of
colored persons for school purposes should be appropriated to their instruction
and for no other purpose." The prohibition was vigorously enforced, but the
second clause was practically a dead letter.
In Cincinnati, '
As early as 1820 a few earnest colored men, desiring to give their children
the benefit of a school, raised by subscription a small sum of money, hired a
* Arnett's Budgett, 11)04, p. 95.
•f-Williams, Vol. II, p. 182. Quoted from National Intelligencer (D. C.), Aug. 29,1818.
Schools
75
teacher, rented a room and opened a school; but with such uncertain and lim¬
ited funds it was possible to continue the school for only a few weeks, and it
was finally closed altogether. This experiment was continued from time to
time during the next ten years in Cincinnati. In September, 1832, a small
Sunday school was gathered, which in three years numbered 125 scholars. In
their zeal for improvement, a lyceum also was organized, where three times a
week practical talks were given on different literary and scientific subjects,
and often an attendance of 300 would gather for instruction. A circulating
library of 100 volumes was also collected, but owing to the inability of so
many to read and write, it was of little use save for its value as an inspiration.
In March, 1832 an effort was again made for a school. A suitable room was
rented from a colored man and a teacher secured. The clamor of the adults to
gain admittance became so great that night schools were opened for two even¬
ings a week, the number of teachers necessary being obtained from Lane
Theological Seminary from among the young men preparing for the ministry.
This school soon assumed such proportions that three additional schools were
demanded and organized, one exclusively for girls, where instruction in sew¬
ing was made especially prominent.
The schools in Cincinnati continued to flourish, and the Negro population in
the state increased till many other schools were established. Notwithstand¬
ing the discouraging circumstances which were met we find that in 1838 there
were colored schools and churches in the counties of Columbiana, Logan,
Clark, Guernsey, Jefferson, Highland, Brown, Dark, Shelby, Green, Miami,
Hamilton, Warren, Gallia, Ross and, Muskingum. At the capital of the state
there were two churches and two schools supported by the colored people.
In the northern section the first school of which I find any record was estab¬
lished in Cleveland in 1832, by John Malvin, who had formerly been a free col¬
ored preacher in "Virginia, but had come to Cleveland in 1827, where he con¬
tinued his work, doing odd jobs to pay his expenses.
Malvin had learned to read when a boy in Virginia, and he at once tried to
interest the few colored families in Cleveland to provide some means for the
education of their children. A subscription guaranteeing $20 per month was
raised for a teacher's salary, and the school was opened in 1832. Three years
later, Malvin, who had proved himself an indefatigable worker, was instru¬
mental in securing a convention at Columbus of the colored people of the
state to devise some way of increasing the means to educate their people. The
outcome of the convention was the organization of the School Fund Society,
whose object was the establishment and maintenance of colored schools.
Under the auspices of this society schools were opened in Cincinnati, Colum¬
bus, Springfield and Cleveland, and were maintained for two years. *
In the southern section of the state the increasing colored population se¬
cured an increasing growth in the number and efficiency of the colored
schools, which were supported largely by themselves, though the outside help
was far greater in the cities than in country districts. In 1835 Cincinnati ex¬
pended $1,000 in sustaining colored schools, of which the colored people gave
$150, the rest being contributed by their friends. In 1839 the colored people
paid $889.03, and the self-sacrifice was not as great as in 1835, which showed a
marked economic as well as intellectual advancement. We must bear in mind
that few employments but day labor were open to the colored people in the
cities at that time, and while in the rural sections the men were mostly small
♦Hjckok, pp. 81-89.
76 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
farmers, and as a consequence there was a greater degree of independence and
thrift. Wherever there was a settlement of 100 or more, there we find a school
for their children. In a small settlement in Gallia county a school of twenty-
five scholars was maintained by colored people, who paid the teacher $50 per
quarter. In 1840 we find colored schools in nearly all the large towns in the
southern part of the state. *
A separate school for colored children was established in Boston, in
1798, and
was held in the house of a reputable colored man named Primus Hall. The
teacher was one Elisha Sylvester, whose salary was paid by the parents of the
children whom he taught. In 1800 sixty-six colored citizens presented a peti¬
tion to the school committee of Boston, praying that a school might be estab¬
lished for their benefit. A sub-committee to whom the petition had been re¬
ferred, reported in favor of granting the prayer, but it was voted down at the
next town meeting. However the school taught by Mr. Sylvester did not per¬
ish. Two young gentlemen from Harvard University, Messrs. Brown and
Williams, continued the school until 1806. During this year the colored Bap¬
tists built a church edifice in Belknap street, and fitted up the lower room for
a school for colored children. From the house of Primus Hall the little school
was moved to its new quarters in the Belknap Street Church. Here it was
continued until 1835, when a school house was erected and paid for out of a
fund left for the purpose by Abiel Smith, and was subsequently called " Smith
School House." The authorities of Boston were induced to give $200 as an
annual appropriation, and the parents of the children in attendance paid 12%
cents per week. The school house was dedicated with appropriate exercises,
Hon. William Minot delivering the dedicatory address.
The African school in Belknap street was under the control of the school
committee from 1812 to 1821, and from 1821 was under the charge of a special sub¬
committee. Among the teachers was John B. Russworm, from 1821 to 1824,
who entered Bowdoin College in the latter year and afterward became gov¬
ernor of the colony of Cape Palmas in southern Liberia, t
Some few schools for Negroes existed here and there in the South before the
war. In the District of Columbia, as already mentioned, no less than fifteen
different schools were conducted here mainly at the expense of the colored
people between 1800 and 1861. In Maryland, St. Frances Academy for colored
girls was founded by the Roman Catholics in 1829. The convent originated
with the French Dominican refugees, who came to Baltimore during the up¬
rising in the West Indies. The sisters were colored. Another school, estab¬
lished in 1835, gave instruction to free colored children. In North Carolina
there were before 1835 several schools maintained by the free Negroes. They
had usually white teachers. After 1835 the few clandestine schools were
taught by Negroes. In Charleston, S. C., there was a school for Negroes
opened in 1744, which lasted some ten years. It was taught by a Negro and
was for free Negroes only, although some slaves who hired their time man¬
aged to send their children there.
Free Negroes in Georgia used to send children to Charleston for education.
They returned and opened clandestine schools in Georgia. In Savannah a
French Negro, Julian Froumontaine, from San Domingo, conducted a free
Negro school openly from 1819 to 1829, and secretly for sometime after. Schools
were stopped nearly everywhere after 1830 and as slavery became more and
more a commercial venture all attempts at Negro education was given up. J
* Hlckok, pp. 88-l»0. + Williams, Vol. II, p,162. t Negro Common School, p. 21.
Schools
77
To the Negro slave, freedom meant schools first of all. Consequently
schools immediately sprang up after emancipation:
Georgia: In December, 1865, the colored people of Savannah, within a few
days after the entrance of Sherman's army, opened a number of schools, hav¬
ing an enrollment of 500 pupils and contributed $1,000 for the support of teach¬
ers. Two of the largest of these were in Bryant's Slave Mart.
In January, 1866, the Negroes of Georgia organized the Georgia Educational
Association, whose object was to induce the freedmen to establish and sup¬
port schools in their own counties and neighborhoods.
In 1867, 191 day schools and 45 night schools were reported as existing. Of
these, 96 were reported either wholly or in part supported by the freedmen,
who also owned 57 of the school buildings.
Arkansas: After 1865 they established the first free schools that ever were
in Arkansas. This they did at Little Rock, where, after paying tuition for a
short time, they formed themselves into an educational association, paid by
subscription the salaries of teachers, and made the schools free.
Florida: Among the various agencies engaged in the work of educating
the freedmen of the South are two, consisting of colored people in the south¬
ern states, and known respectively as the African Civilization Society, and
the Home Missionary Society of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. . .
Several schools were opened at Tallahassee and other places in Florida short¬
ly after the close of the war.
In 1866 the freedmen erected school houses at their own expense, besides con¬
tributing from their scanty means towards the support of teachers. They
formed "school societies" and co-operated with the Bureau in furnishing school
lots and erecting buildings.
Kentucky: After the war, the thirty schools which were established, in
spite of great obstacles, were mainly supported by the freed people themselves.
North Carolina: In 1867 the State Superintendent of Education reported
that many instances had come under his notice where the teachers of a self-
supporting school had been sustained until the last cent the freedmen could
command was exhausted, and where these last had even "taxed their credit in
the coming crop to pay the bills necessary to keep up the school.
District of Columbia : The first school in this district, built expressly for
the education of colored children, was erected by three men who had been
born and reared as slaves in Maryland and Virginia, George Bell, Nicholas
Franklin and Moses Liverpool, about the year 1807.
In 1818 the Bell School house was again taken for educational purposes to
accommodate an association organized by the leading colored men of the city
and for the specific purpose of promoting the education of their race. This
school was established upon the principle of receiving all colored children
who should come, tuition being exacted only from such as were able to pay.
It was more nearly a free school than anything hitherto known in the city.
This association of free people of color was called the "Resolute Beneficial
Society." Provisions were made for an evening school on the premises and
managers of Sunday schools were informed that on Sabbath days the school
house belonging to this society, if required for the instruction of colored
youth, would be at their service.
There was another free school which was called the Columbian Institute,
which continued for two or three years; established about 1831- it relied
mainly for support upon subscription, 12% cents a month only being expected
from each pupil, and this amount was not compulsory. Mr. Prout was at the
head of this school.
78 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
It was in the Smother's school house that they formed their first Sunday
school, and here they continued their very large Sunday school for several
years, the Fifteenth'Street Presbyterian Church springing ultimately from
the organization. John F. Cook succeeded Prout in 1834.
In 1858 the Smother's house, after the Cook school was removed, was occupied
two years by a free Catholic school, supported by the St. Vincent de Paul So¬
ciety, a benevolent organization of colored people. The school was broken up
in 1862 by incendiaries.
Immediately after the war of 1812 a free colored school was founded by an
association of free colored people; it averaged nearly 300 scholars. The asso¬
ciation was composed of the most substantial colored people of the city, and
was maintained with great determination and success for a considerable
period.*
The most elaborate system, perhaps, was that under General Banks in Lou¬
isiana. It was established in 1863, and soon had a regular Board of Education,
which laid and collected taxes and supported eventually nearly a hundred
schools with 10,000 pupils under 162 teachers, t
In General Howard's first Freedmen's Bureau report, he says:
Schools were taken in charge by the Bureau, and in some states carried on
wholly—in connection with local efforts—by use of a refugees' and freed¬
men's fund, which had been collected from various sources. Teachers came
under the general direction of the assistant commissioners, and protection
through the department commanders was given to all engaged in the work. %
The inspector of schools testified :
Petition for Schools.—As showing the desire for education among the
freedmen, we give the following fact: When the collection of a general tax
for colored schools was suspended in Louisiana by military order, the conster¬
nation of the colored population was intense. Petitions began to pour in. I
saw one from the plantations across the river, at least thirty feet in length,
representing 10,000 Negroes. It was affecting to. examine it and note the
names and marks (X) of such a long list of parents, ignorant themselves, but
begging that their children might be educated; promising that from beneath
their present burdens and out of their extreme poverty, they would pay for it.§
The report of 1868 had these figures: ||
The school report for the last six months in 1868 was as follows:
Day schools 1,198
Night schools 228
Total 1,426
Tuition paid by freedmen $ 65,319 75
Expended by Bureau 67,208 48
Total cost 1180,247 44
Schools sustained wholly by freedmen 469
Hchools sustained In part by freedmen 531
School buildings owned by freedmen 364
School buildings furnished by Bureau 417
White teachers 1,031
Colored teachers 713
Total enrollment 81,878
Average attendance 58,790
Pupils paying tuition 26,139
* Public Schools In the District of Columbia, Barnard, 1868-70; Schools of the Colored
Population, 1801-1861.—M. B. Goodwin.
+ Negro Common School, p. 22. J Ibid., p. 23. § Ibid., p. 25. [| Ibid., pp. 28-29.
Schools
79
• The report of the Bureau for 1869 which summed up the work, said:
The foregoing report shows that not more than one-tenth of the children of
freedmen are attending school. Their parents are not yet able to defray the
expenses of education. They are already doing something, probably more in
proportion to -their means, than any other class. During the last year it is
estimated that they have raised, and expended for the construction of school
houses and the support of the teachers not less than two hundred thousand
dollars ($200,000). They have shown a willingness to help, and as they prosper
and acquire property, they will assume a larger share of the burden, either
by voluntary contributions or by the payment of taxes for the support of
schools.
The freedmen assist in "the support of their schools to the extent of their
ability. As their condition is improved, their willingness to contribute for
education, as they always have for religious interests, exhibits itself in the
largely augmented amount paid for the support of schools. Forty-four thous¬
and three hundred and eighty-six pupils paid $106,866.19 for tuition. This is by
far the largest aggregate sum we have yet had the privilege of reporting;
while many thousands of dollars were expended for board and salaries of
teachers, and for construction of school houses, of which we received no re¬
port, the actual amount of which would greatly increase the above sum.
The total schools, attendance and disbursements of the Freedmen's
Bureau were as follows:*
Increase of Education
Date
Schools
No. of
Teachers
Pupils
1866
1867
1868
1869 ...
1870
975
1,839
1,831
2,118
2,677
1,405
2,087
2,295
2,455
3,300
90,778
111,442
104,327
114,522
149,581
Expenditures for Schools
YEAR
Expended by
Total
Freedman's
Bureau
Benevolent
Associations
The Freed¬
men
1866
$ 123,655 39
581,345 48
965,806 67
924,182 16
976,853 29
$ 82,200 00
65,087 01
700,000 00
365,000 00
360,000 00
$ 18,500 00
17,200 00
360,000 00+
190,000 00+
200,000 00+
$ 224,359 39
613,632 49
2,025,896 67
1,479,182 16
1,536,853 29
1867
1868
1869
1870
$ 785,700 00
$ 5,879,924 00
Finally the Negro carpet bag governments established the public
schools:
Although recent researches have shown in the South some germs of a public
school system before the war, there can be no reasonable doubt but what com¬
mon school instruction in the South, in the modern sense of the term, was
founded by the Freedmen's Bureau and missionary societies, and that the
state public school systems were formed mainly by Negro reconstruction
* Negro Common School, pp. 30-32.
+ Estimated by the Bureau officials.
80
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
governments. The earlier state constitutions of Mississippi "from 1817 to 1865
contained a declaration that 'Religion, morality and knowledge being neces¬
sary to good governments, the preservation of liberty and the happiness of
mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.'
It was not, however, until 1868 that encouragement was given to any general
system of public schools meant to embrace the whole youthful population.
In Alabama the Reconstruction Constitution of 1868 provided that "It shall be
the duty of the Board of Education to establish throughout the state, in each
township or other school district which it may have created, one or more
schools at which all the children of the state between the ages of 5 and 21
years may attend free of charge." In Mississippi the constitution of 1868
makes it the duty of the legislature to establish " a uniform system of free
public schools, by taxation or otherwise, for all children between the ages of 5
and 21 years." Arkansas in 1868, Florida in 1869, Louisiana in 1868, North Caro¬
lina in 1869, South Carolina in 1868 and Virginia in 1870 established school sys¬
tems. The constitution of 1868 in Louisiana required the General Assembly to
establish "at least one free public school in every parish," and that these
schools should make no "distinction of race, color, or previous condition."
Georgia's system was not fully established until 1873. *
As Albion Tourgee said : "They instituted a public school system in
a region where public schools had been unknown."
Today the efforts of Negroes to encourage education take three forms:
Church schools.
Aid to private schools.
Aid to public schools.
(a) Church Schools.
The African Methdodist Episcopal Church has the following school
system:
The African Methodist Episcopal Church began in 1844 to start schools for
Negroes. A committee was appointed and founded Onion Seminary. Later
this institution was united with Wilberforce University, which was bought
by the church from the white Methodist Church.- Thus Wilberforce, dating
from 1856, is the oldest Negro institution in the land. The church has now
about twenty-five schools in all. They are supported from three sources: 1.
Tuition, etc., paid by students; 2. Donations and bequests; 3. Appropriations
from the general fund of the church. From these sources about $275,000 was
raised in the four years, 1896-1900; and since 1884, when the General Educa¬
tional Department was organized, there has been raised $1,250,000 for education.
The figures are :
Schools
Teachers
Average attendance, four years
Acres of land
25
140
3,6t>3
1,4*2
Raised and appropriated, lSWi-1900
Raised and appropriated, 1881-1900.
$ 535,000.00
■ 270,088.54
1,140,013.31
♦Negro Common Hehool, p. 37.
Schools
African Methodist Episcopal Schools—Receipts 1896-1900*
81
SCHOOLS
Payne Theological Seminary, Wilberforce, O...
Wilberforce University, "Wilberforce, O
Morris Brown College. Atlanta, Ga
Kittrell College, Kittrell, N. O
Paul Quinn College, Waco, Tex
Allen University, Columbia, S. C
Western University, Q,uindan,Kan
Edward Waters College, Jacksonville, Fia
Shorter University, North Little Rock, Ark
Payne University, Selma,-Ala
Campbell-Stringer College, Jackson, Mo
Wayman Institute, Harrodsburg, Ky
Turner Normal Institute, Shelbyville, Tenn
Flagler High School, Marion, S. C
Delhi Institute, Delhi, La
Sisson's High School, South McAlister, I. T
Blue Creek and Muscogee High School, I. T
Morsell Institute, Hayti
Bermuda Institute, Bermuda
Zion Institute, Sierra Leone, Africa
Eliza Turner School, Monrovia, Africa
Cape Town Institute, Cape Town, Africa
1891
1856
1881
1883
1887
1891
1887
37
311
350
136
203
285
90
172
110
233
100
50
79
161
57
10
$ 13,000
158,000
75,000
30,000
80,000
35,000
75,000
25,000
10,250
3,000
10,300
2,760
3,500
1,500
3,000
The Colored Methodist Episcopal Church has five schools:
Payne College of Augusta, Ga.
Texas College of Tyler, Texas.
Lane College of Jackson, Tenn-.
Homer Seminary of Homer, La.
Hay good Seminary of Washington, Ark.
The white Methodist Church, South, helps in the support of Payne
College.
The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church had these institutions
in 1901. (Several schools had not reported when this report was read) :t
NAME OF SCHOOL
No. of
Teachers
No. of
Students
Amount
collected per
quadrennium
Livingstone College
Clinton Institute
Lancaster Institute
Greenville College
Hannonand Lomax
Walters Institute
Mobile Institute
Jones University
Money raised by Secretary.
Totals
267
202
277
125
80
72
32
1,023
$ 57,193 05
3,450 00
5,038 00
2,705 t>6
300 00
300 00
1,500 00
530 00
568 00
$ 71,585 21
There were the following additional schools:
Atkinson College, Madisonville, Ky.
Palmetto Institute, Union, S. C.
Edenton Industrial High School, Edenton, N. C.
* Negro Church, pp. 129-30.
+ Ibid., pp. 132-33.
82 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Lloyd Academy, Elizabeth town, N. C.
Hemphill High School, Crockett, Ga.
Pettey Academy, Newburn, N. C.
Lomax and Rutler Academy, Tampa, Fla.
Carr Academy, North Carolina.
Lee Institute, Amite City, La.
Pettey Institute, Calvert, Texas.
African Methodist Episcopal Zion High School, Norfolk, Va.
Perhaps the most extensive educational work is done by the Negro
Baptists: The Negro Baptists support 107 schools, as follows:*
List of Institutions by States
STATES
Institution
Location
Arkansas
Florida.
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Indian Territory.
Kansas
Kentucky
Baptist University
Normal College
Eufaula Academy
Marion Academy
Opelika High School
Thomsonville Academy
Stokes Institute
Autauga Institute
Aouchita Academy
Baptist College
Arkadelphia Academy
Brinkley Academy
Magnolia Academy
Wynne Normal and Industrial Institute ..
Southeast Baptist Academy
Fordyce Academy
Florida Baptist College
Florida Institute
"West Florida Baptist Academy.
Institutional Church School
Fernandina Bible College
Americus Institute..
Walker Academy
Jeruel Academy
Central City College
Southern Illinois Polytechnic Institute
New Livingstone Institute
Indiana Colored Baptist Institute .
Dawes Academy
Sango Baptist College
Topeka Industrial Institute
State University
Cadiz Theological Institute
Female High School
Glasgow Normal Institute ..
Western College
Hopklnsville College
Eckstein Norton University.
Polytechnic Institute
London District College
Louisiana.
Baton Rouge Academy
Houma Academy
Morgan City Academy
Howe Institute
Opelousas Academy
Central Louisiana Academy.
Cherryville Academy
Baptist Academy
Selma.
Anniston.
Eufaula.
Marion.
Opelika.
Thomsonville.
Montgomery.
Kingston.
Camden.
Little Rock.
Arkadelphia.
Brinkley.
Magnolia.
Wynne.
Dermott.
Fordyce.
Jacksonville.
Live Oak.
Pensacola.
Jacksonville.
Fernandina.
Americus.
Augusta.
Athens.
Macon.
Cairo.
Metropolis.
Indianapolis.
Muskogee.
Topeka.
Louisville.
Cadiz.
Frankfort.
Glasgow.
Weakly.
Hopklnsville.
Cane Springs.
Danville.
London.
Baton Rouge.
Houma.
Morgan City.
New Iberia.
Opelousas.
Alexandria.
Cherryville.
Lake Providence.
The National Baptist Year Book, 1907.
Schools
List of Institutions by States—Continued
83
STATES
Institution
Location
Louisiana.
Maryland..
Mississippi.
Missouri
North Carolina.
Ohio
South Carolina.
Tennessee.
Texas.
Virginia
West Virginia.
Africa
Monroe High School
Ruston Academy
Shreveport Academy
Mansfield Academy
North Louisiana Industrial High School
Thirteenth Dist. Nor. and Col. Institute .
Clayton "Williams Institute
Natchez College
Gloster High School
Central College
Meridian High School
Ministerial Institute
Nettleton High School
Greenville High School
New Albany High School
Kosciusko Industrial College
Baptist Normal and Industrial School..
Springer Academy
Western College
Latta University
High School
Shiloh Industrial Institute
Thomson's Institute
Addie Norris' Institute
Training School
Roanoke Institute
Albemarle Training School
Bertie Academy
New Berne Institute
Rowan Institute
Burgaw Normal Institute
Colon Training and Industrial School...
Curry School
Peace Haven Institute
Friendship Institute
Morris College
Seneca Institute
Charleston Normal and Indus. Institute
Howe Institute
Nelson Merry College
Lexington Normal School
Guadalupe College
Central Texas Academy
Houston Academy
Hearne Academy
Pine Valley Institute
New Home Academy
Virginia Seminary and College
Union Industrial Academy
Keysville Industrial Institute
Halifax Institute
Spiller Academy
Bluefield Institute
West Virginia Institute Farm
Hope Institute
Rick's Institute
Jordan's Industrial School
Miss De Laney's School
Queenstown Institute
Monroe.
Ruston.
Alexandria.
Mansfield.
Monroe.
Shreveport.
Baltimore.
Natchez.
Gloster.
Kosciusko.
Meridian.
West Point.
Nettleton.
Greenville.
New Albany.
Kosciusko.
Friar Point.
Friar Point.
Macon.
Raleigh.
Wakefield.
Warrenton.
Lumberton.
Winston.
Franklinton.
Elizabeth.
Edenton.
W indsor.
New Berne.
Charlotte.
Burgaw.
Faison.
Urbana.
Broad River.
Rock Hill.
Sumter.
Seneca.
Charleston.
Memphis.
Jefferson City.
Lexington.
Seguin.
Waco.
Houston.
Hearne.
Pine Valley.
Oakwood.
Lynchburg.
Port Conway.
Keysville.
Houston.
Hampton.
Bluefield.
Kanawha county.
Lagos, W. Africa.
Monrovia.
Cape Mount.
Blaptyre,W. 0. A.
South Africa.
Total number of schools 107 | Valuation of property
$600,000
84 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
The income, valuation and enrollment of the Negro Baptist schools
areas follows; these schools, except the ones starred, are supported
almost entirely by Negroes; the full names are given in the preceding
list:
Alabama Baptist...
Americus
Arkadelphla
Autauga
Baptist N. and I
Baptist Institute ...
Baton Rouge
Bertie Academy
Brinkley
Burgaw
Bluefield
Cadiz
Cen. C. College
Cen. M. College
Cen. T. Academy....
Cen. Louisiana
Charleston
Colon •.
Curry
Eckstein
Eufaula
•Florida Baptist
Fordyce
Friendship
Guadalupe
Halifax
Houston Academy .
Howe B. B
Hopkinsville
Inst. C
Jeruel
Keysville
Kosciusko
Latta
London
Meridian
Morris
Natchez
Nelson Merry
New Home
New Berne
Pine Valley
Polytechnic
Roanoke
Rowan
Ruston
Sango •
Seneca
Shiloh
Springer
S. E. Baptist
S. Illinois P
•State University
Stokes
Thirteenth District.
Thomson
Union Ind
Virginia Seminary.
Walker Baptist
Western College
Wynne
Enrollment
in all de¬
partments
830
Total.
90
142
36
371
156
157
130
75
92
175
286
70
18
230
2(19
120
73
145
467
345
252
282
542
163
125
168
275
362
138
191
178
120
85
135
220
145
185
136
101
311
155
2ti5
179
45
397
102
30
Valuation
of
property
60,000
10,025
10,200
2,000
5,850
3,300
26,450
5,010
10,150
2,600
8,300
10,500
25,000
8,600
10,000
5,900
16,500
1,700
10,800
25,000
1,660
40,000
3,000
7,500
76,000
2,000
21,200
31,800
7,500
10,500
4,600
25,600
4,500
4,350
20,000
10,000
15,000
5,150
3,000
3,000
5,250
6,000
6,000
3,600
3,565
15,000
2,500
4,000
2,508
3,800
30,0(10
3,000
10,000
1,509
45,000
15,000
25,000
3,500
9,587
737,377
Expendi¬
tures,
1906
16,000 77
' 1,250'00
1,400 00
3,700 00
3,725 00
620 00
2,850 25
950 00
2,150 00
2,500 00
4,000 00
2,500 00
2,500 00
1,085 00
1,000 00
750 00
2,150 00
900 00
21,000 00
1,000 00
2,700 00
10,000 00
500 00
3,900 00
3,360 00
1,900 00
3,050 00
4,000 00
1,200 00
1,600 00
2,975 00
3.800 00
890 00
2,065 00
1,400 00
1,975 00
1,350 00
906 23
1,600 00
727 25
1,744 00
750 00
1,500 00
1,700 00
1,110 00
16,000 00
5,000 00
1,150 00
$ 148,883 50
The above schools and others supported partially by Negro Baptists
reported in 1906:
Schools
85
Teachers, males...
Teachers, females.
Total
Total students
613
16,664
249
864
"Reports from the field indicate progress. The educational work, especially
in Louisiana, is taking on new life. Baton Rouge College, Coleman Academy
and a half dozen others in that state, are doing most excellent work, and the
people give them a support unprecedented. The colored people of North Caro¬
lina and South Carolina, each, gave some time ago $6,000 to educational work—
the former for the erection of an industrial hall at Shaw University, Raleigh,
and the latter for Convention Hall, Benedict College, Columbia. Kentucky,
Alabama and Georgia are now making great efforts to raise several thousand
dollars to secure equal amounts from the Mission Society of New York for
building purposes. The Florida Baptist Academy, Jacksonville, has just com¬
pleted a boys' dormitory at a cost of $4,000. With the exception of $1,500, the
colored Baptists of the state raised it. The enrollment for the year shows an
increase of students.
"The American Baptist Home Mission Society has done systematic educa¬
tional and mission work among colored Baptists of the South for more than
forty years. The society also aids a few of the schools owned by Negro Bap¬
tists.
"All together, the society aids in the support of forty-four missionaries and
244 teachers. The missionaries are distributed in fifteen states and territories."
(b) Aid to Private Schools.
There are numbers of private schools established by churches and
benevolent societies for Negroes. A special canvass was ma<fe of these
late in 1907 to see how far Negroes supported them.
The United States Bureau of Education in its report for 1905 lists 161
private schools for Negroes in the United States. Of these 74 of the
largest and most important have given us figures showing;
(a) The total cost of maintaining the institution for the last nine
years <1898-9—1906-7), including (except where noted) the cost of the
boarding department, and not including new buildings.
(b) The total cash payments made to the institutions, including pay¬
ments for board, where the boarding department was conducted by
the institution, but not including payments for books, clothes, travel,
etc.
(c) The cash value of students' work, as estimated by the institution.
This must be, of course, a very indefinite figure, but as nearly all the
janitor work of these schools is done by students, and also some pro¬
ductive industries are earried on, some account must be made.
According to these reports the total cost of these 74 schools has been,
so far as reported, $11,537,099 for nine years; missing figures would
bring this total up to $11,610,000. Of this Negroes have paid in cash
$3,358,667, or 28.9 per cent, and in cash and work $5,187,269, which is 44.6
per cent of the total cost.
The figures by institutions follow:
Negro Private
SCHOOL
PLACE
Straight University
Utica Institute
Claflin University
New Orleans, La
Utica, Miss.... ■
Orangeburg, S.C
Shaw U niversity
Paine College
Tougaloo University
Calhoun Colored School
Mary Holmes Seminary
Brainerd Institute
Raleigh N. 0—
Augusta, Ga- ■ •
Tougaloo, Miss
Calhoun, Ala
West Point, Miss » •
n Kftotar M ( _ _ _7 ~
Tidewater ffl«^eciIn8t- Selma, Ala 63,370
KM?? Cheriton, Va 8,760
BishoD S pL hooi Raleigh, N. 0 24,842
Samuel Hoiisfn'n c"k" "; Marshall, Texas 81,793
Jos Brfclt i ?°°i Austin, Texas • 33,700
Tiirina Agricultural, •
s. and Normal School.. Enfleld, N.0 10,791
1,697
' 12,587
8,150
$153,000
42,446
343,522
36,730
301,241
87,607
265,370
205,924
108,000
45,075
92,938
18,281
110,431
146,538
53,157
Allen University""*! CoTumbia, S. 0 " woo
New Orleans University New Orleans, La 49,835
State A. and M. College for M
Colored Race Oroensboro. N. 0 22,122
Paul Quinn College!.!.'!!!!;!!!! Wa™,T«ias 43,238
Virginia Union University Richmond, Va
Lincoln School ' . Meridian, Miss ?,050
Pilgrim High Schoo! Guyton, Ga
Albion Academy, Normal and
Industrial School Franklinton, N. C 18,761
Bennet College Greensboro, N. 0
Emerson N. and I. Institute. . Mobile, Ala 11.688
Livingstone College Salisbury, N. C 88,755
Northern Neck Academy Ivondale ,3,5
Wiley University Marshall, Texas 154,896
Colored Agricultural and
Normal University Langston, Okla—
J Hi«n MISS
g'iwl 24,800 S®
Biww 87,459
Meridian Acaaemy . , _
Bowling Green Academy Bowling Green,Va.
Rust University Holly Springs. Misf
Morris Brown College Atlanta, Ga.
Penn Normal, Industrial and
Agricultural School Progmore, S. 0.
28,470
6,100
3,357
83,790
20,450
1,667
7,779
9,278
7,081
17,593
2,281
15
4.889
1,1H3
2,077
7,719
2,380
28,500
13,308
1,300
638
3,641
180
154,767
64,228
226,983
10,510
1,512
72,790
9,400
4,927
155,682
59,500
283 88,619
Donated in addition by Negroes, $22,886.04.
1905-6, short year account of epidemic.
Cost of buildings not included.
This is approximate.
Whole cost raised by Negroes.
6 years.
5 years, 1902-3—1906-7,
1900-1—1906-7.
7 years, 1900-7. Total cost estimated.
8 years, 1904-7. Board not included.
5 years, 1902-7.
6 years,1901-7. Contains $7,583.15 for buildings.
All raised by Negroes.
8 years, 1899-1907. Approximate totals.
Rent for the teacher's home, |300.
Three years.
5 years.
I 5 years.
Very largely supported by Negroes,
j 7 years.
2 years.
4 years.
3 years. Largely supported by Negroes.
SCHOOL
PLACE
a.,© 5
^ g'H
3-5 3
^ O oo
8f g
» S «
■S8a
g O-i
§ s » £
So„S
££.?~
&»© g'ss
£2-8 8
£ §5 s
svs*
REMARKS
Kentucky Normal, Indus. In¬
stitute for Colored Persons..
Virginia N. and I. School
Lincoln University
Hartshorn Memorial College..
Trinity School
Allen N. and I. School
Howard University
King and Queen Industrial
High School
Washburn Seminary
Gregory Normal Institute
Biddle University
Louisville State University...
Cabin Creek
M. T. and I. College
Tuskegee N. and I. Institute...
Knoxville College
LeMoyne Normal Institute ...
Cookman Institute
Walker Baptist Institute
Scotia Seminary
Lane College
Arkansas Baptist College
Leland University
Franklin Junction Institute..
Florida State Normal and In¬
dustrial School
Spelman Seminary
Jeruel Academy
Atlanta University
Clark University
Fr'anklinton Christian College
Jackson College
Waters Normal Institute
Ballard Normal School
Southern Christian Institute..
Tillotson College
Fisk University
Hampton Institute
Atlanta Baptist College
Ft. Valley H. and I. School ...
Frankfort, Ky
Petersburg, Va
Chester Co., Pa
Richmond, Va
Athens, Ala
Thomasville, Ga
Washington, D. 0
Cauthornville, Va
Beaufort, N. C
Wilmington, N.C
Charlotte, N. C
Louisville, Ky
Griffin, Ga
Holly Springs, Miss...
Tuskegee, Ala
Knoxville, Tenn
Memphis, Tenn
Jacksonville, Fla
Augusta, Ga
Concord, N. C
Jackson, Tenn
Little Rock, Ark
New Orleans, La
Franklin Junction,Va
Tallahassee, Fla
Atlanta, Ga
Athens, Ga
Atlanta, Ga
South Atlanta, Ga
Franklin ton, N. 0
Jackson, Miss
Winton, N. 0
Macon, Ga
Edwards, Miss
Austin, Texas
Nashville, Tenn
Hampton, Va
Atlanta, Ga
Fort Valley, Ga
! 5.095
127,694
19,783
49,708
1,700
16,275
211,988
6,385
361
10,890
24,885
65,680
344
10,611
217,798
109,450
52,376
14,950
2,435
64,588
47,601
62,854
38,331
50,238
53,434
19,112
82,487
116,757
11,701
45,686
13,195
39,314
30,514
42,466
261,576
91,228
50,160
2,260
$ 10,070
12,595
22,000
800
4,212
15,927
1,280
106
1,954
22,829
550
71
1,300
707,285
24,000
2,700
237
48,330
4,500
7,094
8,260
870
423
16,362
7,084
1,691
3,941
8,100
18,721
3,700
22,500
549,618
13,794
5,440
$ 117,000
279,824
387,000
115,720
9,000
38,906
743,788
7,650
2,801
37,964
286,408
76,345
1,146
15,876
1,416,417
257,250
87,750
30,600
9,414
157,675
95,500
119,729
130,467
9,370
139,703
344,460
33,318
460,662
253,877
23,889
89,738
23,992
90,000
118,940
61,030
4.3
45.6
5.1
42.9
18.8
41.8
28.5
83.4
12.8
28.6
8.6
86
30
66.8
15.3
42.5
59.6
48.8
25.8
40.9
49.8
44.1
29.3
47.9
15.5
57.3
17.9
45.9
48.9
50.9
54.9
43.6
25.6
69.5
Board not included. Negroes pay 1-15 of taxes.
Students' work not reduced to cash value.
3 years.
Many men earn their way.
2 years.
2 years.
2 years. Equipment not included.
2 years; $3,841.01 given by Negroes also.
Negroes give $8,500 also.
4 years. Cost of buildings not included.
Student labor not calculated.
$7,760.81 given by Negroes in addition.
Total cost unknown.
1,695,678
147,033
17,630
5.3
34.1
12.8
88 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
From this it is clear that primary and grammar schools for Negroes
are being supported very largely by Negroes themselves nearly
all the institutions whose students pay 50 per cent or more of the cost
in cash being really schools of this character. The schools for higher
training collect a smaller proportion of cash from their students, and
the industrial schools the smallest proportion. But the latter schools
receive a very large payment in work from students.
Beside these schools there are several hundreds of private and unre¬
corded primary schools conducted each year by Negroes in different
localities, and a fairly widespread system of supplementing the public
school funds. No data of these schools are available, bat the following
instance in Virginia is instructive:
A statistical side-light with respect to eleven of these (Virginia) counties is
that Mr. T. C. Walker personally supervised the collection of $1,685 from the
people, by which 77 schools had their terms prolonged from one to two months,
and permanent improvements were made to the amount of $400. Similar in
character was the work of Mr. Fitch, who led the people in twelve school dis¬
tricts to raise the sum of $398, by which their school terms were lengthened.*
The visitor of the General Educational Board makes this report:
In the rural districts it is the Negro who must lengthen the term and pro¬
vide better houses. Often it is necessary for him to build the house, while the
school authorities pay for the teacher. Sometimes rent is received from these
buildings, but more often, particularly in the far South, none is received.
