Ci)e jfatlurr
of Cunningham
By Isabella M. Andrews
Reprinted from The Youth's Companion
Hampton Institute Press
1916
THIS STORY
Reprinted through the courtesy of its author and the Youth's
Companion for the friends of Hampton's work, is based upon
actual facts in the lives of Hampton students, and is given as
representative of the many that might be told of failures grown
to beautiful successes through earnest steadfastness of purpose.
Many of those who go out from the school with so little
that even their best friends feel that they are not by any means
prepared for the great struggle before them, do, through the
grace of God and the love of their fellows, form little centers
of light and influence in some of the darkest corners—corners
into which less rude and ignorant and simple workers could
hardly penetrate. Thus Hampton's "failures" may prove God's
successes.
The Failure of Cunningham
ISABELLA M. ANDREWS
/CUNNINGHAM did not mean to be funny. One look at
the solemnity of his coal-black face and the imperturbable
dignity of his carriage would have assured you of that; but when
Cunningham heard that the Government1 paid the expenses of the
Indians of Hampton Institute while the colored students had to
work their own way, and came with a bow and arrow over his
shoulder asking if Indians were not admitted free, we looked at
his unmistakably African personality and listened to his unmis¬
takably African speech, and thought Cunningham very funny
indeed.
Cunningham stayed; but he put his bow and arrow ,away
and apparently forgot that he had ever been an Indian. At the
same time he gave up his longings for luxurious ease, and chose
the blacksmith's trade. All day long he worked at it, and
when he presented himself at half-past seven o'clock in the night
school, there was no other such spotless young person in the
building.
For two years he worked in the night school. At the end
of this period it became necessary to tell him, for the fifth time,
that it would be impossible to promote him this time. Cun¬
ningham sighed.
"I ain't nevah ben p'omoted since I come to dis yeh school,
Miss," he said plaintively, "but ef yo' say it's bes' I reckon it
must be. When does yo' think I kin begin toe instruc' othas ?
I feel the spirit ob desire possessin' me toe go out and uplif' my
own people."
1 Government aid for Indians was withdrawn from Hampton Institute in
August, 1912.
It was hard to know what to say to Cunningham just then.
To share in the work of elevating his own people had become
his one ambition; but could we send out the blind to lead the
blind? We were beginning to consider him one of the hopeless
cases. He was perfectly faithful, patient, and eager to learn,
but apparently unable to grasp anything more complicated than
the first four principles in arithmetic and the simplest reading
and writing. It was hard to tell him that it was best for him to
take up again the old struggle with long division, and trust his
career as a teacher to the future.
He went back into the beginning class with pathetic patience.
The development of a worthy purpose had greatly changed him
since the time when he first came to Hampton with the idea of
being taken care of by the Government. There was no shirk in
Cunningham now.
At the close of the next term, when we were deliberating
whether we could stretch a point and promote him, a letter came
to the night school principal, saying that his father had died, and
his mother, with her children, was destitute. Cunningham must
come home and take care of them.
It was a cruel blow to the boy. Education had come to
mean to him everything worth living for. Must he put it aside
and take up again the wretched life he had outgrown ?
He turned his back on Hampton with a heavy heart, and went
home. I knew the place and many others like it through the
South. It was just a cluster of tumble-down Negro cabins a few
miles back from the railroad. The men were too lazy to work
the little farms that would have amply repaid the scantiest care;
the women too shiftless to do anything but smoke and gossip; the
children too numerous to count, growing up in absolute igno¬
rance and squalor. Poor Cunningham!
6
Once he wrote to say that he could probably never come
back, and asked for a few books to work with by himself. The
books were sent, and then among the cares that every day and hour
brought we lost sight of him for a time.
I think it was a year afterwards that I received this letter
from him:
Baptist Hill, N. C., February 15, 1887
Dear Miss Burt: I hope You has not forgot me. I am
very well an' hope you is the same. I rite You to say I am
getting along very well and hope you is too. I get jobs at my
trade over to the Four Corners an all time I kin teaches the
Pepel here, ef You has eny books to spare or enything at
tall plese rimember Me. When I lef Hampton I felt verry bad
but I foun I could do something atter all. The Lord is ben with
Me and my People and show Me how to help them respecs
to all frens.
