HHI 
 
 
 ™2851 ; 
 
 
 .A83W2 
 

 
 ^ <-r ^^. 
 
 A 
 
 -^-0^ 
 
 ^^ 
 
 Ho^ 
 
 .' .^' 
 
 I-Jv 
 
 ,0 
 
 ^ V, 
 
 • ci^^^-w.'" _ o 
 
 .V^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 Hq, 
 
 
 
 
 ^"-^^^ 
 
 '^i'. 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
<^ 
 
 ^^ 
 
 
 'M 
 
 -* 
 
 
 >^> 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 ■r 
 
 VK\ 
 
 ''^•h 
 

 i.1 tlii^H ^* 
 
 THE GOOD OF IT 
 
 ENTRANCE TO STONE HALL, ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 HOW IT PAYS TO GIVE HIGHER EDUCATION 
 TO NEGROES — BEING SOME ACCOUNT OF 
 WHAT GRADUATES OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 ARE DOING FOR THE UPLIFTING OF THEIR 
 RACE — BY EDWARD TWICHELL WARE ^ ^ ^ 
 
 1902 
 
,)0 - ^r\ 
 
 EVERY GOOD TREE 
 BRINGETH FORTH 
 GOOD FRUIT — DO MEN 
 GATHER GRAPES OF 
 THORNS OR FIGS OF 
 THISTLES ? .^ ,£?,£>■ .£?• 
 
 NEW YORK PUBL. LrlBJt. 
 
ATLANTA UNIVERSITY GRADUATES* WORK 
 
 STONE HALL AND CAMPUS OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY. 
 
 HILE sitting at breakfast in a 
 ^JU^ hotel dining room in one of our 
 progressive soutliern cities, last 
 June, I fell into conversation 
 with a stranger who gave evi- 
 dence of possessing more than 
 ordinary intelligence and a 
 good fund of information, ex- 
 cept upon one subject. Yet 
 upon this particular subject he had most 
 decided opinions, and expressed himself 
 \Yith great force. We were talking about 
 education as a means of alleviating dis- 
 tressing social conditions. " And yet," 
 said he, "education doesn't always help. 
 Take the case of the Negro — when did 
 education ever do a Negro any good ? 
 Why, do you know three fourths'*bf'*tlte 
 Negroes in our prisons are educated." 
 " How much education do you suppose 
 they have ? " I asked. " They can read and 
 write," he answered, " that is about as far 
 as the Negro can go in education. What- 
 
 ever else he acquires is purely through the 
 faculty of imitation, and the pity of it is 
 that he always imitates what is worst." It 
 happened that I had recently visited the 
 schools and some of the homes of the 
 Negroes in that city (they were graduates 
 of Atlanta University) and so I asked him 
 if he had done the same. " No, I have 
 not," he answered, and then challenged 
 me again, " but when did you ever see an 
 education do a Negro any good ? " 
 
 This man was doubtless expressing his 
 honest conviction with reference to the edu- 
 cation of the Negroes, and I have related 
 the conversation in order to introduce an 
 answer to his question. If I state the 
 • .question in a slightly different form, it 
 ' will find many more subscribers. " When 
 did Higher Education ever do a Negro any 
 good ? " And because I wish to reach a 
 larger number of inquirers, I shall answer 
 it in this form, and because I wish to make 
 the answer convincing, I shall confine it to 
 
ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 what I know and have seen of the students 
 and graduates of Atlanta University. 
 
 For a record of the occupations of all the 
 graduates of this Institution, the reader 
 is referred to the table on the twenty-first 
 page. Let me call attention, however, to 
 this very significant fact : One of the chief 
 objects for the founding of Atlanta Uni- 
 versity was to supply the much needed 
 teachers for Negro schools. Today about 
 sixty per cent of the graduates are teaching. 
 About seventy-five per cent of the Negro 
 teachers of public schools in the city of 
 Atlanta are graduates of Atlanta Uni- 
 versity. 
 
 Ten per cent of the graduates of the 
 College Department are in distinctively 
 religious work. The difficulties which 
 confront educated men in the ministry 
 among the Negroes are peculiarly discour- 
 aging. We are often amused by the ac- 
 counts of meetings in the churches of the 
 
 Negroes ; the violent and noisy exhorting 
 of the preacher, the weird moaning and 
 shouting of the congregation, which in the 
 time of revival reaches such a pitch of ex- 
 citement as to throw the whole congrega- 
 tion into confusion. The religion which 
 finds this sort of expression is too often 
 devoid of practical effect upon the lives of 
 the people, and yet this sort of thing is 
 what ignorant Negroes demand. " Quench 
 not the Spirit," they say, and the ignorant 
 preachers, though often unprincipled, can 
 better satisfy this demand than those who 
 have learned by more genuine experience 
 what is the meaning of Christian faith. 
 The educated Christian minister does not 
 meet the demand of the ignorant people, 
 and, when he does succeed in leading them 
 to better things, he arouses the antagonism 
 of the ignorant ministers, who see in him 
 a dangerous rival. Because of these very 
 conditions, there is a crying need for an edu- 
 
