Chapter XXXVIII: How to Help the Negro to Help Himself 468 (22)

In 1886 he married Miss Mamie E. Nichols, a descendant of
one of the older Washington families, who graces a happy
home. They have been blessed with two boys, whom they are
trying to rear and educate to become good men.

The resistance of the white people to the progress of the colored people is least along the line of business. The colored people themselves have only to develop a larger spirit of race help in business and a magnificent future is just ahead for them.

In addition to little capital and much inexperience the colored merchant has to contend against a hostile public opinion, which seems to resent his efforts to improve his own condition and that of his own race, when he assumes to tear himself away from the mass of his fellow laborers and attempts to keep store like a white man.

Strange enough this hostile feeling is shared in, more by the colored than by the white people, especially along certain lines of business not of a semi-social nature. It is a matter of common complaint by colored business men in those classes of business in which they must compete with white merchants that they do not get their share of the trade of their own race and that their patronage comes very largely from the white race. At present the pathway of the colored man to success in business is very much handicapped by this unfriendly public opinion. His problem is to win the confidence of the public in his ability and purpose to serve them as well as or better than his competitors.

Individuals, here and there, have won this public confidence to a surprising degree and are demonstrating day by day the ability of men and women to do business according to approved business methods. The hostility of the whites is but another manifestation of the general feeling of race prejudice; but the hostility of the masses of their own race can only be attributed to envy and ignorance. For every colored man, woman and child should rejoice in the success or upward step of any colored person, because it is an inspiration and a hope to thousands of others to follow his example. Only the strongest and most progressive few of any race can be successful pioneers. The masses of all races are LED to attempt only what they see persons of their own kind doing. Every community of colored people needs, as a powerful uplifting force, a few captains of industry who will lead his people along the pathway of home-getting and the undertaking of business enterprises. For business will develop their sense of independence and personal responsibility and give strength and symmetry to character. No better service can be performed for the race at this time than to turn the light upon those successful business men and women of the colored race in every community, so that our youth may see them, know them, and take inspiration and courage from their example.

The real leaders of the race are those who lead in doing. It has been said that ninety per cent of all business enterprises among the highly favored white race finally fail in the lifetime of their promoters. The conditions of success in business for the white race are so exacting, uncertain, changeable and inscrutable that only ten per cent retire from the contest victorious. When we recall the fact that the colored people have come so recently from savagery, through the barbarism and debasing effects of American slavery, into the light of the present-day civilization, we should expect them to be slow in getting a footing in the shifting and ever-changing sands of the business world, while in slavery they were deprived of every opportunity to learn anything about the art of business or even to drink in its spirit. It was one of the essential conditions of the slave system that they should be taught to distrust each other; and they learned this lesson well. We must expect that it will take some time to unlearn it. Along with this blighting feeling of distrust the seeds of envy and jealousy were carefully sown. These seeds must have fallen in good soil, for they sprang up and increased wonderfully, and now constitute the thorns and weeds in the pathway of the colored man's success in business.

In view of their economic, educational and political history, we should naturally expect the colored race to make in the first generation of their freedom more progress in education and general culture, more progress in the building of churches and in the acquisition of homes and lands than in the exacting arena of business. At any rate such has been the fact. The entire race is passing through a hard and severe economic struggle. The whole nation is in the throes of a great social distress, on account of the presence of this colored race with physical aspects so different from the main body of the people. The colored people are being put to a severe test. They are being tried as it were by fire. They are face to face and in competition with the most efficient, the most exacting people the world has ever seen. The dross is being driven off. The race is being purified and strengthened for the contests which are to follow. The colored man or woman who would succeed in business must meet not only the competition of his white neighbor with his superior capital and training, but also the blight of distrust and the jealousy and envy of many of his own race. His course is by no means plain sailing. He has foes within his race as well as foes without; enemies in front and enemies in the rear. And yet, in spite of all these adverse conditions a very creditable beginning has already been made in the business world--a beginning that promises well for the future. The business movement among the colored people has not as yet attained great volume, but its foundations have been laid broad and deep. The number of persons engaged in business is quite large, and the classes already invaded by individuals of the colored race cover almost every class of business in which persons of the white race are engaged.

THE CAPITAL OWNED BY NEGROES.