Accomac county, in Virginia, for instance, owns scarcely one-third of the
school houses in use in the county. At convenient points throughout the
county, however, Negroes have purchased land and erected in most cases a
church, a hall for secret society purposes, and a school house. In some places
the hall serves as a school house. So closely are these schools and churches
associated that nearly every school is known by the name of the church near
it. First Baptist, Ebenezer, etc., are the names commonly applied to the
schools. The property is usually owned by the entire Negro community. This
condition is common in the South. Such a contribution to Negro education is
so closely associated with public education that it frequently escapes notice.
The way most in vogue at present for supplementing public education in
the South, among whites especially, is through local taxation, together with
the consolidation of schools. North Carolina is doubtless in the front in this
educational revival in the South. Here they have built, on an average, a
school house a day for the last two years. This movement, however, has
affected the Negro but little as the Superintendent of Public Instruction in¬
formed me. The Negro is hardly in a position now to benefit by political
methods. He is not consulted nor always included, in communities even
where local taxation is adopted by the whites. He does not, of course, under
such circumstances pay the local tax. He generally uses another method for
raising money in the interest of his schools. Here, as in many other phases
of Negro life, the church is the agency employed. Through religious denomi¬
nations the Negro is doing most toward supplementing his elementary public
education. This sometimes results in undue multiplicity of schools, but there
are not wanting instances where communities, regardless of the various relig¬
ious faiths, unite in the support of a single school
* Hampton Negro Conference, No. 8, p. 33.
Schools
89
The Baptist associations of Northern Georgia, and the churches and indi¬
viduals of half a dozen counties made Jeruel Academy a possibility. They
have given it property valued at $6,000, and of the running expenses for 1902
and 1903, amounting to $3,565, Negroes paid $3,189.19. The only outside aid,
amounting to $500, comes from the Home Mission Society.
The Americus Institute, situated in the very heart of the black belt of Geor¬
gia, represents even better the possibilities of the Negroes along the line of
self-help. In its present organization this school is only seven years old.
Prior to that,however, an effort had been made to establish a school there, but
owing to the dishonesty of a white man employed as agent the people sus¬
tained a loss of $1,000 in cash and eleven acres of land, besides another loss of
$275 stolen by a dishonest clerk of the association. Nevertheless, in seven
years Mr. M. W. Reddick, the principal, has built up a school with property
worth $7,000. This has practically all come through the small contributions
of the Negroes themselves. He collects from the neighborhood, through
various Baptist oganizations, churches and individuals, about $1,000 yearly.
Mr. Reddick and his teachers go out to the various churches to collect the
monthly contributions. Thus the school and the idea of education are kept in
the minds of the people, who are being educated to habits of giving and to a
feeling of ownership and pride in their local institutions
Alabama also furnishes excellent examples of this community spirit in edu¬
cation. The Mt. Meigs Institute, of which Miss Cornelia Bowen is principal,
has acquired property valued at $7,000. This has come largely from the earn¬
ings of the Negroes thereabouts. One building was erected by the colored
people themselves at a cost of $2,000, and for two years they supported the
school entirely, paying $1,000 and $1,200 a year, respectively. Though this is a
poor community, they still pay $700 a year tuition. Within five miles of this
institution is another bearing the suggestive title, "The People's Village
School." Miss Georgia Washington, who received her training at Hampton,
is the principal. Here the whole community is organized for educational
purposes and for the economic and religious ends as well. For instance, they
not only conduct the school, but build churches, act as a land company, holding
320 acres of land for sale, and are buying and operating a cotton-gin. The
school is really the center and inspiration of the whole movement. As a result
of it, good homes are being established and land has been acquired. The
school has property valued at $4,000, which consists of four buildings and 27%
acres of land. It is owned and controlled by a board of trustees, all of whom are
local colored men excepting two whites. Each family sending children are
required to pay $4.37 yearly regardless of the number of children. In this way
$500 has been collected this year. Thus this poor community of Alabama Ne¬
gro farmers and laborers is making possible a schooling for their children
such as a pretentious town might envy; for, in addition to sound elementary
literary training, these pupils are taught sewing, cooking, general housework,
and theoretical and practical agriculture
With this group should be mentioned Alabama Baptist University, con¬
trolled by Negroes, who raise annually $10,925 out of the $12,905 needed, and
which has property valued at $40,000, largely acquired by Negroes
The Negroes of Montgomery, Ala., paid $6,000 for the land on which the
State Normal School in that city stands, and presented it unconditionally to
the State Board of Education. They reserved only one acre, which, however,
the school is allowed to use. The Negroes of that city also pay annually to
this school in tuition $1,600 which is used to employ teachers for the primary
work, thus supplementing the school facilities of the city. Two of the school
90 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
houses used by Montgomery for colored schools are also the property of
Negroes.
In the public schools in Selma which, by the way, is one of the best as regards
both building and work which I have seen south of the Potomac, the pupils
pay one dollar a year as a contingent fund for incidentals, furnish all mate¬
rials for the work in both literary and manual training, and provide shades
and curtains for the windows, piano and organ, pictures for the building, and
books for the library. Florida and other Southern states furnish examples
similar to these
To overcome these poor conditions, and to provide reasonably ample oppor¬
tunities for effective training, the Negroes are working in several different
directions. They are not only supplementing the public funds and length¬
ening the school term, but are establishing private schools and consolidating
with the public schools nearby; they are building independent private
schools; and they are supporting in larger measure the great schools estab¬
lished by Northern philanthropy. One of the most conspicuous cases of con¬
solidating with the public school is furnished by the Keyesville Industrial
School in Charlotte county. This is an industrial school, founded in 1898 and
supported almost entirely by Negroes, through the Baptist organizations of
that neighborhood. They have a plant, including 100 acres of land, worth
$2,600. They have domitory accommodations for 30 boarding students and a daily
attendance of 135 pupils. The curriculum includes such instruction as will fit a
pupil to enter Virginia Union University, with which school it is affiliated, and
such manual and industrial training as will fit them for useful lives and for
trade schools like Hampton. This school succeeded in having the pubic school
and the public funds placed in its hands. It gets only the $175 formerly given
by the county to the public school, but it gives the children a term of seven
instead of five months, and it pays two well-trained teachers of its own ap¬
pointing $20 each and board per month instead of $15 and $20, respectively,
without board, as was the case formerly. The children are better housed and
better taught and maintain higher attendance than was known before, to say
nothing of having the benefit of effective manual training. This is made pos¬
sible by the contributions of Negroes to this school. It is a positive effort on
the part of the Negroes thereabout (70,000 within a radius of 75 miles) to im¬
prove their educational facilities. Through the Baptist Associations, Sunday
school contributions, churches, tuition and board from pupils, this community
pays into the school nearly $2,000 yearly. The only support of any magnitude
received from outside is $200 annually from the Baptist Home Mission Society.
Keyesville Institute is but one of a group of half a dozen schools of its kind
scattered around in the counties of Virginia.
The Halifax Institute at Houston, in a neighboring county, is another
school conducted in about the same fashion as the one at Keyesville, though
it is not so large or successful. The community is not yet so well organized
for educational work, but the school is now in competent hands and will suc¬
ceed. Here, too, the county nearby has been consolidated with the private
school and gains thereby several months in length. The Negroes raise $470
annually for the support of this work.
The Pittsylvania Institute, in Pittsylvania county, another of these Baptist
schools, furnishes one of the best illustrations of what a well organized, earnest
community may do towards improving the schools. The county schools there¬
about were, as usual, poor. The nearest boarding school is at .Lynchburg,
thirty miles away. The people, small farmers owning from ten to 200 acres,
decided to have a school. These chose a board of trustees and last year, 1903,
Schools 91
founded their school; they acquired 2^ acres of land for $150 and erected a
building for $1,000. This is two and a half stories high and contains three
class rooms and eight bed rooms. The financial statement for 1903-4 reads as
follows:
Expenses—
Salaries $ 390.00
Fuel 46.78
Paid on building 800.00
Board 903.00
Income—
From Associations $ 456.62
From tuition 447.12
From board 903.00
Total $ 1,806.74
Total $ 2,139.78
This,leaves a debt of $333.04 on the building. So certain are they that this
will be paid that they are planning another $1,000 building, to be ready for use
in October. These people have not asked for a cent outside of their own
neighborhood. They say they prefer to see what they can do before asking
for aid. I met the principal, a well educated Christian gentleman, in Danville,
Va., and heard of this school for the first time. It has a preparatory course of
three years, a normal course of three more, and an academic course of three
years for those wishing to enter college. This first year they enrolled ninety-
four pupils. They have not absorbed the public school for there is none
within two miles.*
(c) Aid to Public Schools.
As to Negro support of public schools we can best repeat the conclu¬
sions of the Atlanta University Conference of 1901:
In nearly all of the states there are a few town and city systems which are
often not included in the State school report, where the cost of Negro schools
is more nearly equal to that of the whites and where, consequently, the Ne¬
groes contribute proportionately less. Since, however, over 70 per centx>f the
Negroes live in the country, this affects comparatively few. With this excep¬
tion, then, it can be said that apparently Negroes contributed to their schools
as follows for 1898:
Total cost $ 4,675,504—100 per cent.
Paid by Negroes, direct taxes 1,336,291
Paid by Negroes, indirect taxes — 2,426,226
Estimated total $3,762,617—79.4 " "
Paid by white taxes 912,887—20.6 " "
In the past the Negroes have undoubtedly contributed a considerably larger
proportion than this. For instance, in Delaware, Maryland and Kentucky,
they contributed more than the total cost of their schools for several years. In
all the other states the tendency has been to use first indirect taxation for
schools and then to add direct taxation until today a large proportion of the
taxes are direct. Now the indirect taxation fell more largely on the Negroes
than the direct, since they are renters and consumers rather than landowners.
If Georgia be taken as a typical state in this respect, then the conclusion of
the Conference, held last May, is true, viz: That in the years 1870 to 1899 the
•Negro school systems of the former slave states have not cost the white tax¬
payers a cent, except possibly in a-few city systems:
Oost of Negro schools, 1870-1899 $69,968,671.48
Estimated total direct school taxes paid by Negroes, 1870-1899.$ 25,000,000.00
Indirect taxes and pro rata share of endowments 45,000,000.00
Approximate total, 1870-1899 $ 70,000,000.00
* Report of Hampton Conference, No. 8, pp. 07, 68-70-76.
92 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
This statement when first made was received with some incredulity and
criticism, and probably will be now. This is simply because of the careless
statement that schools have been "given" the Negro without effort, which
has been so often reiterated. *
Section 11. Beneficial and Insurance Societies
No complete account of Negro beneficial societies is possible, so large
is their number and so wide their ramification. Nor can any hard and
fast line between them and industrial insurance societies be drawn
save in membership and extent of business. These societies are also
difficult to separate from secret societies; many have more or less ritual
work, and the regular secret societies do much fraternal insurance busi¬
ness.
An account of the secret and beneficial societies in several towns of
various sizes and in different localities will give some idea of the dis¬
tribution of these organizations:
Xenia, Ohio, (2,000 Negroes)
The church does not, however, occupy the social life of the Negroes as com¬
pletely as formerly, or as is now the case in some Southern towns. The home
is fast becoming among the more intelligent classes in Xenia the real social
unit. But, leaving aside the home, next to the church are the secret orders.
There are eleven Negro lodges in Xenia, namely: Wilberforce Lodge, No. 21,
of Free and Accepted Masons, having 48 members; Lincoln Chapter, No. 2, of
Royal Arch Masons, having 18 members; Xenia Commandery, No. 8, of Knights
Templars, having 20 members; Damon Lodge, No. 29, of Knights of Pythias,
having 70 members; Toussaint Lodge of G. U. Order of Odd Fellows; Daniel's
Post of Grand Army of the Republic; Daniel's Corps, No. 228, of Women's Re¬
lief Corps; Eastern Star Lodge, No. 2; Bell of Ohio D. T. Tabernacle, No. 511;
Mount Olive Lodge, No. 25, of Good Samaritans, and a lodge of Knights of
Tabor, f
Baltimore, Md., (1890—67,000 Negroes)
There is probably no city in the land where there are as many societies
among the colored people as in Baltimore, and several of the large societies
which have spread far and wide, north and south, had their origin here.
Nearly all of the societies are beneficial, but they may be divided in general
into two classes, those beneficial merely and those with secret features. In
order to help oDe another in sickness and provide for decent burial, through a
system of small but regular payments, beneficial societies were formed among
little groups of acquaintances or fellow laborers. In Baltimore they date back
to 1820, and were afterwards specially exempted from the state laws forbidding
meetings of colored people. Twenty-five, at least, had been formed before the
war; from 1865 to 1870, seventeen or more were formed; since 1870, twenty or
more have been added, several as late as 1884 and 1885. The number of mem¬
bers vary from a dozen to over 100.
In 1884 was held a meeting of many connected with these societies to arouse
a more general interest in the work, and very interesting reports were pre¬
sented. Forty of them gave an aggregate membership of over 2,100. Nearly
•Atlanta University Publication, No. 6, pp. 91-92.
•(•Bureau of Labor, No. 48, p. 1041.
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
93
1,400 members had been buried, over $45,000 haying been given in funeral ex¬
penses; $125,000 had been given as sick dues; $27,000 had been paid widows by
some thirty of the societies; over $10,700 had been given towards house rent;
and over $11,300 had been paid for incidental expenses. Yet there had been
paid back to the members of many of the societies, from unexpended balances,
as dividends, a total of over $40,000; and there remained in the banks, to the
credit of the societies, over $21,400, and in the treasurers' hands a cash balance
amounting to some $1,400. Five had small sums invested besides, and one the
goodly sum of $5,642. The total amount of money handled by all had been
nearly $290,000.
These societies vary somewhat in details. The usual fees from members are
50 cents a month; the usual benefits are $4 a week for a number of weeks, and
then reduced sums, in sickness, and $4,000 for death benefit. Some pay as long
as sickness lasts. Some give widow's dues according to need. One, for exam¬
ple, the Friendly Beneficial Society, organized chiefly by the members of a
Baptist church, some fifteen years ago, with the usual fees and benefits, carries
a standing fund of about $1,000, and the yearly fees of the members have paid
the current expenses of from $300 to $500, and has usually allowed an annual
dividend of $5 to each.
The Colored Barbers' Society, over fifty years old, gives $80 at the death of a
member. Three societies, originally very large, have been gotten up in the
last twenty years, by one colored woman, whose name one of them bears.
A few of these beneficial societies have disbanded; a few have changed to
secret societies. Very few of them have been badly managed, although unin¬
corporated and without any public oversight, and everybody seems to speak
well of them and of their work.
Secret societies among the colored people are now very numerous. Many
important ones date back to before the war. The colored Masons and Inde¬
pendent Order of Odd Fellows are entirely independent of the whites in Balti¬
more, the colored men having been obliged from the state of public feeling in
the United States in the old days to get a charter from the white brethren in
England. In 1884 there were nearly 500 colored Masons in Baltimore; now
there are probably 700. Of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, fifty lodges
of the seventy-seven working ones, giving a membership of over 2,300. The
fifty lodges had, during the past two years, aided their sick, buried eighty-three
brothers and relieved seventy-seven widows and orphans, at a total expendi¬
ture of over $13,000. The order held real estate worth $18,500 and had over
$10,000 in cash.
Of the secret societies in Baltimore, the most influential are the Samaritans,
the Nazarites, the Galilean Fishermen and the Wise Men. The first two were
instituted some years before the war. The first has spread from Baltimore, dur¬
ing the forty years of its existence, to a number of states; but a third of all the
lodges and nearly a third of all the members are in Maryland (1890). Atfout
one-half of the order are women, Daughters of Samaria, and they meet by
themselves in their own lodges. There are now in Maryland fifty-eight lodges,
with a membership of 1,925.
The order of Galilean Fishermen, of men and women together, was begun in
Baltimore in 1856, by a handful of earnest workers; it was legally incorporated
in 1869. The order has become influential. It is said to number over 5,000 in
Maryland.
The order of the Seven Wise Men is a more recent order. There are many
more of the same secret, beneficial nature, but these are the largest.
94
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
In 1885 was incorporated the Colored Mutual Benefit Association, the only
one in the state, entirely managed by colored men, with a colored doctor and
a prominent colored lawyer for counsel. It is endorsed by all the clergymen,
has grown rapidly and proven itself worthy of the support of the people. In
these first few years, some $10,000 have been paid out in benefits. §
Beneficial Societies of Petersburg, Va. (1898) *
(Not including secret orders.)
NAME
When
organ¬
ized
No. of
mem¬
bers
Assessments
per year
Total
annual
income
Sick and
death
benefits
Cash
and
property
I 7 00
$ 275 00
$ 150 00
$ 175 00
3 00
68 55
43 78
3 00
45 00
23 00
3 00
51 00
30 00
3 00
135 00
128 25
+25c.
5 20
1,005 64
806 46
440 00
+12c.
3 00
129 48
110 04
+25c.
8 00
22 50
30 50
62 00
+12c.
3 00
95 11
52 65
214 09
+12c.
3 00
84 00
32 00
150 00
+12c.
3 00
68 00
27 00
100 00
+12c.
3 00
66 00
40 00
36 00
+12c.
3 00
90 00
30 00
100 00
+12c.
3 00
68 00
35 50
75 00
3 00
90 00
60 00
130 00
3 00
120 00
85 00
175 00
+12^c
. 3 00
85 00
11 00
99 53
+50c.
5 20
182 00
158 00
118 00
+25c.
60
60 00
40 00
80 00
3 00
211 00
202 25
100 00
1 20
42 60
112 63
50 00
3 00
120 00
96 00
43 00
$3,113 88
$2,177 81
$2,275 87
Young Men's
JSisters of Friendship, etc..
Union Working Olub
Sisters of Charity
Ladies' Union
Beneficial Association
Daughters of Bethlehem..
Loving Sisters
Ladies'Working Club. ...
St. Mark
Consolation
Daughters of Zion
Young Sisters of Charity..
Humble Christian
Sisters of David
Sisters of Rebeccah
Petersburg
Petersburg Beneficial
First BaptistChurch Ass'u
Young Men's
Oak Street Church Society
Endeavor, etc
Total
1884
i.893
1884
1896
1893
i884
1888
1874
1845
1867
1869
1893
1872
1892
1893
1894
1894
1894
40
22
15
17
47
163
39
16
37
28
26
22
30
26
30
40
29
35
100
44
942
Beneficial Societies of Atlanta, Ga. (1898)
(Not including secret orders.)
NAME
When
organ¬
ized
No. of
mem¬
bers
Annual
income
REMARKS.
Helping Hand, First Con¬
gregational Church
Rising Star, Wheat Street
Baptist Church
Daughters of Bethel, Beth¬
el Church
Ladles'Court of Calanthe..
Daughters of Friendship,
Union No. 1, Friendship
Baptist Church
Fort Street Benevolent
Mission
Daughters of Plenty —
Pilgrims Progress, Park
Street Church
Sisters of Love, Wheat St.
Baptist Church
Nine organizations.
1872
1879
1874
1891
1897
1892
1891
1880
40
175
15
150
115
120
190
973
$ 120
250
525
72
450
890
260
360
570
Benefits paid in 5 years, $255; be¬
nevolence, |25.
Benefits paid in 5 years, $370; dona¬
tions, etc., $50; owns cemetery lot
for its poorer members.
Donations in 5 years, $125; bene¬
fits in 5 years, $580.
Benefits 8590 since 1891.
Benefits 5years, $430; donates much
to the church.
Benefits 1 year, $190.
Benefits in 4 years, $200; secession
from Daughters of Bethel.
Benefits in 5 years, $600.
Has $600 in bank.
$2,978
$ Notes on the Progress of the Colored People of Maryland Since the War. 1890
Jeffrey R. Brackett, Ph. I>. '
* Atlanta University Publication, No, 3. t Organized before the war.
+ Assessment upon each member In case any member dies.
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
95
Warsaw, Ga. (1908)
The history of these societies is interesting. The Christian Progress is the
oldest of them. It was organized soon after the close of the war by a number
of Christian people who banded themselves together for mutual help. The
society has twenty-five members and the monthly dues per person are 25 cents.
The sick benefit is 50 cents per week. The society pays one-half of the doctor's
bill. The death benefit is $27. Any person of good moral character may now
become a member. The next oldest society dates its organization from recon¬
struction days, when there was a military company here with a woman's aux¬
iliary. The company passed out of existence but the auxiliary, under the name
of the Ladies' Branch, has continued to the present time. This society owns
a hall, where its meetings are held. Its membership is fifty and its monthly
dues 25 cents per member. The sick benefit is 50 cents per week and the death
benefit i§ $25. When a member dies an assessment of 25 cents is levied on the
survivors. The Boyer Quiet Club was organized in 1888 at the suggestion of
an old German named Boyer who, although very poor, attempted to help the
poorer Negroes. The society charges an admission fee of $3. It has about
fifty members, with monthly dues of 25 cents. The sick benefits are 50 cents
per week and one-half the cost of the doctor's first visit. The society pays all
the funeral expenses. The Earnest Workers has been organized five years.
It has forty-five members with the usual monthly dues. The sick benefits are
50 cents per week and the cost of the physician's first visit. The death bene¬
fits are $20 and one-half of the funeral expenses; it reported $100 in the treasury.
The E. K. Love Benevolent Society, with headquarters in Savannah, is char¬
tered, the Warsaw branch having sixty members. This society has a twofold
purpose: to aid the sick and bury the dead, and to assist in supporting the
Central City College at Macon, Ga., an institution controlled and supported by
colored Baptists of the state. Each member of the society is taxed 60 cents a
year for the support of the college. For local purposes the members are taxed
25 cents per month. The sick benefit is $1 per week. When a member dies $30
is paid on the funeral expenses and $10 to the nearest relative. Only Christians
are eligible for membership in the society. The Sons and Daughters of Zion
is primarily a children's society. It has twenty-seven members and the
monthly dues are 15 cents per month. The sick benefits are 50 cents per week
and one-half the doctor's bill. The death benefit is $20. It reported $113 in the
treasury. *
Philadelphia, Pa., 1899—(60,000 Negroes)
From early times the precarious economic condition of the free Negroes led
to many mutual aid organizations. They were very simple in form: an initia¬
tion fee of small amount was required and small regular payments; in case of
sickness, a weekly stipend was paid, and in case of death the members were
assessed to pay for the funeral and help the widow. Confined to a few mem¬
bers, all personally known to each other, such societies were successful from
the beginning. We hear of them in the eighteenth century, and by 1838 there
were 100 such small groups, with 7,448 members, in the city. They paid in
$18,851, gave $14,172 in benefits, and had $10,023 on hand. Ten years later about
8,000 members belonged to 106 such societies. Seventy-six of these had a total
membership of 5,187. They contributed usually 25 cents to 37% cents a month ;
the sick received $1.50 to $3.00 per week, and death benefits of $10 to $20 were
allowed. The income of these seventy-six societies was $16,81423; 681 families
were assisted. These societies have since been superceded to some extent by
* Work, In Southern Workman, January, I9i>8.
96
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
other organizations; they are still so numerous, however, that it is impracti¬
cal to catalogue them; there are probably several hundred of various kinds in
the city.
From general observation and the available figures, it seems fairly certain
that at least 4,000 Negroes belong to secret orders, and that these orders an¬
nually collect at least $25,000, part of which is paid out in sick and death bene¬
fits and part invested. The real estate, personal property and funds of these
orders amount to no less than $125,000. The function of the secret society is
partly social intercourse and partly insurance. They furnish pastime from
the monotony of work, a field for ambition and intrigue, a chance for parade,
and insurance against misfortune. Next to the church they are the most popu¬
lar organizations among Negroes.
Of the beneficial societies The Quaker City Association is a sick
and death benefit society, seven years old, which confines its membership to
native Philadelphians. It has 280 members and distributes $1,400 to $1,500
annually. The Sons and Daughters of Delaware is over fifty years old. It
has 106 members and owns $3,000 worth of real estate. The Fraternal Associa¬
tion was founded in 1861; it has 86 members and distributes about $300 a year.
It "was formed for the purpose of relieving the wants and distresses of each
other in the time of affliction and death, and for the furtherance of such
benevolent views and objects as would tend to establish and maintain a per¬
manent and friendly intercourse among them in their social relations in life."
The Sons of St. Thomas was founded in 1823 and was originally confined to
members of St. Thomas Church. It was formerly a large organization, but
now has 80 members, and paid out in 1896, $416 in relief. It has $1,500 invested
in government bonds. In addition to these there is the Sons and Daughters
of Moses, and a large number of other small societies.
There is a rising also a considerable number of insurance societies, differing
from the beneficial in being conducted by directors. The best of these are the
Crucifixion, connected with the Church of the Crucifixion, and the Avery,
connected with Wesley A. M. E. Z. Church; both have a large membership
and are well conducted. Nearly every church is beginning to organize one or
more such societies, some of which in times past have met disaster by bad
management. The True Reformers of Virginia, the most remarkable Negro
beneficial organization yet started,has several branches here. Beside these there
are numberless minor societies, as the Alpha Relief, Knights and Ladies of St.
Paul, the National Co-operative Society, Colored Women's Protective Associa¬
tion, Loyal Beneficial, etc. Some of these are honest efforts and some are
swindling imitations of the pernicious, white, petty insurance societies.*
New York
The older "African societies" in Philadelphia and Newport have
already been noted. There was one in New York also, organized in
1808 and chartered in 1810:
The organization celebrated its incorporation by marching through the
streets with mifsic and flying colors in spite'of a warning to the effect that
" the authorities would be entirely powerless to protect you on the streets, and
you would be torn in pieces by howling mobs."
The society, after its incorporation, exerted a wide influence in the com¬
munity. It became so large that out of it sprang the Clarkson Society, the
Wilberforce Benevolent Society, the Union Society, and the Woolman Society
of Brooklyn.
* Philadelphia Negro, pp. 221-25.
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
97
At present the real estate in its possession is valued at not less than $40,000.
One of the earliest accounts, covering 1813 and 1814, shows receipts to the
amount of $1,148.17; from 1852 to 1855, inclusive, rents of the society's buildings,
dues, etc., $2,628.67; in 1891, $3,162.15, and sick dues paid out to the amount of
$390; gratuities $286.20; for 1892, the receipts from all sources amount to $2,735.64.
The objects of the society were: "To raise a fund to be appropriated ex¬
clusively toward the support of such of the members of said society as shall
by reason of sickness or infirmity, or either, be incapable of attending to their
usual vocation or employment, and also toward the relief of the widows and
orphans of deceased members."
The society owns two pieces of real estate in the central part of the city, one
rented to twenty colored families, and the other a store and dwelling occupied
by three families.
There are a large number of beneficial and insurance societies in New
York now, as in other cities.
Canada
There were in Chatham associations formed, called True Bands. They were
composed of colored people of both sexes, associated for their own improve¬
ment ; their objects were many: For general interest in each other's welfare;
to pursue such plans and objects as may be for their mutual advantage; to
improve their schools and induce their race to send their children into the
schools; to break down prejudice; to bring the churches, so far as possible,
into one body, and not let minor differences divide them; to prevent litigation
by referring all disputes among themselves to a committee; to stop the beg¬
ging system (going to the United States and raising large sums of money, of
which the fugitives never received the benefit); to raise such funds among
themselves as may be necessary for the poor, the sick and the destitute fugi¬
tives newly arrived; to prepare themselves ultimately to bear their due weight
of political power.
The first True Band was organized in Maiden, in September, 1854,consisting
of 600 members. It is represented as having thus far fulfilled its objects ad¬
mirably. Small monthly payments are made by the members. The receipts
have enabled them to meet all cases of destitution and leave a surplus in the
treasury.
In all other places where the bands have been organized the same good re¬
sults have followed. There were in 1856 fourteen True Bands organized in
various sections of Canada West.*
The beneficial societies are thus seen to be universal among colored
people and conducted in all sorts of ways, from the simple form noted
in § 8 to the regular insurance society. No accurate estimate of the
income of these societies is possible.
Their history in Philadelphia is instructive on this point: Judging
from the figures here and in other cities, and remembering that the in¬
surance society is largely replacing the old beneficial society and that
the country districts have fewer societies than the city, it seems, to
hazard a guess, that between a quarter and a half million dollars are
still annually paid to Negro beneficial societies.
As has been said the purely beneficial societies are being absorbed
into larger insurance societies. The first Negro insurance society
appears in Philadelphia:
* Drew: The Refugees.
98
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
The year 1810 witnessed the creation of the African Insurance Company
which was located at No. 159 (now 529) Lombard street: Joseph Randolph,
president; Cyrus Porter, treasurer; William Coleman, secretary, with a capi¬
tal stock of $5,000. " The members of this company are all colored persons," as
stated in the directories for 1811 and 1813. In the latter year it was located at
155 Lombard street, which appears to have been the residence of its secretary,
whose profession was given as "teacher." We find no traces of it after this
year; some of its policies are yet preserved in the families of the insured.*
The transition from beneficial to secret and insurance societies is thus
described in Virginia:
As soon as the colored man became free he formed all kinds of associations
for mutual protection, many of which exist today though in somewhat modi-
lied forms. These organizations were founded for the purpose of caring for
the sick and furnishing decent burial at death. No attention was paid to dif¬
ference of age, and very little to health conditions. The same joining fee was
charged regardless of age, and the same monthly dues paid. The usual
amounts paid for initiation fee in these "Benevolent Societies" was from $2.50
to $5.00. Monthly dues of 50 cents were generally charged.
The amount paid for sick dues was regulated by the by-laws of the various
societies and ranged from $1.50 per week to $5.00. Members were taken in on
the recommendation of friends. These organizations were formed by the
hundred in the cities of Virginia, and many of them served a good purpose in
that the people were brought together and friendly intercourse established.
These societies were known by their names and many of them were long and
curious. Regalia of all kinds were worn and the society having the greatest
amount of regalia was the most popular
From paying no attention to the laws of health and taking in persons with¬
out medical examination, many of these organizations found themselves
loaded down with large amounts of money due on account of unpaid sick dues
and death benefits. Many of them have gone to the wall and there remains
little to tell that they ever existed
In the early eighties the colored people began to take insurance in white
companies requiring a small weekly payment and giving in return therefor a
death benefit and in some instances sick dues. As the amounts charged were
small and no trouble was attached because of the payments being made to
agent^ at the homes, the growth of these societies was rapid.
Some of these persons being more inquisitive than others found that the
amounts paid on accounts of colored persons were smaller than the amounts
paid to whites for the same premiums. Deciding at once that this was unjust,
the more enterprising members of the race began to devise ways and means
to break down this discrimination by the establishing of colored insurance
companies and by attaching an insurance feature to societies already organ¬
ized. The promoters of these various companies had no experience whatever
in insurance, and it never once occurred to them that all successful insurance
is based on some well established mortality table. No investigations were
made in order to find out the relative death rate of the colored and white
races. In order to secure the business from white companies the common
attempt was to adopt a rate lower than that charged by the white companies
and to pay therefor more benefits. The woods are full of the graves of these
* A History of the Insurance Company of North America, (the oldest Are and ma¬
rine insurance company in America). The Negro society was formed in 1796. Of.
Philadelphia Negro, p. 23.
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
99
earlier companies which failed for the want of knowledge of business.*
The following is a list of the larger Negro industrial insurance socie¬
ties now operating:
The United States
People's Mutual Aid Association Little Rock, Ark.
The Royal Mutual Aid Beneficial Association Wilmington, Del.
National Benefit Insurance Co Jacksonville, Fla.
Afro-American Industrial Insurance Co Jacksonville, Fla.
Union Mutual Aid Association Jacksonville, Fla.
Oordele Mutual and Fire Insurance Oo Oordele, Ga.
Atlanta Mutual Insurance Oo Atlanta, Ga.
Union Mutual Insurance Oo Atlanta, Ga.
Savannah Mutual and Fire Insurance Oo Savannah, Ga.
The Pilgrim Health Insurance Co Augusta, Ga.
Southern Mutual Insux-ance Co Augusta, Ga.
Guarantee Relief Association Augusta, Ga.
People's Mutual Aid Association Muskogee, I. T.
United Aid and Benevolent Association Jersey Oity, N. J.
Benevolent Aid and Relief Association Baltimore, Md.
Mutual Benefit Society Baltimore, Md.
Benevolent Aid and Relief Association Annapolis, Md.
Toilers' Mutual Insurance „Co Greensboro, N. C.
Progressive Benefit Association Charleston, S. C.
North Carolina Mutual and Provident Association Durham, N. 0.
United States Life Insurance Co Charleston, S. 0.
Metropolitan Mutual Benefit Association Charleston, S. C.
American Life and Benefit Insurance Oo Durham, N. 0.
The Home Insurance Co Charleston, S. 0.
Piedmont Life Insurance Oo Greensboro, N. C.
Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Co Durham, N. 0.
Toilers' Mutual Life Insurance Oo Tarboro, N. C.
Keystone Aid Society Philadelphia, Pa.
Northern Aid Society Philadelphia, Pa.
Reliable Aid and Improvement Society Philadelphia, Pa.
Mutual Improvement Society Washington, D. C.
National Benefit Association Washington, D. C.
Hand in Hand Fraternity Washington, D. C.
Guarantee Aid and Relief Society Savannah, Ga.
American Beneficial Insurance Co Richmond, Va.
Richmond Beneficial Insurance Co Richmond, Va.
Virginia Beneficial Insurance Co Norfolk, Va.
Star of Zion Relief and Accident Corporation Boydton, Va.
United Aid Insurance Oo Richmond, Va.
Benevolent and Relief Association Guthrie, Okla.
Lincoln Benefit Association Raleigh, N. O.
Pimbas Mutual Aid Society Baltimore, Md.
St. James Beneficial Society Baltimore, Md.
Oo-operative Insurance Oo Hannibal, Mo.
Union Central Relief Florence, Ala.
Independent Benevolent Order Georgia
Grand United Order of True Reformers Richmond, Va.
Independent Order of St. Luke Richmond, Va.
Home Protective Association
People's Mutual Aid Association Helena, Ark.
The Alpha Insurance Co Washington, D. 0.
Industrial Savings Society Wilmington, Del.
Mutual Insurance Co Athens, Ga.
Georgia Southern Home Aid Insurance Co Augusta, Ga.
Standard Beneficial and Relief Oo Baltimore, Md.
People's Beneficial and Fraternal Co Baltimore, Md.
Cosmopolitan Beneficial Association St. Paul, Minn.
Long Island Industrial Association Brooklyn, N. Y.
United Aid Benevolent Association New York, N. Y.
Children's Aid Society. Cincinnati, Ohio
* Report of the Hampton Conference, No. 8, pp. 15-16,18.
100 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Mutual Reliable Aid Society Philadelphia, Pa.
Fidelity Mercantile Fraternity Norfolk, Va.
Consumers' Co-operative Fraternity Norfolk, Va.
United Brotherhood Fx-aternity Norfolk, Va.
The list makes no pretentions to completeness and could be greatly
extended. Such Negro insurance societies have had various external
difficulties:
Afro-American insurance companies were forging ahead so rapidly that the
legislature of Virginia passed a law with the expressed purpose to put the
Afro-American companies out of business, during the year of 1903, and raise
the state license of insurance companies to $200 and 1 per cent on gross receipts.
These enactments simply caused the Afro-American companies to hustle more
and they paid the taxes. These legislators met again; passed a law to this
effect: In order for insurance companies paying sick and death claims to
continue to do business they must deposit in the state treasury the round sum
of $10,000 as a security to their policy holders. Many thought that Virginia
would be a grave yard for Afro-American insurance companies. White agents
on their route told Afro-Americans holding policies in Afro-American com¬
panies, that their moneys were lost and they had better join the white compa¬
nies. The Virginia Beneficial and Insurance Co., and three other Afro-Ameri¬
can companies individually put up their $10,000 and today there are more Afro-
American insurance companies, with home offices in the state, doing business
than there are white. %
Most of the laws referred to are to protect policy holders, but the
Negro societies have noticed that Southern legislatures only began to
awaken to this need of protection when Negro societies began driving
the whites out of business.
Virginia was the first center of this development, because of the ex¬
traordinary growth of Negro industrial insurance there:
We find on investigation that in the state of Virginia quite a number of in¬
surance organizations have been formed, and in the report of the Auditor of
Public Accounts for the year 1902, we find the following report which will
give some idea of the magnitude of the insurance business as conducted by
Negroes in the state of Virginia. There are quite a number of insurance com¬
panies and fraternal societies in the state that do not as yet make reports to
the Auditor. According to the official directory of the city of Kichmond
there are in that city alone sixteen insurance companies conducted byNegroes:
ASSOCIATION
Policies
written
190S
Insurance
1909
Policies
in force
Value
American Benefit
Richmond Benefit
Southern Aid Society of Virginia
Benevolent Aid and Relief Association
Grand Fountain United Order True Reformers.
19,146
6,(599
4,657
(5,880
700
15,740
$ 653,521
221,945
395,680
268,<>15
25,<75
1,883,434
18,030
14,820
6,808
3,627
697
64,357
$ 617,106
434,970
500,311
132,062
25,875
7,715,702
53,322
1 3,449,170
108,339
$9,426,026
If a complete report could be had of the business which the colored insur¬
ance companies and the fraternal societies are doing in the state of Virginia it
| New York Age.