 MONUMENT TO FIRST PRESIDENT AND FOUNDER OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, ERECTED BY 
 GRADUATES OVER HIS GRAVE ON THE CAMPUS. 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 CHURCH IN CHARLESTON, S. C, OF WHICH AN ATLANTA GRADUATE 
 OF 1879 IS PASTOR. 
 
 catecl ministry among these people. The 
 bUnd leaders have been leading the blind 
 too long already. By patience and perse- 
 verance and delicate handling of a difficult 
 problem, progress is being made, and 
 Christian men aie spoiling a picturesque 
 feature of Negro religious life by putting 
 in its place a genuine worship of God. 
 
 One of the graduates of Atlanta Univer- 
 sity of the class of 1876 has been for 
 twenty-five years pas- 
 tor of a Church in 
 Chattanooga, Tenn. 
 A few years ago the 
 other Negro churches 
 of that city united 
 with his in a series of 
 revival services held 
 in his church build- 
 ing. He was anxious 
 lest the meetings 
 should degenerate in- 
 to fruitless excite- 
 ment. "Still," he 
 said, " these people 
 know I do not wish 
 any such ' carryings- 
 
 on ' in our church." I 
 attended the first meet- 
 ing of the series and 
 though some of the 
 speakers certainly tried 
 to make the people 
 " rise," the service was 
 orderly and effective. 
 He tells me that he was 
 not able to keep the 
 desired control in all 
 the meetings, but there 
 was this advantage, that 
 all the people learned 
 that they were welcome 
 in his church, and he 
 was able to combat the 
 accusation that because 
 he was an educated 
 preacher his church was 
 no place for the igno- 
 rant. This church is now crowded to its 
 utmost capacity, and the people are con- 
 sidering the erecting of a new edifice at 
 the cost of ten thousand dollars. They 
 have decided not to build, however, until 
 they have all the money in hand. 
 
 The wife of this minister is also a gradu- 
 ate of Atlanta University. They have six 
 children, the oldest of whom will soon be 
 ready to come to Atlanta, They have a 
 
 CHURCH IN NEWNAN, GA., OF WHICH A GRADUATE OF 1894 IS PASTOR. 
 
ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 GATE CITY PUBLIC SCHOOL, ATLANTA, OF WHICH A GRADUATE OF 189O 
 IS PRINCIPAL. 
 
 pleasant home and are highly respected 
 by all who know them. For eleven years 
 this colored man served as a member of 
 the City Board of Education, being ap- 
 
 pointed to that office by the Mayor and 
 Aldermen. 
 
 The largest public school for the Negroes 
 in Georgia, is the Gate City School in At- 
 
 PRINCIPAL AND TEACHERS OF GATE CITY SCHOOL, ATLANTA. ALL BUT FOUR OF THE 
 FOURTEEN ARE GRADUATES OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY. 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 '"^%^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE, GREENSBORO, GA., ESTABLISHED 
 AND CONDUCTED BY A GRADUATE OF 1896. 
 
 lanta. The principal of that school and all 
 of the teachers, except four, are graduates 
 of Atlanta University, while one of these 
 four received most of her training there. 
 Over one thousand children attend this 
 school, one set coming in the morning 
 and the other in the afternoon. The 
 rooms are large and airy, the appearance 
 of the children for the most part neat and 
 
 tidy, and the discipline good. When I 
 visited the school, the principal had the 
 gong sounded for fire drill, and in four 
 minutes the six hundred children were all 
 out of the building and standing in line in 
 the yard. The public school system for 
 Negroes in the South is dependent for its 
 effectiveness upon just such institutions 
 as Atlanta University, where teachers can 
 
 TEACHERS AND PUPILS OF GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE. 
 
ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 be well trained and disciplined for their 
 work. 
 
 Last April I had the privilege of attend- 
 ing the Southern Educational Conference 
 at Athens, Ga., and while there I took oc- 
 casion to visit the schools for the Negroes 
 in that city, and everywhere I found the 
 graduates of Atlanta University. In the 
 West Broad Street School, the principal 
 is a graduate of the College Department, 
 and all the rest of the teachers are gradu- 
 ates of the Normal Department. In Knox 
 Institute, which is an American Missionary 
 
 among those in small places. A thrifty 
 and ambitious farmer of Greensboro, Ga., 
 agreed with his wife that their boys should 
 have a good education. Two of them grad- 
 uated from Atlanta University in 1896. 
 One of these brothers is now the principal 
 of the Walker Institute in Augusta, Ga., 
 a school of the Northern Baptist Church, 
 and the other is the founder and principal 
 of the Georgia Normal and Industrial Insti- 
 tute in Greensboro, Ga. His work started a 
 few years ago in a little four- room house, 
 but quickly outgrew its accommodations. 
 