The colored people are rapidly acquiring property. This is a matter of common, every-day observation. The value of property owned by them is no less than five hundred millions of dollars. In Georgia alone, where separate records are kept, their assessed valuation exceeds fifteen millions, one million of which was added in the past year. The assessed valuation is only about forty per cent of the actual value. From all over the country equally encouraging reports are sent out of the steady progress of this people in the acquisition of landed property. Although tens of thousands are shiftless, thousands are saving money. It is being stored up slowly but surely for future use. Much of it is already invested in business. A larger part of this property and money will be turned into business channels as fast as the race, by its patronage and support, evidences its desire to advance this business movement.

THE EXTENT OF THE BUSINESS MOVEMENT AMONG THE NEGROES.

In order to obtain reliable data for a study of the progress of the colored people in the skilled trades, in business, in getting homes and in building churches and other institutions, the United States Commission to the Paris Exposition of 1900 sent out the writer in February of that year as an expert agent to visit the chief industrial centers of the South and secure the data for the purpose of making the facts collected, a feature of the Negro exhibit. In every city or town visited the colored people took great pride in showing their successful business establishments; and they all had some to show. In every place a beginning had been made. The writer personally visited, inspected and collected data from one hundred and forty-three business establishments of considerable importance owned and conducted by colored men and women. They range from a grocery store, with stock and fixtures of the value of five hundred dollars, to a bank, which, on the day of my visit, had a cash balance in its vault of $82,000. Only the best business places were visited. There were hundreds of small shops in the cities and towns visited, all of which evidenced the breadth of the business movement of the people.

THE ATLANTA UNIVERSITY CONFERENCE.

The results of this hurried trip corroborates in a remarkable degree the report of the Atlanta University Conference. "The Report of the Negro in Business" was made in 1899. In that year the conference made an investigation of this subject under the direction of Prof. W. E. B. DuBois, professor of sociology in that university. This report is a most valuable contribution to the study of the race problem. Prof. DuBois has shown commendable zeal in studying the race problem, while so many others are content to discuss it. The data for his study were collected principally by the alumni of Atlanta University and are thus entitled to a high degree of credibility.

Reports were received from one thousand nine hundred and six colored men and women in business, showing the kind of business, time in business, and the amount of capital invested. Almost every kind of business carried on by white people was represented, thus evidencing a desire and a reaching out on the part of the Negro that will produce great results in years to come. Only establishments of considerable importance were solicited and reported.

Time in business: Four-fifths had been established five years or more; one-fifth more than twenty years. Sixty-seven more than thirty years. This shows a remarkable longevity in business that is highly gratifying.

Capital invested: Complete returns were not received from all; only 1,736 establishments reported capital. Their aggregate capital was $5,631,137. Prof. DuBois estimated that the total amount invested by American Negroes in business managed by themselves in 1899 was $8,784,000. Compared with the immense sum of money invested in business in the United States, this seems meager enough; but when we consider the poverty of the colored people at the beginning of their freedom, the saving and investment of nearly $9,000,000 in business enterprises conducted by themselves in one generation is a most creditable showing.

By far the larger part of the capital of the colored people is as yet invested in enterprises conducted by white persons. In the city of Washington, where the idea of the advantage to the race in having a number of successful business enterprises has been very much agitated, only about one-fifth of its wealthy colored people have any investments in enterprises conducted by colored men, as shown in the report of the Hampton Conference for 1898. A like proportion will doubtless be found in other cities.

THE CENSUS OF 1890 ON NEGRO BUSINESS.

According to the census of 1890 (the returns from the census of 1900 on this subject not being available at this writing), taken twenty-five years after the war, the colored people had representatives engaged in every business listed in the census schedules. It is true that the number of persons engaged and the capital engaged in some branches of business were not imposing, yet an effort had been made--a start, a beginning had been made in every branch of business carried on in this country. The census of 1890 does not in all cases make a distinction between "proprietor" and occupation. Hence, it is not always easy to pick out the "proprietors." The tables have been gone over very carefully. Only those occupations have been selected about which there can be no doubt that the persons listed are "proprietors." The total number of persons of Negro descent engaged in business in 1890 was 20,020.

It is obvious to any one who has paid even a little attention to it that there has been a considerable increase since 1890, in the number of such business ventures and in the capital employed.

THE NATIONAL NEGRO BUSINESS LEAGUE.