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
101
would show that more than 300,000 colored men, women and children carry
some form of insurance. This means a great deal for the business conditions
of the people of this state, since these organizations not only provide for the
relief of the policy holders in sickness, but a large part of the money paid out
on the account of death claims finds permanent investment in various forms. *
The career of one Negro insurance society has been so remarkable
that it deserves especial study. Most of the following facts are from a
United States Government investigation:
The True Reformers constitutes probably the most remarkable Negro
organization in the country. The association has its headquarters in Rich¬
mond, Va., and its history in brief is as follows:
The Grand Fountain
The association was organized in January, 1881, by Rev. William Washing¬
ton Browne, an ex-slave of Habersham county, Ga., as a fraternal beneficiary
institution, composed of male and female members, and began with 100 mem¬
bers and a capital of $150. On April 4,1883, or over two years later, the circuit
court of the city of Richmond, Va., granted a regular charter of incorporation
as a joint stock company to Browne and his associates under the name of "The
Grand Fountain of the United Order of True Reformers." The chief purpose
of incorporation was to provide what is to be known as an endowment or
mutual benefit fund; the capital stock was " to be not less than $100 nor more
than $10,000, to be divided into shares of the value of $5 each;" the company
was to hold real estate " not to exceed in value the sum of $25,000;" the princi¬
pal office was to be kept in the city of Richmond, and officers named in the
charter for the year were Rev. William W. Browne, Richmond, Va., Grand
Worthy Master; Eliza Allen, Petersburg, Va., Grand Worthy Mistress; R. T.
Quarles, Ashland, Va., Grand Worthy Vice-Master; S. W. Sutton, Richmond,
Va., Grand Worthy Chaplain; Peter H. Woolfolk, Richmond, Va., Grand
Worthy Secretary; Robert I. Clarke, Centralia, Va., Grand Worthy.Treasurer.
These, with six others, composed the Board of Directors for the first year.
Thus the True Reformers started on their way as a full-fledged joint stock
corporation, whose chief aim was to provide a form of what is known as
mutual beneficial insurance for its members. In 1898 the charter was amended
so that a part of section 2 should read as follows: " The said corporation shall
issue certificates of membership to its members and shall pay death benefits
to the heirs, assigns, personal or legal representatives of the deceased mem¬
bers ;" and section 4, as follows: " The real estate to be held shall not exceed
in value the sum of five hundred thousand ($500,000) dollars."
Up to December, 1901, the last report of the organization shows that it had
paid in death claims $606,000, and in sick, $1,500,000, and that the membership
was over 50,000, having increased 18,000 in the preceding year. The increase in
twenty years from a membership of 100 and a capital of $150 to a membership
of over 50,000, and with real estate aggregating $223,500 in value, constitutes an
excellent showing.
But it is not the growth nor even the existence of the Grand Fountain of
the True Reformers as a mutual insurance association, with its small army of
employees, that causes it to be considered here; it is the affiliated by-products,
to use an industrial expression, that are of interest and that may prove to be
of great economic value to the Negro race, t
The report of the order for 1907 with the " by-products " or affiliated depart¬
ments is as follows:
The Fountain Department has grown from four Fountains or lodges in 1881,
to 2,678 Fountains or lodges in January, 1907. The 100 members have grown
* Hampton Conference, No. 7.
-j- Bulletin of the United States Department of Labor, No. 41, pp. 807-14.
102 Economic Cooperation Among Negro Americans
to more than 100,000, who have been initiated into the order, and of whom there
are now benefited in the Fountains 50,636. There have been 8,332 deaths in the
Senior Fountain, for which there has been paid $979,440.55.
The joining fees of this department are from $4.60 to $6.60, and persons are
admitted from 18 to 60 years of age. Monthly dues, 55 cents for eight months
and 60 cents for four months are paid into the Fountain by each member. No
extra tax or assessment is levied to pay the death benefits.
In 1885 there was organized and put in operation a department for the chil¬
dren known as the Rosebud Department. For twenty-one years this depart¬
ment was in operation under the management of the Grand Fountain and
more than 30,000 children have been entered into this department. Children
are taken from 2 to 18 years of age. The joining fee is 50 cents, monthly dues
are 16 cents. Sick benefits range from $1 down to 25 cents per week, accord¬
ing to the length of time sick. There have been 777 deaths in this class for
which the sum of $23,214 has been paid.
The class department of the Mutual Benefit Degree was introduced in 1885
for the purpose of paying to members of the Fountain department an addi¬
tional amount in death claims of from $200 to $1,000. This department, like the
others, has grown and increased, from time to time, until today there are 5,980
members. There have been 1,134 deaths in the twenty-two years, for which
there has been paid to the heirs of deceased members $354,334.70.
The following tables will give the ages, joining fees and dues of each of the
classes:
Class "B" Table
AGES
Joining
fee
Value of
certificate
after lYr.
Value of
certificate
before 1 yr
Annual
dues
Quarter¬
ly dues
18 to 25
25 to 30
30 to 35
35 to 40
40 to 45
45 to 50
50 to 55
55 to 60
$ 2 50
2 75
3 00
3 25
3 50
, 3 75
4 00
4 25
$ 200 00
200 00
200 00
200 00
140 00
115 00
90 00
65 00
$ 100 00
100 00
100 00
100 00
70 00
58 00
45 00
33 00
I 4 75
4 75
4 75
5 70
5 70
6 65
6 65
7 70
$ 1 20
1 20
1 20
1 43
1 43
1 66
1 66
1 90
Class "E" Table
AGES
Joining
fee
Value of
certificate
after 1 Yr.
Value of
certificate
before lyr.
Annual
dues
Quarter¬
ly dues
18 to 25
25 to 30
30 to 35
35 to 40
40 to 45
45 to 60
50 to 55
$ 5 00
5 25
5 50
5 75
6 00
6 25
6 50
$ 500 00
500 00
500 00
500 00
500 00
500 00
500 00
$ 250 00
250 00
250 00
250 00
250 00
250 00
250 00
$12 60
12 60
15 60
15 60
20 48
. 20 48
23 48
$ 3 15
3 15
3 90
3 90
5 12
5 12
5 87
Class "M" Table
AGES
Joining
fee
Value of
certificate
Annual
dues
Quarter¬
ly dues
18 to 30
80 to 35
85 to 40-
40 to 45
45 to 50
$11 00
12 00
12 50
18 00
13 50
$ 1,000 00
900 00
900 00
800 00
700 00
$21 00
25 56
25 56
26 04
26 04
$ 5 25
6 89
6 89
6 51
6 51
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
103
The benefits paid by all departments to date have been:
8,322 Fountain deaths $ 979,440.55
727 Rosebud deaths 23,214.00
542 Glass B deaths 90,444.75
691 Class E deaths . 263,714^95
1 Glass M death 175.00
Total, 10,193 deaths $1,356,989.25
This amount paid in death benefits is not all that has been paid, for the va¬
rious subordinate Fountains have paid over a million and a half dollars in sick
benefits, making a grand total paid to members by the Grand Fountain and
its subordinate lodges of $2,856,989.25.
Savings Bank
In 1887 the necessity for a repository for the funds of the organization was
made very evident when at the organization of a subordinate Fountain in
Charlotte county, Virginia, the funds collected were entrusted to a white store¬
keeper by the treasurer for safe keeping. The white storekeeper passed the
word amongst his neighbors, and it was determined by them to break up the
organization. Feeling between the races was running very high because of a
recent lynching in the neighborhood. This strange condition of affairs led to
the organization of the savings bank. The Savings Bank of the Grand Foun¬
tain, United Order of True Reformers, was chartered by the Virginia Legisla¬
ture March, 1888, and went into operation April 3, 1889, receiving $1,200 on de¬
posit the first day.
The capital stock was placed at $100,000, each share being $5. The by-laws
provided that only members of the Grand Fountain could take stock, and one
person was only allowed to take a limited amount. In this way it was sought
by the founders to perpetuate the bank and prevent the possible pooling of
the stock. In thirteen years from the date of the charter the whole amount
of capital stock was taken up.
The bank receives deposits of from one dollar up, and pays interest at the
rate of 3 per cent on all deposits. The business for the first five months of the
bank amounted to $9,881.28 in deposits. Today it has:
Capital stock paid in
Surplus fund
Undivided profits, less amount paid for interest, expenses and taxes
Individual deposits subject to check
Time certificates of deposit
Total
The Reformers' Mercantile and Industrial Association
The Reformers' Mercantile and Industrial Association was incorporated
December 14, 1899. This department conducts a system of stores doing an an¬
nual business of over $100,000. The principal one of these stores is located at
Richmond, Va.
The Reformer
The Reformer, a weekly newspaper with a circulation of 19,000 copies, is pub¬
lished by the Reformers' Mercantile aDd Industrial Association. A general
printing department is conducted by the Reformer, where all classes of print¬
ing is neatly and quickly done.
Hotel Reformer
The Hotel Reformer, located at No. 900 North Sixth street, Richmond, Va,
has accommodation for 150 guests.
.$ 100,000 00
. 95,000 00
29,136 95
. 125,526 76
. 210,746 11
.$ 560,409 82
104
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Old Folks' Home
An Old Folks' Home located at Westham, Henrico county, Va., six miles
west of Richmond, is established for the benefit of the old members of the
colored race. Westham farm, on which the home is located, consists of 634%
acres, of which 200 acres have been cut up for Brownsville, a colored town.
The Old Folks' Home is supported by voluntary contributions made by the
various members of the organization and the friendly public. Inmates are
taken regardless of their religious belief or fraternal connection.
Reformer Building and Loan Association, incorporated
The Reformer Building and Loan Association, incorporated under the laws
of the State of Virginia, has as its object the encouragement of industry, fru¬
gality, home building and saving among its members. Its offices are located
at No. 604 North Second street, Richmond, Va.
Real Estate Department
The Real Estate Department of the Grand Fountain was established in 1902,
and controls the property holdings of the organization. It has under its con¬
trol twenty-seven buildings and three farms, with a total value of $400,000,
which belong to the institution, and leases for the benefit of the institution
twenty-three other buildings.
Brief summaries of the business of thirty other Negro industrial in¬
surance societies follow:
1. Progressive Benefit Association, Charleston, S. C.—Fees 5 to 40 cents per
week, to be collected by agents. Sickness is reported at the office, and paid
one week after report on doctor's certificate. Death claims are paid one week
after reported. Business: 1904, $10,744; 1905, $10,102; 1906, $10,331; 1907 to July 1,
$4,632.
2. The American Life and Benefit Insurance Co., Durham,N. C—Chartered
February, 1906. Business: Amount paid in 1906-7, $5,235.15; amount paid out*
$3,250.76.
3. The American Beneficial Insurance Co., Richmond, Va.—Two hundred
stockholders. Branch establishments in all cities and towns of Virginia and
the District of Columbia. Business: 1902-3, $61,177.34; 1903-4, $60,657.80; 1904-5,
$76,278.80; 1905-6, $83,951.60; 1906-7, $89,453.84. Total paid up capital, $15,000. Real
estate owned in Richmond and Newport News, $5,000. "It was organized Aug¬
ust, 1902, in the city of Richmond, with the present officers in charge. It had
a healthy start from the beginning,for within three weeks after the President
made the call for those who desired to take stock to meet him, $8,700 in cash
was paid in. Sixty thousand persons have taken policies with us during these
five years."
4. Home Protective Association.—Members in State, 2,000; lodges, 100.
Methods of operation: On the assessment plan. Total income for 1906-7, $18,000;
real estate owned, $4,500. " The association was organized three years ago with
ten charter members."
5. Mutual Improvement Society, Washington, D. C.—Members, 6,000, with
branch offices in twenty-five States of the Union. Business: Two years, 1906-7,
$60,000. " Society was incorporated March 1, 1897."
6. Union Mutual Aid Association, Jacksonville, Fla.—Branch establish¬
ments throughout principal cities and towns of Florida. Business done in the
last three years, $50,000; total capital, $5,000. Real estate owned: Bridge and
Union streets.
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
105
7. United Aid and Benevolent Association of America, Jersey City, N. J.—
Branch establishments: New York City, New Rochelle, Tarrytown, White
Plains, Nyack, and Saratoga Springs, N. Y., Lakewood, Asbury Park, Newark,
N. J., Columbia, S. C. Insures against sickness, accident and death and fire in
the insurance department. In the real estate department, rents, leases, buys
and sells; takes first and second mortgages, and loans money. Business: Last
year, the receipts for the Insurance Department, $17,672.75; in the Real Estate
Department, $11,591.81, making a total of $29,263.56. Paid out last year for sick
claims, $4,620.50, and $2,532.25 in death claims, total $7,152.75, leaving a balance
of $10,520; capital, $10,000. Ileal estate owned: New York and New Jersey.
"The United Aid and Benevolent Association was organized June 10,1901, and
incorporated under the laws of the State of New Jersey in the same year. On
June 10, 1907, the company had been in operation six years. Since that time,
we have insured about 15,000 persons. Our realty company is incorporated for
$25,000."
8. Union Benefit Association, Savannah, Ga., with 25,009 members. Branch
offices: Atlanta, Ga., Charleston, S. C., Thomasville, Ga., Albany, Ga., Beaufort,
S, C., Rincon, Ga., Bluffton, S. C., Guyton, Ga., Daufuskie, S. C., Summerville,
S. C., Jesup, Ga. Mutual co-operative upon the assessment plan. Total income
for 1906, $24,282.20. " The association was organized in 1903; since that time we
have written up over $700,000 worth of business. The business is gradually
increasing and warrants over 200 employees."
9. The Gallilean Fishermen Joint Stock Association owns a building worth
$5,000. Baltimore, Md., 1906.
10. The Stock Association of the Grand United Order of the Sons and
Daughters of Good Hope. Baltimore, Md.
11. The Grand United Order of the Sons and Daughters of Moses owns a
building worth $9,000. Baltimore, Md.
12. Benevolent and Relief Association, Guthrie, Okla.—Capital stock $5,000,
13. Co-operative Insurance Co., Hannibal, Mo.—The company is about one
year old and it has 1,000 members. 1906.
14. National Benefit Association, Jacksonville, Fla.—Capital stock $10,000.
15. The Afro-American Industrial and Benefit Association, Jacksonville,
Fla.—Paid up capital stock $10,000.
16. Toilers' Mutual Life Insurance Co., Tarboro, N. C.—Directors, 11; busi¬
ness done in 1906-7, $2,982,85. No capital; an assessment company. "Com¬
menced business March 5,1906."
17. Star of Zion Relief Accident Corporation, Boydton, Va.—Membership,
2,500. Benefits: From 5 to 49 years 18 cents to 25 cents. After twelve months
a member is benefited by a policy of $100, which matures in twelve or fourteen
years, followed by a continued policy of $100 to $300 at same rates. In the Ac¬
cident Department sick and accident and death benefits are paid according to
age. For $2 per week one receives $100 at death—10 per cent every ten years,
minus what you draw out. After five years one-half of the initiation fee is
paid back, on written application, complying with the rules of the Supreme
Fountain. After thirty years membership policies are paid off. Fees: $3 to
join, 30 cents per month ; in city, 60 cents per month. Benefits from $25 to $50.
Capital stock, $10,000. Business done in two years, 1906-7, about $10,000, with a
paid capital of $1,000. Real estate, $2,500. "Chartered under the laws of Vir¬
ginia May 9,1904." One of the main features of the order is its Reformation
Department, intended to reclaim the fallen youth of the race.
18. People's Mutual Aid Association, Little Rock, Ark.—Branch establish¬
ments at Pine Bluff, Helena, Fort Smith, Texarkana, Wynne, Marianna, Arka-
106 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
delphia, Brinkley, Jonesboro, Hot Springs, Batesville, Clarendon, DeValls
Bluff, Cotton Plant, Camden and Forrest City, Ark., Muskogee, South McAl-
lester, Ardmore and Chickasha, Indian Territory. Business done in 1906-7,
$63,923.10; 1907, $237,449. Capital paid up, $50,000. "Organized July 1, 1904.
Twenty-three thousand, five hundred and seventy-eight members to date.
Since the association was organized we have met with wonderful success.
Today we are employing 125 young men and women. Prospects bid fair for
an opening of at least 150 more during the next two years. Connected with
Capital City Savings Bank."
19. North Carolina Mutual and Provident Association, Durham, N. C., has
110,000 members; fifty-one branch offices, twenty-nine in North Carolina and
twelve in South Carolina. Insurance on the assessment plan. We also write
straight life and endowment insurance. Policies are collected weekly, month¬
ly and annually by over 400 agents through fifty-one branch offices. Total
business in 1906, $117,000. Twenty-five thousand dollars worth of real estate
in Durham, N. C. "This company was organized in April, 1899, with seven
directors. After operating two years five of these men became discouraged
and the entire business was bought by John Merrick, A. M. Moore and C. C.
Spaulding. Now we are paying an average of 1150 per day for benefits and
our business is in a prosperous condition, having never been sued for a single
legal claim."
20. National Benefit Association, Washington, D. C,—Thirty-nine stock¬
holders and 27,888 members. Branch offices in Newark, New Brunswick and
Camden, N. J., Providence, R. I., New York, N. Y., and Pittsburg, Steelton,
Williamsport, Wilkesbarre, Harrisburg and Philadelphia, Pa. -Business done
1902, $12,920.67; 1903, $13,896.13; 1904, $18,015.92; 1905, $28,283.99; 1906, $43,270.34. Total
paid up capital, $5,000. No stock for sale. Real estate owned: Home office,
$20,000; four unimproved lots in Anacostia, D. C., $1,000; otherwise invested,
$20,000. Organized in 1899. In event of sickness or accident a weekly benefit
of $1.50 to $8, and of death from $12 to $125.
21. Keystone Aid and Insurance Society, Philadelphia, Pa.—Membership
13,000. Business 1906, $47,580.73; 1907 (six months), $32,463.39. Total capital,
$10,000. Reserve added to capital increases it to $16,500.29. Real estate owned:
Home office. "Incorporated July 12,1902, under the laws of Pennsylvania.
Has in five years paid out in the conducting of the business over $150,000."
22. The Hand in Hand Fraternity, Washington, D. C.—A fraternal insur¬
ance organization, incorporated under the laws of the District of Columbia.
Issues policies from $100 to $!$0. Collects premiums or assessments.
23. The Guarantee Aid and Relief Society, Savannah, Ga.—Branch offices in
Atlanta, Americus, Albany, Augusta, Dawson, Cuthbert and Richland, Ga.
Business done in 1906, $15,971.38.
24. Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Co., Durham, N. C.—Membership 20,000,
with branch offices in about seventy towns throughout North Carolina. In
1906-7 $15,000 worth of business, including both new and old business. No capi¬
tal. " Charter secured during the latter part of 1903. Commenced doing busi¬
ness in February, 1904. Very little business was done until 1905, and the
greatest business done was in 1906. The management has been changed sev¬
eral times, and under the present management the company is seeing its
brightest days. Plans are at present on foot to organize another company, to
be a stock company (capital stock $100,000), to do exclusively a life business.
The present company will ultimately be absorbed by the new company."
25. The Atlanta Mutual Insurance Association, Atlanta, Ga.—Branch offices
in Augusta, Savannah, Columbus, Albany, Macon, Stockbridge, Covington,
Beneficial and Insurance Societies
107
Conyers, Forsyth, Athens, Cartersville, Tallapoosa, Douglasville, Austell and
Dallas. Dues collected weekly, on the co-operative assessment plan. Business
done for 1906, $381,373; six months in 1907, $160,180. Total capital, $5,000. " The
company began business September 25, 1905, by depositing $5,000 with the
State Treasurer and by the expenditure of an additional $8,500 in agency, fees,
etc. The Association has a membership of 15,000."
26. Benevolent Aid and Relief Association of Baltimore, Baltimore, Md.—
Business done in 1906-7, $5,000.
27. Reliable Mutual Aid and Improvement Society, Philadelphia, Pa.—Busi¬
ness done in 1906, $25,000; 1907, $30,000. Mutual concern. Real estate owned at
1440 Lombard street, $5,000. Organized 1902. Cash balance of $1,000. Sick and
accident benefits from $2.50 to $10 per week; death benefits from $50 to $250.
Dues collected and payable monthly: Children under 12 years, 50 cents; adults
in Class B, $1.00; adults in Glass A, $2.00.
28. Provident Medical Aid and Burial Association of Chicago, Chicago, 111.—
Total capital, $5,000. Incorporated in 1901.
29. Richmond Beneficial Insurance Co., Richmond, Va.:
Cash in banks and office $ 9,541 00
Real estate in the cites of Virginia 10,000 00
Capital stock paid in 10,000 00
Deposited with the State of Virginia .. 10,000 00
Stocks and bonds 10,400 00
Annual premium receipts 112,682 81
Paid to policy-holders in 1906 57,609 64
The company began business by operating only the combination policy, but
has for the last three years operated in addition a straight life policy, with
both an Infantile and an Adult Department. Members between 12 months
and 60 years pay 5 to 25 cents per week; sick benefits from $1.25 to $6; death
benefits from $12.50 to $75. The benefits vary with the age of the member and
the premium paid. Members received in the straight life from 10 to 60 years;
benefits paid from $500 down, varying with the age and premium paid.
Weekly
premiums
Ages—Years
Sick
benefits
Death
benefits
05
Mos. 12 to 40
$ 1 25
$ 20 00
05
Yrs. 41 to 50
1 00
12 50
05
" 51 to 60
75
10 00
10
Mos. 12 to 40
2 50
40 00
10
Yrs. 41 to 50
2 00
25 00
10
" 51 to 60
1 50
20 00
15
Mos. 15 to 40
3 75
45 00
15
Yrs. 41 to 50
3 00
37 50
15
" 51 to 60
2 25
30 00
20
Mos. 18 to 40
5 00
60 00
20
Yrs. 41 to 50
4 00
50 00
20
" 51 to 60
3 00
40 00
25
Mos. 18 to 40
6 00
75 00
25
Yrs. 41 to 50
5 00
60 00
25
" 51 to 60
3 75
45 00
Paid to Policy-holders in 1906
14,826 sick and accident claims $ 43'1§®
450 death claims 14,429 04
Total
$ 57,609 64
108 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
The company was granted, a charter in 1894 with a capital stock of $5,000, and.
has issued during eleven years 90,000 certificates of membership arnd has paid
more than $325,000 on account of sick, accident and death claims. The total
receipts of the company for 1905 exceeded $118,000; the number of policies is¬
sued was 11,444. The company employs about 400 young men and women. The
authorized capital stock of $10,000 has been subscribed and paid. It has $10,000
on deposit in the State Treasury as a protection to its policy-holders. The
company has purchased the three-story brick building now used as the home
office, and has begun to establish branch offices in a number of the larger
cities. Its funds have been invested in real estate and other paying invest¬
ments.
30. Independent Order of St. Luke, Richmond, Ya.—Founded in the year
1865. Membership in 1900,1,000; in 1908,21,200. Total amount of money handled
in the last eight years,$202,201.42; amount handled from December, 1906, to De¬
cember, 1907, $44,634.25. " The expenditures are divided into two classes: Class
number one, a mortuary fund; class number two, expense fund. The princi¬
pal object is to defray the expenses of the mortuary fund. This order has 650
branch offices in 14 different States. The principal departments of work are:
Printing, supply, general office. In the fraternal organization we have three
incorporated bodies: 1. The St. Luke Association, which handles the real
estate and property to the amount of $30,000. 2. The St. Luke Penny Savings
Bank, an incorporated institution, with a capital stock of $50,000. 3. The St.
Luke Emporium, a general department store, an incorporated institution with
a capital stock of $25,000, all paid in." This store in 1907 did a business of
$28,340.
The total income of insurance societies is difficult to estimate. Those
which we have reported have, approximately, incomes as follows:
NAME
True Reformers
Progressive Benefit
American Life and Benefit
American Beneficial
People's Mutual
Home Protective
Mutual Improvement
Union Mutual
United Aid and Benevolent
Union Benefit
Toilers' Mutual
Star of Zion
North Carolina Mutual
National Benefit
Keystone Aid Society
Guarantee Relief Association
Carolina Mutual
Atlanta Mutual Insurance Co
St. Luke's
Benevolent Aid and Relief Ass'n...
Reliable Mutual
Richmond Beneficial Insurance Co
Total
Income
| 450,000
10,331
5,235
89,453
237,449
18,000
30,000
20,000
29,263
24,282
2,982
5,000
117,000
43,270
47,580
15,971
10.000
381,373
44,634
3,000
30,000
112,682
$1,727,705
Property
$ 400,000
5,666
4^500
5,66O
2,500
25,000
21,000
16,500
63,000
5,000
49,941
$ 597,441
This is only a partial report of a selected list, and the real estate re¬
port is especially defective. The total income of such societies cannot
be far from three millions of dollars. They probably hold in real estate
and other capital (deposited bonds, for instance), at least one million
dollars in property.
Secret Societies
109
The chief criticism of these societies is the unscientific basis of their
insurance business. It is a phase of insurance through which all
groups have at one time or another passed, but it is today largely dis¬
credited by the best opinion. Its defect lies in the irregular imposition
of the burden of insurance, and dependence on lapsed policies to supply
the needed surplus. Under Massachusetts insurance legislation many
of these companies could not exist. Nevertheless, there are signs of
improvement; many societies, like the True Reformers, are gradually
adopting graduated payments on a scientific age classification and
others will follow.*
There is also wide room for peculation and dishonesty in industrial
insurance. Protective legislation, especially in the South, is driving
out the worst offenders, but some still remain. On the whole, however,
these societies have done three things:
(a) Encouraged economic co-operation and confidence.
(b) Consolidated small capital.
(c) Taught business methods.
We will now take up the kindred secret societies.
Section 12. Secret Societies
The Masons
The Grand Secretary of the Prince Hall Lodge of Massachusetts,
the mother Grand Lodge of Negro Masonry in America, gives the
number of Negro Masons as follows:
African Lodge in its beginning had fifteen members. In 1904 I made as
careful an investigation as the data in my possession permitted, with the fol¬
lowing result:
STATES
Alabama
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
District of Columbia
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Carried forward 1,031
Lodges
Members
104
2,815
181
3,782
14
318
15
310
10
250
15
400
12
708
231
3.794
187
4,050
47
1,372
28
778
15
323
46
1,256
41
1,272
41
1,251
826
22
11
437
10
313
1,031
24,255
STATES
Brought forward
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
New Jersey
New York
North Carolina ...
Ohio
Oklahoma
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina —
Tennessee
Texas
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Total
Lodges Members
1,031
4
241
96
20
25
84
42
74
55
6
39
* Note the table on page 100. Some associations have less insurance in force at the
end of the year than they have written during the year, showing many lapses. In
other cases the figures show a better condition.
110 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
A conservative estimate of increase for these totals since then, would add 15
per cent to the number of lodges and 33 per cent to the membership. In the
Southern States the growth has been phenomenally rapid. The ratio of mem¬
bership in the several States remains about the same, and the differences in
membership—where the conditions might be supposed to be the same, are due
to differences of Grand Lodge policy, one elevating the standard of qualifica¬
tions for membership, and the other lowering them.
In the North American Review for May, 1897, a W. S. Harwood published a
very interesting paper on Secret Societies in America, white and colored, in
which he gives total membership, money raised, and disbursements for
charity. In his table the number of colored Masons is given as 224,000. This
is excessive. The Encyclopaedia of Fraternities, published in 1899, states the
number as 55,713.
The financial status of the various lodges can only be approximately
stated from the following actual data. The regular income of those
reporting is $261,751, and they hold $1,005,150 worth of property. Proba¬
bly the total income is about $500,000 and the property over $1,000,000:
STATE
Income
Expendituee
Pbopebty
Grand
Lodge
Subordinate
lodges
Charity
Other
purposes
Arkansas
$ 1,597
1,885
$ 51,157
$ 22,055
$ 23,683
$ 217,247
California
Colorado
16,000
5,475+
.3,000
110,000
80,000
10,352
40,000
55,900
17,500
1,650
4,225
80,855
61,948
1,715
3,013+
7,000
68,560
80,000
District of Columbia
683
3,037
5,755
1,600
Florida
Georgia
32,400
Illinois
2,300
681
1,400
Indiana
5,173
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maryland
7,500
5,000
Massachusetts
373
Michigan
389
1,757
Mississippi
2,896
Missouri
31,707
27,705
Iowa
2,400
New Jersey
New York
1,000
2,520
North Carolina
14,000
Ohio
Oklahoma
3,000
48,000
Pennsylvania
2,000
1,576
28,000
South Carolina
7,000+
' 80,610
25,000
45,284
To this must be added an account of the insurance features, which
are usually in a separate department, known as the Masonic Benefit
Association. The method of operation is by assessment of all members
on the death of any participant. Reports by States are as follows:
Alabama
The insurance feature of the work shows that the reserve fund of $2,555.45 on
hand in 1898 amounted in 1905 to $38,635.48. Nearly the whole fund is paid out
Secret Societies
111
each year, so that probably over $100,000 has been paid widows and orphans.
The insurance association had 1,400 members in 1898, and assessments of 10 cents
per capita at death were made. One hundred dollars was paid at death, unless
the member's lodge is in arrears for three assessments. This benefit was
changed in 1906 so as to be $100 for persons dying in the first year of insurance,
$200 in second year, $300 in third year and $500 thereafter.
Arkansas
Total insurance paid to widows and orphans, $125,000.
Receipts Expenditures Balance
1892 $ 4,187 83 $ 5,187 83
1893 7,422 90 6,063 37 $ 1,359 54
1895 4,912 29 4,500 00 474 88
1896 5,600 00 5,600 00
1897 6,691 20 5,568 32 1,122 88
1898 8,509 56 8,478 90 30 66
1899 Deficit 8,331 J7 8,387 64 56 47
1900 336 88
1901 14,107 59 12,873 90 1,233 69
1902 14,817 27 13,689 17 2,361 79
1903 16,214 21 13,605 00 4,071 00
1905 27,092 49 18,868 75 8,223 74
Florida
Receipts, 1906 $ 6,976 08
Claims $ 4,001 00
Expenses 910 44 4,911 44
Balance $ 2,064 57
Other funds 444 65
Total $2,509 22
Claims unpaid:
Approved $ 600 00
Unapproved and filed 2,700 00 3,300 00
Louisiana
YEAR
Receipts
Claims
paid
Balance
Unpaid
claims
1899
$ 3,120
$ 1,451
11,950
13,100
$ 1,668
1904
$ 2,400
2.540
1905
Assessments are 25 cents per capita, monthly; benefits $200 and $300 at death.
Mississippi
In 1905 the Grand Master says:
"We have 7,000 craftmen in our ranks, and with such a number it is not sur¬
prising that we should have fourteen deaths a month, or 168 per annum. The
present assessment rate is 7 1-7 cents for each death, and fourteen assessments
are paid for $1; thus we pay $7,250 per month or $87,000 per year. This is the
greatest amount collected and paid out by any institution operated and con¬
trolled by our race variety known to us in the civilized world. This is a
startling statement, but no doubt true. This institution has $19,132.65 to its
credit in three banks. They have also recently purchased 1,000 acres of land.
Governor Vardaman and all the other devils this side of Hades cannot stay
this kind of prosperity."
112
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Total amount raised 1880-1905 $ 537,120 42
Claims paid and expenses 519,812 10
Balance $ 17,808 32
Largest amount raised in one year... 90,524 35
Missouri
Receipts Claims paid
1899 $ 5,101 42 $ 4,505 00
1905 8,386 80
North Carolina
Income, 1905 $ 8,500
Claims paid 8,325
Oklahoma
Income $ 948 57
Texas
Paid out, 10 years $ 150,000 00
1906, income 11,870 60
Paid out 4,123 50
Balance $ 7,247 10
Sinking fund, etc 1,866 08
Cash on hand $ 9,113 18
This endowment policy is confined to the South and is criticised by
Northern Masons. Massachusetts thus criticises Mississippi:
This association pays $500 to its beneficiaries, and costs, in the way of assess¬
ments, $1 per month, on an estimated annual death rate of twenty-four per
thousand for their seven thousand members. At its last annual report in 1904,
it was able to show a balance to the credit of $19,132.65. Another item of cost
which does not appear in the estimate follows:
Members suspended for non-payment
of dues 666
Dimitted 184
Suspended, all other causes 20
Expelled 12
Deceased 142
1,024
Reinstated 656
Affiliated 103
759
The suspension for non-payment of dues and assessments, dimissions and
deaths are the net losses of the association, which the reinstatements and
affiliations fail to balance by 233, a loss which must be made good by the con¬
tinual accession of new members. It is not possible for this association to be
permanently successful, and it already shows symptoms of the weakness and
decay which precedes its death. As it becomes older, and the demands upon
its resources increase, it will fall to irretrievable ruin, like all other similar
organizations. If it seeks to avoid the inevitable, two courses only are open,
either to reduce the benefit or increase the assessments, and this never yet did
more than to postpone the fatal day. It's a mathematical impossibility
always to pay out two dollars for each and every dollar paid in. It's a mis¬
fortune for any Grand Lodge to identify itself with any such movement.
Vital statistics for these associations are given only for 1904:
Secret Societies
113
Death Rate per 1,000
(For Year 1904.)
Alabama...
Arkansas ..
Mississippi
Missouri 20
Normal death rate per 1,000 (American experience). 12
24
20
20
14
Other enterprises of the Masons are as follows:
In Alabama $500 was given in $50 scholarships to ten students, and
$50 to the Old Folks' Home at Mobile.
Florida has an Orphan's Home:
Georgia has a Widows' and Orphans' Home and School at Americus,
managed by trustees elected by the Grand Lodge.
The income for 1904 was $3,532.70, and expenses $3,240.78. The Home
was reported out of debt and worth $25,000.
Louisiana reports:
Two notable features in the Grand Master's address, were, first, the arrange¬
ments made in connection with the fraternity of Odd Fellows for the purchase
of land and building in the city of New Orleans for their joint occupancy.
These were purchased for them at a cost of $14,000, the building to be refitted
at an expense of $6,000, leased for a term of five years, with privilege of pur¬
chase at the expiration of lease. The second was the establishment of a lodge
at Belize, British Honduras, under the jurisdiction of the M. W. Eureka Grand
Lodge. To this end six brethren journeyed to Belize, and with the aid of a
resident Mason, of the jurisdiction of Louisiana, entered, passed and raised
sixty-one candidates, dispensating them under the name Pride of Honduras
Lodge, No. 30.
Massachusetts has published Upton's Negro Masonry and erected a
$500 monument to Prince Hall.
Illinois has a Masonic Home at Rock Island worth $6,000.
Maryland and District of Columbia have a Joint Stock Building Asso¬
ciation.
Tennessee has a Widows' and Orphans' Home.
Kentucky reports:
The first Kentucky lodge of colored Masons, Mt. Moriah, No. 1, was organ¬
ized by residents of Louisville in 1850, under the jurisdiction of Ohio, and for
three years met in New Albany, Ind., on account of the black laws, which for¬
bade the assembling of free people of color. At the expiration of that time
the lodge removed to Louisville, and shortly afterwards, while in open com¬
munication, their rooms were forcibly entered by the police, twenty-one of
the brethren arrested, one of whom was Brother Gibson, the Secretary. On
arriving at the prison, the jailers refused to receive them; the judge of the
court who was consulted, ordered their discharge upon their personal promise
to appear for trial the next morning. They went in a body for trial, found
the court house guarded by the police, were denied admission, and told to go
their ways, say nothing and they would not again be disturbed. When we add
Receipts, 1907.
Expense
Balance...
$ 770 25
8.3,971 74
. 3,201 49
114 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
that the jailers and judge were Master Masons, we have given all the explana¬
tion necessary.
Mt. Moriah increased so rapidly in numbers that it was twice divided, and
the Grand Lodge established in 1866.
Arkansas reports:
The forty-two members of 1873 have grown to (1905) 4,995. The Grand Lodge
took in:
1878-1883 $ 1,951 93
1884-1894 11,090 09
1894-1904 15,969 77
1873-1904 * 29,969 79
In twenty-four years the order increased from 14 to 275 lodges.
Texas reports:
The Masons in Texas own in fee simple 160 acres of good land, unincumbered.
It is located in the famous fruit district of Texas and will bring $50 per acre.
The Grand Lodge has just had erected in Fort Worth a Grand Masonic Temple
at a cost of $50,000. The Grand Lodge paid out to widows in the last ten years
$150,000. The local lodges (subordinate) own $100,000 in real property. The
local lodges pay their sick members more than $30,000 annually and they spend
$10,000 per year to bury their dead. If we take all the money out of the local
lodges' treasuries and put it in one we would have more than $75,000. We have
240 working lodges.
District of Columbia reports:
District of Columbia
The first lodge was Social, No. 7, chartered in 1826 by the Grand Lodge of
Pennsylvania. This was followed in 1845 and 1846, respectively, by the Uni¬
versal, No. 10, of Alexandria, D. C., and Felix, No. 17, of Washington, both
chartered by the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania. On March 27, 1848, M. W.
Union Grand Lodge of F. & A. M. for the District of Columbia was established
by these three lodges.
Financial statement of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons for
the District of Columbia and its subordinate lodges, 1897-1906:
Grand Lodge
Total amount of receipts, 10 years $ 6,836.56
Total amount of expenditures, 10 years $ 4,594.20
Total amount expended for charity, 10 years 1,581.34
Total expended $ 6,175.54
Fourteen Subordinate Lodges
Membership 1,045
Total amount of receipts, 10 years 57,548.38
Total amount of expenditures, 10 years 32,891.04
Total amount expended for charity, 10 years ... 15,996.04
Total expended $ 48,887.08
Amount Invested in stock of Masonic Building Association.. .$5,475
Sum total of receipts in 10 years .• $ 64,384.94 .
Sum total of expenditures, 10 years 37,485.24
Sum total expended for cliarlty, 10 years 17,577.88
Total expended
$ 55,062.62
Secret Societies
115
Iowa has an Orphans' Home, with an income of $7,618.50 in 1907.