 SEWING AND DRESSMAKING AT GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL 
 INSTITUTE. 
 
 Association School, the principal and head 
 of Industrial Department are graduates of 
 the College Department of Atlanta Univer- 
 sity, and all the rest of the teachers are 
 graduates of the Normal Department. 
 There are only two other schools for the 
 Negroes in Athens, and on rhe teaching 
 force of each I found Atlanta graduates. 
 Such is the contribution of Atlanta Univer- 
 sity to the educational work for the Negroes 
 in a city seventy miles away. 
 
 Work among the Negroes in the cities, 
 though of vital importance, lacks many of 
 the crude and interesting features of work 
 
 The young man then set to work, with 
 the industrial training he had received in 
 Atlanta University, to put up a building 
 of larger dimensions in which to house 
 his school. Last May I attended his 
 graduating exercises. The schoolhouse is 
 little more than a great barn, but it belongs 
 to the colored people of that community 
 and they are proud of it. Principal and 
 students work away at the finishing of 
 their schoolhouse as they find time and 
 money for materials. At commencement 
 they were rejoicing in a second floor re- 
 cently built, which made place for a chapel 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 TEACHERS AND PUPILS OF LAMSON SCHOOL, MARSHALLVILLE, GA. THE PRINCIPAL IS A GRADUATE 
 OF 1885 AND THREE OF HER ASSISTANTS ARE ALSO ATLANTA GRADUATES. 
 
 BIBLE TRAINING SCHOOL OF TUSKEGEE INSTITUTE, ALA., WHOSE DEAN (ALSO CHAPLAIN OF THE 
 INSTITUTE) IS A GRADUATE OF 1876. SIX OTHER GRADUATES ARE ALSO ASSISTING MR. WASHING 
 TON AT TUSKEGEE. 
 
10 
 
 ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 and two dormitor}- rooms. Formerly 
 the first floor had been two stories 
 high, fully twenty-five feet from floor 
 to rafters. The little house in which 
 the school began is now used for girls" 
 dormitory and dining-room. In this 
 department the mother of the prin- 
 cipal is his able assistant. Adjacent 
 to the little house, and back of the 
 school building is a garden, and in 
 the agricultural department the father 
 gives his services. In the large build- 
 ing are also sleeping rooms for the 
 boys, for there are one hundred stu- 
 dents enrolled, twenty-six of whom 
 are boarders. In front of the school 
 are scattered a few spreading pines 
 which shade a stretch of green grass 
 cropped close by the cows and mules. 
 At the time of my visit, under these 
 trees were arranged rough board 
 tables, and on them spread a simple 
 feast for parents and friends who had 
 come many miles by cart and mule 
 to see the -graduation." While I 
 was there several members of the 
 School Board, among them the Editor 
 of the County Paper, came out to visit the 
 school. They spoke words of hearty praise 
 for the principal and his work. IMost honor. 
 however, is really due to the farmer and 
 
 HAINES INSTITUTE, AUGUSTA, GA. 
 
 PRINCIPAL AND TEACHERS OF HAINES INSTITUTE, AU- 
 GUSTA, GA. THE FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL (IN THE 
 FOREGROUND WITH HANDS BEHIND) IS A GRADUATE OF 
 1873, AND SIX OF HER ASSISTANTS ARE ALSO ATLANTA 
 GR-ADUATES. 
 
 his wife who sent their sons to the place 
 Avhere they believed they could get the 
 best education, and did so at the cost of 
 peculiar sacrifice. 
 
 A visit to Tuskegee Institute is 
 always most agreeable to one who 
 is associated wit^ Atlanta Univer- 
 sity, not only because of the interest 
 that attracts ever}^ one to that mag- 
 nificent industrial work, and not 
 only because of the cordiality of 
 Mr. Washington, but also because 
 the Atlanta University graduates 
 working there are always ready to 
 greet old friends and make them 
 feel at home. The Chaplain, who 
 is also Dean of the Bible School, 
 and his wife and the wife of the 
 Treasurer and several of the other 
 workers are Atlanta graduates, put- 
 ting into practice at Tuskegee the 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 11 
 
 MANUAL TRAINING AT HAINES INSTITUTE, IN CHARGE OF AN ATLANTA 
 GRADUATE OF I90I. 
 
 training they have received at Atlanta Uni- 
 versity. 
 
