Up from Slavery: An Autobiography
whole, adopt his process, it would settle the whole race question. It
mattered nothing that I tried to convince him that our present problem
was to teach the Negroes how to produce enough corn to last them
through one year. Another Chicago crank had a scheme by which he wanted
me to join him in an effort to close up all the National banks in the
country. If that was done, he felt sure it would put the Negro on his
feet.
The number of people who stand ready to consume one’s time, to no
purpose, is almost countless. At one time I spoke before a large
audience in Boston in the evening. The next morning I was awakened by
having a card brought to my room, and with it a message that some one
was anxious to see me. Thinking that it must be something very
important, I dressed hastily and went down. When I reached the hotel
office I found a blank and innocent-looking individual waiting for me,
who coolly remarked: “I heard you talk at a meeting last night. I
rather liked your talk, and so I came in this morning to hear you talk
some more.”
I am often asked how it is possible for me to superintend the work at
Tuskegee and at the same time be so much away from the school. In
partial answer to this I would say that I think I have learned, in some
degree at least, to disregard the old maxim which says, “Do not get
others to do that which you can do yourself.” My motto, on the other
hand, is, “Do not do that which others can do as well.”
One of the most encouraging signs in connection with the Tuskegee
school is found in the fact that the organization is so thorough that
the daily work of the school is not dependent upon the presence of any
one individual. The whole executive force, including instructors and
clerks, now numbers eighty-six. This force is so organized and
subdivided that the machinery of the school goes on day by day like
clockwork. Most of our teachers have been connected with the
institutions for a number of years, and are as much interested in it as
I am. In my absence, Mr. Warren Logan, the treasurer, who has been at
the school seventeen years, is the executive. He is efficiently
supported by Mrs. Washington, and by my faithful secretary, Mr. Emmett
J. Scott, who handles the bulk of my correspondence and keeps me in
daily touch with the life of the school, and who also keeps me informed
of whatever takes place in the South that concerns the race. I owe more
to his tact, wisdom, and hard work than I can describe.
The main executive work of the school, whether I am at Tuskegee or not,
centres in what we call the executive council. This council meets twice
a week, and is composed of the nine persons who are at the head of the
nine departments of the school. For example: Mrs. B.K. Bruce, the Lady
Principal, the widow of the late ex-senator Bruce, is a member of the
council, and represents in it all that pertains to the life of the
girls at the school. In addition to the executive council there is a
financial committee of six, that meets every week and decides upon the
expenditures for the week. Once a month, and sometimes oftener, there
is a general meeting of all the instructors. Aside from these there are
innumerable smaller meetings, such as that of the instructors in the
Phelps Hall Bible Training School, or of the instructors in the
agricultural department.
In order that I may keep in constant touch with the life of the
institution, I have a system of reports so arranged that a record of
the school’s work reaches me every day of the year, no matter in what
part of the country I am. I know by these reports even what students
are excused from school, and why they are excused—whether for reasons
of ill health or otherwise. Through the medium of these reports I know
each day what the income of the school in money is; I know how many
gallons of milk and how many pounds of butter come from the dairy; what
the bill of fare for the teachers and students is; whether a certain
kind of meat was boiled or baked, and whether certain vegetables served
in the dining room were bought from a store or procured from our own
farm. Human nature I find to be very much the same the world over, and
it is sometimes not hard to yield to the temptation to go to a barrel
of rice that has come from the store—with the grain all prepared to go
in the pot—rather than to take the time and trouble to go to the field
and dig and wash one’s own sweet potatoes, which might be prepared in a
manner to take the place of the rice.
I am often asked how, in the midst of so much work, a large part of
which is for the public, I can find time for any rest or recreation,
and what kind of recreation or sports I am fond of. This is rather a
difficult question to answer. I have a strong feeling that every
individual owes it to himself, and to the cause which he is serving, to
keep a vigorous, healthy body, with the nerves steady and strong,
prepared for great efforts and prepared for disappointments and trying
positions. As far as I can, I make it a rule to plan for each day’s
work—not merely to go through with the same routine of daily duties,
but to get rid of the routine work as early in the day as possible, and
then to enter upon some new or advance work. I make it a rule to clear
my desk every day, before leaving my office, of all correspondence and
memoranda, so that on the morrow I can begin a _new_ day of work. I
make it a rule never to let my work drive me, but to so master it, and
keep it in such complete control, and to keep so far ahead of it, that
I will be the master instead of the servant. There is a physical and
mental and spiritual enjoyment that comes from a consciousness of being
the absolute master of one’s work, in all its details, that is very
satisfactory and inspiring. My experience teaches me that, if one
learns to follow this plan, he gets a freshness of body and vigour of
mind out of work that goes a long way toward keeping him strong and
healthy. I believe that when one can grow to the point where he loves
his work, this gives him a kind of strength that is most valuable.