As an evidence that the race is rapidly advancing along business lines, a conference or convention of colored business men was called by Mr. Booker T. Washington to meet in Boston August 23-24, 1900, for the purpose of making a showing of the progress of the race in business and to give encouragement and impetus to the business movement. The success of this convention was a pleasant surprise to many persons. Over two hundred delegates reported in person, and nearly two hundred additional reported by letter. The tone of the reports they brought from their several localities was uniformly hopeful. Most of the delegates present lived outside of New England, some coming from as far south as Florida and Texas, and as far west as Nebraska. A permanent organization was formed, called The National Negro Business League, the purpose of which is to keep its members in touch with one another. Their "Proceedings" were published by Mr. J. R. Hamm of No. 46 Howard street, Boston, in a handsome volume of two hundred and eighty pages, and constitutes one of the most valuable contributions to the study of the progress of the colored people.

This business league held its second annual convention in Chicago in August, 1901. This meeting also was a great success in every way, and received, if possible, more attention and space from the public press than the previous meeting in Boston.

A recent study of the colored business enterprises of Washington, published by the writer, shows that there are in the National capital 1,302 colored "proprietors" in all kinds of business and professions. Their capital exceeds seven hundred thousand dollars, and they transact more than two million dollars worth of business annually, affording employment to 3,030 persons.

Among the more conspicuous examples of successful enterprises conducted by colored men in the United States may be mentioned the following: Thirteen building and loan associations, seven banks, about one hundred life insurance and benefit companies, several mining companies, one street railway company, one iron foundry, one cotton mill, one silk mill, three book and tract publication houses, one of them having a plant valued at $45,000; over two hundred newspapers and three magazines. One of these newspapers has 5,000 subscribers and a plant costing $10,000. One firm of truck gardeners, near Charleston, South Carolina, over 500 acres under cultivation, has been in the business over 30 years and ships several carloads of garden truck to Northern markets every week. The railroad company considers its trade of such importance that it has built a siding to their farm and the cars are loaded directly from their warehouses. This is probably the most extensive individual or partnership business carried on by colored men anywhere in the United States. Noisette Bros. is the name of the firm. Near Kansas City, Kansas, there is a colored man, Mr. J. K. Graves, who owns and cultivates over 400 acres of land. He has been engaged principally in raising potatoes. His crop last year was over 75,000 bushels, which, with the other things raised and sold, was worth about $25,000. Within a radius of thirty-five miles of his farm, he says that there are 312 Negro farmers, horticulturists, gardeners, truckers, potato growers and dealers, most of whom are up to date and have all modern appliances necessary to carry on their business.

Mr. C. C. Leslie, a dealer in fish in Charleston, South Carolina, has $30,000 invested in the business, in nets, boats, ice-houses, real estate, etc., and ships to Northern markets from three to five carloads of fish per week during the busy season.

In Charleston the most prosperous butchers are colored men. In Columbus, Mississippi, there is a colored butcher who owns his abattoir and supplies the best trade of his town with meat. Some of the most prosperous fish, produce and poultry dealers in the markets of Washington are colored men. One firm has been in business continuously over thirty years, the sons succeeding the father in the business. Several have maintained their stands over twenty years.

A pawnbroker in Augusta, Georgia, has $5,000 capital. The largest and best equipped drug store in Anniston, Alabama, is owned by a colored physician. He has a considerable wholesale trade in patent medicines and druggists' sundries.

One of the best equipped ready-made clothing stores in Columbia, South Carolina, is owned by a colored man. He carries a stock of ten thousand dollars.

A stock breeder in Knoxville, Tennessee, is worth $100,000, and has $50,000 invested in blooded horses.

A photographer in St. Paul, Minnesota, does a business of $20,000 a year. Another in New Bedford, Massachusetts, began as an errand boy, learned the photographic art thoroughly, saved his money, bought out the white proprietor, and now conducts the leading studio in that old and aristocratic city.

The caterers of Philadelphia and Baltimore have long been noted for their success in business, although they have lost some ground from white competition during the last few years. There are yet several with capital above $5,000.

The caterer at the great naval banquet at Newport in honor of Admiral Sampson and our navy upon its return from the victories in the war with Spain, where the very unusual task was accomplished of serving one thousand men in a very satisfactory manner, was a colored man.

The foregoing are only a few of the many examples of success that individuals of the colored people have achieved in business. They are cited by way of "a bill of specifications." They show conclusively that, in spite of many adverse conditions, it is possible for a colored person, by perseverance and honesty, to succeed in business.

THIRD PAPER.