 Time would fail me to tell of the Haines 
 Institute in Augusta, Ga., one of the schools 
 of the Freedmen's Board of the Presbyterian 
 Church, the founder and principal of which 
 with six of her assistants are graduates of 
 Atlanta University ; or of the Lamson 
 School in Marshallville, Ga., one of the A. 
 M. A. Schools, the founder and principal of 
 which with three of her assistants are grad- 
 uates of Atlanta University. There are one 
 hundred and twenty-five boys and girls at 
 the Lamson School now, and there will be 
 more when cotton-picking season is over, 
 for most of the pupils come from 
 the cotton fields and corn fields of 
 Georgia, and there first learn the 
 most rudimentary principles of liv- 
 ing. Nor can I tell much of the 
 Reed Orphan Home in Covington, 
 born of the sympathetic heart of 
 one of the Atlanta graduates who 
 went there to teach, and adopted a 
 motherless little child because there 
 was no one else to care for her. 
 And today this good woman tells 
 me that she can come to Atlanta 
 for a short visit without anxiety 
 
 because she leaves the 
 orphans in charge of 
 that little waif, now 
 grown, on whose ac- 
 count her work of 
 mercy was begun. 
 
 In each of the South- 
 ern States there is an 
 institution for agricul- 
 tural and mechanical 
 instruction of Negroes, 
 sometimes with normal 
 and collegiate depart- 
 ments, maintained by 
 the State government, 
 largely, if not w^holly, 
 with money received 
 from the United States 
 treasury under what are 
 known as the " Land Grant " and the " Mor- 
 rill " acts. These schools naturally require 
 teachers of high grade, fitted not only to 
 instruct but to organize and manage. It is 
 a significant fact that Atlanta University 
 has furnished teachers to no less than eight 
 of these institutions and to two of them 
 their presidents. The Georgia State In- 
 dustrial College for Colored Youth near 
 Savannah was originally organized in 1890 
 under an x'Vtlanta University graduate of the 
 class of 1876, who has remained at its head 
 to the present time, and a considerable por- 
 tion of his Faculty has usually been drawn 
 from fellow-graduates of his Alma Mater. 
 
 REED ORPHAN HOME, COVINGTON, GA., WHOSE FOUNDER 
 AND HOUSE-MOTHER IS A GRADUATE OF l88^. 
 
12 
 
 ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 At Lincoln Institute, Jefferson City, Mis- 
 souri, which is the Land Grant colored in- 
 stitution for that State, the recently ap- 
 pointed president is an Atlanta graduate of 
 the class of 1894, who for seven years had 
 been one of its professors, much of that 
 time, also, its vice-president. 
 
 In another of these State institutions, 
 that at Prairie View, Texas, two of the old- 
 est members of the Faculty came from At- 
 lanta University, one of them a graduate of 
 1883, now in his thirteenth year of service 
 there, and the other a non-graduate who 
 had taken only a partial course at Atlanta, 
 but who had proved so capable in his me- 
 chanical work that he was called upon for 
 several years to serve as assistant instructor 
 in the shop. At Prairie View he has su- 
 perintended the construction of several of 
 the school buildings and been intrusted 
 Avith the installing of thousands of dollars' 
 worth of expensive machinery and other 
 mechanical outfit. 
 
 Scattered all over the South are numer- 
 
 ous missionary schools for Negroes, often 
 of secondary and even higher grade, sup- 
 ported mainly by the churches of the dif- 
 ferent denominations both at the North and 
 the South. To very many of these institu- 
 tions, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, Con- 
 gregational, and Episcopalian, Atlanta Uni- 
 versity has furnished teachers for both aca- 
 demic and industrial work, and to a consid- 
 erable number of them their principals or 
 presidents. In one of these institutions, 
 Clark University at South Atlanta, Ga., an 
 Atlanta University graduate of the class of 
 1876 has held the chair of Classics for 
 twenty-six years, and is almost, if not quite, 
 the oldest member of the Faculty in time 
 of service. He is a speaker of marked 
 power, has delivered many public addresses 
 in the interest of his race, and written much 
 for the press, exerting a wide and whole- 
 some influence. 
 
 In quite a number of these missionary 
 schools the heads of the industrial depart- 
 ments or the instructors in them are gradu- 
 
 BOYS DORMITORY AND STUDENTS OF GEORGIA STATE INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE, NEAR SAVANNAH, GA. 
 WHOSE FIRST AND ONLY PRESIDEI^T IS AN ATLANTA GRADUATE OF 1876. 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 13 
 
 OFFICK AND LIBRARY OF PRESIDENT OF GEORGIA STATE INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE. 
 
 ates of Atlanta University. The Superin- 
 tendent of the Industrial Department of 
 Biddle University at Charlotte, N. C, the 
 large institution maintained by the Northern 
 Presbyterian Church, has for the past 
 eleven years been an Atlanta graduate of 
 the class of i8go, and one or more of the 
 buildings of that institution have been 
 erected by its students under his super- 
 vision. 
 