The Odd Fellows
Members of the Philomathean Institute of New York arid of the
Philadelphia Library Company and Debating Society of Philadelphia,
applied for admission to the International Order of Odd Fellows in
1842. They were refused on account of their race. Thereupon Peter
Ogden,a Negro, who had already joined the Grand United Order of Odd
Fellows of England, secured a charter for the first Negro American
lodge, Philomathean, No. 646, of New York, which was set up March
1, 1843. In 1847 certain white lodges of Pennsylvania sought to join the
English order, but finding themselves compelled to treat with Ogden,
demurred. Ogden replied:
In regard to your first objection, you say you have heard that I was a colored
man. That is true, and I am not ashamed to own it, and the whole order is
acquainted with the fact, as well as the Committee of Management at Leeds.
Those who do not know it personally, know it by the magazines which are
published in England and America. In regard to the second point in your
communication, I would not meet you on any other ground than perfect
equality in every sense of the word, and instructions from the A. M. C. of our
order in May last to the Committee of Management was that nothing should
be done that would interfere with the lodges already established here. With
regard to the effects which an union might have upon what you justly term
the skeleton of your order, I think the course you are pursuing will very soon
nail down the coffin-lid, and consign it to oblivion, and the world will be led
to view it among the things that once were, but are now " no more forever."*
A bit of prophecy that proved only too true.
This spirit of independent manliness in its relations with England
has been kept up. In 1865, for instance, we find this resolution:
Resolved, That the Sub-committee of Management in America do respect¬
fully represent to the Committee of Management, England, that we are grate¬
ful for the care which has been exercised by them, yet we do respectfully sub¬
mit that there is a feature in the characters forming the group on the P. G. M.
certificates which is objectionable, and we do therefore submit to your honor¬
able body that said objection be removed and that that figure representing the
colored man be placed on an equal footing with the others."t
The growth of the order is thus indicated:
1848 1 lodge
1868 89 lodges 4,009 members
1886 1,000 " 36,853 "
1896 2,047 " 155,537
1904 4,613 " 285,931 "
The reports of the Grand Secretary are as follows:
* Brooks, pp. 46,47.
f Brooks, p. 95.
116
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
1845
$ 109
00
1845-1846
175
99
1846-1847
163
18
1847-1848
399
JO
1848-1849
209
98
1849-1850
321
37
1851
286
34
1852
416
36
1853
263
59
1854
361
67
1855
350
65
1856
363
34
1857
2a3
62
1858
329
64
1859
460
27
1860
385
11
1860-1862
581
91
1863
297
41
1864
365
33
1865
436
80
Receipts
Disbursements
97 01
169 90
120 03
419 61
210 34
250 28
307 95
372 28
260 94
329 06
371 02
359 95
297 05
273 06
532 56
352 01
565 14
273 77
377 07
412 93
Term
1867.
1868.
1870..
1871..
1872..
1873..
1874..
1874-1888*.
1888-1890..
1890-1892..
1892-1894..
1894-1896..
1896-1898..
1898-1900..
1900-1902..
1902-1904..
1904-1906..
Receipts
673
646
684
713
812
1,043
1,869
2,893
3,000
16,413
17,159
24,026
33,517
35,275
37,471
48,727
52,196
58,976
Disbursements
Grand Lodge Reports
STATE
Receipts
Disbursements
Kentucky (1906)
Georgia (1903-4)
Colorado and Jurisdiction
(1904)
(1905)
Illinois and Wisconsin:
(1004)
(1905) :
Missouri (1907)
Florida (1906)
Louisiana (1907)
Ohio (1907)
t 445 98
1,215 39
74 48
64 35
359 61
370 24
3,284 00
1,938 31
783 62
1,193 93
Subordinate Lodge Reports
(Lodge reports are simply sent to the central office and filed.)
The following were available:
STATE
Receipts
Disbursements
Georgia (1904-5)
Ohio (1907)
Kentucky (1907)
Colorado and Jurisdiction:
(1904)
(1905)
Missouri (1907)
Illinois and Wisconsin (1905).
Florida
Louisiana
$ 27,718 33
12,960 83
10,806 33
16,782 90
42,127 83
21,594 22
13,813 53
25,503 37
2,460 47
8,409 80
11,825 00
8,016 75
14,796 18
43,104 30
STATE
Date
Sick and
Funeral
Benefits
Widows
and,
Orphans
Charity
Whole
amount
paid out
Invested
property
and in fund
Ohio
1907
1906
1905
1907
1907
1907
1905
$ 3,285.50
12,344.80
6.961.55
5,925.00
12,668.47
1,000.40
12,385.70
$ 329.88
2,398.74
664.00
5,600.00
1,532.31
19.00
2,725.06
$8,317.30
1,836.36
391.20
300.00
606.69
64.65
3,973.96
$ 13,813.53
$ 61,780.03
14,337.63
54,637.11
117,372,65
103,843.38
5,752.12
120,377.99
Illinois and Wisconsin
Missouri
Kentucky
Colorado and Jurisdiction.
Georgia
11,825.00
25.503.37
2,992.53
39.139.38
* Data not obtainable.
Secret Societies
Subordinate Lodge Reports, Combined
117
YEARS
1850
1851 ""
1852
1853
1854
1855
1856
1857
1858
1859
1860
1861-1862
1863
1864
1865
1866
1867
1868
1869
1870 (16 lodges failed to report)
1871
1872
1873
1874
1892-1894
1894-1896 ■.
1896-1898
1898-1900
1900-1902
Sick and
Funeral
Benefits
$ 2,058.12
1,808.20
1,808.30
2.036.60
1,916.34
2.824.46
2,557.14
2,736.71
2,989.54
2,776.92
2,380.25
2.141.47
2,458.88
2.831.61
3,644.03
3.943.11
5,691.13
6,711.50
8,418.67
9.697.12
14,897.48
19,975.35
22,356.60
24,093.93
45,485.42
294,824.29
331,760.00
350,540.00
460,500.00
Widows
and
Orphans
: 54.00
68.00
48.00
124.60
107.75
197.60
134.28
94.50
355.20
171.52
103.69
307.91
515.55
301.12
342.19
639.55
520.18
567.13
847.32
2,290.98
2,065.28
2,395.65
1,911.12
18,907.20
40,360.29
Benevolent
purposes
240.51
688.28
611.32
671.69
542.56
980.85
252.58
598.15
1,146.43
412.06
558.90
238.00
374.01
190.28
543.19
420.21
746.85
1,071.51
673.05
912.27
782.62
1,972.88
1,907.86
2,142.80
331,760.00
Whole amount
invested,
property and
in fund
The condition of the order in various years is thus reported:
1845
Funds Effects
Receipts $ 2,033 10
Expenditures 1,543 89
Philomathean, New York 1843 Balance $ 489 71 $ 620 76
Hamilton, New York 1844 210 00 200 64
Unity, Philadelphia 1844 Balance 402 50 1,000 00
Philomathean, Albany 1844 100 00 85 00
Receipts $ 238 00
Expenditures 208 00
Balance $ 30 00
Philomathean, Poughkeepsie.. 1845 115 00
1886
" There were 1,000 lodges in America, 112 Past Grand Masters' Councils, 404
Households of Ruth and 47 Patriarchies. There were 36,853 members and 9,007
past officers; 3,241 members had been relieved,415 brothers buried, 554 widows
relieved, 404 orphans assisted. The amount paid to sick members was $37,757.82;
paid for funerals, $21,002.45; to widows, $6,957.20; for charity, $4,326.95; paid for
other objects, $44,122.50; the whole amount paid out, $114,066.92; amount in¬
vested, $100,993.15; value of property, $172,816.90; balance in funds, $69,317.55;
invested, value of property and in funds, $343,197.70."
1893=4
" During the years 1893-4 there were 339 new branches opened. Twenty-four
thousand, twenty-six dollars and ninety cents was received by the Sub-com¬
mittee of Management for taxes and supplies, and the surplus fund increased
118 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
from $5.49 to $10,309.31. Instead of having to borrow money at exorbitant
rates, as the last S. C. of M. were forced to do, the order has ever since carried
a large surplus fund in its treasury."
1895-6
"Whole number of Lodges in good standing 2,047
Whole number of Households In good standing 959
Number of P. G. M. Councils in good standing 173
Number of Patriarchies in good standing 88
Number of District Lodges in good standing 36
Total active branches 3,303
Estimated number of members in Lodges 118,500
Estimated number of members in Households 31,000
Estimated number of members in Councils 3,987
Estimated number of members In Patriarchies 2,100
Total membership in all branches 155,537
Whole No. of brothers and sisters relieved for the term 11,851
Whole number buried during the years 1895-6 1,434
Amount paid to sick during the years 1895-6 $ 198,423.82
Amount paid to widows, orphans and charity 40,360,29
"Whole amount invested, property and funds 1,867,597.94
The city of Philadelphia in 1906 had 19 lodges, with 1,167 members;
75 members received sick benefits, 7 death benefits, 8 widows were re¬
lieved and 6 widows and orphans buried.
Expenditures were:
Sickness $ 1,177 98
Funerals 958 50
Widows and charity 197 2ft
Total $ 2,333 74
Other expenses .$ 3,047 30
Total $ 5,88104
Invested 6,732 54
Value of property 27,615 50
Balance in funds 4,387 18
Total property of all kinds 45,827 11
Statistics, Tenth Session, 1900
Whole number of active Lodges enrolled 2,592
Whole number of Household of Ruth 1,242
Whole number of P. G. M. Councils 181
Whole number of Juvenile Societies 131
Whole number of Patriarchies 84
Whole number of District Grand Lodges 36
Whole number of District Households 17
Total number of all branches 4,283?
Total membership in all Lodges 117,500
Total membership in all Households 36,160
Total membership in all Patriarchies 2,500
Total membership in all Juvenile Societies 2,200
Total membership in all Councils 4,000
Total membership of all branches 162,350
Whole number of members relieved In 1898-9 18,56c1
Whole number of widows and orphans relieved 9,140
Whole number of members buried 4,860
Total amount paid for sick and funerals $ 350,540
Value of funds and property of the order 2,150,500
On the occasion of the Forty-eighth General Meeting 1906, held at
[Richmond,. Va., the orator of the occasion said:
Secret Societies 119
uIn the past six years ending with the beginning of this B. M. C., after
spending in round numbers a million dollars, providing for the sick, burying
the deceased, relieving the widows and orphans and meeting other just obli¬
gations, the order represents investments that have passed the three million
dollar mark.
"A certain reliable Philadelphia paper, not connected with our order, stated
in a recent issue words similar to these: 'The G. U. O. of O. F. is erecting in
this city a hundred thousand dollar building owned and wholly controlled by
Negroes on the American continent.' That we teach industry and frugality,
that we encourage the brethren to lay aside for the gloomy day, as a means
< to dry the widow's tear,' ' the mourner's heart to cheer,' our progressive En¬
dowment Departments are living evidences.'"
The membership was as follows:
Whole number of active Lodges enrolled 4,648
Whole number of active Households enrolled 2,636
Whole number of active P. G. M. Councils enrolled 274
Whole number of active Juvenile Societies 395
Whole number of Patriarchies 142
Whole number of D. G. Lodges 39
Whole number of District Households 26
Total number of all branches , 8,155
Increase over last report 1,641
Numerical Strength
Total membership in all Lodges 186,108
Total membership in all Households 79,343
Total membership in all Councils 5,210
Total membership in all Patriarchies 3,025
Total membership in all Juveniles 12,245
Total membership in all branches 285,931
Increase over last report 56,190
The financial statement 1893-1906 is as follows:
Receipts 1893-1894 $24,026 90
Disbursements . .189&-1994 13,717 59
Balance cash $10,309 31
Receipts 1895-1896 'SHST
Disbursements. .1895-1896 25,951 46
Balance cash 7,566 13
Receipts 1897-1898 ^oc'ole ti
Disbursements.. 1897-1898 28,948 71
Balance cash 7,326 93
Receipts 1899-i^ *28722 5!
Disbursements . .1899-1900 28,72,1
Balance cash 6'748 80
Receipts 1900-1902 $48,727 32
Disbursements . .1900-1902 34,1
Balance cash.
Receipts 1902-1904 *33 843 12
Disbursements ..1902-1904 '
Cash balance
Receipts 1904~i™a *37'750 01
Disbursements . .1904-1906 '
Balance cash.
14,137 63
18,353 51
$ 21,226 05
120
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Summary
Cash balance on hand August 31,1904 $40,811 47
Receipts from all sources during term 58,976 Oft
Total $99,787 5$
Disbursements for all purposes 87,750 01
Balance cash 162,037 52
Details of Receipts, 1904-1906
Receipts from Lodges $40,784 03
Receipts from Households 13,964 4T
Receipts from Councils 1,398 54
Receipts from Patriarchies 161 88
Receipts from District Grand Lodges 75 2$
Receipts from District Households 106 73
Receipts from Juvenile Societies 77 26
Receipts from interest on deposits 1,907 05
Receipts from Odd Fellows' Journal 500 00
Receipts from rentals 150 81
Total,
.$58,076 06
Disbursements, 1904=1906
Odd Fellows' Journal $11,823 17
Salaries and clerk hire 10,167'05
Traveling expenses of tl\e S. O. M. and Grand Auditors. 5,787 70
Postage, express charges, telephone service 2,767 09
Office rent, gas, ice and laundry 640 70
Watson & Hazlehurst 2,500 00
Committee of Management, England, and custom duties 1,211 36
Officers, 12 B. M. 0., 3 Grand Household and 17Tri-annual
Conference 758 50
Miscellaneous purposes 2,094 44
Total $37,750 01
Total Receipts
Total receipts $57,018 20
Interest on deposits 1,807 05
Rentals 150 81
Grand total 858,976 06
Cash Expenses
1904
September $ 1,151 66
October 1,732 18
November 1,565 94
December 1,477 29
1905
January 2,847 89
February 892 55
March 812 60
April 493 18
May 927 58
June 563 81
July 6,692 39
August 947 23
Carried forward $ 19,604 25
Brought forward $19,604 25
September 731 34E
October 978 47
November 1,543 87
December 2,683 34
1906
January 2,862 68
February 611 01
March 1,990 95
April 1,035 69
May 1,162 79
June 1,503 17
July 566 95
August 2,475 53
Total $37,750 01
Recapitulation
Balance on hand August 31, 1904 $40,811 47
Receipts for term, 1904-1906, from all sources 58,976 06
Total $99,787 53
Disbursements for all purposes 87,750 01
Cash balance August 31,1006 $62,037 52
Secret Societies *21
The funds of the order are deposited thus:
Union Trust Oo, (savings fund)
Union Trust Co. (check fund) L,
Provident Life and Trust Oo R-wu
^ jjjiio iuiu xrusi kjo 5,683 06
Real Estate Trust Co 12,070 01
Consolidation National Bank 69 88
In hands of treasurer 6,135 99
Total $ 62,037 52
Detailed reports are:
STATES
Pennsylvania ...
New York
Delaware
New Jersey
Rhode Island
Tennessee
North Carolina ..
Missouri
Illinois
Mississippi
Arkansas
South Carolina...
Connecticut
Maryland
Virginia
West Indies
Kansas
Georgia
Kentucky
Dist. of Columbia
Louisiana
Indiana
Alabama
Ohio
Texas
Massachusetts ...
Florida
Canada
West Indies
Iowa
West Virginia—
California
Colorado
Michigan
Oklahoma
W. C. of Africa...
Indian Territory.
West Indies
| Number of Lodges
Number of Members
Number of Broth¬
ers Relieved
Widows and Or¬
phans Relieved
Paid for Sick and
Funeral Benefits
Paid to Widows
and Orphans
Value of Property
Cash in Hand
Value of all Prop¬
erty and Funds <
94
48
12
41
5
124
238
66
52
384
315
292
13
95
235
10
27
4,897
3,506
324
1,761
305
5,018
6,766
2,300
2,076
8,500
11,085
9,872
510
2,236
9,000
418
606
416
268
32
162
20
1,008
751
179
182
246
167
3,212
35
226
786
63
11
69
23
2
49
18
215
184
47
51
325
242
195
2
59
272
22
23
$ 10,636.33
11,508.80
306.89
4,539.93
367.76
5,763.20
8,714.72
2,963.00
6,715.84
11,125.00
1,560.00
8,036.00
619.95
5,246.27
16,982.35
1,568.66
493.39
$ 621.56
406.85
2.50
600.00
44.00
818.80
1.703.93
7,000.00
1.265.94
11,000.00
12,500.00
12,000.00
30.00
374.50
1,809.25
152.96
40.00
$ 54,154.37
51,221.38
4,167.68
19,198.27
83,523.70
110,525.50
218,046.48
35,689.75
79,198.00
82,650.00
30,000.00
42,000.00
8,920.65
23,152.06
100,000.00
5,015.29
$ 20,207.55
$ 118,563.29
1,251.77
38,173.27
42,024.71
7,500.00
37,500.00
12,063.64
59,396.41
27,860.29
128
29
140
42
4,141
2,618
4,565
1,356
407
209
695
107
120
66
227
30
13,713.76
9,177.63
13,590.79
2,847.00
951.00
491.00
4,955.75
449.25
82,358.27
16,135.73
47,665.00
33,869.42
10,693.87
65,462.90
63
180
18
2,500
5,200
181
780
72
75
582
11
4,650.00
7,950.00
4,073.87
3,340.00
5,260.00
178.00
55,800.00
22,560.00
36,935.00
6,200.00
62,000.00
12,847.45
12
14
51
16
13
11
20
14
497
373
1,519
616
374
189
370
296
62
9
33
11
850.80
794.50
195.64
52.00
8,961.05
2,262.28
14,371.62
36,833.82
4,079.95
4,000.00
1,978.97
2,699.38
1,826.07
418.28
5,378.13
10,087.12
76
3
7
22
12
10
41
1
7
30
3,623.85
1,107.60
441.00
267.00
90.73
478.10
33.00
1,600.67
7,006.81
58.10
20.00
279.06
496.77
3.196.15
7
398
56
17
907.63
95.00
9,950.00
Knights of Pythias
The order was organized by J. H. Rath bone and others, in the city of Wash¬
ington, D. C., February 19, 1864.
At the session of the Supreme Lodge of the Knights of Pythias of the
World, held at Richmond, Va., March 8,1869, an application for a charter from
a body of colored citizens of Philadelphia, Pa., was refused on account of their
color. Nevertheless, several colored men, E. A. Lightfoot, T. W. Stringer
122 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
and others, were afterwards regularly initiated into the mysteries of the
order of Page, Esquire, Knight, etc., in a regular lodge, working under the
control of the Supreme Lodge of Knights of Pythias of the World.
Thereupon a Supreme Grand Council of the Knights of Pythias, to be known
as the Supreme Lodge of North America, South America, Europe, Asia and
Africa, was instituted for the purpose of extending its benefits to all persons,
without distinction of race or color. Lightfoot Lodge, No. 1, in the city of
Yicksburg, State of Mississippi, March 26,1880 (the date of the Pythian period),
was the first.
There was a re-incorporation, with a slight change of name, in 1903.
In his address before the Supreme Lodge, in 1905, the Supreme Chan¬
cellor said:
"Up to this time I think we have demonstrated the Negro's ability to suc¬
cessfully conduct an organization with a representative form of government.
The history of our order for the past few years is known to all of you. The
manner in which we have risen from nothing, as it were, a few years ago to
the high and respected position we occupy today, with 26 Grand Lodges, 1,536
subordinate lodges, 68,462 members, with $211,899.46 in our various treasuries,
$33,268.37 of which belongs to the Supreme Lodge itself, is the wonder of the
age. With this growth and prosperity come great responsibilities. I wish to
say frankly, as I have said before, that my great interest in the order is due to
the fact that I consider it one of the greatest agencies now employed in the
work of uplifting the race to which we belong."
The membership has grown as follows:
STATES
1897
1899
1901
1903
1905
Alabama
Arkansas
544
219
997
805
107
1,640
1,654
96
300
506
2,386
206
763
475
816
723
1,760
3,069
1,048
382
105
3,674
3,727
85
329
771
4,516
242
1,543
872
500
1,476
3,845
3,790
1,976
713
202
6,146
7,000
Colorado
200
1,430
7,984
144
1,706
2,010
537
2,010
6,400
. 7,930
2,800
978
315
965
3,131
1,037
230
3,500
5,075
3,542
2,012
345
184
1,800
Florida
Georgia
400
1,284
265
1,344
136
500
Illinois
Indiana
861
i.89
409
1,016
1,150
650
411
Kentucky
Louisiana
Mississippi
Missouri
New Jersey
281
577
800
741
New York
230
North Carolina
Ohio
1,400
333
2,166
680
2,534
1,033
Pennsylvania
Massachusetts
277
Tennessee
576
2,600
1,411
837
1,057
4,038
1,654
1,187
1,554
5,500
2,630
1,528
Texas
Virginia
West Virginia
Indian Territory
809
842
399
Oklahoma
Supreme Jurisdiction
2,000
* Total
27,212
44,640
69,381
* These are official totals and do not In all cases agree with the columns.
Expenditures and property are thus reported:
Expenditures, etc., Knights of Pythias
STATES
Paid for Sickness and Death
1897-99
Alabama
Arkansas
District of Columbia ..
Colorado
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Mississippi
Missouri
New Jersey
New York
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Tennessee
Texas
Virginia
West Virginia
Supreme Jurisdiction
Rhode Island and Mas¬
sachusetts
South Carolina
North Carolina
Indian Territory —
Total.
9,432 00
1,437 00
194 00
1,991 00
12,267 40
1,209 00
25 00
1,485 82
7,839 66
3,718 10
4,038 60
169 30
10,460 00
3,300 00
1,112 20
2,700 00
6,035 37
1,546 75
484 45
6,230 00
730 00
1,676 00
850 00
5,920 35
1,848 70
250 00
3,848 33
360 00
3,587 15
$ 33,389 10
1901-8
$ 5,059 28
300 00
1,013 90
963 87
1,863 50
200 00
465 00
2,259 75
10,460 30
14,494 44
350 00
60 00
3,906 50
148 00
2,000 00
11,462 00
$ 55,006 54
10,000 00
7,000 00
1,458 90
24,660 00
2,393 00
2,984 50
270 00
400 00
3,775 00
15,334 45
5,000 00
4,000 00
650 50
250 00
14,000 00
834 00
4,856 66
16,842 00
9,369 96
$ 124,146 97
Surplus Endowment
11,385 44
4,760 00
372 49
192 25
11,244 75
2,276 41
527 41
355 00
6,544 96
5,003 07
2,303 26
6,622 74
828 94
2,199 20
7,125 79
5,659 64
2,638 09
$ 70,039 44
S-S
15,827 54
20,245 00
621 90
15,168 00
3,117 94
3,540 31
250 25
12,512 02
28,505 92
7,387 86
7,541 27
150 00
518 50
4,125 47
5,000 00
6,962 88
8,614 80
3,700 00
9,604 41
$ 153,392 07
Grand Lodge Balance
2,252 35
222 49
363 43
1,901 29
468 57
39 90
85 00
;,662 97
80 00
75 00
181 00
5,293 31
1,420 88
$ 16,046 96
$ 2,000 00
189 80
5,677 68
184 94
71 64
19 63
25 10
908 90
5,796 48
1,570 13
1,326 35
200 00
74 47
1,911 81
2,595 18
1,597 67
373 58
968 87
70 00
135 50
200 00
54 25
$ 25,941 08 $
K>
W
124 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Consolidated statements for the whole country are as follows:
Financial Statement, Supreme Lodge, Knights of Pythias
Total per capita tax
Total biennial tax
Total supplies (all sources)
Uniform Rank Department
Total Endowment
Grand total receipts
Amount Endowment paid
Surplus Endowment (on hand)...
Amount Endowment funds (on
hand)
Amount Endowment claims un¬
paid
Grand and Supreme Lodge funds
on hand
Property (Grand Lodges)
Property (Subordinate Lodges)..
1899
184 50
675 00
1,677 89
217 00
2,992 14
5,746 03
1901
| 825 12
1,100 00
2,944 77
2,083 92
8,601 77
15,505 58
1903
$ 1,243 20
1,582 50
5,225 29
3,667 35
10,872 19
22,590 53
189,875 87
70,039 44
1905
$ 1,967 45
1,675 00
7,331 74
4,281 85
18,805 71
34,061 25*
328,014 38
153,392 07
195,217 05
14,142 12
16,584 41
31,233 30
275,334 85
* Except Temple fund. Cf. infra.
The Endowment Department insures lives at the following rates:
Table of Monthly Payments
Age
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
Amount
45c
45c
.... 50c
.... 55c
55c
.... 55C
60c
.... 60c
Age Amount
60c
65c
65c
70c
70c
70c
75c
75c
Age Amount
35 $ .80
37.
85
90
90
95
95
1.00
Age Amount
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
It pays the following sums:
In case of death during first year's membership
In case of death during second year's membership.
In case of death during third year's membership...
In case of death during fourth year's membership..
In case of death during fifth year's membership
.05
95
85
85
90
1.00
100
200
800
400
500
The military department (''Uniform Rank") reports in 1905:
" In my report to you at the last session of the Supreme Lodge, our table
showed the inspection of fourteen States, comprising 70 companies, while
today we report over 100 companies. We then reported 2,970 members. Today
we report eighteen States and 3,665 members. Then we had in the treasury
$4,694.98, while today we report $9,793.74. We then reported valuation of prop¬
erty at $33,731.50, today $55,522.16. We then reported 160 companies, while today
we find from a partial report over 190, most of which are fully equipped,
which makes us today have the largest, most complete and equipped military
body known to the race."
An assessment of 20 cents per member a year was laid for building a
National Pythian Temple and Sanatorium for the order. From this a
total of $19,522.58 was raised last year.
The United Brothers of Friendship
The United Brothers of Friendship was organized at Louisville, Ky.,
August 1, 1861, first as a benevolent and later as a secret order. In 1905
Secret Societies 125
the following receipts and disbursements were reported by the Grand
Lodge:
Receipts
For Widows and Orphans $21,286 88
* or Home and Business Fund 1,856 85
For Grand Lodge taxes 3,661 69
For National Grand Lodge taxes 327 47
For sale of supplies 744 10
For interest on United States bonds 275 00
For loan 25 00
Total receipts for one year $ 28,176 99
Disbursements
For Widows and Orphans $17,370 30
For United States bonds • 4,208 73
For printing and supplies 1,217 31
For Grand Lodge contingent 496 99
For miscellanies 750 10
For Mutual Aid expenses 342 60
For the Grand Master's office 390 33
For the Grand Secretary's office 200 00
For the Grand Treasurer's office 136 00
For National Grand Lodge taxes 300 00
Total disbursements for one year $25,412 86
The State organizations report as follows:
STATE
Members
Real
property
Personal
property
Endow¬
ment as¬
sessment,
1907
Death
Claims
paid
Cash from
1906
Alabama
Arkansas
California
Colorado... *
Illinois
Indiana
Kansas
Louisiana
Kentucky
Mississippi
Missouri
Ohio
Tennessee
Texas
Oklahoma
Liberia (Africa).
5,800
3,600
300
500
3,600
1,600
600
1,600
14,000
3,000
10,000
1,000
3,800
11,000
2,000
1,000
I 30,000
25,000
15,000
10,000
8,000
8,000
100,000
20,000
75,000
5,000
20,000
100,000
5,000
12,000
$ 5,000
3,000
$ 24,000
9,600
$ 20,000
7,000
5,000
3,500
1,000
500
3,000
15,000
2,000
25,000
1,000
5,000
30,000
500
1,000
50,000
18,000
30,000
45,000
16,000
25,000
8,000
50,000
2,000
7,000
45,000
1,500
15,000
' 40,000
The official totals are;
Number juveniles 10,000
Total males
Total females 41,900
Total real property $483,000
Total personal property 45,000
Total endowment 192,000
Total endowment paid 146,500-
Ca.sh on hand 80,700
Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World
(Howard Branch)
Organized 1899.
Number of lodges 61.
The eighth annual report says as to the origin of the colored Elks;
126 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
"Like all other secret and benevolent organizations that have been organ¬
ized, the white order of Elks will not permit colored persons to become mem¬
bers. But there are colored Elks now. How and where they got their secret
work is known to many white Elks of this country. Some may try to depre¬
cate the colored Elks, but we have the same ritual that the white Elks have.
Our membership has grown to over5,000. Theletter 'I' stands for 'Improved.'
The difference between white and colored Elks is this: The white order is
known as the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks. Ours is known as the
Improved Benevolent Protective Order of Elks of the World.'"
The Secretary reported $1,217.38 as the income of the Grand Lodge
and these additional facts:
Sixty-one lodges report a total membership of 3,740.
Thirty-nine lodges report an increase of 1,249 members.
Forty-nine lodges report $7,383.35 in the bank.
Thirty-two lodges report property to the value of $6,124.85.
Twenty-eight lodges spent in charity $3,079.75.
Fifteen lodges report 25 deaths. Of the 80 lodges on the rolls 61 have remit¬
ted taxes, some for one, more for two and others for three and four quarters.
Thirty States are represented in our jurisdiction and 28 new lodges have been
added to our number.
The Galilean Fishermen
The Grand United Order of Galilean Fishermen was organized in
Baltimore, Md., in 1856. The order has at least $250,000 worth of real
estate. It has a bank at Hampton, Va., with a paid up capital of
$8,695.79. The insurance department has issued 16,800 policies since
1902, and paid $48,900 in death claims. It has a surplus of $1^,000. The
printing plant does a business of $2,500 a year. The joining fee is $4.50
and the monthly dues from 35c to 60c. Sick benefits of $1.50 to $6 a
week and death benefits of $50 to $200 are paid.
The chief of the other Negro secret orders are:
Improved Benevolent Protective Order of Elks of the World (Brook¬
lyn Branch).
Knights of Tabor.
Benevolent Order of Buffaloes.
Ancient Order of Forresters.
The Good Samaritans.
Nazarites.
Sons and Daughters of Jacob.
Seven Wise Men.
Knights of Honor, etc., etc.*
* The only secret organization In Arkansas of national repute, which has its origin
in the State,is the Mosaic Templars of America. It was conceived and had its birth
from the fertile brain of two Negroes, O. W. Keatts and J. E. Bush, in 1882, in the city
of Little Rock. Today this organization is known in nearly every Southern State in
the Union and numbers its members by the thousands. They have expended in cash
for the relief of the widows, orphans of deceased members in the past twenty years,
$176,000: paid to its policy-holders $51,009, and at their last session in Shreveport, La.,
July 25, 1802, reported a property valuation of $225,000.—National Negro Business
League, 1902, p. 105.
Secret Societies
127
That Negroes are aware of the faulty economic basis of assessment
insurance is shown by the speech of John W. Strauther of Mississippi,
before the Negro Business League of 1904:
Fraternal insurance is that class of insurance which levies an assessment
upon members to create a fund to pay the families of the deceased members
an endowment or death benefit and no profit therefrom.
Among Negroes it is the outgrowth of excessive rates charged by the old
line insurance companies which compelled the poorer classes to organize into
these benevolent associations and attach thereto insurance for the members
which would give relief to the families at their death.
This branch of insurance is not held in high favor by many people from the
fact, it is supposed, that the fraternal order that carries fraternal insurance
takes too great a risk and, therefore, the increased mortality would increase
the burden of tax upon the membership and thereby bankrupt the institu¬
tion ; but we should not become discouraged, because it is an established fact
that fraternal insurance is a success and it has done much for the advance¬
ment of the Negro in this country.
You will remember that the Negro was excluded from the old line compa¬
nies on account of color, and, therefore, it was impossible for the Negro to give
protection to his family and loved ones as it was the great privilege of other
Americans. But there were other causes, prominently among them was the
high premiums charged, which made it impossible to one working for small
wages to pay the premiums charged and meet his other obligations.
These conditions have long since passed and it is merely due to fraternal
insurance that has compelled the old line companies to accept the Negro and,
in many instances, they have employed colored agents, and in other instances,
the whites have catered to colored business through their white agents.
To give you a faint idea of what the Negro is doing in fraternal insurance,
I will call your attention to the report of the Insurance Commissioner of my
State for the year's business ending December 31, 1903.
Twenty fraternal orders reported the number of certificates in force as
32,562, amounting to $5,043,010.66. The total paid by the above fraternal in¬
surance orders is $157,616.82, leaving a balance in the treasury of these associa¬
tions $16,767.71. I will mention, the most prominent among these institutions?
the Masonic Benefit Association, which paid last year $69,306.60. This amount
was raised by an assessment of 7% per capita, a total cost per annum of $12.00
per member; since the organization of the association in 1880, they have paid
over $650,000.
The Odd Fellows' Benefit Association, organized in 1880, paid last year $26,-
420.71, having paid over $500,000 since organization. This amount is raised by
an assessment of 16 2-3 per cent or $12 per annum per member. The Independ¬
ent Order of Sons and Daughters of Jacob of America, paid $21,583.89; the En¬
dowment Bureau of the Knights of Pythias paid $18,993 on assessments of $1.50
or $6 per annum, having paid in all since organization in 1894, $200,000. Judg¬
ing from the amount of business done in Mississippi, we believe we can safely
say that the business of fraternal insurance among the Negroes in this coun¬
try amounts to over »million dollars annually.*
The Masons appear to hold at least one million dollars worth of
property and have an annual income of a half million dollars a year.
The Odd Fellows claim two and one-half million dollars worth of
♦National Business League, 1904, pp. 9<>-97.
128
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
property and an income between a quarter and a half of a million.
The Pythians have $300,000 worth of property and an income of possi¬
bly a quarter of a million. The Brothers of Friendship claim $500,000 in
property, and other associations may add a half million. From these
figures it seems that Negro secret orders in the United States own
between four and five million dollars worth of property and collect
each year at least $1,500,000.
From the beneficial societies and secret orders have arisen various
benevolent or semi-benevolent enterprises, such as homes, orphanages,
hospitals and cemeteries.
Section 13. Cooperative Benevolence
(a) Homes and Orphanages
There are between 75 and 100 homes and orphanages in the United
States supported wholly or largely by Negroes. A list of 57 follows:
1. Colored Orphan Asylum, Oxford, N. C.
2. Masonic Home, Columbus, Ga.
3. Masonic Orphans' Home, Bennettsville, N. C.
4. Aged Men and Women's Home, Baltimore, Md.—Property, $3,000; in¬
mates, 16; State aid, $250.
5. St. Francis Orphan Asylum, Baltimore, Md.—Property, $60,000; in¬
mates, 94.
6. Bethel Old Folks' Home, Baltimore, Md.—Property, $10,000; inmates, 16.
7. Carter's Old Folks' Home, Atlanta, Ga.
8. Old Folks' Home, Augusta, Ga.
9. Friends Orphan Asylum, Richmond, Ya.
10. Home for the Aged, Cleveland, Ohio.—Income, $1,209.44; expenditures,
$814.57.
11. Georgia Colored Industrial and Orphan's Home, Macon, Ga.—Inmates,
35; income, $4,350; property, $10,000. New building nearly ready.
12. General State Reformatory, Macon, Ga.
Receipts, 1906
Balance $ 291 60
Gash donations from the public 3,425 70
Other donations, value 399 30
Amount of produce raised on farm by in¬
mates 415 00
Total $ 4,531 60
13. Masonic Home, Rock Island, 111.—Income", $960.
14. Old People's Home, Chicago, 111.—Inmates, 7; income, $900. New apart¬
ments nearly ready.
15. Widows' and Orphans' Home, Jackson, Miss.
16. Orphans'Home, Huntington, W.Va.—Inmates, 65. The State has been
paying two teachers. Ten years.
17. Old Ladies'and Orphans'Home, Memphis, Tenn.
18. Old Folks' and Orphans' Home, Memphis, Tenn.—Property, $15,000.
19. Jenkins Orphanage, Courtland, Va.—Seven years.
20. Shiloh Orphanage, Augusta, Ga.
21. Masonic Widows' and Orphans' Home, Nashville, Tenn.—Property,
$7,000.
Cooperative Benevolence
129
22. Orphanage, Gilmer, Texas.
23. Orphanage, Austin, Texas.
24. Jenkins Orphanage, Charleston, S. C.
25. Home for Aged and Infirm Colored Persons, Philadelphia, Pa.—Property,
$400,000; income, $20,000. Sheltered 558 old people, 1864-1899.
26. Colored Orphans'Asylum, Cincinnati, Ohio. Property, $100,000; endow¬
ment fund, $25,000; income, $2,010; inmates, 72; receipts, $3,123.45.
Inmates
Number remaining May 1, 1906
Admitted
Placed In homes
Died
Oared for during year
Remaining
Males Females Total
19
16
35
19
18
87
5
13
18
2
2
38
34
72
33
19
52
Total income from Negroes about $300.
27. Crawford's Old Folks' Home, Cincinnati, Ohio.—Property, $25,000.
28. Home for Aged Colored Women, Cincinnati, Ohio.—Property, $4,000.
29. Hannah Grey Home, New Haven, Conn.—Inmates, 5; income, $200.
30. Universal Progressive School for Orphans, Baltimore, Md.—Property,
$1,950; inmates, 35.
31. Old Folks' Home, Kansas City, Mo.—1889 (?).
32. Children's Orphans' Home, Kansas City, Mo.—Inmates, 100; expendi¬
tures, $65 per month.