When I begin my work in the morning, I expect to have a successful and
pleasant day of it, but at the same time I prepare myself for
unpleasant and unexpected hard places. I prepared myself to hear that
one of our school buildings is on fire, or has burned, or that some
disagreeable accident has occurred, or that some one has abused me in a
public address or printed article, for something that I have done or
omitted to do, or for something that he had heard that I had
said—probably something that I had never thought of saying.
In nineteen years of continuous work I have taken but one vacation.
That was two years ago, when some of my friends put the money into my
hands and forced Mrs. Washington and myself to spend three months in
Europe. I have said that I believe it is the duty of every one to keep
his body in good condition. I try to look after the little ills, with
the idea that if I take care of the little ills the big ones will not
come. When I find myself unable to sleep well, I know that something is
wrong. If I find any part of my system the least weak, and not
performing its duty, I consult a good physician. The ability to sleep
well, at any time and in any place, I find of great advantage. I have
so trained myself that I can lie down for a nap of fifteen or twenty
minutes, and get up refreshed in body and mind.
I have said that I make it a rule to finish up each day’s work before
leaving it. There is, perhaps, one exception to this. When I have an
unusually difficult question to decide—one that appeals strongly to the
emotions—I find it a safe rule to sleep over it for a night, or to wait
until I have had an opportunity to talk it over with my wife and
friends.
As to my reading; the most time I get for solid reading is when I am on
the cars. Newspapers are to me a constant source of delight and
recreation. The only trouble is that I read too many of them. Fiction I
care little for. Frequently I have to almost force myself to read a
novel that is on every one’s lips. The kind of reading that I have the
greatest fondness for is biography. I like to be sure that I am reading
about a real man or a real thing. I think I do not go too far when I
say that I have read nearly every book and magazine article that has
been written about Abraham Lincoln. In literature he is my patron
saint.
Out of the twelve months in a year I suppose that, on an average, I
spend six months away from Tuskegee. While my being absent from the
school so much unquestionably has its disadvantages, yet there are at
the same time some compensations. The change of work brings a certain
kind of rest. I enjoy a ride of a long distance on the cars, when I am
permitted to ride where I can be comfortable. I get rest on the cars,
except when the inevitable individual who seems to be on every train
approaches me with the now familiar phrase: “Isn’t this Booker
Washington? I want to introduce myself to you.” Absence from the school
enables me to lose sight of the unimportant details of the work, and
study it in a broader and more comprehensive manner than I could do on
the grounds. This absence also brings me into contact with the best
work being done in educational lines, and into contact with the best
educators in the land.
But, after all this is said, the time when I get the most solid rest
and recreation is when I can be at Tuskegee, and, after our evening
meal is over, can sit down, as is our custom, with my wife and Portia
and Baker and Davidson, my three children, and read a story, or each
take turns in telling a story. To me there is nothing on earth equal to
that, although what is nearly equal to it is to go with them for an
hour or more, as we like to do on Sunday afternoons, into the woods,
where we can live for a while near the heart of nature, where no one
can disturb or vex us, surrounded by pure air, the trees, the
shrubbery, the flowers, and the sweet fragrance that springs from a
hundred plants, enjoying the chirp of the crickets and the songs of the
birds. This is solid rest.
My garden, also, what little time I can be at Tuskegee, is another
source of rest and enjoyment. Somehow I like, as often as possible, to
touch nature, not something that is artificial or an imitation, but the
real thing. When I can leave my office in time so that I can spend
thirty or forty minutes in spading the ground, in planting seeds, in
digging about the plants, I feel that I am coming into contact with
something that is giving me strength for the many duties and hard
places that await me out in the big world. I pity the man or woman who
has never learned to enjoy nature and to get strength and inspiration
out of it.
Aside from the large number of fowls and animals kept by the school, I
keep individually a number of pigs and fowls of the best grades, and in
raising these I take a great deal of pleasure. I think the pig is my
favourite animal. Few things are more satisfactory to me than a
high-grade Berkshire or Poland China pig.
Games I care little for. I have never seen a game of football. In cards
I do not know one card from another. A game of old-fashioned marbles
with my two boys, once in a while, is all I care for in this direction.
I suppose I would care for games now if I had had any time in my youth
to give to them, but that was not possible.
Chapter XVI.
Europe
In 1893 I was married to Miss Margaret James Murray, a native of
Mississippi, and a graduate of Fisk University, in Nashville, Tenn.,
who had come to Tuskegee as a teacher several years before, and at the
time we were married was filling the position of Lady Principal. Not
only is Mrs. Washington completely one with me in the work directly