 The position of teacher is the vantage 
 ground from which most of the Atlanta 
 graduates reach out to help their fellows 
 up to better things, and yet occasionally 
 teaching opens the way for service that is 
 still more far-reaching. This was the case 
 with one of the Atlanta graduates who seven- 
 teen years ago went to Texas as a public 
 school teacher. When he traveled about 
 in that State, he could not fail to observe 
 the squalid condition of the Negro homes. 
 He chanced one day to read an account of 
 a certain village improvement society in 
 New England. With reference to this he 
 says, " I thought if the people of New Eng- 
 
 land needed such an organization, if with all 
 their wealth and culture and taste they had 
 found it advantageous to associate them- 
 selves together for the betterment of their 
 environment, how much more ought the 
 Negro, recently emancipated, without a 
 beautiful home, and with the worst kind 
 of environment, to take up work on these 
 lines." This was the beginning of the 
 Farmers' Improvement Society of Texas — 
 first a doubtful experiment, after five years 
 of persistent endeavor a well established 
 society in Oakland, and now an organiza- 
 tion with over a hundred branches scat- 
 tered over the State of Texas, with about 
 three thousand members who have bought 
 and largely paid for fifty thousand acres of 
 land, which with their other possessions 
 will bring their wealth up to three quarters 
 of a million dollars. Before an applicant 
 is allowed to pay his initiation fee and be 
 enrolled as a member, he is required by the 
 constitution of the society to answer cer- 
 tain questions in the affirmative, of which I 
 quote the following: 
 
14 
 
 ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 " Will you promise to do all in your 
 power to emancipate yourself from the 
 credit system ? " 
 
 " Will you endeavor to economize and 
 plan so that your efforts thus made will be 
 a success ? " 
 
 " Will you faithfully try to become a 
 better worker, and if you are a farmer, will 
 you make every effort to improve your 
 methods of agriculture ? " 
 
 " Do you hereby solemnly promise to 
 improve your home and make life pleasant 
 and agreeable for your family as far as you 
 are able ? " 
 
 The founder of this society is a man of 
 
 The Farmers' Improvement Society 
 holds an annual " convocation " and fair. 
 Last October it was held at Columbus, 
 Texas. The group of women in the pic- 
 ture on page sixteen calls to mind a branch 
 of the society which makes eligible the 
 " better half " in looking more carefully 
 after the pigs, chickens, eggs, butter and 
 other small products of the farm. It en- 
 joys the suggestive title of : 
 
 "THE WOMAN'S BARNYARD AUXILIARY OF THE 
 FARMERS' IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY OF TEXAS." 
 
 Not many of the Atlanta graduates have 
 gone into business, and yet those who have 
 are making a marked success of it. One 
 
 LINCOLN INSTITUTE, JEFFERSON CITY, MO., WHOSE 
 
 much native ability and of undaunted per- 
 severance. He attributes his success, how- 
 ever, largely to the mental training and dis- 
 cipline which he received at Atlanta Uni- 
 versity. His ability and usefulness have 
 been so far recognized by the people of his 
 State that he has twice been elected to the 
 Texas Legislature, and that by the aid of 
 votes of Southern white men in a predomi- 
 nantly white community. Quite recently he 
 has been appointed to an important and 
 lucrative Federal office in Texas by Presi- 
 dent Roosevelt, whose attention was first 
 drawn to him by an article of his in the 
 N. Y. Outlook, describing the work of the 
 Farmers' Improvement Society. 
 
 PRESIDENT IS AN ATLANTA GRADUATE OF IO94. 
 
 young man is a prosperous grocer in the 
 city of Atlanta. He read a paper at the 
 Conference of the Colored Men's Business 
 League of America in Chicago a few years 
 ago, in which he emphasized the impor- 
 tance of a thorough education for success 
 in business. 
 
 Last April while in Charleston, S. C, 
 walking down King Street, an important 
 business street of that city, my attention 
 was arrested by an unusually neat and 
 attractive shoe store. What was my sur- 
 prise and pleasure upon stopping to find in 
 charge of the store two Atlanta graduates 
 of the college class of 1899. These two 
 classmates went into that business about 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 15 
 
 PROFESSORS HOUSE AT BIDDLK UNIVERSITY, CHARLOTTE, 
 N. C, IN PROCESS OF ERECTION BY STUDENTS OF THAT 
 INSTITUTION, UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THEIR SUPERIN- 
 TENDENT OF INDUSTRIAL WORK, AN ATLANTA GRADUATE 
 OF 1890. 
 
 two years ago, and have been very success- 
 ful. They tell me that they have customers 
 among people of both races. 
 