33. Rescue Home, Kansas City, Mo.
34. Baptist Orphanage, Baltimore, Md.—Inmates 25.
35. Orphanage, Richmond, Ya.
36. Weaver Orphan Home for Colored Children, Hampton, Va.:
Cash receipts for 1905 $ 947 50
Donations, for 1906 $ 643 14
Received from parents 267 00
Sales of articles 14 12
Miscellaneous 28 50 952 76
Total $1,900 26
37. Gad. S. Johnson's Orphanage, Macon, Ga.—Inmates, 25; income, $1,500.
38. Home for Parentless Children, Petersburg, Va.
39. Maryland Home for Friendless Children, Baltimore, Md.—Property,
2,000; inmates, 52; State aid, $250.
Receipts
Brought forward from the year 1905 $ 269 47
Loans 850 00
Mortgage 1,950 00
Oityaid 826 20
State aid 500 00
Sale of property 1,000 00
Legacy 97 50
General contributions, etc 648 71
Total $6,141 88
40. Amanda Smith Orphanage, Harvey, 111.
41. Iowa Negroes' Home for Aged and Orphans, Des Moines, Iowa.
42. St. Louis Colored Orphans' Home, St. Louis, Mo.
4a Carrie Steele Orphanage, Atlanta, Ga.—Inmates, 97; income, $2,200 ($100
from Negroes directly; the balance from taxes on both races.)
130
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
44. Reed Home and School, Covington, Ga.:
Home building and site on which it stands $ 3,000
Farm within city limits 3,500
Brick machine and tools 1,500
Saw mill 750
Live stock 500
Farm implements 150
Library 500
Total $ 9,600
45. Bridges Orphanage, Macon, Ga.
46. State Protective Home and Mitchell Hospital, Leavenworth, Kansas.—
Income, $2,320.60, during 1883.
47. Home for Destitute Children and Aged Persons, San Antonio, Texas—
Inmates, 18.
Two Years'Income
Total amount collected by subscription $ 114 45
Total amount of special donations 120 82
Total amount collected for building purposes 68 55
Total amount from Bexar county and Board of Children. 794 20
Total amount from tables and entertainments 173 16
Total amount collected from railway employees 85 65
Total amount collected from churches 1 19
Total collected for two years $1,564 22
The property recently bought for the Home was contracted for on the fol¬
lowing terms: One hundred dollars cash, the balance, $900, to be paid in
monthly installments with 8 per cent interest during the next six years.
48. Old Folks' Home, Hampton, Va.
49. Widows' and Orphans' Home, Vicksburg, Miss.
50. " Tents " Old Folks' Home, Hampton, Va.
51. Home for Aged Colored Women, Providence, R. I.
52. Working Girls' Home, Providence, R. I.
53. Old Folks' Home, Columbus, Ohio.
54. Day Nursery, Columbus, Ohio.
55. Old Folks' Home, Westham, Ya.—Inmates, 6; income, $10,000, for home
and farm. (See True Reformers, page 104).
56. Reformatory for Boys, Broadneck, Hanover county. Va. (State.)
57. Rescue Home for Orphans and Old Folks, Jacksonville, Fla.
(b) Hospitals
There are about 40 hospitals conducted by Negroes, including the
Freedmen's Hospital of Washington, D. C., which the Government
supports.
A list of 31 hospitals follows:
1. Mercy Hospital and Nurse Training School, Ocala, Fla.
2. Mercy Hospital and School for Nurses, Philadelphia, Pa.—Total income
to November, 1907, $6,474.02; patients, 4,232; received from Negroes, $4,390.69,
and from the State, $5,000 every two years.
3. Freedmen's Hospital, Washington, D. C.—Patients under care, 2,723; re¬
ceipts and expenditures for the year, $53,000.
4. Frederick Douglass Memorial Hospital and Training School, Philadel¬
phia, Pa.—Patients ending November, 1907, 6,657; income, $8,219 for mainten¬
ance ; income for building, $10,400.
Cooperative Benevolence
131
5. Mitchell Hospital, Leavenworth, Kansas.—Income, $2,320.60 during the
year 1883. «
6. Taylor Lane Hospital, Columbia, S. C.
7. Mercy Hospital, Nashville, Tenn.—Patients, 394; total income, $1,873, all
from Negroes.
8. Douglass Hospital and Training School, Kansas City, Kansas.—Patients
last year, 81; income, $5,858.
9. Harris Sanatorium, Mobile, Ala.—Patients last year, 25.
10. Colored Hospital, Petersburg, Va.
11. Provident Hospital, Baltimore, Md.—Property, $15,000.
12. Provident Hospital, Chicago, 111.
18. Lincoln Hospital, Durham, N. C.
14. Lamar Hospital, Augusta, Ga.
15. Georgia Infirmary, Savannah, Ga.
16. Charity Hospital, Savannah, Ga.
17. Burrus Sanatorium, Augusta, Ga.
18. Colored Hospital, Evansville, Ind.
19. Citizens' National Hospital, Louisville, Ky.
20. Provident Hospital, St. Louis, Mo.
21. State's Hospital, Winston, N. C.
22. Good Samaritan Hospital, Charlotte, N. C.
23. Colley's Hospital, Cincinnati, Ohio.
24. Nurse Training School, Charleston, S. C.
25. Hairston Infirmary, Memphis, Tenn.
26. Dr. J. T. Wilson's Infirmary, Nashville, Tenn.
27. Colored Hospital, Dallas, Texas.
28. Richmond Hospital, Richmond, Va.
29. Woman's Central League Hospital, Richmond, Va.
30. Slater Hospital, Winston-Salem, N. C.
31. Lincoln Hospital and Home, New York, N. Y.
(c) Cemeteries
Nearly every town in the South has a colored cemetery owned and
conducted by Negroes. There are a few exceptions, as in Augusta, Ga. :
" The colored cemetery is owned and controlled by the city. Any one who
wishes a lot can purchase it from the city. Lots are owned by all of the be¬
nevolent societies and families who are able to pay for them.
"A keeper of the cemetery is annually elected by council, with an assistant,
who is colored, and who has the keeping of the colored cemetery assigned
him."
The country districts are poorly provided for:
"The colored cemetery here (Brunswick, Ga.,) was given the colored people
by the city : the keeper is paid $15 per month by the city; the people pay $2
for a grave to be dug. The cemetery is here crowded to overflowing; the peo¬
ple are contemplating buying a piece of ground about five miles out for a ceme¬
tery. The others, far out in the country and on the islands, are generally in
church yards or in the woods—no particular place. Oft-times the undertaker
can scarcely get to the place for the weeds. Nevertheless, if a person dies here
in Brunswick, who lived once in the country or across the river, the body must
be taken at all hazards to the old burying grounds, even if the place is thickly
covered with weeds and can scarcely be found."
132
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
There are probably 500 Negro cemeteries owned, of which the list
below is simply an indication of their number and situation:
1. Baptist Cemetery, Paris, Texas.
2. Colored Cemetery, Tuskegee, Ala.
3. The Ashbury Cemetery, Baltimore, Md.
4. The Mt. Auburn Cemetery, Baltimore, Md.
3. The Greenwood Cemetery, Paris, Texas.—Total business done, $406; to¬
tal paid up capital, $500.
7. Colored Cemetery, Kittrell, N. C.
8. Benevolent Cemetery, Dallas, Texas.
9. Colored Cemetery, Austin, Texas.
" " Waco, Texas.
" " Ft. Worth, Texas.
The Masons' Cemetery, San Antonio, Texas.
Colored Knights of Pythias' Cemetery, San Antonio, Texas.
Odd Fellows' Cemetery, San Antonio, Texas.
Colored U. B. F.'s Cemetery, San Antonio, Texas.
Colored Cemetery, High Point, N. C.
Greensboro, "
Raleigh, "
Lexington, "
Laurinburg, "
Wilmington, "
Charlotte, "
Thomasville, "
Abbeville, S. C.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
83.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
families.
Little Rock, Ark.
Pine Bluff, "
Hot Springs, "
Houston, Texas.
U • it
Beaumont, "
Jefferson, "
Palestine, "
Marshall, "
Elizabeth City, N". C.
McCoy Cemetery, Memphis,Tenn.—Total capital, $7,000.
Union-Forever Cemetery, Memphis, Tenn-.
New South Fort Pickering Cemetery, Memphis, Tenn.
Providence Cemetery, Petersburg, Va.
East View " " "
Greenwood " Nashville, Tenn.
Louisville Cemetery Association, Louisville, Ky.
Toussaint L'Ouverture Cemetery, Franklin, Tenn.
Colored Cemetery, Shelbyville, Tenn.
" " Winchester, "
" " Clarksville, "
Zion " Memphis, "
Colored " Lexington, Ky.
" " , Ga.—Partners, 5. Cemetery for special
Capital, $150.
Co-operative Benevolence 133
50. Brothers and Sisters of Love, , Ga.—Partners, 150; capital,
$600. Fourteen years:
1906 1907
Paid sick Benefits |200 $225
Paid for burial 100 75
51. Colored Cemetery, Raleigh, N. C.
The Raleigh business League is an organization composed of citizens of
Raleigh and surroundings who are interested in public improvements and
are at this time engaged in an effort to improve the city cemetery for colored
people, and also to form a new cemetery association for the purpose of enlarg¬
ing and improving the old one and building a suitable structure to protect the
patrons of the cemetery from inclement weather while engaged in burial ser¬
vices.
52. Summit View Cemetery, Guthrie, Okla.
53. Colored Cemetery, Athens, Ala.
54. " " Albany, Ga.
55. Olive " Philadelphia, Pa.—Eight acres, worth $100,000 ; 900 lot
owners. About fifty years old.
56. Lebanon Cemetery, Philadelphia, Pa.—Worth |75,000 and about fifty
years old.
57. Merion Cemetery, Philadelphia, Pa.—Twenty-one acres, worth $30,000
and about eight years old.
58. Fraternal Burying Society, Philadelphia, Pa.
59. Greenwood Cemetery, " "
60. Eden Cemetery Co., " "
61. People's Undertakers Co., Dallas, Texas.—Capital, $4,000; business 1906,
$75; 1907, $100. Began business in 1901. Do about 75 per cent of business of col¬
ored people of Dallas county. Give regular employment to four persons. Own
no hacks, but use those owned by colored men.
62. Woodland Cemetery Association is a co-operative concern, organized
for the purpose of purchasing burial grounds. Originally there were 120 mem¬
bers, each of whom owns a lot. There are now 15 active members. These re¬
tained active membership by assuming all obligations incident to the care
and keeping of said grounds. Have no capital stock. Invested about $1,000.
Money for sale of lots used in caring for grounds. Dallas, Texas.
63. Colored Cemetery, Buena Vista, Ga.—Bought twelve years ago. Five
acres, cost $60.
64. Hudson Cemetery, Yazoo Ci ty, Miss.
65. Cemetery, Marlin, Texas. 79. Cemetery, Rome, Ga.
66.
u
Mexia, '•
80.
Cuthbert, Ga.
67.
u
Prairie View,
Texas.
81.
Athens, Ga.
68.
11
Tyler,
U
82.
Covington, Ga.
69.
u
Neyland,
a
83.
Hawkinsville, Ga.
70.
«
Greenville,
a
84.
Columbus, "
71.
u
Seguin,
u
85.
Unionville, "
72.
tl
Daingerfield,
a
86.
Locust Grove, "
73.
11
Richmond,
u
87.
Barnesville, "
74.
a
Milan, Tenn.
00
00
Marshallville, "
75.
a
Fort Valley, Ga.
89.
Willard, "
76.
u
Americus,
a
90.
Adelaide, "
77.
a
Milledgeville
Ga.
91.
Sparta, "
78.
u
Savannah,
U
92.
'• Lawtonville, "
134
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
93.
Cemetery, Griffin, Ga.
124.
Cemetery, Palatka, Fla.
94.
" Sandersville, Ga.
125.
" Fesseden, "
95.
" Macon, "
126.
" Trilby, "
96.
" Cordele, "
127.
" Gainesville, Fla.
97.
" Pinehurst, "
128.
" Huntsville, Ala.
98.
"■ Denmark, S. C.
129.
" Selma, "
99.
" Beaufort, "
130.
" Kowaliga, "
o
o
" Charleston,"
131.
" Normal, "
101.
" Cheraw, "
132.
" Anniston, "
102.
" Aiken, "
133.
" Tuscaloosa, "
103.
" Columbus, Ohio.
134.
" Florence, ".
104.
" Enfield, N. C.
135.
" Montgomery"
105.
" Troy, "
136.
" St. Joseph, Mo.
106.
" Evansville, Ind.
137.
" Jefferson City, Mo.
107.
" Helena, Ark.
138.
" St. Louis, "
108.
" Newport, "
139.
" Kansas City, "
109.
" Fort Smith, Ark.
140.
" Arlington, Va.
110.
"• New Durham, N. J.
141.
" Cappohosic,"
111.
" Minneapolis, Minn.
142.
" Chicago, 111.
112.
" Holly Springs, Miss.
143.
" Evanston, 111.
113.
" Mound Bayou, "
144.
" New Haven, Conn.
114.
" Kingfisher, Okla.
145.
" Eatonton, Ga.
115.
" Langston, "
146.
" Shady Dale, Ga.
116.
" New Orleans, La.
147.
" Monticello, "
117.
" New York, N. T.
148.
" Lexington, Miss.
118.
" Okmulgee, I. T.
149.
" J ackson, "
119.
" Ardmore, "
150.
Holly Grove Cem'y,Gibbons,"
120.
" Taft,. "
151.
Cemetery, Chattanooga, Tenn.
121.
" Miami, Fla.
152.
" Murfreesboro, "
122.
" Jacksonville, Fla.
153.
" Knoxville, "
123.
" Sanford, "
154. Nine Cemeteries,Richmond,Ya.:
Three associations own nine burial grounds with a capital stock of $10,000, etc.
There must be at least 500 such cemeteries in the United States, and
perhaps twice this number.
Section 14. Banks
The first Negro bank in the United States was the Capital Savings
Bank of Washington, D. C., opened in 1888. Before that, however, a
bank had been especially established for the freedmen:
Pending the continuance of the Civil war, and soon after the colored race
became a considerable element in the military forces of the United States, the
safe-keeping of the pay and bounty moneys of this class became a matter of
great importance to them and their families, and to meet this exigency, mili¬
tary savings banks were created at Norfolk, Ya., and Beaufort, S. C., centers
at that time of colored troops. At the close of the war the emancipation of this
race increased the necessity of some financial agency to meet their economic
and commercial wants, and in response to this demand, taking suggestions and
counsel of the expedients that military experience had suggested for the bene¬
fit of this people, the National Congress incorporated, March, 1865, the Freed-
men's Savings and Trust Company.
Banks
135
The incorporators were:
Peter Cooper, William C. Bryant, A. A. Low, S.B.Chittenden, Charles H.
Marshall, William A. Booth, Gerritt Smith, William A. Hall, William Allen,
John Jay, Abraham Baldwin, A. S. Barnes, Hiram Barney, Seth B. Hunt,
Samuel Holmes, Charles Collins, R. R. Graves, Walter S. Griffith, A. H. Wallis,
D. S. Gregory, J. W. Alvord, George Whipple, A. S. Hatch, Walter T. Hatch,
E. A. Lambert, W. G. Lambert, Roe Lockwood, R. H. Manning, R. W. Ropes,
Albert Woodruff and Thomas Denney, of New York; John M. Forbes, William
Clafin, S. G. Howe, George L. Stearnes, Edward Atkinson, A. A. Lawrence and
John M. S. Williams,of Massachusetts; Edward Harris and Thomas Davis, of
Rhode Island; Stephen Colweil, J. Wheaton Smith, Francis E. Cope, Thomas
Webster, B. S. Hunt and Henry Samuel, of Pennsylvania; Edward Harwood,
Adam Poe, Levi Coffin J. M. Walden, of Ohio, who, with their successors, were
"constituted a body corporate in the city of Washington, in the District of
Columbia, by the name of the Freedmen's Savings and Trust Company, and
by that name may sue and be sued in any court of the United States."
Section five of the act of incorporation said :
And be it further enacted, That the general business and object of the cor¬
poration hereby created shall be to receive on deposit such sums of money as
may, from time to time, be offered therefor by or on behalf of persons hereto¬
fore held in slavery in the United States, or their descendants, and investing
the same in the stocks, bonds, treasury notes or other securities of the United
States.
The Senate committee of investigation said:
Until 1868 the spirit and letter of the charter seemed to have been recog¬
nized very faithfully by the trustees and officers who administered the affairs
of the company, and until the beginning of 1870 there do not appear to have
been in the administration any serious and practical departures from the
kindly and judicious programme indicated in the act creating the institution.
In May, 1870, an amendment to the charter was secured, which embodied a
radical and what subsequent events proved to be a.dangerous and hurtful
change in the character of securities in which the trustees were empowered to
invest the deposits of the institution. Two-thirds of the deposits, that portion
from which the dividends were expected to accrue, were originally required
to be invested exclusively in United States securities, but by the amendment
referred to one-half was subject to investment, at the discretion of the trustees,
" in bonds and notes secured by mortgage on real estate in double the value of
the loan." From this period began the speculative, indiscreet and culpable
transactions which ultimately caused the suspension of the bank, and disas¬
trous losses to a very large extent upon an innocent, trusting and necessitous
class of citizens. *
The bank failed in 1874, and no one was ever punished for the swindle.
The business of the Freedmen's Savings Bank, 1866-1872, was as fol¬
lows:+
» Report of the Senate Select Committee to investigate the Freedmen's Savings
and Trust Co., 1880.
+ Senate Report No. 440, Forty-sixth Congress, second session, p. 41, Appendix;
Race Traits and Tendencies of the American Negro, p. 290.
136
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Total Afrit,
of deposits
Deposit
each year
Bal. due
depositors
5 305,167
1,624,835
3,582,378
7,257,798
12,605,782
19,952,947
31,260,499
55,000,000
5 305,167
1,319,686
1,957,525
3,675,420
5,347,983
7,347,165
11,281,313
$ 199,283
366,338
638,299
1,073,465
1,657,000
2,455,836
3,684,739
4,200,000
3,013,670
Branches of the Freedman's Bank *
BRANCHES
Atlanta, Ga
Augusta, Ga
Baltimore, Md
Beaufort, S. C
Charleston, 8. C
Chattanooga, Tenn.
Columbus, Miss
Columbia, Tenn
Huntsville, Ala
Jacksonville, Fla...
Lexington, Ky
Little Rock, Ark....
Louisville, Ky
Lynchburg, Va
Macon, Ga
Memphis, Tenn
Mobile, Ala
Montgomery, Ala...
Natchez, Miss
Nashville, Tenn
New Berne, N. C
New Orleans, La
New York City
Norfolk, Va
Philadelphia, Pa
Raleigh, N. C
Richmond, Va
Savannah, Ga
Shreveport, La
St. Louis, Mo
Tallahassee, Fla
Vicksburg, Miss ...
Washington, D. C..
Wilmington, N. C...
Total
Dates of
Organization
Jan. 14,1870 ...
March 8,1866..
March 12, 1866.
Oct. 16,1865
Jan. 11,1866....
May 10,1869
Aug. 1,1870....
, 1871
Dec. 11, 1865 ...
March 10, 1866.
Oct. —, 1870....
Nov. 25,1870...
Sept. 1, 1865....
June —, 1871...
Oct. 14, 1868....
Dec. 30,1865....
Jan. 1,1866
June 14,1870...
March 29,1870.
Oct. 28,1865....
Jan. 11,1866
Jan. 7t 1866
July 21,1866. ..
June 3, 1865 ...
Jan. 4,1870
Jan. 9, 1869
Oct. 13,1865
Jan. 11, 1866
Nov. 15, 1870...
June 27,1868...
Aug. 22, 1866...
Dec. 3, 1865
Aug. 1, 1865
Oct. 24,1865 ....
Amount of Interest Paid by the Company
From organization to January 1,1867 $ 1,985 47
For the year ending January 1, 1868 9,521 60
For two years ending November 1, 1868 24,544 08
For the year ending November 1,1869 43,896 98
For the year ending November 1,1870 59,376 20
For the term ending March 1,1971 20,840 32
For two terms ending January 1,1872 122,215 17
Total $ 262,379 82
♦ Report of the Senate Select Committee to investigate the Freedmen's Savings
Bank and Trust Co., 1880; Appendix, pp. 41-42.
Banks
137
At the time of the company's failure, in 1874, it consisted of 32 branches,
with 61,131 depositors, and the balance due these depositors at the time was
$3,013,699.
The total payments to March, 1896, were $1,722,548, leaving a balance unpaid
of $1,291,121. The present cash balance in the hands of the government re¬
ceivers amounts to $30,476. *
Of all disgraceful swindles perpetrated on a struggling people, the
Freedman's Bank was among the worst and the Negro did well not to
wait for justice, but went to banking himself as soon as his ignorance
and poverty allowed.
The Capital Savings Bank, Washington, D. C., 1888
Capital Stock, $150,000
In the year 1888 a statement was made on the floor of the United States
Senate by a prominent Senator that with all their boasted progress, the
colored race had not a single bank official to its credit. This remark was the
immediate spur to several gentlemen who believed that the stigma of racial
incapacity was unjust and who resolved to start a bank, if possible !
On Wednesday morning, October 17, 1888, the doors of the Capital Savings
Bank were thrown open for business at 804 F street, N. W., Washington, D. C.
The amount of stock subscribed was $6,000, of which $1,000 paid up in cash.
The business of the bank was a success from the start. The capital was
steadily increased, from time to time, until now it is $50,000 paid up, and a con¬
siderable surplus. The bank is a voluntary association and owns the large
bank building at 609 F street, N. W., in the heart of the business section of the
National Capital, containing some twenty handsome office rooms heated by
steam. The Capital Savings Bank is now one of the recognized banking in¬
stitutions of the city. It stood the strain of the panic in 1893 without asking
quarter from anyone, paying every obligation on demand, t
This bank lived about sixteen years and did a large business. It
finally failed through bad management and some possible dishonesty.
The Mutual Bank and Trust Co. of Chattanooga, was opened in 1889,
and failed in the panic of 1893, after a career of four years.
The Metropolitan Bank of Savannah, failed in 1908.
These are the only failures so far, but most of the banks are very
young.
I'he following is a list of Negro banks taken from Bankers' directo¬
ries:
* Race Traits and Tendencies of the American Negro, p. 290.
-(-Colored Washington: Efforts for Social Betterment, pp. 16,18.
PLACE
NAME
Year
established
President
Paid in
capital
Surplus
Deposits
O
3
>
3
o
s
w
2
a
OK!
Little Rock, Ark
Birmingham, Ala
Philadelphia, Pa
Nashville, Tenn
Memphis, Tenn
Richmond, Ya
Richmond, Va
Richmond, Va
Fort Worth, Texas ...
Hampton, Va
Natchez, Miss
Yazoo City, Miss
Mound Bayou, Miss .
Vicksburg, Miss
Vicksburg, Miss
Indianola, Miss
Greenville, Miss
Jackson, Miss
Jackson, Miss
Savannah, Ga
Savannah, Ga
Savannah, Ga
Edmondson, Ark
Winston-Salem, N. C
Columbus, Miss
Richmond, Va
Boley, Ind. Ter
Jacksonville, Fla
Capital Oitv Savings Bank
Alabama Penny Savings and Loan
People's Savings Bank
One Cent Savings Bank
Solvent Savings and Trust Co
True Reformers
Mechanics1 Savings Bank
St. Luke's Penny Savings Bank...
Provident Bank and Trust Co
G. U. O. Galilean Fishermen
Bluff City Savings Bank
People's Penny Savings Bank
Bank of Mound Bayou
Lincoln Savings Bank
Union Savings Bank
Delta Penny Savings Bank
K. of H. W. Savings Savings Bank
American Trust and Savings Bank
Southern Bank
Wage Earners' Bank
Metropolitan Bank (failed 1908)
Union Savings Bank..!
Penny Savings Bank
Forsyth Savings and Trust Co
Penny Savings Bank
Nickel Savings Bank
Farmers and Merchants Bank
Capital Trust and Investment Co..
'03
'90
'07
'04
'06
'88
'01
'03
'07
'01
'06
'05
'04
'02
'04
'04
'04'
'06
'07
'06
'96
'07
'02
M.W.Gibbs
W. R. Pettiford
Geo. H. White
R. H. Boyd
R. R. Church
W. L. Taylor
John Mitchell
M. L. Walker
R. C. Houston (Masonic
building)
T. H. Shorts
J. B. Banks
H. H. King
J. W. Francis
W. E. Mollison
T. G. Ewing
W. A. Attawav
E. A. Williams
L. K. Atwood
L. K. Atwood
L. S. Williams
P. S. Ball
L. S. Reed
12,000
25,000
2,445
7,732
100,000
24,174
15,000
7,000
' 2,666'
J. s. Hill....
W. W. Cox .
R. F. Tancil.
W. H. Dill ..
S. H. Hart ..
8,000
5,300
4,325
10,000
5,000
10,000
10,340
7,960
9,430
1,346
1,650
9,200
5,000
2.899
140,000
6,000
5,000
2,000
1,000
1,000
1,000
4,000
3,500
2,000
240
3,000
2,000
27,000
225,000
34,000
52,000
340,000
100,000
40,000
39,000
12,000
6,000
27,000
11,000
15,000
64,000
20,000
21,000
4,568
5,270
13,000
12,000
36,000
In addition to these, the following banks are reported to us:
NAME
29. Mechanics' Investment Co
30. Gideon Savings Bank
31. People's Bank and Trust Co..
32. Afro-American Investment Co..
33. Loan and Trust Co
34. Sons and Daughters of Peace
35. Isaac Smith's Bank and Trust Co
PLACE
Savannah Ga
Norfolk Va.
Muskogee Ind. Ter.
Savannah Ga.
Savannah Ga.
Newport News Va.
New Berne N. C.
NAME
36. Creek Citizens' Bank
87. Gold Bond Bank
38. Unity Savings and Trust Co
39. Tuskegee Institute Bank...
40. Progress Savings Bank... .
41. Negro Bank
PLACE
Muskogee Ind. Ter.
Muskogee.... Ind. Ter.
Pine Bluff Ark.
Tuskegee Ala.
Key West Fla.
Manchester Va.
Banks 139
Bank statements and histories follow:
Bank of the Q. U. O. of True Reformers
(Established 1889)
Total Receipts of True Reformers' Bank
1890 $ 9,811 28 I 1892 $ 79,052 79 I 1894 $ 162,483 32
18yl 55,937 70|1893 108,205 98 | 1905 807,995 17
The Report, August 2,1902
From the Finance Department $ 135,737 45
From the Real Estate Department 21,014 00
From the Regalia Department 7,636 58
From the Reformer Department 7,427 32
From the Supply Department 21,254 13
From the Record Department 77,131 37
From the Old Folks' Home 8,127 44
From the Richmond Mercantile Store 57,237 92
From the Washington Mercantile Store 11,982 50
From the Manchester Mercantile Store 14,946 75
From the Portsmouth Mercantile Store 12,872 49
From the Roanoke Mercantile Store 5,577 24
From Fountains 47,659 35
From Rose Buds 5,666 71
From Individuals 259,653 74
From societies 62,228 78
From loans 18,391 14
From collections 1,409 44
From exchanges 665 50
From clubs 14,686 67
From Hotel Reformer 4,793 39
Total $ 796,099 91
Cash balance forwarded from the last report 103,229 96
Total receipts, including balance forwarded $ 899,329 87
Total disbursements by depositors, discounts, mortgages, etc 820,740 53
Cash balance to date $ 78,589 34
Amount of cash handled at last report 6,996,349 38
Amount of business done this year 1,616,840 44
Total amount of business done to date $8,613,189 82
Average monthly business done 134,736 70
Number of letters received this year 11,831
Number of letters sent out 8,979
Number of letters and packages referred to other Departments 2,066
Number of depositors at the last report 10.631
Number of new depositors this year 744
Total number of depositors 11,375
Statement, April 6,1906
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts $ 463,564 21 Capital stock paid in $ 100,000 00
Stocks bonds and mortgages. 5,000 00 Surplus fund 86,972 00
Fiirnif'nre and fixtures ... 2,500 00 Undivided profits, less amount
Checks antf other cash items 2,555 32 paid for interest, expenses
Dva/e ba^nke^rs6 Bank ^ ^ • 12,81124 Time certificates of deposits .. 224',083 21
Hneeie nickels (ie'nts^ 7,150 63 Individual deposits subject to
Paper cSr?!ncy *7,866 00 check 102,584 89
$ 541,447 40 Total $541,447 40
The bank has paid in dividends to the stockholders $160,350 to date.
140
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Receipts
Grand Fountain $ 392,
Fountains 31,
Rose Buds 2,
Individuals 382
Societies 135,
Loans 51
Interest 1
Collections 1
Supplies
Exchange
Richmond Division
Clubs 9.
Total $ 1
Repokt, 1907
Balance from last year $ 78,216 70
Receipts for year 1,008,99(3 40
284 76 Total 1 1,087,213 16
524 54
,978 06 Disbursements 1,000,811 83
,799 73
,172 52 Cash Bal. at last report.. .$ 86,401 33
'kJo qi Capital stock paid in 100,000 00
' j_'Jj New depositors 1,803 00
67 Amount paid in dividends ... 18,884 00
Amount cash handled at last
,171 45 report 14,923,240 76
Business done this year 2,009,808 22
) Total 116,933,048 98
Alabama Savings Bank
Report of the Alabama Penny Savings and Loan Co., Sept. 12, l'.!07
(Established 1890)
Resources
Liabilities
Loans and discounts $ 210,349 14
Overdrafts 1,497 56
Stocks and bond 210 00
Real estate 51,122 78
Furniture and fixtures 2,967 72
Cash available 47,341 26
Capital stock
Surplus
Undivided profits
Due depositors on certificates.
Due depositors on demand
Dividends uncalled for
Notes payable
Total $ 313,488 46
25,000 00
6,000 00
4,984 03
49,611 24
213,385 35
674 50
13,833 34
Total $ 313,488 46
Deposits
July 15,1902 $ 78,124 21
July 15, 1903 100,948 96
July 15, 1905 107,046 69
July 15, 1906 165,177 73
July 15, 1907 215,455 26
Sept. 15,1906, to Sept. 15,1907, (9,112 depositors). .$ 1,099,224 00
The Alabama Savings Bank was organized August, 1890. One of the consid¬
erations which led to the effort of building a bank was that it might serve as
a remedy for the squandering of property in our district. During my pastor¬
ate in Birmingham there was a family who had two children. Both of the
parents died, and the property left to the children was squandered. The
estate was estimated at $10,000. The administrator sold the boy, the elder of
the two, old horses and carriages in payment for his interest in the estate. To
make a bond of $20,000, as was necessary in this case, was impossible for any
colored person to do. When I saw our helplessness in the effort to help orphan
children in saving the property earned by their parents, I conceived the idea
if we had a strong financial institution that could make bonds and save the
property left to the heirs for their benefit, it would greatly help the race
The next day after the opening, I took my seat as President and made the
first loan in the history of our bank. This loan was $10 for thirty days, interest
50 cents. The last loan I made in the fifteenth year of the bank's existence
was just before visiting the National Business League, in New York City,
August, 1905. It was for $14,000, time ten years, with satisfactory interest
arrangement. The borrower was the Knights of Pythias, of Alabama, for the
purpose of erecting their magnificent three-story brick building.*
* National Negro Business League, 1906, pp. 162-4.
Banks 141
The Wage Earners' Loan and Investment Co.
&68 W. Broad St., Savannah, Oa.
(Established 1900)
Assets at the End of each Fiscal Year
iS? (commenced business) $ 102 00
i 1,144 00
2,462 03
JXg 11,637 37
14,587 53
20,897 28
85,749 51
67,966 90
Seventh Annual Statement, October 5,1907
Resources Liabilities
Loans outstanding $ 57,041 14 Capital paid in $ 11,518 35
Real estate and investments .. 5,717 00 Reserve and undivided profits 6,987 44
Office furniture and fixtures... 392 71 Deposits 49 439 51
Cash 4,816 05 Dividends unpaid ' 21 60
Total $ 67,966 90 Total $ 67,966 90
Business done in 1906 $ 143,743 65
Total paid up capital 10,000 00
Real estate 6,000 00
This company was organized in October, 1900, with a total paid in capital of
$102.
Mechanics' Savings Bank
511 North Third Street, Richmond, Va.
(Established 1901)
Statement, 1906
Resources
Loans and discount $ 5,581 02
Overdraft 1,241 02
Stocks, bonds and mortgages 7,411 73
Furniture and fixtures 2.164 62
Real estate 88,159 35
Cash on hand:
Coin $ 488 90
Currency 861 00
Exchange 618 95
Total $ 1,968 85
Due from American National Bank 7,452 07
Due from National bank and banks of New York.. 2,156 77
Due from National banks of Virginia 20,168 35 $ 31,747 04
Other items 1,868 08
Total resources $ 138,161 86
Liabilities
Capital stock paid in $
Surplus 00
Time deposits *}■
Demand deposits ™
Dividends unpaid f J* w
Certified checks 149 9,j
$ 138,161 86
The financial report of the Cashier, Thomas H. Wyatt, showed that there
was $32,616.22 to the credit of the stockholders. The aggregate deposits for the
year 1907 were $481,243.65, and the gross receipts up to the close of the year, ex¬
clusive of furniture and fixtures, were $151,904.48. The Board of Directors had
declared a dividend of 10 per cent on all of its stock. One of the features, too,
in this report was the recommendation to erect a fine banking house for the
institution.
142 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Lincoln Savings Bank, Vicksburg, Miss.
(Established 1902)
Capital stock $ 10,000
Surplus 1,150
Deposits 16,500
We are five years old. We have many white depositors, and white borrow¬
ers have to be kept off with a club, figuratively speaking. We shall be in the
clearing house which is now being organized in this city.
One Cent Savings Bank, Nashville, Tenn.
(Established 1903)
Statement, 1906
Loans and discounts $ 17,516 96
Cash Resources
Due from banks and bankers 29,655 16
Checks and other cash items 502 62
Specie 335 46
Currency 261 00 $ 30,754 24
Total resources $ 48,271 20
Liabilities
Capital stock paid in $ 2,140 00
Surplus and undivided profits, less expenses and taxes paid 1,312 41
Individual deposits 44,818 79
Total liabilities $ 48,271 20
I want to give you, in a few words, a comparative statement of our deposits
for a few months during our existence. In the month of January, 1904, our
deposits were $11,047.30; in January of the next year, $19,927.11; in January,
1906, they were $31,676, showing an average increase of nearly $10,000 for each
year. In April, 1904, our deposits amounted to $10,892; in April, 1905, to $16,358.09;
in April, 1906, to $23,870.32. In June, 1904, our deposits amounted to $14,819.82; in
June, 1905, to $26,759.5, and in June, 1906, to $36,243.09. So you see, my friends, we
are gradually growing. Our paid up capital stock amounts to $7,125; our total
deposits on the 30th of June, 1906, amounted to $55,312.36.*
Solvent Savings Bank andTrust Co., Memphis,Tenn,
Fourth Annual Statement, Dec. 31,1907
Resources
Loans and discounts I 15,372 09
Furniture and fixtures 4,492 23
Expenses paid, less Int. and Ex. collected 4,837 90
Cash Resources
Due from banks and bankers $ 6,509 63
Checks and other cash items 5,06120
Specie 5,275 91
Currency 9,874 00 26,720 74
Total resources $ 51,422 96
Liabilities
Capital stock paid in $ 7,732 00
Individual deposits subject to check 33,040 45
Certificates of deposit 2,680 06
Certified and Cashier's checks 70 00
Savings deposits subject to check 7,900 45
Total liabilities $ 51,422 66
* National Negro Business League, 1906, p. 172.
Banks
143
Growth of Deposits
June 80, 1906 $ 7,585 04
December 81,1906 18,374 71
June 30,1907 83,207 47
December 31,1907 43,620 96
The Surry Sessex and Southampton American Home and Missionary Bank-
mg Association, Courtland, Va., 1903.—Conducted by the Jenkins Benevolent
and Education Association:
Business 1906-7 $62,167 83
Total paid up capital 18,955 00
Real estate 20,000 00
In one mile of the town of Courtland, in the county of Southampton.
Bank of Mound Bayou, Mound Bayou, Miss.
(Established 1904)
Statement, Oct. 12,1906
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts $ 41,487 88 Individual deposits subject to
Building and fixtures 7,035 63 checks $ 42,632 64
Expenses 777 91 Capital paid in 8,400 00
Overdrafts 819 07 Undivided profits 1,012 94
Cash and sight exchange 20,390 64 Bills payable 18,465 00
Total resources $ 70,510 58 Total liabilities $70,510 58
The Bank of Mound Bayou was organized January 8,1904, with an author¬
ized capital of $10,000. We were chartered by Governor Vardaman, who, not
so much because of kindly feelings towards the members of our race, but
mainly because of the indomitable perseverance of the Mississippi Negro, has
been forced to sign more charters for Negro banks than any other man in the
world, living or dead. Located in a town and surrounded by a community
whose citizenry is composed almost exclusively of our people, our bank has
had a splendid opportunity to indicate the Negro's capacity to operate a finan¬
cial institution among themselves. Starting without any experience, no cor¬
respondents or financial connections, in a one-story frame building, 16x20, it
has today about $40,000 in resources and liabilities; correspondents and finan¬
cial connections in Clarksdale, Miss., Memphis, New Orleans and New York.