Yours truly,
Chas. F. Cunningham
In his large, slow handwriting it covered three pages of the
coarse, blue-ruled sheet. With what infinite pains it had been
composed and copied I could well guess. Had I not seen Cun¬
ningham, with his big frame bent close to the desk and his fore¬
head beaded with perspiration, toil all through the half-hour's
writing period to make one row of letters on his copy paper?
So finished a production as this, made while he was at Hampton,
would have created a sensation among his teachers.
Needless to say that I answered at once with encouraging
words, and the more substantial aid of a box of books, magazines,
papers, and such tools of the trade as I could collect and Hamp¬
ton could spare. For it had many such calls. And again
Cunningham was out of our minds for a time.
In the middle of June I was obliged to take a railway journey
7
farther south. On my return, when within a day's ride of Hamp¬
ton, I missed a connection, and found myself stranded at a
desolate junction, with no possibility of getting away until the
next day. Fortunately, I remembered that the junction was the
nearest station to Cunningham's home. After engaging the least
objectionable room in the squalid hotel over the railroad station,
and eating the most objectionable dinner I ever tasted, I began
to look about for a conveyance to take me to Baptist Hill.
The outlook was not promising. The station, painted a
hideous orange color with white trimmings, stood alone in the
scrubby pine woods, where hardly a squirrel track was visible.
The few loungers that always mysteriously appear to watch an in¬
coming train had disappeared as mysteriously. No one remained
about the place except the telegraph operator, who was also ticket
agent, baggage master, and hotel keeper, his wife, a colored
maid-of-all-work, two shepherd dogs, a gray cat, and myself.
After two hours of this agreeable society, the sight of a
steer-cart plodding through the woods was a most welcome one.
I hurried out to see if the colored driver would take me to Baptist
Hill.
"Ya-as," he said, meditatively, "ef yo'kin hang on. I'se
gwine thar."
The cart consisted of a pair of wheels with a single plank
from one hub to the other, whereon the proprietor sat and
swung his feet in dangerous neighborhood, as I thought, to the
vicious-looking steer. As there were no accommodations for
freight of any kind, I inferred that this simple vehicle was in¬
tended for pleasure driving only. With an inward shudder I
gathered my skirts in my hand, and mounted the narrow seat.
There, with the wheel on one side and my charioteer on the
other, I could only swing my feet, clutch the plank firmly with
8
both hands, and give my whole mind to "hanging on,"
attending but slightly to my talkative driver.
I have a dim conviction that the road, after we left the
woods, was lined with holly trees, which even in summer have
a peculiar witchery for me, and that these were aflame with the
sturdy trumpet-flower clambering over them at random. I saw
here and there a stately magnolia in belated glory. But for the
most part that four-mile drive is a blank as regards what I saw
or heard. Like all things good and bad, however, it had an end.
"Heah yo' is," said my friend.
To my inquiries for his name he had grinned broadly and
said, "Deymos'ly calls me Puhsimmons, Miss." And with the
name Persimmons I contented myself, owing to the difficulty of
carrying on conversation.
"Dat young Cunningham, he make right smart ob a change
roun' heah, Miss. Dis yeah am de place."
We had driven into a bit of settlement that looked as little
as possible like my notion of what Baptist Hill was. The road
appeared to have been raked with a garden rake, so clean it was.
Every poor little hut, hanging like a bird's nest to its big outside
chimney, was gleaming with whitewash, and surrounded by a
rude, whitewashed fence.
The "store" had, of course, its group of loungers, but I
could see a man hoeing benind one of the cabins, another mend¬
ing a plow near by, and best of all, half a dozen women,
smoking, to be sure, but washing and hanging out clothes in the
yard of the largest cabin. One of them answered my inquiry for
Cunningham.
"Reckon he's right ober yander in de schoolhouse, Miss,"
she said grandly, "onless he's ben sen' foh' to Fo' Co'ners.
But dat ain' likely, cos de ain' no chillun roun'."
10
I had not noticed any building that seemed to be a scholhouse ;
but following the woman's gesture, I saw one of the whitewashed
cabins, distinguished from the rest by ajbench holding a tin basin,
on one side of the door, while on the other side hung an immense
brown towel. This was a good beginning.