 The four Atlanta graduates who have 
 studied medicine are doing remarkably 
 well. All of them were among the first 
 in their classes in the medical schools 
 which they attended. Two have been ap- 
 pointed city physicians for the Negroes in 
 Denver, Colo., and in Savannah, Ga., re- 
 spectively. The one who is located in 
 
 Atlanta has neat and attractive 
 rooms on Peachtree Street, 
 where I called upon him re- 
 cently. He says that there is 
 a great opportunity for colored 
 physicians, and great need for 
 them to work among their peo- 
 ple. The ignorance of great 
 numbers of the Negroes with 
 reference to the simplest and 
 most rudimentary principles of 
 hygiene is deplorable. Here is 
 opportunity for a noble work 
 for medical missionaries at 
 home ; and who can minister 
 more sympathetically or help- 
 fully to the needs of the Negroes 
 than carefully trained physicians from their 
 own number ? 
 
 Only two graduates of Atlanta Univer- 
 sity are practicing law as a means of liveli- 
 hood, though several others have studied 
 law and been admitted to the bar. One of 
 the two referred to, a graduate of 1881, has 
 for nearly twenty years had a successful 
 practice in Boston, not only among the nu- 
 merous Negroes of that city and Cambridge, 
 but among the Chinese, Italians, and white 
 
 SHOP FOR FORGE-WORK AT PRAIRIE VIEW STATK NORMAL SCHOOL, TEXAS, IN 
 PROCESS OF ERECTION BY STUDENTS OF THAT INSTITUTION, UNDER THE 
 DIRECTION OF THEIR SUPERINTENDENT OF INDUSTRIAL WORK, A FORMER 
 COLLEGE STUDENT AND TEACHER IN THE INDUSTRIAL DEPARTMENT OF AT- 
 LANTA UNIVERSITY. 
 
16 
 
 ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 CONVOCATION AND FAIR OF THE FARMERS' IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY OF TEXAS, FOUNDED BY A GRAD- 
 UATE OF 1880. 
 
 Americans as well. Drawing his clients in 
 good proportion from the races of four con- 
 tinents, he is perhaps the most cosmopoli- 
 tan lawyer in his city. A few years ago he 
 was honored with an appointment as Master- 
 in-Chancery by the late lamented Governor 
 Wolcott of Massachusetts. The other prac- 
 
 ticing lawyer, an Atlanta graduate of 1893, 
 is also succeeding well in his profession at 
 Augusta, Ga., and not long ago won a case 
 before the Supreme Court of Georgia against 
 white lawyers, which he had appealed from 
 a lower court. 
 
 After all, the real test of education is to 
 
 np^nrwrsrsp 
 
 EXHIBIT OF FARM PRODUCTS AT FAIR OF FARMERS' IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY OF 
 
 TEXAS. 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 17 
 
 be found in the home Ufe of the people. 
 Your minister may be eloquent, your doc- 
 tor skilled, and your teacher efficient, yet 
 if they have not the spirit of integrity and 
 gentleness and forbearance and service in 
 the home, their education is defective. 
 Wisdom without righteousness is folly, and 
 people do well to emphasize the moral 
 education of the Negroes. We believe that 
 the most effective channel by which to in- 
 stil the qualities of Christian character into 
 the hearts of people is that of personal 
 association. In the contact of living souls 
 is found the supreme quality of education. 
 Much is made, therefore, of the home life 
 at Atlanta University, where the students 
 coming jnto daily association with the 
 teachers may learn by the influence of 
 example. Eveiy student, even though he 
 has been a day pupil, must spend at least 
 one year in the school family before gradu- 
 ating. It certainly has been encouraging 
 for me, as I have been about in the South, 
 to visit the schools and homes of our 
 graduates, to see that they have not for- 
 gotten the good manners and Christian 
 customs learned at the Atlanta University. 
 In the home life of people rests the ruin 
 or welfare of the race. Upon this point 
 one of the normal graduates writes thus : 
 
 SHOE STORE IN CHARLESTON, S C, CONDUCTED BY 
 TWO COLLEGE GRADUATES OF 1 899. 
 
 " Not only have our graduates estab- 
 lished homes in the cities but many of 
 them have chosen to locate in the smaller 
 towns and country places, where the ex- 
 ample or object lesson of good homes and 
 
 OFFICE OF CITY PHYSICIAN FOR NEGROES, DENVER, COLO., AN ATLANTA 
 GRADUATE OF 1881. 
 
18 
 
 ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 HOME IN DECATUR, GA., OF A GRADUATE OF 1885 (RECENTLY DE- 
 CEASED), AND HIS WIFE, A GRADUATE OF 1886. 
 
 Christian character is in a sense more 
 needed. One of our normal graduates 
 went to a town where there was but one 
 house occupied by Negroes that had more 
 than one room. The first thing she did 
 after marrying was to build a five-room 
 cottage. This little cottage was an inspira- 
 tion to others in the community. They 
 
 began to feel that, with some effort and econ- 
 omy on their part, they too might improve 
 the condition of their own homes. To- 
 day, through the influence of this one life, 
 the people have been encouraged to im- 
 prove the conditions of their surroundings 
 by making additions to the one-room cabins 
 or building new ones. They own their own 
 homes, and there are few 
 one-room cabins in the com- 
 munity. This question of 
 good homes means much for 
 the people. It means better 
 morals, less sickness, stronger 
 children and fewer deaths. 
 How necessary is it then 
 that we appreciate more 
 highly the work done by our 
 old students in this direc- 
 tion ! The hope of the race 
 must be the foundation of 
 pure homes, built from the 
 high ideals that so many of 
 ' our graduates have shown 
 in planting theirs. We are 
 striving to make our homes 
 our castles in the true sense 
 of the word — not by fortifi- 
 cations against the mortal 
 
 HOME IN SAVANNAH, GA., OF A GRADUATE OF 1S79. 
 