In sending some of our paper to New York this spring for discount to our
New York correspondent, the Cashier replied that he had placed the amount
to our credit at 5 per cent per annum and assured us that it was a pleasure to
serve us. We completed this year and are now domiciled in a two-story
pressed brick front building, with modern vault, time lock safe and com¬
mensurate fixtures. Located in a contiguous cotton territory about 30,000
acres, one-third of which is in cultivation, and a live hard wood timber indus¬
try, we have handled more money in a short while than many larger institu¬
tions in larger towns. The total clearings through our bank from September,
1905, to January, 1906, were more than $300,000.*
Union Savings and Loan Co., Savannah, Qa.
(Established 1905)
Stockholders 450
Business, 1905 $120,01(0
Total capital paid in 14,000
Real estate 8,250
Deposits 15,000
We began business November 8,1905, with $1,000 paid in. We have purchased
» National Negro Business League, 1906, pp. 168-9.
144 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
one of the most desirable localities in this beautiful city. In the heart of
Savannah, in front of the magnificent post office, just across the square from
the court house, and in the midst of the banking and business life of Savannah.
We shall erect a building here that will be a monument to the race.
We desire that our people everywhere should hold an interest in this great
and beautiful building. The ground and building complete will cost between
$22,000 and $25,000, every dollar of which will be owned by Negroes.
Mechanics' Investment Co., Savannah, Ga.:
Authorized capital $ 25,000 00
Shares, each 10 00
Afro-American Loan and Investment Co., Savannah, Ga.—Established 1906.
Business done 1906-7, $20,000; total paid up capital, $10,000.
Metropolitan Mutual Benefit Association and Metropolitan Mercantile and
Realty Co., Savannah, Ga., (incorporated).—We are doing a regular banking
business, paying 7 per cent on yearly deposits on $100 and upwards; deposits
in the savings department, 5 per cent.
We are well equipped with a burglar proof vault, safety deposit boxes, steel
money chests and time lock. Deposit boxes are now for rent at reasonable
cost.
We handle yearly between $50,000 and $90,000. [Failed, 1908.]
We have four Negro banks in the city of Savannah ; the oldest one is the
Wage Earners' Bank, established some six years ago; the next one established
was the Metropolitan Savings Bank; the third was the Afro-American Sav¬
ings Bank, and the next bank which came into existence in Savannah was
the Union Savings Bank, which I represent. We organized on the 8th day of
last November with an authorized capital stock of $8,000; we have handled up
to last month $21,000, and now have a paid up capital stock of "a little over
$5,000. I think thus far we have had remarkable success.*
Gideon Savings Bank, Norfolk, Va.
(Established 1905)
Statement
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts $ 9,622 88 Capital stock paid in $ 7,187 00
Banking house 4,197 42 Individual deposits subject to
Furniture and fixtures 2,254 62 check 9,991 21
Specie, nickles and cents 956 24 Time certificates of deposit 1,719 50
Paper currency 2,044 00 Bills payable 177 50
Total | 19,075 21 Total $ 19,075 21
The Sons and Daughters of Peace, Newport News, Va.
(Established 1905)
Statement of Aug. 22,1907
Loans and discounts $ 8,983 25 Capital stock $ 8,600 00
Overdrafts 24 86 ■ Deposits subject to check 8,405 10
Banking house 4,000 00 Certified checks 125 00
Furniture and fixtures 779 00 Other items liability 4,050 78
Exchanges for clearing house.. 60 87
Due from National banks 1,300 44
State banks 5,487 08
Specie, nickels and cents 255 83
Paper currency 310 00
Total $21,180 83 $21,180 83
♦ Negro National Business League, 1906, p. 190.
Banks 145
Our bank was opened July 4,1905. The first day we did only |500 of business,
u we are glad to say that we averaged for the first year over $50,000, and still
e er ast year. This year we mean to do even more. The future for our
en erprise is indeed bright, and we believe our bank is destined to be one of
the financial strongholds of our people of this section. We are in a vicinity of
activity. And we are endeavoring to get the people to save systematically,
which means a business that can be depended upon. So far, we have suc¬
ceeded nicely and our patronage is steadily growing; we have both small and
large accounts numbering possibly 400 or 500.
Statement, at the Close of Business, Dec. 3,1907
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts $ 8,545 49 Capital stock paid in $ 8,600 00
Overdrafts 57 22 Individual deposits subject* to
Banking house 4,000 00 check 6,38133
Furniture and fixtures 779 00 Time certificates of deposit 1,930 91
Exchanges for clearing house . 67 86 Certified checks 76 10
Due from National banks 1,500 44 All other Items of liability,
Due from State banks and pri- viz 3,100 00
vate bankers 8,450 48
Specie, nickels and cents 470 85
Paper currency 1,217 00
Total $ 20,088 34 Total $20,088 34
Last year our deposits were $60,000 with a thousand patrons more or less, and
this year we wish to do a great deal more; for this reason we solicit your busi¬
ness.
We have recently purchased our banking house, and put in improvements
and we are prepared to give you every accommodation consistent to our busi¬
ness. Take a number of shares of our stock at once. If you cannot take as
many as you wish, take one or two at any rate. We lend money on easy terms.
Delta Penny Savings Bank, lndianola, Miss.
(Established 1904)
Capital Slock, $35,000
Statement, Oct. 31,1907
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts, etc $ 62,119 08 Capital paid in $ 10,900 00
Overdrafts secured 952 65 Surplus 1,000 00
Bankinghouse 5,000 00 Undivided profits 1,81492
Furniture and fixtures 2,755 50 Demand deposits 61,842 68
Sight exchange 27,711 10 Time deposits 14,450 11
Cash on hand 6,107 20 Bills payable.. i4,000 00
Unpaid dividends 440 00
Cashier's checks 197 82
Total $ 104,645 53 Total $ 104,645 53
This bank was organized in October, 1904, and opened its doors January, 1905,
with total resources of $12,000. January 1,1906, total resources had increased
to $36,000; January 1,1907, total resources had increased to over $50,000. I here¬
with enclose you one of our last statements, which will show you that we now
have total resources of over $100,000.
Your readers will likely recall the stir that was created some months ago
because President Roosevelt sought to retain a colored woman, Mrs. Minnie
Cox as postmistress at lndianola, Miss. So much disturbance was created
that the President finally closed the post office and Mrs. Cox withdrew from
the office In the meantime her husband, Mr. W. W. Cox, was a railway pos-
' tal clerk ' Because of the disturbance Mr. Cox later gave up his position on
the railroad and for a while both of them lived out of lndianola. Some months
146
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
ago, however, Mr. Cox determined to open a Negro bank in Indianola, and I
can indicate the progress and success of this bank in no better manner than
to quote the following sentences which have just come to me from a reliable
business man in Mississippi:
" Now with reference to Mr. W. W. Cox, of Indianola, Miss., I beg to advise
that no man of color is as highly regarded and respected by the white people
of his town and county as he. It is true that he organized and is cashier of
the Delta Penny Savings Bank, domiciled there. I visited Indianola during
the spring of 1905 and was very much surprised to note the esteem in which he
was held by the bankers and business men (white) of that place. He is a good,
clean man and above the average in intelligence, and knows how to handle
the typical Southern white man. In the last statement furnished by his bank
to the State Auditor, his bank showed total resources of $46,000. He owns and
lives in one of the best resident houses in Indianola, regardless of race, and
located in a part of the town where other colored men seem to be not desired."
Progress Savings Bank, Key West, Fla.—Established 1905. Stockholders, 44;
business done in 1906-7, $800; total paid up capital, $450.
This institution commenced with only $50 capital about two years ago. The
death of its principal founder, Mr. J. R. Shackelford, a few months after its
organization greatly retarded its progress. However, there is light ahead.
Southern Bank, Jackson, Miss.
(Established 1906)
The bank, though but one year old, is in a prosperous condition, having
earned 22 per cent upon average capital employed. A great deal of good has
been done for the colored people, through this bank by inducing the people to
save their earnings, as will be shown from the following statement as made
to the stockholders.
The Board of Directors ordered that the earnings be retained in the bank
during the present financial panic throughout the country:
Statement Shown
Resources Liabilities
Cash $12,653 77 Capital stock $10,000 00
Furniture and fixtures 4,107 43 Dep. Sub. stock 27,698 52
Expense (,:67 77 Savings deposits 11,369 52
Loans and discounts 4,049 69 Undivided profits 2,210 84
Mortgage loans 21,518 96 Cashier's checks 80 05
Due from banks 8,064 27 Bills payable 103 33
Bills receivable 95 00
Total $ 51,456 89 Total $ 51,456 89
American Trust and /Savings Bank, of Jackson, Miss., which I have the
pleasure to represent, opened its doors about two years ago with a paid up
capital of only $2,700 and deposits of only $41,000
This same bank that had such a small beginning in two years' time earned
23 per cent dividend for the first year, and thereby startled the Mississippi
banking world, while the Negro bankers sat back wreathed with smilesof joy,
and the second year this same little bank earned 28.8 per cent; paid to its
stockholders on the fifth day of last February, 20 per cent dividends in cash
and placed 8.8 per cent to surplus, after paying all expenses for the year which
was the largest dividend earned and paid in the State of Mississippi, where
Mr. Vardaman wields the scepter of state and sometimes shapes the destinies
of men. And, now in its third year's work, the American Trust and Savings
Bank has already earned, since February 5tli (which marks the beginning of
Banks 147
its third fiscal year), the year being only half gone and the capital much
larger on which to earn this year than last,—12 per cent after paying all ex¬
penses. *
The Knights of Honor of the World Savings Bank was organized in 1902, and
was domiciled at Vicksburg, Miss., being the pioneer bank of the State; in
1903, it was decided to change the location to Greenville, Miss., which was done,
the Lincoln Savings Bank succeeding it at Yicksburg
The Knights of Honor Bank is capitalized at $10,000, with nearly one-half of
the stock paid in; we have a deposit account of nearly $13,000, there being a
greater demand just at this season for cash than for deposit slips. Our busi¬
ness is, as I am told, like most institutions working on a small capital, con¬
fined principally to chattel mortgages and short loans, they being a source of
greater revenue and quicker returns, t
People's Bank and Trust Co., Muskogee, I. T.—Established 1906. Stockhold¬
ers, 14; 200 acres of land and several lots in Indian Territory.
Penny Savings Bank, Columbus, Miss.
Statement of the Penny Savings Bank of Columbus, Miss., Oct. 10,1907
Capital Stock, $10,000
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts on person- Capital paid in $ 1,920 00
al endorsements, real estate or Undivided profits 233 96
collateral securities $ 6,082 53 Individual deposits subject to
Overdrafts secured 71 70 check 7,124 05
Furniture and fixtures 1,085 00 Time certificates of deposit 1,716 24
Expenses 216 28 Cashier's checks 282 00
Sight exchange 692 50
Cash on hand 3,128 24
Total $ 11,270 25 Total $11,276 25
Of the above amount of loans and discounts—
To officers of the bank $514 70
To directors of the bank 240 00
To stockholders of the bank 473 45
The Forsyth Savings and Trust Co., Winston=Salem, N. C.
(.Established 1907)
We have done a business of more than $75,000 since we opened in May of this
year (1907). Total paid up capital, $1,354; capital subscribed, $10,000, to be paid
in ten annual installments.
This movement originated with Prof. S. G. Atkins. A temporary organiza¬
tion was formed in 1906, January. We tried various plans to raise the monejT
necessary to open a bank under State laws. Finally we appealed to Hon. J. C.
Buxton, State Senator from this county, who secured a special act from the
General Assembly of North Carolina in January, 1907. We elected officers in
February, 1907, and opened our doors for business May 11,1907.
At Close of Business, Dec. 24, 1907:
Resources
Loans and discounts $ 6,6S»5 04
. Fixtures, furniture, etc. 313 71
Cash due from other banks 1,508 85
In safe in office 257 27
Other cash 1,500 00
Total $10,274 87
* National Negro Business League, 1906, pp. 180-1.
f National Negro Business League, 1906, p. 174.
148 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Liabilities
Cash capital 1,854 00
Time deposits 4,297 45
Deposits subject to check 2,547 77
Bills payable 2,000 00
Undivided profits 75 65
Total $10,274 87
Fkom May 11, to DEC. 24,1904:
Total receipts from all sources 47,423 79
Paid out for all purposes 44,157 67
Volume of business $91,581 46
Earnings from real estate loans $ 173 01
Earnings from all other sources 211 88
Total earnings $ 384
Expenses
Salary $ 148 29
Rents 55 50
Interest on time deposits 26 09
Telephone 21 93
Recording papers 14 50
Printing and Ads 15 09
Supplies and sundries 22 99
Fuel 4 85
Total expense I 309 24
Balance from earnings $ 75 65
G. U. O. Galilean Fishermen Consolidated Bank, Hampton, Va.
Report of the condition of the Grand United Order of Galilean Fishermen Consoli¬
dated Bank, at the close of business on the 22d day of August, 1907:
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts $19,903 12 Capital stock paid in $ 8,695 79
Overdrafts 680 49 Undivided profits, less amount
Other real estate 6,033 53 paid for interest, expenses and
Furniture and.fixtures 1,914 46 taxes 233 14
Checks and other cash items 179 21 Dividends unpaid 13 32
Due from National banks 156 24 Individual deposits subject to
Due from State banks and pri- check 21,456 06
vate bankers 692 98 Bills payable 3,000 00
Specie, nickels and cents 1,749 28
Paper currency 2,089 00
Total $33,398 31 Total $33,398 31
Authorized capital stock $100,000
St. Luke Penny Savings Bank, Richmond, Va.
Statement at the Close of Business, Dec. 3,1907:
Resources Liabilities
Loans and discounts $20,987 69 Capital stock paid in $20,147 03
Stocks, bonds and mortgages .. 5,000 00 Surplus fund 3,500 00
Banking house 28,000 00 Undivided profits, less amount
Furniture and fixtures 3,798 73 paid for interest, expenses and
Exchanges for clearing house .. 265 47 taxes 2,488 00
Due from National banks 4,838 06 Dividends unpaid 15 50
Due from State banks and pri- Individual deposits subject to
vate bankers 100 00 check 19,380 22
Specie, nickels and cents 5,942 45 Demand certificates of deposit
Paper currency 3,641 00 Time certificates of deposit 31,308 55
All other items of resources, Bills payable
viz 3,305 90 All other items of liability
Total $76,839 30 Total $76,839 30
The Union Savings Bank, Vicksburg, Miss.
Stockholders, 100; business 1906, $250,000; 1907, $300,576.45; total paid up capi¬
tal, $10,000.
Co-operative Business
149
Resources
Statement Made October 10, 1907:
Loans and discounts
Overdrafts secured ...!
Furniture and fixtures
Cash on hand
Liabilities
$ 9,603 96
10,892 91
2,775 00
35,976 89
672 30
Bills payable
Unpaid dividends.
Cashier's checks ..
50 00
28 08
Total
$ 49,999 14 Total
The Capital City Savings Bank, Little Rock, Ark.
(Established 1903)
$49,999 14
We are lending money to the Negro men of the city; we are securing them
credit and accommodation with wholesale houses which they never enjoyed
before. We are redeeming homes for many Negroes who, in a measure, had
lost them. At the close of 1905 the entire loss of the first year had been
covered, and a dividend of 4% per cent declared. Our growth has not been
anything like phenomenal, but steady and firm. At the close of business, in
1903, our deposits were $12,000; 1904, $20,000; 1905, $27,000; July 31, 1906, $45,000.
We started out with one salaried employee, we now have five. The Insur¬
ance Department, within less than two years, had passed through the bank
$20,000, and besides, serving as a financial adjunct to the bank, furnishes em¬
ployment to 120 young Negroes. Salaries range from $6 to $20 per week.
Summing up the whole thing in a nutshell, get up and hustle, some money
and the co-operation of those interested, have made our bank a success. *
There are, then, in the United States forty-one Negro banks; twenty-
seven of these have a capital of $506,778 paid in; twenty-five have
$1,387,429 on deposit, and the total resources of twenty-seven of the
banks are $1,197,005.
The history of co-operative business among Negroes is long and inter¬
esting. To some it is simply a record of failure, just as similar attempts
were for so longa time among whites in France, England and America.
Just as in the case of these latter groups, however, failure was but edu¬
cation for growing success in certain limited directions, so among
Negroes we can already see the education of failure beginning to tell.
How co-operation began in church, school and beneficial society, we
have already seen. During slavery a kind of quasi co-operation was
the buying of freedom by slaves or their relatives. In Cincinnati, for
instance:
In 1835 there were in Cincinnati, the center of the colored population in
Ohio, 2,500 colored people of this number, 1,195 had once been slaves, and had
gained their freedom by purchase, manumission or escape; 476 had bought
their freedom at an expense of $215,522.04, making the average price of each
person $452.77. Some had earned their purchase money while still in slavery
by working Sundays, cultivating a little patch of ground which had been
allowed them by their masters, and by hoarding the small gifts which would
from time to time be given the slaves. Sometimes an indulgent master would
allow a favorite slave to buy his time; he would then hire himself on a neigh-
Section 15. Co-operative Business
"♦National Negro Business League, 1906, pp. 185-6.
150 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
boring plantation, making some profit by the transaction. Others were per¬
mitted to go North, where they would have more opportunity to earn money,
and here, by dint of hard work and most exacting economy, they would man¬
age to collect the price of their liberty. In 1835 there were a large number in
Cincinnati thus working out their freedom, the masters retaining their "free
papers" for security. One woman paid for herself $400, and then earned
enough to buy a little home valued at |600, every dollar earned by washing
and ironing. The majority of freedom earners, as soon as their own was paid
for, at once began to work for the freedom of a father, mother, brother or sis¬
ter, who were still in slavery. Four-fifths of the colored people in that city
had members of their families yet in bondage. Of course, it was only the
kinder and more indulgent masters who would allow slaves to work their
freedom. *
We can best see the state of co-operative business among the Negroes
by studying the experience of a single city, and then turning to a more
general survey.
Baltimore+
From the testimony of many persons, the colored people of Baltimore appear
to have been actively engaged in all manner of business ventures even before
the Civil War. These ante-bellum enterprises were carried on generally by
individual ownership. But immediately after the Civil War, numerous co¬
operative movements sprang up among the people all over the city. Co¬
operative grocery stores, coal yards, beneficial societies and other kinds of
business met with marked success for short periods, but each one in its turn
finally failed owing either to lack of capital or trained business management
or both. The experience of these earlier business undertakings, like that of
the later ones, seems to show that the patronage of the colored people, both as
stockholders and consumers, has never been withheld from any business,
launched by colored men, that showed the slightest stability or promised
reasonable values for money expended. Indeed the faith of our people in
standing by co-operative enterprises in face of the signal failures of co-opera¬
tive undertakings among us here, is most remarkable. And at the present
time, so ready and willing is the support of the masses of the people, that the
most pessimistic would hesitate to say that the dozen or more co-operative
enterprises now doing business will not come through all right. Aside from
two secret orders, the Masons, who own a public hall on North .Eutaw street,
and the Nazarites, who own one on North Calvert street, and a few charitable
institutions, the only successful business carried on in the past has been by
individuals. Of flourishing establishments of all kinds, conducted by indi¬
viduals, we have a great many.
Why the individual has succeeded while his co-operative neighbor failed is
not to be answered here. But, that one, in reading the following sketches of
co-operative undertakings, may not marvel that the same causes for failure
are given in nearly every case, we will set forth briefly the cause of these
recurring causes.
The first cause generally assigned for failure is lack of capital. This is cer¬
tainly a real obstacle and well nigh impossible to be avoided. An organization
on its first legs, so to speak, gets its capital from a people reluctant to part for
a short time with their hard wrought savings, and when the enterprise in the
stress of losses and current demands needs additional aid, its stockholders,
•Hickok: The Negro in Ohio, pp. 111-112.
■{•Report by Mr. Mason A. Hawkins of the Baltimore High School.
Co-operative Business 151
becoming panic stricken, refuse to invest more money and thus lose all. It
as een a hard lesson for the colored stockholder to learn, viz: that a non-
paying enterprise might be made prosperous by the addition of more capital.
is, however, is not surprising when one considers the poverty of the stock¬
holders. He clings every time to what he has.
A second cause is the lack of trained managers and workers. This also is a
real cause, which still obtains, because our small business concerns have not
had time either to graduate persons capable of managing large business or
any large number of trained helpers, and the opportunity is not elsewhere
afforded.
Of the several causes assigned for failure these are the chief. And they
must continue the causes for some time to come. And yet in spite of these
real causes, I believe that co-operative stores, like those of England, where
the stockholders are taught economy, and co-operative building associations
that will build or remodel dwellings to house poor people comfortably and
cheaply, ought to be possible even now.
One general criticism might be made against all co-operative movements of
the past That is, the promoters were too anxious to begin business and did
not wait until the stockholders had paid in sufficient money to insure a fair
beginning. Of the enterprises cited below, in no case was there more than 25
per cent of the capital stock available at the opening of the business, and in
the majority of cases it was much less. If the opening of the business could
be delayed until sufficient capital was actually in hand; if this capital could
be held indefinitely and the management placed in the hands of competent
persons, the success of these movements would have been assured. But in
many cases there have been no competent managers. In other cases the
stockholders either ignorantly or otherwise failed to select the best men
available. And in a number of cases, especially is this true of building asso¬
ciations, the stockholders have withdrawn their money prematurely. Almost
without exception these enterprises, without providing a surplus for increas¬
ing business, declared exorbitant dividends. It is said in some quarters that
dividends had to be made in order to satisfy the clamor of subscribers of stock.
No doubt this explanation is in part true; but ignorance of sound business
principles is the chief reason for declaring dividends so large and so early in
the history of a company.
There are some people, naturally, who think that the promoters of these
enterprises cheated the people and themselves benefited. Without attempting
to prove the honesty of every promoter—some have been dishonest—the
causes already assigned, small capital, lack of trained managers, lack of
trained helpers, lack of almost everything that means success, are sufficient
reasons for the failure of co-operative enterprises among us in the past.
Without further comment, I will give such information as has appeared to
me reliable, although in some instances it may seem somewhat indefinite.
Douglass Institute
Prior to the war, the colored people of Baltimore had no place, aside from
the churches in which to hold public entertainments. To meet this need sev¬
eral colored men, John H. Butler, Simon Smith and Walter Sorrell, formed a
partnership and purchased in 1863 a large three-story brick building on Lex¬
ington street, near North, and had it converted into a hall. They named it
Douelass Institute, after the grand old man from Maryland. Besides public
entertainments of all sorts, the hail was used as a meeting place for fraternal
152 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
orders. Douglass Institute remained as such for twenty years. It was finally
owned by J. H. Butler. It is now used as an engine house, having been re¬
modelled for that purpose. During the period of its use as a hall, it was the
scene of many brilliant social gatherings and the home of the old style liter¬
ary assembly.
The Chesapeake Marine Railway and Dry Dock Co.
The Chesapeake Marine Railway and Dry Dock Co., a company owned and
controlled by colored men, was organized in the year 1865. The company was
capitalized at $40,000. The stock was divided into 8,000 shares at $5 a share.
The corporation lived for a period of eighteen years or from 1865 to about 1883.
The company was for many years very successful.
Causes which brought the corporation into existence are these: The white
laboring classes of Maryland organized a movement to drive all free Negro
labor out of the State. The Negroes had for many years done all the caulking,
a very profitable employment, and also a business for which Baltimore had
become famous. Besides this, they were very successful as stevedores, and
naturally had a large monopoly of the domestic work. The whites tried to
compel the ship yards to discontinue the employment of Negro caulkers. But
the 200 or 360 colored caulkers were the most proficient in the State, conse¬
quently the owners of ship yards could not afford to take the less competent
white labor. Failing in their effort to get them out of the work by this means
and failing to get £ bill passed by the State Legislature, compelling all free
Negroes to leave the State or choose a master, the whites resorted to brute
force. Without police protection the colored men were fast being driven out
of the ship yards by the white mobs that attacked them as they went home
from work, when further attacks of the mob were rendered unnecessary by
the ultimate agreement of the white ship carpenters not to work in any ship
yard where colored caulkers were employed. As there were few or no colored
ship's carpenters, the colored caulkers were thrown out of the yards.
The movement to procure a yard of their own was started by a number of
colored men. Meetings were held throughout the city with the result that
finally $10,000 were raised. Prominent among the promoters of this organiza¬
tion were: John W. Locks, Isaac Myers, George Meyers, Joseph Thomas,
James Lemmon, Washington Perkins, and John H. Smith, who paid the first
dollar in the organization. Mr. Smith is the only one of the promoters still
living. It is he, who just related to me, with a memory green and full as of
the events of early youth, the remarkable struggle of this early Negro enter¬
prise.
A ship yard, situated at the corner of Philpot and Point street, said to be the
spot where Frederick Douglass sat on a cellar door and studied his spelling
book, owned by N. Muller, was bought for $40,000. The $10,000 already paid for
stock was paid for the property and the balance through a mortgage of $30,000
to Wm. Applegarth on the yard, etc. At the time the yard was bought the
majority of the corporation thought it was fee simple property, but instead
there was a ground'rent of $2,000 a year. However, the opinion is, that this
was the only available place.
In the first year of the company's existence, it did a much larger business
than its most sanguine supporters had expected. In its second and third years
it held Government contracts besides many other large contracts. In the
fourth year the Government work was lost to the white caulkers because of
the fact that the colored company could not compete with the whites, the col-
Cooperative Business 153
ored caulkers refusing to work for a lower rate of wages. Nevertheless, busi¬
ness was prosperous and in five years the entire mortgage of $30,000 with inter¬
est at 6 per cent per annum, a bonus of $1,000 a year, which they had agreed to
pay so long as a part of the mortgage was unpaid, $2,000 a year ground rent,
and the wages of from 100 to 200 men earning from $2 to $3.50 per day besides
other expenses, were paid with the help of a small additional loan.
In the sixth year of the company's history, a stock dividend was declared;
that is, the remaining unsubscribed stock was divided among the stockholders
in proportion to the amount and age of their holdings. There had been sub¬
scribed and paid in all told $14,000, In the seventh year a 10 per cent dividend
was paid, and for four years thereafter dividends of from 4 to 10 per cent were
paid.
Wrangling over offices the first two years caused loss. Desertion of the
white boss carpenter came next, followed by his men and colored caulkers,
together with the loss of a number of patrons; the desertion of the colored
manager, Samuel Dogherty, with his followers next occurred, and other minor
desertions caused the company loss of money and prestige.
After twelve years a series of mishaps—wearing away of the fixed capital—
for which no precaution had been taken, occurred. The larger of two railways
used for docking ships wore out. It took one year to repair it at a cost of $6,000.
The white firm that repaired it left a flaw, which later caused the ship yard
a loss of much money and prestige. Ships, in several instances, were wedged
in the track and were extricated only at a great cost and delay.
The lack of trained managers was also another hindrance. The colored
caulkers were most experienced workmen, but none had had any training or
experience in the role of manager. But the final and greatest cause was the
refusal of the owners of the ground to release the yard to the colored company
except at an enormous rate of increase. The ground relit was doubled; that
is, instead of $2,000 they now demanded $4,000. With the change which had
now come about in the construction of ships from wooden bottoms to steel and
with the increasing number of ships of larger tonnage which could not be
accommodated by the company, the management of the Chesapeake Marine
and Dry Dock Co. gave up business.
The stockholders lost outright. It is said, however, that the loss of no one
person was great as the stock was very widely distributed.
The organization of the ship company saved the colored caulkers, for they
are now members of the white caulkers' union. The failure of the whites in
driving out the colored caulkers put an end to their efforts to drive colored
labor out of other fields. And although the company failed, it must surely
have been an object lesson to the whites as well as to the blacks of the power
and capability of the colored people in their industrial development.
Cash accounts of three later years follow,showing the main causes of
ultimate failure:
1. High wages.
2. Few repairs.
3. Bent.
The concern lost money in the Freedman's Bank.*
* Of. Section 14.
154 Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
1876
1879
1880
Total business
Cash receipts and balances
Paid out-
Wages
Ground rent
Taxes
Repairs
Material
Miscellaneous
Dividends
% 27,454.95
26,010.32
12,912.43
2,088.06
467.22
234.15
7,366.54
2,563.75
$ 20,688.78
19,969.18
11,419.95
2,062.43
125.87
176.47
4,539.36
1,466.16
$ 27,783.42
26,972.53
14,764.75
2,003.38
496.83
180.52
5,246.32
2,472.29
1,231.16
Total
Balance
Bills receivable
$ 25,632.15
(Dec.23) 378.17
$ 19,790.24
(Dec. 27) 178.94
611.66
1,200.00
1,361.99
$ 26,395.25
(Dec. 24) 577.28
597.00
1,200.00
1,423.91
Material on hand
Bills payable
Sinking fund
2,000.00
Co-operative Stores, 1865-1870
Upon the testimony of several reliable persons we are informed of the organi¬
zation of numerous co-operative stores during the period immediately follow¬
ing the Civil war, 1865-1870. They are said to have lived for short periods but
appeared prosperous while they lasted. A man by the name of Deaver is
mentioned as the manager for one of these stores.
Following the period of co-operative stores there sprang up several years
later a Co-operative Building and Loan Association.
, Samaritan Temple
About 1880 a secret order known as the Good Samaritans formed a joint stock
company. The stock was sold to individuals and lodges. A building, situated
at the corner of Saratoga and Calvert streets, was purchased for $10,000. The
original price, $20,000, was halved by placing a mortgage, of $10,000 on the
ground, subject to an annual ground rent. The hall was unusually large, ex¬
tending half the block on Saratoga street, five stories high, with a width of 30
feet or more on Calvert street. The ground floor was left for business pur¬
poses, the second and third floors for halls proper, and the rest of the building
as lodge rooms.
From the general use made of the entire building the company should have
realized a handsome profit. It is now impossible to discover what the profits
were or what losses the stockholders sustained. After having the property
for twenty years it slipped out of control of the stock company. Some of the
promoters of the project were: George Meyers, Wm. E. Wilkes, J. Seaton, J.
M. Ralph, I. Oliver, W. H. Chester.
The Afro-American Ledger
The Afro-American Ledger, a weekly paper, was started in 1891 by the Rev.
Wm. Alexander and half a dozen others associated with him. The paper cir¬
culated at first largely among the Baptist communicants and was regarded
as the Baptist organ. From a financial standpoint it was very successful,
numbering at the time of its failure 2,500 paid subscribers. Its failure was
caused by the failure of the Northwestern Family Supply Co., which had
bought a controlling interest in the paper and paid for the same by an issue
of its stock to the original owners of the paper, resulting, unfortunately, in a
Co-operative Business 155
total loss to them, as the stock of the Northwestern Family Supply Co. was
°r._ ess 111 1895" The Afro-American Ledger, however, was revived under
ano er management, and is today the chief colored organ of the State.
The North Baltimore Permanent Building and Loan Association
U Th^s f,s®ociation was organized in 1893 with a capital stock of $10,000. At its
height it had about forty-five members. Of the $10,000 capital not more than
$5,000 was paid in. At the expiration of six years the company was dissolved
without material loss to any one.
Rev. G. R. Waller was for five years president of the Association. Other
prominent members were : Benjamin Hamilton, Wm. Fisher, Secretary; G. W.
Dyer, Treasurer.
The Association owned in its own name one large dwelling on Courtland
street, near Franklin. This dwelling was used as the office of the Association
and as a night school, which was conducted by the President, Mr. Waller, and
other members of the Association.
The cause which brought the corporation to an untimely end was the lend¬
ing of money to members on their notes with their stock as security. This
practice resulted in a gradual retirement of the stock—the notes were never
paid—and the collapse of the company.
The Northwestern Family Supply Co.
The Northwestern Family Supply Co., the largest co-operative undertaking
since the failure of the Chesapeake Marine Railway and Dry Dock Co., and
possibly the largest in its circulation among the people in the history of co¬
operative enterprises among the Negroes of Baltimore, was started in 1894 by
a pork butcher, colored, of Lafayette Market. As the name suggests, the com¬
pany dealt in a full line of groceries, meats and other necessities.
The company was capitalized at $50,000. Stock was sold at $5 and $10 a share.
It is difficult to say just how much was actually paid in when business began;
but at the high tide of success there are said to have been 2,000 members.
The main store was located on Fremont avenue, near Lafayette, and three
branch stores were located in different sections of the city. That the com¬
pany did a very large business is also attested by the six or seven delivery
wagons which were kept busy delivering goods to all parts of the city. The
manager, Mr. Daly, says that one month the gross receipts were $10,000. Ex¬
orbitant dividends of from 10 to 20 per cent were paid.
From the extensive membership, from the very nature of the business, here
was a company that promised flattering success. But never was permanent
success less probable nor wanton ignorance of simple business principles more
rampant. Had there been only a fair amount of correct business principles
applied in the management of its stores, the Northwestern Family Supply
Co. might have been in existence today, a giant business establishment of the
city and a credit to the race. But nobody knew anything. The clerks in the
stores could not wrap bundles or weigh out 16 ounces to the pound. The
butchers—they were all butchers—could not cut meat; the buyers knew noth¬
ing of buying; there was needless loss on every hand. The general manager,
unable to neglect his own business, left the unwieldy plant without active
management. Add to these causes the final blunder, each stockholder was
allowed to deal out in goods the amount he had paid in stock, and the won¬
der is that the corporation lasted two years. The inevitable crash came with
almost a total loss to the stockholders that had not dealt out their stock in
goods.
156 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
A very great benefit, however, is claimed for the Northwestern Family
Supply Co. It is said to have implanted in the breasts of the colored people
a hankering after business of their own. This much is certain: the seed has
been sown by some means, for numerous little stores of all kinds, but chiefly
grocery stores, are scattered throughout the northwestern section of the city.
The Lexington Savings Bank
Following iri the wake of the Northwestern Family Supply Co., came the
Lexington Savings Bank. It was organized in 1895 by Lawyer E. J. Waring,
who was made its President. Some of the stockholders were: E.J. Waring,
J. H. Murphy, Julius Johnson and others. Its capital stock was $25,000, but it
started business with not more than $5,000, $2,500 of which was controlled by
the President. Of the amount held by Mr. Waring $2,000 belonged in equal
parts to two white men, Messrs. Cooper and Singer. The bank did business
satisfactorily for a short period. The first large deposit, a deposit of $100, was
made by Mr. J. H. Murphy. After something less than a year the bank was
compelled to close its doors. The failure was caused by the loaning of money
on insufficient security. The loss to depositors and stockholders was insig¬
nificant. It is said Messrs. Cooper and Singer lost nothing, but that the Presi¬
dent was bankrupted through his business manipulations.
Although the money loss was slight, the confidence and credit of Negro
business enterprises and the faith of Negroes themselves in them, were shaken
as by nothing else because of the confidence and admiration in which Mr. E. J.
Waring was held.
The Home Shoe Co., and The Lancet Publishing Co.
The last chapter of defunct stock companies can be told in a word: l&ck of
capital, lack of active business management, and in case of the first, lack of
prudence on the part of the Board of Directors.
Both of these companies were started about the same time, February, 1902,
and were located in the same building, 600 North Eutaw street. The Home
Shoe Co. was capitalized at $3,000, to deal in men's, women's and children's
shoes. The store was opened in mid-season, the middle of August, before
$1,000 of the capital stock had been paid in. Bad judgment in the selection of
employees, bad site for store and insufficient capital, were causes of the failure.
For several months a fairly good business was done, but the money had
simply to be turned back into stock to increase the line of goods. When the
time came to put in the spring stock, the capital was insufficient and business
gradually dwindled until late in the summer, the corporation sold out to one
of its members for 6 cents on the dollar.
The total amount of capital paid in was $1,700. The loss was confined almost
entirely to the twelve Directors, who were the original founders.
The Lancet Publishing Co., job printers and publishers of a weekly, lasted
until November, 1905. The plant was owned by nine or ten men, who lost 90
per cent or more of all they had invested. The exact amount of the loss is not
available.
One possibly depressing feature about the failure of these two companies is
that they were managed and owned by the most intelligent colored men of
the city, lawyers, doctors, school teachers and business men. But almost with¬
out exception these men had no knowledge of the particular business at hand;
so that, so far as these enterprises were concerned, they were just as ignorant
as the unlettered masses.
Cooperative Business
157
H *S a certain typical co-operative business con-
UC 6 e^roes *n United States. It is not, of course, anything
approaching a complete list:
3.
(a) Productive Go-operation.
. Florida Printing and Improvement
Co., Jacksonville, Fla.
■ Hill Horseshoe and Overshoe Co.,
Denver, Col.
Spencer Red Brick Co., Spencer,
N. Y.
4. Savannah Mattress Co., Savannah,
Ga.
5. Black Diamond Development Co.,
Chicago, 111.
6. Orescent Manufacturing Co., Lynch¬
burg, Va.
7. Brown Manufacturing Co., Los An¬
geles, Cal.
(b) Co-operation in Transportation.
1. Colored Railroad, Wilmington, N. 0.
2. Automobile Co., Nahville, Tenn.
3. North Jacksonville Street Railway, Town and Improvement Co., Jacksonville,
Fla.
12.
13.
14.
Western Repair Automobile Co.,
Washington, D. 0.
Golden Ohest and Freeman Mining
Co., Denver, Col.
Star Coal Co., Des Moines, Iowa.
The Rolesville Colored Saw Mill Co.,
Raleigh, N. 0.
Bruno Manufacturing Co., Boston,
Mass.
Razor Strop and Leather Goods Co.,
New York, N. Y.
Lewis Cigar Co., Philadelphia, Pa.
(c) Distributive Co-operation.
. Afro-American Go., Baltimore, Md.
. Warren Hot Springs Furniture and
Undertaking Co., Hot Springs,
Ark.