I stepped across the road, and stood at the window an un¬
seen listener. The pathetic little room went to my heart-
There was not a sign of furniture in it, save a row of upturned
boxes and pails for seats. Even these had given out, and were
supplemented with a huge log rolled in from the woods, whereon
were uncomfortably perched between fifteen and twenty colored
children from six to sixteen years old. Every eye was solemnly
fixed on the teacher, and the teacher was Cunningham.
He had tacked upon the wall a large sheet of brown paper, and
with a piece of charcoal in his hand, was equipped as with black"
board and chalk.
"Thomas Jefferson," he said, "how much am five and
three ?"
Thomas Jefferson rose and began to count with something
in his hands. Then I saw that each child was counting and using
for counters—what but pine needles! Thomas finished his cal¬
culations.
"Seben," he said gravely.
There were shocked faces all around at Thomas's failure,
and eager hands went up to correct him.
"Calliny Johnson," said Cunningham, in precisely Miss
Thurman's schoolroom manner.
"Eight," answered Calliny, in an agony of delight at being
chosen.
"Toe be sho," said Cunningham.
He set down 5 -|-3=8 on his paper, and turning to the abashed
Thomas, said encouragingly,
11
"Now coun' em out again, Thomas Jefferson, an' then
come an' put it on de boa'd, an' yo' won't forgit nex' time."
I entered the doorway just then.
"How do you do, Cunningham ?" I said.
Cunningham looked as if he saw a ghost, and Calliny began to
cry.
"My Lawd a massy, Miss Burt!" said Cunningham, the big
tears beginning to roll down his cheeks. "How evah did yo'git
yeah? My, but I'se pow'ful glad to see yo'! Whar's—"
There he broke down, dropped his face into his hands, and
cried aloud. Joy at the sight of a face that was associated with
the best of his life, a new pang for the old sacrifice, all the dis¬
appointments and discouragements of the last two years were
cried out then and there.
The children cried because they didn't understand, and I
cried because I did. But we all pulled through and came to clear
weather again. Cunningham dismissed the school, and I heard
from him the story of his life since he left us, how he had built
and whitewashed his own cabin, and kept it spotlessly clean as
he had been taught to keep his room at Hampton; how he had
begun his school with only his own four brothers and sisters,
"For yo' knows,Miss, I nevah thought I could do anything, an'
I doan reckon anybody did." How the little leaven had worked
I did not need to be told.
After this visit to Cunningham, I stayed to visit the school
when the bell called it together again. I heard the first class
add, multiply, subtract, and divide, with figures below twenty,
and read in words with one syllable. I saw the second class per¬
form written addition and subtraction with their own brown paper
and charcoal, and heard them read in the first series of the "Na¬
ture Reader" I had sent. I saw the pupils write with the same
12
rude material, from a copy painfully made by Cunningham and
tacked on the wall, and I saw them make their orderly exit, sing¬
ing as they marched, "Dere were ten virgins when de bride¬
groom come."
School over, I went home with Cunningham, and shared the
supper of corn-meal mush and molasses which his fond old
mother put before us. I even attended the evening prayer-meet¬
ing he conducted in the open air, to which everyone in the
neighborhood seemed to have come. The people gathered around
to hear Cunningham's teacher talk and to talk in praise of him.
"He jus' done mek us w'ite," said one old turbanned
mammy.
Cunningham borrowed the only horse in the place from one
neighbor, and from another a cart, which, if not luxurious, was
a great improvement upon my conveyance of the morning.
Leaving the meeting in progress, we drove away in the fast fail¬
ing twilight—for I could not miss my early morning train.
Cunningham slept at the "hotel" also in order to say good-
by in the morning; but when I came down ready to leave, I found
that during the night a sick man back in the woods had sent for
him in urgent haste, and he had gone, leaving the farewell unsaid.
So ended my visit.
And this was our failure—our hopeless case! It was all
poor and plain and mean and sordid. But I went back to Hamp¬
ton and told my story in humbleness of heart. I did not need
to point the moral there. Perhaps I need not here.
13