GRADUATES' WORK 
 
 21 
 
 Summary of Atlanta University Graduates 
 and their Occupations 
 
 The following table is taken from the annual statement in the catalogue 
 of 1902, but does not include the graduates of that year. Including these, the 
 total number of graduates is now 429. 
 
 
 ♦College. 
 
 Normal. 
 
 tToTAL. 
 
 
 Number. 
 
 Per Cent. 
 
 Number. 
 
 Per Cent. 
 
 Number. 
 
 Per Cent. 
 
 TOTAL 
 
 104 
 88 
 16 
 91 
 13 
 91 
 76 
 15 
 
 56 
 
 10 
 
 9 
 
 5 
 4 
 2 
 1 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 100.0 
 84.6 
 15.4 
 
 87.5 
 12.5 
 100.0 
 83.5 
 16.5 
 
 61.5 
 11.0 
 9.9 
 5 5 
 4.4 
 2.2 
 LI 
 1.1 
 
 1.1 
 
 2.2 
 
 310 
 14 
 
 296 
 275 
 35 
 275 
 8 
 267 
 
 163 
 3 
 
 1 
 
 5 
 
 93 
 10 
 
 100.0 
 4.5 
 
 95.5 
 88.7 
 11.3 
 100.0 
 2.9 
 97.1 
 
 59.3 
 1.1 
 
 0.4 
 
 1.8 
 
 33.8 
 3.6 
 
 t412 
 
 102 
 
 t310 
 
 1364 
 
 48 
 1364 
 
 84 
 1280 
 
 +217 
 13 
 
 6 
 
 6 
 
 94 
 12 
 
 100.0 
 
 Male 
 
 24.8 
 
 
 75.2 
 
 
 88.3 
 
 Dead 
 
 11.7 
 
 LIVING 
 
 100.0 
 
 Male 
 
 23.1 
 
 
 76.9 
 
 OCCUPATIONS. 
 
 59.6 
 
 
 3.6 
 
 
 
 
 1.7 
 
 
 
 
 
 13entist 
 
 
 
 1.7 
 
 Married Women not otherwise des- 
 
 25.8 
 
 Undesignated 
 
 3.3 
 
 * Including three graduates from a theological course, 
 t Two students graduated in two departments. 
 
22 STATEMENT OF THE VORK 
 
 boys' dormitory. stone hall. gikls dormitory. 
 
 THE WORK OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 ( Thirty-fourth year) 
 
 Teacher Training 
 
 The principal work of Atlanta Univei'sity is the training of teachers for 
 the Negfo pnblic schools, especially in the cities and larger towns wJiere graded 
 schools, crowded with hundreds of cJiild7'en, call for teacJiers and principals with 
 ability to organise, discipline, and teach in the most effective manner. One and 
 a half million Negroes {one sixth of their entire niimber) live in the cities. 
 
 Industrial Teachers 
 
 In its departments of Mechanic Arts and Domestic Science, young men and 
 women are trained for positions as industrial teacJiers in private, industrial and 
 missionary schools and the State industrial colleges. The University is already 
 prepared to supply teachers of industry in the public common schools as soon as 
 such instruction is provided for. 
 
 Sociological Work 
 
 The University makes a specialty of the careful, scientific investigation of 
 the social, edticational, economic, and m.oral conditions of the Negro population, 
 for the double purpose of supplying accurate information to students of social 
 problems everywhere, and especially, for aiding and stimjilating its graduates in 
 efforts for social betterment. This zvork of Atlanta University has been highly 
 commended by the London Spectator and the Southern History Association. 
 
 M f> - 3 8» Curriculum 
 
 A college course of four years, preceded by a three years^ preparatory coui'se, 
 a normal course of fojir years, and an English high school course of three years, 
 make up the cui'riciUum. The completion of a grammar school training is re- 
 qtdred for admission into the lozvest classes. Industrial training is an integral 
 part of the various courses. Provision is also made for post-graduate study. 
 
 LfffG. 
 
OF ATLANTA UNIVERSITY 
 
 23 
 
 Unsectanan Position 
 
 Earnestly Christian, as required by its charter, yet entirely mtsectarian, the 
 institution is controlled solely by its ozun board of trustees, on which several 
 denominations are represented. Earnest efforts are made to imbue the students 
 with a missionary spirit, leading them to use their superior education in the 
 service of the masses of their race. 
 