. Relief Joint Stock Co., Little Rock,
Ark.
. Cordele Enterprise, Cordele, Ga.
. Colorado Springs Mercantile Co.,
Colorado Springs, Col.
. Commercial Pioneer Institution,
Cambridge, Mass.
. Wyandotte Drug Co., Kansas City,
Kan.
. Women's Exchange, Frankfort, Ky.
Sandy W. Trice & Co., Chicago, 111.
Tribune Publishing Co., Oklahoma
City, Okla.
Savannah Pharmacy, Savannah, Ga.
The People's Drug Store, Cleveland,
Ohio.
The People's Shoe Co., Atlanta, Ga.
Iowa State Bystander Co., Des
Moines, Iowa.
Farmers' Improvement Co., Paris,
Tex.
Philadelphia Storage and Cleaning
Co., Philadelphia, Pa.
Afro-American News, Marlin,Tex.
The Artesian Drug Co., Albany, Ga.
The Advocate Publishing Co., Port¬
land, Ore.
Commercial Shoe Co., Macon, Ga.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
35.
Colored Business Men's Association,
Indianapolis, Ind.
The Students' Tea Co., Richmond,
Va.
The Kansas City Embalming and
Casket Co., Kansas City, Kan.
People's Trading Co., Albany, Ga.
Union Publishing Co., Atlanta, Ga.
Gate City Drug Store, Atlanta, Ga.
People's Shoe Co., Savannah, Ga.
Savannah Shoe and Mercantile Co.,
Savannah, Ga.
Little Dan Publishing Co., Ameri-
cus, Ga.
Franklin County Colored Fair Asso¬
ciation, Frankfort, Ky.
Bugle Publishing Co., Frankfort,Ky.
Woman's Loyal League, Grand Rap¬
ids, Mich.
The Weldon Co., Brooklyn, N. Y.
New York Age Publishing Co., New
York, N. Y.
Record Publishing Co., Richmond,
Va.
Capitol Shoe Co., Richmond, Va.
St. John's Intermediate Relief, Nor¬
folk, Va.
People's Drug Co., Lynchburg, Va.
Mercantile Co., Marlin, Tex.
Langston Mercantile Association,
Langston, Okla.
158
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
41. The Raleigh Co-operative Grocery
Store, Raleigh, N. C.
42. Co-operative Grocery Store, Louis¬
iana, Mo.
48. Pulliam Grocery Co., Talladega, Ala.
44. American Swiss Commercial Co.,
Los Angeles, Oal.
45. Afro-American Co-operative Co.,
Los Angeles, Cal.
46. Canadian Second-Hand Store, Los
Angeles, Cal.
47. California Publishing Co., Los An¬
geles, Oal.
48. Sunset Investment Co., Los Angeles,
Cal.
49. Green Willow Park Association,
Washington, D. 0.
50. Lake View Park Association, W ash -
ington, D. O.
51. National Amusement Co., Washing¬
ton, D. C.
52. National Colored People's Co-opera¬
tive Union, Washington, D. C.
53. Jane Moseley Steamboat Co., Wash¬
ington, D. 0.
54. Sunny South Amusement Co.,
Washington, D. O.
55. The People's Advocate, Washing¬
ton, D. 0.
56. Colored American Loan Co., Den¬
ver, Col.
57. Afro-American Co-operative Con¬
cern, Athens, Ga.
58. Canadian Employment Co., Des
Moines, Iowa.
59. Douglass Improvement Co., Des
Moines, la.
60. Superior Laundry Co., Des Moines,
Iowa.
61. Electric Carpet Dusting Co.. Des
Moines, Iowa.
62. Hyde Carpet Cleaning and Moth
Exterminator Co., Des Moines, la.
63. Colored American Steamboat Co.,
Norfolk, Va.
64. White Light Bicycle Co., Norfolk,
Va.
65. Virginia Laundry, Norfolk, Va.
66. Women's Business Association,
Norfolk, Va.
67. Women's Exchange, Norfolk, Va.
68. Satisfied Orchestra, Ft. Worth, Tex.
69. Ft. Worth Silver Cornet Band Co.,
Ft. Worth, Tex.
70. Woman's Grocery Co., Richmond,
Va.
71. Hercules Co., Huntington, W. Va.
72. Hampton Supply Oo., Hampton, Va.
73. Weekly Saving Co., Lynchburg, Va.
74. Tidewater Union Undertakers, Nor¬
folk, Va.
75. Tri-Oity Auto Co., Norfolk, Va.
76. Oil City Grocery Co., Beaumont,
Tex.
77. Oil City Drug Co., Beaumont, Tex.
78. Workingmen's Co-operative Unlon,
Hampton, Va.
79. Bay Shore Hotel, Hampton, Va.
80. Parkwood Cemetery Association,
Chicago, 111.
81. Afro-American News Office, Chica¬
go, 111.
82. Wyandotte Mercantile Co., Kansas
City, Kan.
83. Wyandotte Cemetery Co., Kansas
City, Kan.
84. Excelsior Grocery Co., Boston,Mass.
85. Franklin Burial Association, Bos¬
ton, Mass.
86. Public Cash Grocery Store, Boston,
Mass.
87. E. B. Haskins Tailoring Co., Boston,
Mass.
88. Coffer & Jerido, Ice Cream Dealers,
Boston, Mass.
89. Armory Hill Carpet Cleaning Co.,
Boston, Mass.
90. Amory Hill Carpet Cleaning 0o.r
Springfield, Mass.
91. People's Coal Co., Baltimore, Md.
92. Queen Commercial Enterprise, Bal¬
timore, Md.
9a Druid Hill Hand and Steam Laun¬
dry, Baltimore, Md.
94. Good Hope Joint Stock Association,
Baltimore, Md.
95. St. Paul Window Washing Co., St.
Paul, Minn.
96. Colored Co-operation of America,
Ithaca, N. Y.
97. New Amsterdam Musical Associa¬
tion, New York, N. Y.
98. The Weldon Realty Co., New York,
N. Y.
99. True Reformers' Burial Association,
New York, N. Y.
100. United Benevolent Association,
New York, N. Y.
101. Colored Grocery Co., Augusta, Ga.
102. Greenwood Grocery Co.,Greenwood,
S. C.
103. J. H. Zedricks& Co., Chicago, 111.
Cooperative Business
(d) Real Estate and Credit.
Industrial Realty and Investment
Co., Terre Haute, Ind
Twin City Realty Co., Winston-
Salem, N. C.
Western Realty and Land Co., Tulsa,
Ind. Ter.
Masonic Building Association, Sa¬
vannah, Ga.
Pickens Realty and Trust Co., Mus¬
kogee, Ind. Ter.
Union Investment Co., Jacksonville,
Fla.
The Pioneer Real Estate Co.,Omaha,
Neb.
The Q,ueen Improvement Co., Balti¬
more, Md.
Samaritan Joint Stock Association,
Baltimore, Md.
Nazarite Joint Stock Co., Baltimore,
Md.
West End Loan and Investment Co.,
Baltimore, Md.
Metropolitan Realty Co., Baltimore,
Md.
Industrial Loan Realty Co., Minne¬
apolis, Minn.
United Realty Co., New York, N. Y.
Building and Loan Association,
Hampton, Va.
Cambridge Realty Association,Cam¬
bridge, Mass.
The Orgen Realty Investment Co.,
Houston, Tex.
159
20.
21.
28.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
The Afro-American Real Estate Co.,
Baltimore, Md.
Douglas Investment Co., Pittsburg,
Pa.
Pittsburg Savings and Investment
Co., Pittsburg, Pa.
Gold Real Estate and Investment
Co., Pittsburg, Pa.
Eureka Investment Co., Philadel¬
phia, Pa.
Pacific Investment Co., Philadel¬
phia, Pa.
Home Extension Co., Philadelphia,
Pa.
Banner Realty Co., Philadelphia, Pa.
Rhode Island Investment and Loan
Co., Newport, R. I.
Real Estate Co., Montgomery, Ala.
Southern California Real Estate and
Investment Co., Los Angeles, Cal.
The Citizen's Investment Co., Den¬
ver, Col.
Western Loan Association, Denver,
Col.
Hyde Real Estate and Investment
Co., Des Moines, Iowa.
Enterprise Investment Co., Des
Moines, Iowa.
Afro-American Realty Co., New
York, N.Y.
The Mohawk Realty Co., Cleveland,
Ohio.
Most of these are now in operation, although some few may have
recently suspended. A great many firms are of a semi-co-operative
nature, but we are studying those with a number of co-operators—
always three or four, and usually from ten to 100 or more. There follow
many instances of living and defunct enterprises, illustrating the
varying kinds of attempts:
Productive Co-operation
This is, of course, the most rarely suceesful, as the history of co-opera¬
tion among all nations proves:
The Coleman Manufacturing Company was established in 1897, in Concord,
N.C., by several colored men, represented by a' President and a Board of
Directors. They went to work calmly to see whether or not the colored people
throughout the United States were interested in organizations of that kind,
and the influx of letters and money that came in tells me, and tells you and
every one, that the Negro is interested in a cotton factory and has one built
there in North Carolina, and is going to build another one next year. The
plant of the Coleman Manufacturing Company is valued at $100,000, is a three
story brick structure that you can set Parker Memorial Hall in the corner of.
It has a 270 horse power Corliss engine there and machinery that will com¬
pare favorable with any in or around Boston
160 Economic Cooperation Among Negro Americans
We employ between 200 and 230 colored boys and girls, and only last week
sent to Charleston for 50 more, and just as soon as we begin the building
of this other mill, in December, we intend to employ 100 colored mechanics.
We manufacture there cotton goods and yarns. -You can judge of the
machinery there when the greatest machinist in the country, representing
the great Parker Company, only last week pronounced the machinery in the
Coleman Manufacturing Company's works the best in Cabarrus county,
North Carolina.*
Just as this mill was well started, Mr. Coleman died, and a white
company bought the mill and is running it with white help.
The New Century Cotton Mills, Dallas,Texas, began operation and training
of its operatives January 5,1903, superintended by trained expert officers from
the mills of New England. The operatives were gathered from among the
colored youth of our city, none of whom had ever before entered the door of a
cotton mill.
The mill is equipped with 3,000 spindles, complete for making warp yarns,
and has the latest improved machinery. The main building was a remodeled
business block, containing, with the new additions, 20,000 feet of floor space,
with three acres of land in the mill grounds. The textile equipment, sprinkler
system, private electric light plant, railroad switch, etc., furnish every facility
and appliance for economical and convenient operation. It has from its first
inceptiofi and will ever be the object of the management to make the mill
strictly and purely a race institution, representing in every feature the actual
accomplishments, in their respective lines, of the tradesmen of our race. For
example, every one of the 500,000 bricks used in the construction of buildings
were laid by colored mechanics; every piece of lumber or timber framed into
this mill plant is the work of colored men; the erection of all machinery,
boilers, engines, lines of shafting and counter shafts, the erection of all textile
machines, the erection of the complete automatic sprinkler system for fire
protection and the installing of the complete electric lighting system, were
all accomplished by colored men, under proper supervision and instruction;
and the mill stands today the pride of every laboring man of color within our
city as the evidence of their ability to do things
The mill is now employing seventy-two operatives on the day run in its
various departments, and in this, the eight months since training began, they
are putting out daily the standard production for which the mill was de¬
signed, viz: Three thousand pounds of warp yards per day
The New Century Cotton Mills has consumed 800 bales of cotton in the first
seven months of its operation.
The mill has paid more than $10,000 in wages to its employees.
The mill has trained 150 operatives, and contemplates running double time
when the new crop of cotton is at hand. The production is sold in Dallas, New
York and Boston. We have delivered to one customer 225,000 pounds of yarn.t
Both this mill and a similar Mississippi venture failed.
The Southern Stove Hollow-ware and Foundry Company was temporarily
organized on the 15th day of February, 1897 and was permanently organized
and incorporated at Chattanooga, under the laws of the State of Tennessee, on
August 15,1897. Our charter provides for a capital stock of $5,000, to be divided
into shares of $25 each, which are sold only to colored people, either for cash
•National Negro Business League, 1900, p. 207.
+ National Negro Business League, 1903, pp. 54-55.
Cooperative Business
161
or upon monthly payments, but in no case is a certificate issued until fully
paid for.
The Foundry was built and began operations on a small scale on or about
October 27, 1897, and has now increased and been perfected until we manufac¬
ture stoves, hollow-ware of all kinds, fire grates complete, boiler grate bars,
refrigerator cups, shoe lasts and stands, and other kinds of castings generally
made in foundries. We also do a repair business which has now grown until
it has become a business that pays well and is one of our chief sources of
revenue.
The land, buildings, machinery and all patterns are fully paid for except
part of the stove patterns, and these we are paying for in products of our
foundry; and we can say that we are virtually free from debt. Of the capital
stock authorized we have sold $1,466 worth, and this has all been used strictly
in equipping the plant; but this sum does not represent now the worth of our
plant, as all our profits have been allowed to accumulate and have been used
in business.*
The enterprise was quite successful, but at last failed for lack of capi¬
tal; nevertheless, in 1900 it was reported from Chattanooga:
We have two foundries there, owned, operated, controlled and worked and
run by colored men, capitalized today at $25,000. These foundries have passed
the stage of experimentation; they are now certainties; they are paying in¬
stitutions. Everything they manufacture they have orders for. Their work
is in demand. They have not as much capital as they need and as they wish,
but with that amount of capital they succeeded in the manufacture of stoves
and cooking utensils and skillets, and grates for furnaces and foundries; and
right there in Chattanooga they have a great demand for that work.t
Coal mining has been tried:
Something over a year ago the idea got into the heads of some of us to or¬
ganize and conduct a coal mining corporation, and we did, and the Birming¬
ham Grate Coal Mining Company came into existence in the city of Birming¬
ham, Jefferson county. By some accident of fortune it was my lot to be
elected president of this company. Our capital stock was fixed at $10,000. We
leased a rich mine, which was at the time standing idle, and proceeded to get
hold of some coal
We leased these mines for five years, paying a royalty for the land. We
began working and began putting out coal on the 27th of September last year,
1899. We have mined from that time, mining from 25 to 30 tons of coal per
day, up to 125 tons per day; and soon we will roll from the earth to the top and
put on the cars, 250 tons per day.f
Spencer Red Brick Co., and the East Ithaca Red Brick and Tile Co., have
twelve and three members, respectively. Both plants are equipped with up-
to-date machinery and steam power. Their business is making brick and
drain tile. Both plants were built, the machinery set and installed by George
Washington Cook during the years 1906-7. The total paid up capital is $6,000
and $22,000, respectively, and they own 17 acres and 8 acres.
Mr. Cook has been in the brick business for the last twenty-eight years and
for eleven years was manager and superintendent of the Ithaca Building and
Paving Brick Co., at Newfield, which position he held at a salary of $1,200 a
* Atlanta University Publication, No. 4.
+ National Negro Business League, 1900, p. 53.
J National Negro Business League, 1900, pp. 106-108.
162 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
year. The last year he was at Newfield he leased the plant with an option
and sold the same to the Scranton Fire Brick Co., of Scranton, Pa. He then
went to Ithaca and built a new plant near Cornell University at East Ithaca,
on a branch of the Lehigh Valley Railroad. As he was unable to supply the
trade with one plant, and not wishing to have any opposition in the trade, he
took up another in Spencer, N.Y., 18 miles south of Ithaca, on two branches of
the Lehigh Valley Railroad, and formed a Negro stock company. The ma¬
chinery of both plants was put up by Mr. Cook.
The East Ithaca Red Brick and Tile Co. employs 25 men and has a daily
capacity of 35,000 and 1,500 tile per hour. The Spencer Brick Co., employs 40
men and has a daily capacity of 50,000.
The Hill Horseshoe and Overshoe Co., Denver, Col., manufacturing horse¬
shoes; membership, 40. In 1907 began manufacturing to the amount of $800,
having a total paid up capital of $25,000; originated in 1905, incorporated in
1906, stock selling at 10 cents per share.
The Black Diamond Development Company was organized October, 1905,
under the laws of Arizona, with a capital stock of 500,000 shares at a par
value of $1 per share, full paid and non-assessable.
The 80 acre leasehold, which it purchased one year ago, being located six
miles southeast of Chanute, Kansas, Neosha county, and entirely surrounded
by good producers, has now five large gas wells all complete and their pro¬
duct ready for the market. These wells are decidedly above the average in
size, having a capacity of more than 12,000,000 cubic feet of gas per day.
March 20, 1907: Since the report on the foregoing pages was made to the
company there has been continuous development done on the property of this
company.
Well No. 6 has been drilled and seems to be another good gas well, and is
located one-half mile south of our other wells and on one of our new proper¬
ties. The pipe line is nearing completion and it is only a matter of a few
days until we will be delivering gas to the Kansas City Natural Gas Co., and
our Kansas City friends will be burning Black Diamond Development Com¬
pany's gas in their homes and factories. The price of Black Diamond Devel¬
opment Co.'s stock has advanced to 50 cents.
Kowaliga
The President of the Title Guarantee and Trust Co., New York, writes
of the founder, W. E. Benson:
About five years ago he came North with a proposition to buy about 6,000
acres of magnificent timber and farming land surrounding Kowaliga, organize
an industrial corporation with substantial capitial, build cheap farmhouses,
establish small mills, sell on easy terms or lease small farms, teach profitable
farming and sensible lumbering, develop the turpentine industry, and gen¬
erally furnish work through the winter for a population that otherwise would
be idle, or worse. A number of us helped him organize his company, buy
his land, and commence the development. At first $20,000 was raised, of which
$10,000 was furnished by his father and others at home. Subsequently he
secured $10,000 more for additional land and improvements, and six months
ago he bought 1,600 acres of turpentine forest to round out his plantation, now
comprising 9,000 acres, and secured $20,000 additional stock subscriptions so
that the capital of his company now paid in is $50,000. Its primary object is
not to make money, and those of us who subscribed were prepared to lose
our money, but now do not expect to, and it looks as if it might be another
Cooperative Business 163
case of wise philanthrophy at 5 per cent or better. The campaign has not
been an easy one.
The manager reports in 1907:
The Dixie Industrial Company was incorporated under the laws of Alabama
in 1900, with a capital of $10,000, and secured its first tract of 5,000 acres of land
with a few dilapidated cabins. The company now has a paid up capital of
$53,000; owns nearly 9,000 acres of splendid farm and timber land, operates a
saw-mill, shingle-mill, turpentine still and a plantation store. It has built 18
cottages and leases 40 farms, furnishing employment to nearly 300 Negroes.
The company has cleared over 20 per cent on the entire capital invested,
having accumulated a surplus of more than $12,000 up to date. At the last
meeting of its directors an annual dividend of 4 per cent was declared and an
additional capital stock issue of $47,000 was voted, placing the total capitaliza¬
tion at $100,000.
Two annual statements follow:
1st. December 31, 1901
Cash on hand $ 1,028 16
Merchandise on hand 254 64
Secured loans and notes 942 54
Sawmill plant, cost machinery, tools and
building 2,000 00
Real estate, actual cost, 6,478 acres farm and
timber lands 26,369 00
Preliminary and legal expense 462 66
Total $ SI 052 03
Liabilities
Capital stock paid In $21,120 00
Bills payable 102 23
Notes and Interest on deferred payments on
real estate 9,777 20
Surplus balance on profit and loss account... 52 60
Total $ 31,052 03
6th. December 31, 1906
Assets
Cash on hand-
Bank of Wetumpka $ 714 22
Bank of Alexander City 79 09
Bank of Montgomery 500 00
Current cash 410 35 $ 1,703 66
Bills receivable 2,482 44
Accounts receivable 8,346 58 10,779 02
Merchandise and supplies on hand .. 8,011 98
Personal property 10,659 36
Real estate 55,291 59 73,962 88
Preliminary expense 570 59
Total $87,016 15
Liabilities
Bills payable-
Unpaid installments for land and
other bills payable $17,599 86
Accounts payable 3,147 21
Capital stock 53,820 00
Surplus, close 1905 $ 7,047 65
Balance P. and L. statement 5,401 48
Surplus this date $12,449 08 12,449 08
Total $87,016 15
164
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Oyster Beds
The Negroes of Warsaw, Ga., are, with a few exceptions, engaged in the oyster
industry, the men principally as oyster gatherers and the women and children
as oyster shuckers. Ninety per cent of all the labor employed in the oyster
industry of the State is Negro. The factories are encouraging the Negroes to
lease and plant oyster land and many of them are taking out leases. The
most important lease is that of the Georgia Benevolent Fishermen's Associa¬
tion. The organization is fourteen years old and is the oldest chartered organi¬
zation among the oyster Negroes for business purposes. The association has
45 members and a lease of 2,000 acres of oyster ground. The company is doing
well and reported that they had over $1,000 in the bank. Six of the Warsaw
Negroes are members of this association. There is another valuable lease of
oyster lands about 10 miles from Warsaw that is held by Negroes.*
This kind of co-operation is widespread.
Co-operation -in Transportation
Jim Crow street cars have led to two interesting experiments, one a
partial failure and one successful for seven years:
In Nashville there was an attempt to run an automobile line of carriages.
About $20,000 was raised by general subscription and expended; but the com¬
pany was first cheated by the company selling the carriages, which proved
too weak for the hills, and afterward the electric company broke its promise
to furnish power. The company pluckily attempted a power plant but was
not successful. The carriages ran regularly for several months, and are still
run occasionally for special parties.
North Jacksonville Street Railway, Town and Improvement Co., Jacksonville, Pla.
In 1901 the city council passed an ordinance giving the conductors of the
street railway the right to assign and reassign passengers to seats in the cars.
This ordinance was looked upon by many to be worse than a direct separate
car, for the reason the conductors could seat you in a seat in the car and if he
wanted that seat for a white person, could make you get up with your wife
and your girl and compel you to take another. He was also given police power
to arrest you. This act brought about a strike. Our people, almost to a man,
stopped riding on the cars. Our leaders met at St. Paul A. M. E. Church in that
city at a called meeting, and passed resolutions to start a company, to pur¬
chase automobile carriages. I was asked by a friend or two to go to this meet¬
ing. This I refused to do. I thought this to be my time to go to the city coun¬
cil and ask for a franchise to build a colored park and street railway of our
own to go to. This I did
The Negroes themselves fought us from start to finish, but the white men
who had the granting of this franchise, said: "We have actually made the
colored people mad for passing this bill they called obnoxious and by giving
this grant to them, it will pacify them. They will never build it anyway, but
we shall clear ourselves."
And, too, the then President of the city council was a personal friend of
your humble servant, a man whom we had worked with in the office two
years previous to this time
Everybody began to look upon the project to be a practical one and a money
maker, provided it was properly handled; hence I had gotten a friend of
♦ "Work, In Southern Workman, January, 1908.
Cooperative Business 165
wasla'lk'aSS^S^- ^ ^n^erestinS two parties in the matter, and the same time I
mgwith two other parties. We had perfected our arrangements with
wo men o build the road for a described sum. At the s'ame time a banker
an an outside friend of his were figuring with me on a basis to do the con-
5 ,r^C. ^°r ^^'000 cheaper than the original people. The first people heard
of this and undertook to force me to sign a contract, agreeing to give them the
price they wanted, which was $20,000 more than the last parties were ask¬
ing
The road paid the last quarter as follows:
To May, collected $ 1,221 05
To June, collected 1,815 00
To July, collected 1,900 00
Our expenditures for the same time as above were $1,555, leaving a clear net
profit, this quarter, of $3,381.05
The whites hold the principal of our bond issue, and out of $150,000 capital
stock they own about $23,000, leaving in the treasury $200,000 of the shares and
in the hands of the colored men, as our books will show, $25,500.
The first day we ran our cars we handled 7,220 persons, took in $340 that day.
In five days after this a park that used to have a sign over the gate, saying:
"Niggers and dogs not allowed," was torn down, and the following Saturday
the colored baseball team played a game of ball out there. *
The white bondholders finally succeeded in foreclosing and getting
control of the company early in 1908.
Wilmington, N. C.
There was an effort in the years 1883-84 to build a railroad from Wilmington,
N. C., to Wrightsville Sound, a summer resort on the sea coast, 9 or 10 miles
from Wilmington. It was the intention of Mr. Martin (the superintendent)
prime mover, to finally extend the road to New Berne, N. C., via Onslow, N. C.
Rev. Joseph C. Price was elected President, Mr. J. C. Dancey, Secretary and
Treasurer, and I one of the Board of Directors.
When 9 miles were graded, some bridges built and crossties put down, Mr.
Martin died and there being no one found with anything like the push which
he showed, the company went to pieces. Several years after the whites
secured a charter, and carried out Mr. Martin's plans. They built the road
and are now operating it.
To this section belong the various church publishing houses already
described.
Distribution
Here we find naturally the largest number of enterprises and the
largest percentage of success. There have been and are many co-opera¬
tive grocery stores:
I am identified with what may be termed a combine of co-operative stores.
The first store was established at Keysville, Va, 1889. The firm name is Wilson
6 Co., with a cash capital of $125; and $75 was used in buying a site. We com¬
menced then with $50 and the motto hung out, " Square Dealing."
The second store was established in the winter of 1896 at Evington,Va., with
a capital of $55. Here we were given three months to stay. The whites said
to the blacks, " They will only be there three months."
* National Negro Business League, 1904, pp. 65-8.
166 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
The third store was established in 1899 in the month of September with a
capital of $200 at Nameless,"Va. After operating for a short time we established
that in a different community. The other was established by the side of a
white friend; this was established in the midst of colored people. Our busi¬
ness plans at once met our emergencies. Succeeds because every store is dis¬
tinct, yet a part of the great store, the system enables us to tide over smaller
stores without loss; to buy to advantage without risk, because we know when
and where we can put the goods. Succeeds because there is unity—many
receivers of money but only one paying teller
From 1899 to 1900 we did business in those combined co-operative stores
amounting to $18,000. *
The People's Mercantile Association of Washington, D. C., was organized
April, 1902, under the laws of the District of Columbia with a capital stock of
$20,000, divided in 2,000 shares of $10 each, one-tenth share $1.
The object of the association is to open a department store or stores in the
District of Columbia and in other cities, and to carry lines of general merchan¬
dise. Today we have about 300 subscribers, representing about $4,000. t
Other instances are:
Greenwood, S. C.
The Palmetto Grocery Co., which is composed of Negroes, and is doing a suc¬
cessful general grocery business.
Dover, Del.
Co-operative store in Dover, Del., which deals in food supplies. It has been
in operation two or three years and is successful in a small way.
Richmond, Va.
The Students' Tea Co., with about 150 stockholders, has branch establish¬
ments in Petersburg and Farmville,Ya. It is a mercantile business dealing
in teas, coffees, spices and extracts sold through agents. Business 1906-1907,
$10,000. Total paid up capital, $2,000.
Little Rock, Ark.
Relief Joint Stock Co., a retail grocery store on weekly and monthly pay¬
ments, having 37 members. Business done 1906, $5,007.45; previous years,$8,000;
total paid up capital, $3,000.
The business was organized in 1903. During the two years and six months
in business we did a very prosperous business until some dissatisfaction arose
amongst the stockholders, then we were forced to close down June 1,1907.
The True Reformers grocery stores belong in this group. Retail dry
goods stores are less frequent, but growing in number.
Chicago, 111.
Sandy W. Trice & Co., 1218 State street.—Sandy W. Trice, President; A. J.
Carey, Vice-President; W. M. Farmer, Secretary; Geo. W. Murry, Treasurer.
A department store run on cash basis. Business April, 1906-7, $14,400; capitali¬
zation, $15,000; paid in, $10,000. Opened up June, 1900, firm named Trice & Wil¬
liams. Corporated 1906 as Sandy W. Trice <fc Co.
♦National Negro Business League, 1900, pp. 189-90.
f National Negro Business League, 1902, p. 71.
Cooperative Business 167
J. H. Zedricks & Co., 939 West Lake street.—A corporation. General mail
OP ^ house' manufacturing and selling general merchandise, also selling
«£nn f ycatal°gue, correspondence and agents. Business in 1906, $800; 1907,
' °i rS^ months. This shows an increase over the same period last
year. Total paid up capital, $2,500.
Established in 1905 by Mr. John H. Zedricks, 848 West Madison street, with
a capital of 60 cents. Have mailed 3,000 four-page circulars, with an additional
10,000 letters, going to all parts of the world. Have shipped small orders to all
parts of the United States, as well as to Liberia, Africa, the Republic of Pana¬
ma, Cuba and Hayti, Incorporated in 1907 for $2,500 under the State laws of
Illinois. Twenty-five page catalogue now in hands of printer.
Publishing has been a favorite method of co-operation.
A few of the newspapers are owned individually, but most of them by
groups of stockholders.
Negro journalism in the United States had its origin in the aspiration for
freedom. The first Negro newspaper in the United States was begun in New
York City, March 30,1827, and was called The Journal of Freedom. Its editor
was John B. Russworm, a graduate of Dartmouth College of the class of 1826,
perhaps the first Negro to receive a degree from an American institution of
learning. Associated with him in the editing was the Rev. Samuel E. Cornish,
a controversialist of no mean powers.
This journal had an existence of but three years, and other attempts by
Negroes to publish newspapers failed of notable success until Frederick
Douglass started The North Star at Rochester, N. Y., in 1847. The name was
subsequently changed to Frederick Douglass's Paper, and Mr. Douglass con¬
tinued it up to the opening of the Civil War. For length of life, extent of
circulation, ability of matter contributed and commanding talents of its edi¬
tor, the publication was one which occupies a conspicuous chapter in the his¬
tory of Negro journalism.
The number of papers and periodicals devoted to the interest of the Negro
race has been variously estimated at from 150 to 500. In the newspaper direc¬
tories for 1905 was given 140 publications of every class. Accessable data give
reasons to believe that this number is at least 100 short. In the State of Mis¬
sissippi alone there are twenty publications appearing at regular intervals,
while one newspaper directory gives but four.*
Drugstores form a favorite line of co-operative effort. An incomplete
canvass in 1907 showed the following, nearly all of which were con¬
ducted by companies of three or more persons:
Drug Stores
Alabama 10 Kansas 5 Pennsylvania 2
Arkansas 8 Kentucky 7 Rhode Island 1
Colorado 4 Louisiana 1 South Carolina 4
District of Columbia... 14 Mississippi 2 Tennessee 8
Florida 16 Missouri 8 Texas 2
Georgia 21 Maryland 2 Virginia 11
TiHnni« 5 Massachusetts 4 —
TnriUmfi 1 North Carolina 10 Total 180
! 2 New York 5
Indian Territory * Ohio 3
* L M Herstaaw, in Charities, October, 1905.
168
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Of these 43 reported $139,883 invested and 516 persons employed. The
total investment may reach $500,000. Four typical stores report:
The Artesian Drug Co., Albany, Ga.—Nineteen members; two places of busi¬
ness. Capital, $1,360. Business: 1905,$16,400; 1906, $20,100.
The company was launched in 1902, with a paid up capital of $1,360. We
have been able to declare dividends successively as well as launch a branch
drug store with a $1,500 stock.
The People's Drug Co., Cleveland, Ohio.—Seventy stockholders. Business
opened February 1,1906; business done during eleven months of 1906, $4,000;
paid up capital, $1,300, July 1,1907.
Certain men were led to believe that a drug store on a co-operative plan
could be made to succeed among the colored people of Cleveland. After a few
preliminary meetings among those chiefly interested, during which time sub¬
scriptions of stock at $1 per share were solicited with fair success, it was de¬
cided to undertake the enterprise. A pharmacist was secured, and the busi¬
ness was launched February 1, 1906, in a building leased for five years. The
store is neat and attractive, has a good location and is well furnished. It will
compare favorably with any drug store of its size in Cleveland.
Savannah Pharmacy, Savannah, Ga.—Five members. Business 1906-1907,
$12,000; capital, $5,000. Incorporated.
Wyandotte Drug Co., Kansas City, Kan.—Five members. Business 1906,
$18,000; capital, $675.
We have two clerks and a delivery boy, and have what the City Assessor
says is the third drug store in this city of 104,000 population, by the city census
of 1907, in amount of stock.
Undertaking has probably a larger invested capital than the drug
business, but this kind of enterprise is usually conducted by individuals
rather than companies. There are, however, many groups like the
following:
Moore & Burnett Co., Los Angeles, Cal.—Eighteen stockholders. Three
establishments. Capital, $4,500; business 1906, $7,000.
Warren Hot Springs Furniture and Undertaking Co., Hot Springs, Ark.—
Partners, 3. Undertaking, furniture, new and s.econd-hand, bought, sold and
exchanged; cash or installment plan. Formed partnership August, 1907.
Capital paid up, $5,000.
J. T. T. Warren has been in the business fifteen years. Each member of the
firm are property owners. You will find us rated in Bradstreet, I think.
The Kansas City Embalming and Casket Co., 1014 North Fifth street, Kansas
City, Kan.—A corporation. Organized in 1901; capital, $2,000. Business:
1903... .$5,000 | 1904... .$6,000 | 1905... .$6,000 | 1906... .$8,753 | 1907... .$9,000
Cemeteries have already been noticed. They are combined with
undertaking, and sometimes become business corporations like the
following:
The Union Development Co. (Incorporated), Louisville, Ky.—Owners of the
Greenwood Cemetery.
Cooperative Business
169
Fourth Annual Report, Fiscal Year Ending July 31, 1907
Receipts from cemetery, etc... t ) 785 25
Receipts from sale of stock 'lOl 75
Total $ 1 887 00
Balance brought forward '194 76
Total receipts $ 2,081 76
Disbursements—
n* bonds ■ $ 550 00
C. M. Phillips lig gg
General expenses, etc.V.... ...... 1,347 17
„ Total $ 2,011 02
By balance 70 74
Total j 2,081 76
Balance due O. M. Phillips on account pur¬
chase . ... 8 4,677 00
Balance due on bonds 19,900 00
Total $ 24,577 10
Assets $30,235 00
Liabilities 24,577 10
Capital Stock
Original number shares 6,000
Total number sold 631
Balance 5,369
Frank H. Antle, Secretary, E. O. Malonb, President,
1940 Grayson street. 923 Nineteenth street.
Discrimination in certain lines of retail business often lead to colored
stores. Clerks sometimes refuse to fit Negroes' shoes, hence enter¬
prises like the following:
Commercial Shoe Co., Macon, Ga.—Business 1906 and 1907, $3,476.44; paid up
capital, $1,500. Began June 26,1906, and has steadily gained patronage.
The People's Shoe Co. (Incorporated), Atlanta, Ga.—Number of partners or
members, about fifty-seven (57); business 1906-1907, approximately $15,000.
The charter was granted under the laws of Georgia in the year 1901 but re¬
mained dormant until October, 1905, when it was purchased by the present
owners, who sold enough stock to open the business in March, 1906. The offi¬
cers are elected by the stockholders at a meeting held in October of each year
for that purpose and for transacting any other business specified in the con¬
stitution of the corporation.
The business has met with the success expected of it by those who are finan¬
cially interested in it, and is gradually increasing.
A few millinery stores are starting, like the following:
Women's Exchange, Frankfort, Ky.—Number of partners or members, five
(5); business 1906-1907, $1,500; paid up capital, $500. Opened March 1, 1906, with
$250.
We simply desired to awaken interest among our people along business
lines for women, as there had been so many failures (men) here. We are all
housekeepers. Had we the entire charge we could soon build a fine business;
employ one girl. Each member has a day on "duty" to give direct personal
attention to Unusual, with women, we have never had one unkind
word or unpleasant feeling.
Various forms of house service have developed into co-operative
170 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
businesses, as catering, cleaning, supplying cut wood and coal in small
quantities, etc.
In Philadelphia a Caterers1 Supply Co., established 10 years ago, is a
co-operative concern for supplying dishes, linen, etc., to the members.
It has a stock worth $10,000.
There a re numbers of establishments like The Model Carpet Cleaning
and Storage Co., of Philadelphia, which
Since its incorporation has purchased and is now operating the plant located
at( 610 and 612 South Seventeenth street. And in June of this year it pur¬
chased the building situated at 614 and 616 South Seventeenth street, where
the general business of the company will be conducted. In this building there
are two stores, a large banquet and dance hall, and in addition sufficient room
to hold several hundred loads of furniture.
The Young Men's Business Association, of Richmond, Va., reports:
Twenty of us organized by putting up one dollar each. Later we put up
larger amounts until now each of the company has $250 worth of stock in the
concern. There are nine other stock holders owning from one to five shares
each. We made some investments in real estate. We opened the wood and
coal business in a small way January 1,1906, at the corner of Adam and Leigh
streets, where we are yet in business. We first put $500 in the business, and
later put more until we now have about $3,000 invested. The first year our
business amounted to $4,811.06; last year we delivered from our yard 689 cords
of wood and 1,292 tons of coal, amounting to $12,859.15. Our sales for the first
three months of this year are 773 tons of coal and 215 5-7 cords of wood, amount¬
ing to $6,381.63. Amount of business done from J anuary 2,1906, to April 1,1908,
$23,551.84. We own 100 acres of timber land 15 miles of our city. We have 29
stockholders, 20 of whom constitute the Board of Directors.
Another kind of co-operation is the agriculture fair associations, of
which there are a dozen or more. A report of one of the most succees-
ful follows:
Agricultural and Mechanical Association of Colored People, Lexington,
Ky.—Fifty-seven members, representing 227 shares of stock. Holds annual
fairs for the exhibition of all kind of farm products, horses, cattle, fowls, etc.,
racing and other amusements. In 1906 our receipts were about $8,000, and 1907
a little over $10,000. Paid up capital, 227 shares of stock at $10 per share;
$10,000 in real estate in Lexington, Ky. Organized in 1869, and has been in
successful operation to the present. The dividends very often amount to more
than the original cost of stock.