 Enrollment 
 
 About JOO students are enrolled,, some 50 of them in the college course, 
 under 2^ teachers and officers. From the college and normal courses, 42g grad- 
 uates have been sent out, nearly all of ivhom have readily found permanent em- 
 ployment in teaching or other useful occupations. 
 
 The Plant 
 
 Five large brick buildings on a campus of sixty-five acres, an endoivcd library 
 of over 11,000 volumes, physical, chemical, and sociological laboratories zvith groiv- 
 ing equipment, and a large, well furnished printing office constitute the chief 
 
 features of the material plant, ivhich 
 is ivorth not less than $2^0,000. 
 
 KNUWLES INDUSTRIAL BUILDING. 
 
 Permanent Funds 
 
 /;/ round numbers, these are as 
 follows : 
 
 For scholarships .... $30,000 
 
 For general endowment . 12,000 
 
 For maintenance of library, 6,000 
 
 Total $48,000 
 
 Needs 
 
 The great need of the University is an endozvment of at least $^00,000. 
 The pressing need is money for current expenses. The total annual cost of the 
 zvork is about $^0,000. Of this the students themselves pay in cash about 
 $10,000, and the invested funds and a feiv miscellaneous revenues yield an in- 
 come of about $S,000. For the remaining $J^,000, the University is dependent 
 upon the annual gifts of its friends. 
 
 Legacies for endozvment or current 
 expenses should be made payable to ^'The 
 Trustees of the Atlanta University'' 
 in Atlanta, Ga., and attested by three 
 tvitnesses. 
 
 Remittances of any amount may 
 be addressed to 
 
 Horace BumSTEAD, President, or I 
 
 Myron IV. Adams, Treasure?-, 
 
 DOMESTIC SCIENCE BUILDINCi 
 
 Atlanta University, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
PRESIDENT CHARLES W. ELIOT, 
 OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY, IN 
 REFERRING TO THE WORK OF 
 ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, HAS SAID: 
 "BUT THERE IS ANOTHER ESSEN- 
 TIAL THING — NAMELY, THAT THE 
 TEACHERS, PREACHERS, PHYSI- 
 CIANS, LAWYERS, ENGINEERS, AND 
 SUPERIOR MECHANICS, THE LEAD- 
 ERS OF INDUSTRY, THROUGHOUT 
 THE NEGRO COMMUNITIES OF THE 
 SOUTH, SHOULD BE TRAINED IN 
 SUPERIOR INSTITUTIONS. IF ANY 
 EXPECT THAT THE NEGRO TEACH- 
 ERS OF THE SOUTH CAN BE ADE- 
 QUATELY EDUCATED IN PRIMARY 
 SCHOOLS, OR GRAMMAR SCHOOLS, 
 OR INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS PURE 
 AND SIMPLE, I CAN ONLY SAY IN 
 REPLY THAT THAT IS MORE THAN 
 WE CAN DO AT THE NORTH WITH 
 THE WHITE RACE. THE ONLY WAY 
 TO HAVE GOOD PRIMARY SCHOOLS 
 AND GRAMMAR SCHOOLS IN MASSA- 
 CHUSETTS IS TO HAVE HIGH AND 
 NORMAL SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES, 
 IN WHICH THE HIGHER TEACHERS 
 ARE TRAINED. IT MUST BE SO 
 THROUGHOUT THE SOUTH ; THE 
 NEGRO RACE NEEDS ABSOLUTELY 
 THESE HIGHER FACILITIES OF 
 EDUCATION." /s>^ jsf jsf £>- JEf £>^ 
 

 
 
■O-V /<>■ •!■ 
 
 ^"-^^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 4 CI 
 
 ^0-^* 
 
 v-^ 
 
 
 
 *' ^^^\ ^•, 
 
 ' » . s .U ^ O , i - ^v 
 
 A 
 
 'V 
 
 ^. 
 
 <^. 
 
 ••• *'^ .,, -^-j- ''■' -^ 
 
 0' 
 
 
 ^. 
 
 "fife. ^^ ^c,^ !*^p^^° '^^'^ '^^^fe- '^'^''^ ^~^^^W^^ ^'l -^k^^ 
 
 > 
 
 
 V ,^ 
 
 ^fe^:^ 
 
 " ^'X ^P 
 
/% "^^K^ /^\. ^^^i¥^^ -^^"^ '^. 
 
 
 
 * „ .. a ' 
 
 O VO- o ° " " « ■<*>, 
 
 ^0 
 
 
 
 
 ^^^i^^.^ ^^ '^-- '-^ 
 
 * o - o' 
 
 jP -7*. ' ^ ^*^ ^, 1.0 v*. ' ^ 
 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS ^:j 
 
 019 593 913 5