Real Estate and Credit Societies
Most of the operations of beneficial and insurance societies fall under
this head. The early land buying operations began with the Elgin As¬
sociation, Canada, in 1850. Some of these are:
The Elgin Settlement, 1850.—Financed by whites and bought by Negroes.
Within fifteen years from the commencement of the settlement all the land
purchased by the association was allotted and peopled by one thousand col¬
ored settlers. Farms were cleared, houses built after a prescribed model,
roads opened up, and school-houses, a brick hotel and industrial buildings
erected.
The Dawn Settlement, Dresden, Can., 18^2,—Purchased 300 acres.
Co-operative Business 171
Refugees Home, Windsor, Can., 1852.—Forty lots of 25 acres each were
bought the first year.
Ohio Settlements.—These were made before the war, and with little or no
outside aid, except in Brown county. In 1840 there were owned in—
Pike county 2,225 acres
Shelby county 4,286 acres
Dark county 4,000 acres
Brown county
Recent efforts are:
Calhoun, Ala., 1897.—The buying of 3,000 acres by 71 men. Property worth
$25,000.
Mound Bayou, Miss.—Mound Bayou is situated near the center of the great
Yazoo Delta, in Bolivar county, Miss., about midway between Memphis and
Yicksburg, and near 20 miles east of the Mississippi river and a like distance
from the hills that form the western boundary of the delta, the name is de¬
rived from a large mound (relic of a true historic people), situated at the
junction of two prominent bayous comprising a most important part of the
natural drainage system of that locality.
In February, 1888, the first settlers began to move in, not to stop in the town,
but to occupy log shanties on lands that they had begun to clear; about a
month later ground was cleared for a small store house and two dwellings,
one to be occupied by the family of my cousin and the other by my own
family. There was hardly a spare inch of earth's surface unoccupied by
vigorous roots, driven foith by the wonderful power of the virgin soil. We
had to grub a small spot in the front yard to form a safe playground for the
children.
There being no lands available for cultivation, the community had to adapt
itself to timber work for subsistence and gradually enlarge farm work as
lands were cleared. About the year 1890 the original survey of Mound Bayou
was made, embracing about 20 acres, and a few years later the town was regu¬
larly incorporated, the charter being signed by Governor A. J. McLauren and
Hon. Joseph F. Power, Secretary of State. At that time there was one fair
country store and two small business houses altogether, employing a capital
of about $3,000 and doing an annual business of possibly $5,000. During a
period of ten years, various additions have been made till the town now em¬
braces about 75 acres, regularly laid out, having more than V/% miles of plank
sidewalk, lighted with large oil and gasoline street lamps, a population of 400,
many living in neat and cosy homes, surrounded by a neighboring population
of over 2,500, largely occupying their own farms, ranging from 20 to 600 acres,
comprising altogether 30,000 acres, over one-fourth of which is in cultivation,
producing a variety of crops, mostly cotton, present average production of the
latter about 3,500 bales.
The sixth annual report to the League shows over forty business establish¬
ments covering nearly every necessity of the retail and supply trade, and em¬
ploying an aggregate capital of over $90,000, and doing an annual business of
about $75,000, to which may be added a post office money order business of
$20 000 and clearings of the local bank of over $500,000 annually. Mound Bayou
ranks about tenth among the intermediate stations on the main line of rail¬
road between Yicksburg and Memphis, and the depot business amounts to
something like $30,000 per year, making a total of near three-quarters of a mil¬
lion dollars of business, where twenty years ago there was practically none
h tever There are eleven credible public buildings, including two graded
172 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
schools, one public school and town hall, altogether valued at exceeding
$'20,000.
Of the 44 business proprietors, 17 own their places of business, as well as
homes, while 12 of the remainder own homes or plantations. Only one of the
principal merchants is not a property holder in the settlement. He owns a
home and property in an adjoining State. The principal additions to the rank
of merchants comes from prosperous, energetic farmers who have improved
their places, lease to tenants, and remove to town for business, educational
and social advantages.*
Athens, Ga.—More than three years ago in a suburban section of Athens,
Ga., a meeting was held for giving the farmers a practical talk. It was sug¬
gested that they organize into an association. This met with approval, and
an organization known as the Mutual Benefit Association was formed. The
object of this organization was the buying of land, the building and improve¬
ment of homes, and the construction of a model community school.
At cotton selling time in the fall of 1900 more than a hundred dollars was
placed in the treasury. It may be added that the number of active members
had been reduced to ten because certain ones did not have sufficient funds to
put in. It happened about this time that a very desirable tract of land was
offered for sale for debt. This tract contained 40 acres of frontage along the
public highway, and had a house which though antiquated was serviceable.
The titles were investigated and by the middle of December the transaction
was closed. The amount charged for the place was $350. The bond for title
was secured for $100 and the other amounts were to be made in three payments
with legal interest. Three years were given in which to pay this money, but
these energetic farmers succeeded in paying the entire debt in two years. For
the second payment, December, 1901, $112.50was raised and last of all $167, with
which the deed was taken up. In addition to this last amount, enough money
was raised to take up, the following January, another place which adjoined
the one previously purchased, t
The Kowaliga experiment has been mentioned. $ Other efforts are
making at Tuskegee, Ala., Hilton Head, S. C., and elsewhere.
A remarkable Negro organization is the following:
The Farmers' Improvement Society of Texas.—Chartered by the State of
Texas:
Total number of branches 415
Total number of members 10,000
Total number of acres owned by members... 70,216
Numberof cows 5,216
Number of horses and mules 9,860
Total taxable valuation of members1 property $1,260,427
We Pledge Our Members—
1st. To fight the credit or mortgage system, which is the Negro's second
slavery.
2d. To improve our method of farming, we want closer attention to busi¬
ness, improved stock, better crops and better financial returns.
3d. To co-operate in buying and selling. We can buy cheaper by buying
together. By selling together we can sell higher. By co-operation, stores can
be established and manufactories built and our boys and girls given employ¬
ment.
* National Negro Business League, 1905, pp. 184-5.
+ Report of Miss Judia Jackson at the Hampton Conference. J Of. p. 162.
Cooperative Business 173
^ care for the sick and bury the dead. In this the Farmers' Improve-
_jOCie^ —els any organization on earth for the amount of money ex-
pen e . For instance: Any branch, no matter how small, can at the end of
the first year give $1.50 a week for sickness and $20 for death, if you organize
early enough in the year to follow the General Order No. 6. All this at a cost
of only 10 cents per month. By sending only $1.05 to the Annual Convocation
you will give your heirs as much as $100. Besides this you will be cared for in
sickness as tenderly as though you were paying 75 cents or more per month,
the usual cost in other societies. A man occasionally gets down at a critical
period in his crop. Your fellow members will save your crop free of charge.
5th. To buy and improve homes. The Christian home is the unit of civili¬
zation. We believe in good homes and good people inside of them with plenty
of good food raised at home or bought for cash. We are uniting the race for
these grand purposes. Besides all this and best of all the Farmers' Improve¬
ment Society has established an Agricultural and Industrial College in which
your children will receive a first-class training at a cost of only $50 a year.
Branches are established in about four hundred different communities in
Texas and Oklahoma. Meetings are held semi-monthly; supplies are bought
under co-operative system in February and November of each year. Compe¬
tition among members in raising best crops and stock; agricultural fairs and
lectures. Amount raised and spent under co-operation in 1906, $25,000, in
round numbers; 1905, $15,000; 1904, $7,000.
No real estate is owned by the organization except halls to meet in owned by
branches, estimated value $20,000, and about ten stores with average stock of
about $400.
Organized by R. L. Smith, December, 1890. The effect of the movement to
break up the credit system was so marked that in six years other commuities
were induced to accept the plan.
There are large numbers of real estate companies:
Afro-American Realty Company, 67 West 134th St., New York City.—Three
hundred and fifty stockholders. Real estate along lines that will better the
housing conditions of Negro tenants. Methods of operation: buying and leas¬
ing of city tenant property. Paid up capital, $71,520. Real estate owned,
$483,000—Nos. 24, 26, 28 and 30 W. 136th street; 24, 26 and 28 W. 140th 'street; 303
W. 149th street, and 302 W. 150th street, New York City.
This company has recently been in financial difficulties but still sur¬
vives.
Mohawk Realty Co., Cleveland, O.—Capital, $10,000; 4 years old.
Commercial Pioneer Institution,, Cambridge Mass.—Business: commercial,
real estate, employment, printing, etc. The business is under the direction of
the President as manager, with the assistance of the Directors and Trustees.
Business has averaged from $1,000 to $1,200,1906-1907. Paid up capital, about
$750; real estate owned, $5,400.
Twin City Realty, Winston-Salem, N. C.—Business 1906, $2,000; 1907, $3,000.
Industrial Realty Co., Terre Haute, Ind.—Eighty-two stockholders. Gen¬
eral loan and investment, collecting rents, acting as agents to buy and sell
1 es^-ate Business is managed by a Board of Directors, consisting of seven
mpmhprs ' Board of Directors is elected by stockholders. The Board elects
memue . number a president, Vice-President, Treasurer and Secretary.
mOI1K heen organized just two months. Our net earnings the first month
e$1^25 the second month $16.60; capital, $245.90.
174 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
The company was organized in April, 1907. Incorporated under the laws of
the State of Indiana with a capital stock of $10,000 divided into 2,000 shares of
$5 each. The subscribers of these shares could either pay cash for them or pay
for them at the rate of 10 cents per month on each share. At present we have
sold 732 shares. This brings into the treasury $73.20 per month. When the
2,000 shares are all subscribed for we will have an income of $200 per month for
fifty months, when the $10,000. will be paid up. All of this money is put out at
interest, none of the principal being used for expenses.
At present none of the officers receive any salary for their services. They
all follow their respective vocations and look after the interest of the company
between times. Our leading colored physician gives us office space, light and
heat free. Other services are not charged for.
Colorado Mercantile Co., Colorado Springs, Col.—Forty-three members; ar¬
ranges short loans. Business, 1904-1907, $20,000; capital, $1,970.
Western Realty and Land Co., Tulsa, Okla.—Three partners. General real
estate business and employment agency in connection. Buy, sell, lease, rent
and locate land; collect rents; agents for other firms and dealers; secure em¬
ployment for colored help, and all work in the above named lines. Methods
of operation: Buying and selling for ourselves, as well as a general broker's
business Tior individuals and larger companies, mostly white, as our President
is perhaps the best posted land man in the Creek Nation, knowing personally
the heads or relatives of over five thousand allottees in the Creek Nation. Our
regular commission is 5 per cent on. first thousand dollars and %% per cent on
the remaining thousands. Total business done 1906 through this office, $25,000.
In 1907, up to date, about $12,000; paid up capital, $7,000; real estate owued,
about 3,000 acres, in the Creek Nation.
Started February 24,1906. Ottawa Gurley, President; Joe Roach,Vice-Presi¬
dent; Perry Johnson, Treasurer; George P. Johnson, Secretary; W. Li. McKee,
Manager. March 17,1907, O. W. Gurley was forced to resign and sell his inter¬
est, the company assuming his interest. W. L. McKee was elected President.
On July 22,1907, Joseph Roach was killed by a train, and his interest was
bought from his widow and consumed by the company, leaving the officers as
they now stand. Perry Johnson is a silent partner, residing in Muskogee and
having charge of the racing track there, owning some of the finest head of
racing stock in the Southwest.
Building and loan associations have had several periods of waxing
and waning; at present they are increasing.
In 1840 the Iron Chest Co. of Cincinnati, O., accumulated funds and
erected a block of buildings which still stands. Brackett says:
A building loan society formed in 1867, in South Baltimore, handled from
$12,000 to $15,000. The shares matured in seven years. Another society was
formed in 1881, and another in 1886. The membership was never very large.
The par value of each share was $125, issue of shares limited to 1,000.
Another series of associations in East Baltimore, in 1868, had 100 members
and probably facilitated the purchase of forty or fifty houses.
At the Hampton Conference, in 1898, seventeen building and loan
associations were reported in Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland, Dis¬
trict of Columbia, Virginia, Georgia, Florida and Arkansas. An account
of several follows:
The Burean Building and Loan A ssociation, Philadelphia, Pa.—Six hundred
members. Assists its members to purchase homes. Monthly savings on the
fourth Thursday of each month; $41,586.79 in 1906-1907; assets, $139,308.65. In¬
corporated February, 1888. Money loaned at no higher rate than 6 per cent.
Cooperative Business 175
There have been secured through its aid 140 homes for as many Negro fami-
les in e eity of Philadelphia, which have an average valuation of $2,500, or.
an aggregate value of $350,000. The average monthly receipts of the associa¬
tion is $3,000, and the assets $125,000. The association has paid to the stock¬
holders of matured stock within the last six jrears $75,200. On Thursday, the
24th instant, the eleventh series will have matured, when $7,550 will be paid,
making a grand total of $82,750 paid to the stockholders within the last six
years, which represents the accumulated savings of the 500 members connected
with it.
The Western Building and Loan Association, Muskogee, I. T.—Members, 44.
We sell shares on monthly installments and build for members, taking first
mortgage on property. Twenty-four hundred dollars worth of business in
1906, $2,500 in 1907; capital, $2,500. Two lots in Reeves Addition, Muskogee, I. T.
Organized January 27,1906; incorporated February 7, 1906.
Norfolk Home Building and Loan Association, Norfolk, Ya.—About 500
shares of stock subscribed; making loans to stockholders for home building
improvement; business, $3,500 for 1906; for 1907 to July 1, $3,700; author¬
ized capital, $50,000; weekly payments 25 cents per share on stock.
The enterprise was organized January 1,1906. The growth was very slow
first year; much more rapid this year. Loans are made to stockholders on
their stock secured by mortgage on real estate. Have loaned about $6,000 in
sums ranging from $50 to $1,000. Numbers are availing themselves of this
opportunity to purchase or build small homes and pay for them on weekly
payments.
Pioneer Building and Loan Association, Greensboro, N. C.—Eight hundred
and five shares held by about 100 members. Branches at High Point and
Ashboro, N. C. Twenty-five cents per share per week collected from mem¬
bers and put to purchase and improve homes. Each share at maturity will be
worth $100. We lend on real estate and on stock, but make it a point to own
more directly.
Organized in 1902 by a man who had previously organized two in Wilming¬
ton, N. C.—the first Negro association in this State. Now we have more than
a dozen in this State. Association is composed exclusively of Negro stock¬
holders, except two white men, who are experienced bookkeepers and
accountants, and who serve upon our finance committee. This association has
lent to its stockholders for the purchase of homes, etc., nearly $12,000. It is
earning larger profits per share than any other organization of its kind in the
State. It proposes to establish a bank in Greensboro as soon as the proposed
one now under consideration in Winston is finally finished or disposed of;
that is, as soon as the permanent organization has been well perfected.
Receipts Disbursements
$ 377 87 Balance from third year.
8,799 00 Dues $ *2,162 50
193 80 Fines
905 96 Interest 113 79
Expense 277 29
2,061 41 Bills payable 1,761 70
131 50 Admission fee
33 75 Withdrawal fee
50 Transfer fee
1 98 Bills receivable 5 50
Real estate loans 4,094 15
1,298 09 Stock loans 4,576 72
Dividends 78 17
Cash on hand January 1,1907 610 16
$13,803 86 Total $13,803 86
176
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Assets
Cash on hand January 1,1907 $ 610 16
Stock loans 6,602 45
Real estate loans 11,930 85
Dues unpaid 100 25
Fines 16 35
Interest unpaid 24 30
Taxes advanced 42 26
Insurance 4 50
Bills receivable 52 82
Office supplies 63 60
Total $19,447 57
Liabilities
Dues f?
Dues advanced f''®
Interest {*
Bills payable J®
Profits 1,600 46
Total 119,447 57
Exhibit of Series
SERIES
Wo. of
shares
No. of
weeks
AmH paid
per share
Profits
per share
Value
per share
First
34
218
|54 50
$10 50
$65 00
Second
45
200
50 00
8 09
58 09
Third
56
179
45 75
6 19
51 94
Fourth
16
151
37 75
4 30
42 05
Fifth
43
131
32 75
3 03
35 78
Sixth
30
109
27 25
1 58
28 83
Seventh
193
83
20 75
1 05
21 80
Eighth
216
44
11 00
36
11 36
Ninth
72
13
3 25
03
3 28
Profits Per Series
First $ 357.06
Second 364.20
Third 346.69
Fourth 68.95
Fifth 130.46
Sixth 47.42
Seventh 207.31
Eighth 79.03
Ninth 2.29
Undistributed .05
Total $ 1,600.46
Twin City Building and Loan Association, Winston-Salem, N. C.—Persons
subscribe for so many shares, and pay weekly until the stock matures. We
work along building and loan lines. Amount of business done since October
10,1903, $30,113.38.
The Twin City Building and Loan Association was organized October 10,
1903. Since this time it has built more than twenty homes for our people.
Third Annual Report op the
Twin City Building and Loan Association
(For the Year Ending December 31,1906.)
Assets
Loans on mortgages
Loans on shares
Real estate acquired by pur¬
chase
Cash in bank
Furniture and fixtures
Interest due and upaid
Fines due and unpaid
9,825,
813.
167.69
236.14
47.30
95.84
23.35
Total $ 11,208.65
Receipts
Cash on hand Dec. 31, 1905 $ 227.9i>
Installments paid 3,196.25
Loans or shares paid
Interest received.
Fines received
Entrance fees
Transfer fees
Borrowed money .
Stock loan fees
Pass books
Real estate
209.50
511.92
13.35
37.00
1.75
3,000.00
1.75
3.60
7.95
Total $ 7,211.0ft
Cooperative Business
Liabilities
DJ|,Iharel'0Ms™, installments
Due shareholders 'A j ' 6,036.25
credl ted .caoiaei s> earnln gs
Borrowed money
Interest on borrowed m on pv '
Bssr 10 be M
en"Ss gJS
Dividends due and unpaid 70.00
Assessment 9.45
Total $ 11,208.65
Disbursements
504.50
700.00
2,500.00
19.27
Loans on mortgages $
Loans on shares
Paid 011 withdrawals, dues
Salaries paid
Advertising and printing
Interest paid
Rent paid
Taxes
Dividends on redeemed shares..
Fuel, etc
Paid on real estate
Cash on hand Dee. 81, 1906
177
4,535.00
660.38
1,278.95
8H.OO
12.28
185.55
84.50
27.97
20.00
14.70
167.69
236.14
Total $ 7,211.0f>
Central Trust Building and Loan Association, Jacksonville, Fla.—Lends on
30, 60 or 90 days' time. Business: 1906, $12,500; 1907, $15,000; capital, $10,000.
Organized 1902 to operate a building and loan association for the protection
of our people.
The Cherry Building and Loan Association, 1440 Lombard street, Philadel¬
phia, Pa. One hundred and fourteen members. Business: 1906, $8,591 • 1907
$11,866. '
Organized by members of the First African Baptist Church principally.
1907
Receipts $ 14,534.02
Disbursements 14,417.94
Assets 45,458.32
Liabilities,726% shares 36,603.40
Stock Statement
Series
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
83
34
35
36
37
Shares
10
5
7
26 ^
34
39
15 %
33
27
30
24
51
Sj*
33
Loans
81,000 00
120 00
460 00
50 00
50 00
2,265 00
44 00
124 00
800 00
5,300 00
5,440 00
3,004 00
1,906 00
819 00
3,200 00
724 18
1,470 00
2,650 00
3,612 50
1,000 00
4,400 00
3,202 00
1,110 00
2,700 00
Amount paid
per share
144 00
144 00
138 00
132 00
126 00
120 00
114 00
108 00
102 00
96 00
90 00
84 00
78 00
72 00
66 00
60 00
54 00
48 00
42 00
36 00
30 00
24 00
18 00
12 00
6 00
Profit per
share
$ 56 00
56 00
52 90
48 40
44 10
40 00
36 10
32 40
28 90
25 60
22 50
19 60
16 90
14 40
12 10
10 00
8 10
5 60
4 90
3 60
2 50
1 60
90
40
10
Total worth
per share
$ 200 00
200 00
190 90
180 80
170 10
160 00
150 10
140 40
130 90
121 60
112 50
103 60
94 90
86 40
78 10
70 00
64 10
53 60
46 90
39 60
32 50
25 60
18 90
12 40
6 10
Workingmen's Loan and Building Association, 111 Seventh street, Augusta,
Ga.—Corporation, 75 stockholders. Building homes for stockholders and
dealing generally in real estate. Receipts: 1905, $5,773.16; 1906, $4,809.47; 1907,
$4,547.15; dividend declared, 6 per cent per annum. We have a surplus of
$6,028.35; capital, $9,450; real estate, $7,152. Organized April 1,1889.
178 Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Eighteenth Annual Statement, Mat 31,1907
Resources
Liabilities
Loans
Cash on hand
Real estate...
Office fixtures
$ 7,271 44 Capital stock
1,329 7(5 Bills payable
7,152 00 Undivided profits
127 50
$ 9,450 00
402 35
6,028 85
Total
$15,880 70
Total
$15,880 70
Receipts
Disbursements
Profit Account
$ 1,435.36
860.51
Profits
$ 574.85
The Pittsburg Home Building Co., 5638 Penn avenue, Pittsburg, Pa.—Forty-
three stockholders. Ileal estate, buying, building and selling, and also rent¬
ing. Company's business is conducted by a Board of Directors of nine mem¬
bers. Rents collected for company, $3,575.62; rents collected for clients,
$2,672.81; capital, $25,000; owns 3 flats.
The colored citizens came together July 1, 1901, to buy and build better
houses for our people in the city of Pittsburg, as this city had very poor
accommodation for the citizens of this race. They only could get old houses
unimproved.
Other associations are operated at New Albany, Ind. ("prosperous,
with valuable property"); Raleigh, N. C.; Baltimore, Md. (five asso¬
ciations); Claremont, Va., and Philadelphia (nine, including those
mentioned).
The secret societies have many building associations:
Pythian Mutual Investment Association, Charleston, W. Va.—Five hundred
and seventy stockholders. Branch establishments, Huntington, W. Va. Real
estate and investment. Business 1906-1907, $49,006.97; paid up capital, $21,259.42;
real estate owned, $38,368.19. Organized and incorporated January 9, 1902,
under the laws of the State of West Virginia. Business has been successfully
conducted, a 6 per cent dividend paid each year.
The Odd Fellows'' Hall Association, composed of the various branches of the
order and the individual members thereof, was organized December 30,1889,
and subsequently duly incorporated under the laws of the District of Colum¬
bia.
The price of each share of stock was fixed at $10, and the number of shares
issued was not to exceed 5,000, nor the real or personal property to exceed
$50,000. Its income is $7,000 a year and its capital $35,000. It owns a hall.
The District of Columbia has a Masonic Hall Building Association with 300
members, which does a business of renting houses and halls. Shares at $10
each are sold. From September 1, 1906, to September 1, 1907, a business of
$11,875.37 was done. The property owned is valued at $35,000 and consists of
a large hall, corner Fifth and Virginia avenue, S. E., 3 houses, 743,745, 747 Fifth
street, and a hall at 1111 Nineteenth street N". W., Washington. The organiza¬
tion was founded in 1893. It was out of debt by November, 1905, and is still
out of debt.
There are many trade unions like the following:
The Colored Longshoremen of New Orleans will hold their annual election
on the 29th instant. They have one of the largest organizations in existence
Group Economy 179
hi all the South. The active membership is upward of 1,400 in good standing.
^ • aVe °wn drug store, and employ several physicians to attend
eir sick. One of the physicians gets a salary of $1,400 per year, and another
gets $900, payable quarterly. The affairs of the association have been put in
first-class shape during the past two years. A great debt which accumulated
under previous administrations has been paid off, and today the longshoremen
of New Orleans are in better shape than ever.
The dues, fees, assessments and taxes of this association amount to upwards
of $25,000 per annum, and the expenditures for sick benefits, pensions, funerals,
drugs, rent, salaries of physicians, druggist and other officials, amount to
almost as much. A glance at the figures for one year's transaction alone, will
prove that the longshoremen association of New Orleans is probably handling
more finances than any other colored concern of the kind in this country. All
this business is conducted by Negro intelligence and brains.
Section 16. The Group Economy
We have studied the various forms of co-operation, but there is a
larger form which I have elsewhere called the Group Economy.
It consists of such a co-operative arrangement of industries and ser¬
vices within the Negro group that the group tends to become a closed
economic circle largely independent of the surrounding white world.
The recognition of this fact explains many of the anomalies which
puzzle the student of the Negro American.
You used to see numbers of colored barbers; you are tempted to think
they are all gone—yet today there are more Negro barbers in the United
States than ever before, but also at the same time a larger number than
ever before cater solely to colored trade where they have a monopoly.
Because the Negro lawyer, physician, and teacher serve almost ex¬
clusively a colored clientage, their very existence is half forgotten.
The new Negro business men are not successors of the old ; there used
to be Negro business men in New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore
catering to white trade. The new Negro business man caters to colored
trade. So far has this gone that today in every city of the United
States with a considerable Negro population, the colored group is serv¬
ing itself with religious ministration, medical care, legal advice, and
education of children: to a growing degree with food, houses, books,
and newspapers. So extraordinary has been this development that it
forms a large and growing part in the economy in the case of fully one-
half of the Negroes of the United States and in the case of something
between 50,000 and 100,000 town and city Negroes, representing at least
300,000 persons the group economy approaches a complete system.
This study can best be closed by a picture of this group economy of
one city of 70,000 Negroes:
The Negro Qroup Economy of Philadelphia, 1907
Lawyers " Artists J
Dentists U Chiropodists f
Druggist 1 Occulists f
Physicians 28 Electrical engineers 2
180
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Teachers 58
Graduate nurses 18
Music teachers 22
Advertisers 2
Antiques 2
Bank 1
Barbers 104
Bands of music 8
Bicycles 3
Bootblack parlors 21
Boot and shoemakers 12
Blacksmiths 2
Brass melter 1
Building and loan associations 9
Brokers 4
Carpenters 8
Steam carpet cleaning 8
Caterers 80
Caterers and confectioners 2
Cigar manufacturers 7
Cigar and tobacco dealers 33
Cleaning and dying 5
Coal and ice dealers 24
Cemeteries 4
Clothiers 2
Contractors 6
Confectioners 6
Crockery 2
Tailors 20
Dry Goods 4
Employment agencies 35
Express and hauling 47
Florists 3
Fruit and produce 3
Furniture 13
Gents' furnishing 2
Grocers 48
Hair culture and manicure 22
Hotels 10
Ice 6
Ice cream parlors 3
Insurance agents 10
Insurance companies 5
Jewelry 4
Job printers 1"
Junk dealers 15
Laundries 12
Livery stables 6
Loans 2
Manufacturers 10
Masseurs 5
Meat dealers 3
Metal signs 1
Milk dealers 5
Millinery 2
Moving pictures 2
Newsdealers 9
Newspapers 20
Orchestras 4
Painters 2
Paperhangers 4
Photographers 4
Poolrooms 6
Provision stores 3
Real estate 18
Restaurants 83
Patent medicines 4
Saloons 2
Second-hand goods 2
Shoe dealer * 1
Stationery 3
Stoves 2
Undertakers 11
Upholsterers 12
Whitewashing 8
Wholesale medicine 1
Corporations 32
Real estate owners 802
Clergymen (heads 'of churches with
28,000 members) 80
Secret societies (lodges) 46
Political clubs 4
Other clubs 33
Charitable organizations 32
Hospitals 2
Day nurseries 3
Social settlements 2
When one remembers that in every city and town in the United
States where Negroes live a similar co-operative economy is growing
up and developing, one gets in microcosm a picture of the co-operative
development beginning among Negro Americans.
Above and beyond this is the effort to mold Negro opinion by news¬
papers and organizations. The chief National Negro Conventions have
been:
1830, Philadelphia (annually until about 1836).
1847, Troy, N. Y.
1852, Rochester, N. Y.
1856, Chatham, Canada.
Twelfth Atlanta Conference 181
1864, Syracuse, N. Y.
1879, Nashville, Tenn.
1890, Rochester, N. Y.—The Afro-American. Council. (Annually since).
1900, Boston, Mass.—The Negro Business League. (Annually since).
1905, Niagara Falls, N. Y.—The Niagara Movement. (Annually since).
Section 17. The Twelfth Atlanta Conference
The Twelfth Atlanta Conference met in Ware Memorial Chapel, May
28,1907, President Horace Bumstead, presiding. The following was the
programme:
Programme
First Session, 10:00 a. m.
President Horace Bumstead, presiding.
Subject: "Business as a Career."
Address: Mr. R. P. Sims, Bluefields, W. Va.
Second Session, 11:30 a. m.
Subject: "Health and Business."
Address: Dr. L. B. Palmer.
Third Session, 3:00 p. m.
Tenth Annual Mothers' Meeting. (In charge of the Gate City Free Kinder¬
garten Association), Mrs. Hattie Landrum Green, presiding.
Subject: "Co-operation for the Children."
1. Kindergarten songs, games and exercises by 100 children of the four Kind¬
ergartens :
East Cain Street—Miss Ola Perry.
Bradley Street—Mrs. J. P. Williamson.
White's Alley—Miss Ethel Evans.
Summerhill—Mrs. John Rush.
2. Paper—Mrs. John Rush.
3. Paper—Mrs. Irene Smallwood Bowen.
4. Reports of Contributions to the 1907-8 Kindergartens.
Fourth Session, 8:00 p. m.
President Horace Bumstead, presiding.
Subject: " Co-operative Business."
"The Meaning of Co-operation "-Mr. W. E. B. Du Bois.
"Co-operation"-Mr. N. O. Nelson, St. Louis, Mo.
"Co-operation and Immigration "-Mr. George Crawford. New Haven, Conn.
Remarks: Rev. Byron Gunner, Columbia, S. C.
The Resolutions adopted are printed on page 4.
182
Economic Co-operation Among Negro Americans
Index
Alabama, Migration from, 50-51
Alabama Penny Savings Bank, 140
Africa, 12-18
African Travellers, Testimony ofr 13, ff.
African Migration, 45-48
African Methodist Episcopal Church, 57-63
African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, 71, 72, 81
Agriculture in Africa, 15
American Colonization Society, The, 45
Ashanti, 16
Atlanta, Ga., 94
Atlanta University Conference, 5
Baltimore, Md., 92,150-56,179
Banks, 134-149
Bank Statements, 138-149
Baptists, 63-71,82-85
Baptist Schools, 82-85
Beneficial and Insurance Societies, 92
Beneficial Societies, 25
Benevolence, 128-134
Bibliography, 6-9
Black Diamond Development Co., 162
Boston Schools, 76
Brown, John, 28-31
Building and Loan Associations, 174-179
Burean Building and Loan Association, 174
Canada, 26 ff.,47,48,97,98
Capital City Savings Bank, 149
Carey, Lott, 45,46,69
Carnegie Institution, 5
Cemeteries, 131-134,168-169
Chatham Convention, 30
Cherry Building and Loan Association, 177
Chesapeake Marine Railway and Dry Dock Co., The, 152-154
Church Schools, 80-85
Church, The Negro, 20
Cincinnati, 74-76
Co-operation in Transportation, 157,164,165
Co-operation Among Negroes, 10
Co-operation of Freedmen, 42-44
Co-operative Business, 149-179
Coleman Cotton Mills, 159,160
Colored Methodist Episcopal Church, 72-81
Conferences, 5
Conventions, 180
Cotton Mills, 159,160
Index
Cost of Negro Schools,
Cuffe, John and Paul,
Davis Bend, Miss.,
Denominations, Other,
Development of Co-operation,
Development of Negro Churches,
Distributive Co-operation,
Douglass, Frederick,
Drug Stores,
Eaton, Col. John,
Economic Conditions of Africa,
Elks,
Emancipation,
Emigrant Aid Societies,
Farmers' Improvement Society,
Free African Society,
Freedmen's Bank,
Freedmen's Bureau,
Freedmen, Schools for,
Fugitive Slaves,
Galilean Fishermen,
Gileadites, League of,
Group Economy, The,
Hall, Prince,
Hayti, Migration to,
Henson, Josiah,
Homes and Orphanages,
Hospitals,
Howard, General O. O.,
Income of Insurance Societies,
Income of Churches,
Insurance and Beneficial Societies,
Insurance Societies,
Insurance in Virginia,
Insurrections,
Iron in Africa,
Jamaica,
Kansas,
Knights of Pythias,
Kowaliga,
Land Buying,
Liberia,
Louisiana, Migration from,
Markets in Africa,
Maroons in Jamaica,
Masons,
Masons, Origin of,
Mechanics' Savings Bank,
Migration of Negroes,
Money in Africa, -
Mound Bayou,
Mound Bayou, Miss.,
183
91,92
45
38
72
24 ff.
55
157, 158,165-170
29
167,168
33 ff.
13 ff.
125,126
25, 26,32
23,54
172,173
21 ff., 45
134-137
78,79
77-80
32
126-128
31
179,180
22 ff.
48
28
128-130
130,131
32 ff.
108
73
92-109
99, 100, 104, 109
20
25
13 ff.
19
49-54
121-124
162-174
43,44,170
45,46,47
49,50
17
19
109
22 ff.
141
45-54
18
171,172
143
184
Economic Co=operation Among Negro Americans
Nashville Convention,
52
National Baptist Publishing Board,
63-68
Negro Church and Co-operation,
54 ff.
Negro Conventions,
54 ff.
Negro Exodus, 1879,
49-54
Negro Governors,
19
Negro Missionaries,
69
Negro Union of Newport, R. I.,
45
Negroes and Public Schools,
79-80
New York,
96,97,179
Newspapers,
167
North Carolina, Migration from,
51,52
Obeah Worship,
18,24
Odd Fellows,
115-121
Ohio,
74-76
Orphanage,
128-130
Petersburg, Va.,
98
Philadelphia, Pa.,
95,96,179
Pioneer Building and Loan Association,
175
Private Schools,
85-91
Productive Co-operation,
157,159
Public Schools,
91,92
Real Estate and Credit,
159,170-179
Ross, Dr. A. M.,
30
Russwurm, J. B„
46,47
Saint Luke's Order,
108
Schools,
73
Secret Societies,
93,109-128
Scope of this Study, The,
10-12
Shoe Stores,
169
Singleton Colony,
49
Sons and Daughters of Peace,
144
Spencer Red Brick Company,
161
Texas, Migration from,
49,50
Trade in Africa,
16 ff.
True Reformers,
101-104
True Reformers' Bank,
103,134-137
Tubman, Harriet,
28,29
Twin City Building and Loan Association,
176
Types of Co-operation,
54 ff.
Underground Railroad, The
26 ff.
United Brothers of Friendship,
124,125
Virginia,
98-100
Voodooism,
24
Warsaw, Ga.,
95
West Indies,
18-20
Western Realty and Land Company,
174
Xenia, Ohio,
92
Zion Methodists,
71,72,81
"The proper study of mankind is man"
STUDIES OF NEGRO PROBLEMS
The Atlanta University Publications
COPIES FOR SALE:
No. 1, Mortality among Negroes in Cities; 5 1 pp., 1896. Out of
print.
Mortality among Negroes in Cities; 24 pp.,(2d eel., abridged,
1903). 175 copies, at 25c.
No. 2, Social and Physical Condition of Negroes in Cities; 86 pp.,
1897; 737 copies at 50 cents.
No. 3, Some Efforts of Negroes for Social Betterment; 66 pp.,
1898. Out of print.
No. 4, The Negro in Business; 78 pp., 1899. Out of print.
No. 5, The College-bred Negro; I 15 pp., 1900. Out of print.
The College-bred Negro; 32 pp., (2d edition, abridged).
1,321 copies at 25 cents.
No. 6, The Negro Common School; 120 pp., 1901. 77 copies at
$2.00.
No. 7, The Negro Artisan; 200 pp., 1902l 644 copies at 75c.
No. 8, The Negro Church; 212 pp., 1903. 363 copies at $1.00.
No. 9, Notes on Negro Crime; 75 pp., 1904. 1,126 copies at 50c.
No. 10, A Select Bibliography of the Negro American; 72 pp.,
1905. 1,281 copies at 25 cents.
No. 1 1, Health and Physique of the Negro American; 11 2 pp.,
1 906. 343 copies at $ 1.00.
No. 12, Economic Co-operation among Negro Americans, 184 pp.,
1907. 1,500 copies at $1.00.
We study the problem that others discuss
THE achievements of races are not only
what they have done during the short
span of two thousand years, when with
rapidly increasing numbers the total amount
of mental work accumulated at an ever in=
creasing rate. In this the European, the
Chinaman, the East Indian, have far out=
stripped other races. But back of this period
lies the time when mankind struggled with
the elements, when every small advance
that seems to us now insignificant was an
achievement of the highest order, as great
as the discovery of steam power or of elec=
tricity, if not greater. It may well be, that
these early inventions were made hardly
consciously, certainly not by deliberate ef=
fort, yet every one of them represents a
giant's stride forward in the development of
human culture. To these early advances
the Negro race has contributed its liberal
share. While much of the history of early
invention is shrouded in darkness, it seems
likely that at a time when the European
was still satisfied with rude stone tools, the
African had invented or adopted the art of
smelting iron. „ 0
& —Franz Boas