THE NEGRO AS A BUSINESS MAN.

BY REV. J. H. MORGAN.

REV. J. H. MORGAN.

Rev. J. H. Morgan was born in Philadelphia, Pa., November
15, 1843. His father was Rev. John R. V. Morgan. His
mother's maiden name was Mary Ann Harmon. At his mother's
death, which occurred when he was fourteen years old, he was
adopted into the family of James T. Robinson of
Philadelphia. Becoming dissatisfied at some fancied slight,
he left without authority, determined to provide for
himself, and be his own man. He soon found that the job was
not so easily done, as thought about, nevertheless he was
determined to win out, so he kept at it, and being of a
jovial disposition he soon made friends, and had the happy
faculty of keeping them. He started in the business of
selling home-made pies and cakes along the wharves. After a
short time he gave up this business for that of cabin boy on
a passenger boat plying between Philadelphia and Bristol,
Pa., making Bristol his home. At the breaking out of the
Civil War he was very anxious to enlist as a soldier, but
they informed him at Trenton, that it was a white man's war
and they were not taking colored men, as their ankles set so
near the middle of their feet, that when they said forward
march, they would be as likely to go backward as forward, so
he hired as a cook in an officers' mess and went to the
front with Company C First Regiment N. J. V. six months'
men. He was not down there long before he lost all his
desire to become a soldier, when the opportunity came for
him to enlist. While in Alexandria, Va., he started in to
learn the barber trade, and on his return home worked as a
journeyman at his trade until he set up in business for
himself.

In 1876 he organized a mission at Poughkeepsie, N. Y., and
being young and enthusiastic, he requested at the next
conference to be sent to the mission to build it up. Bishop
Payne demurred, but after his persistence in the matter, he
consented, saying, "Well I will let you make your own
appointment this time, but will be expecting to hear from
you before the year is out, asking for a change." So after
ordaining him an Elder in Sullivan Street Church, May 12,
1878, he was stationed at Poughkeepsie. There he had some
misunderstanding with the people, which caused them to
promise to "cut his bread and butter short," which promise
he says was the only one that they made, that they
faithfully carried out. One day they fed his family on wind
pudding, air sauce and balloon trimmings, and right here
Bishop D. A. Payne became a prophet, because he heard from
him, and his time was short, as in a few days after he
received an appointment to Albany, N. Y., and was returned
the following year on account of effective service done. At
the following conference he was elected as delegate to the
General Conference at St. Louis with Rev. W. F. Dickerson,
John F. Thomas and C. T. Shaffer. On his return from the
conference he was transferred to N. J. Conference and
stationed at Princeton, N. J., and with the exception of
four years spent in the N. E. Conference, one in the N. Y.
Conference, he has remained in the N. J. Conference. Rev.
Morgan is the recognized historian of the conference, and
was its secretary for a number of years, and was the
Vice-President of the first Board of Church Extension. The
Reverend is known in his conference under the cognomen of
"The Only Morgan"--his description of things and events
gaining for him this title. He was made Presiding Elder by
Bishop H. M. Turner, and he thus describes his return from
the Presiding Eldership to one of the weakest appointments
in another conference: "Milton, or some one, says that the
devil was nine days falling from heaven to hell; I made the
trip in less than twenty minutes." Bishop H. M. Turner's
second wife and the subject of this sketch were converted in
and became members of the same church at Bristol, Pa. He was
considered an exceptionally good superintendent of the
Sabbath school before he was a member of the church. It was
during the time that he was a local preacher at this church
that he learned the lesson of his life. "I had a fair
smattering of an education and, being in business, I was
always consulted in the affairs of the church."

It becomes more and more evident every day of our existence, as individuals, and as a race, that a grave mistake has been made by those who have heretofore, or may be now, making claim to leadership of making higher education the main and only route to the full development of the race. The higher education is in the order of specials. It is true that we need the artistic structure, but we need first a foundation upon which to rest it. We seem to have started with the idea that the structure has already been laid, which is true as concerns the other man. But we have not laid one foot ourselves, but are endeavoring to build upon another's, and as often as we build and finish the structure, the other man, by virtue of owning the foundation and that upon which it rests, claims and takes all (under the fixed rule that the people who own the land will rule it), and the last state is worse than the first, unless this happens at a time of life when the experience will become a lesson, well learned, and time allotted for a new start along the proper lines. It is, therefore, very evident that the essential thing in the line of individual and race development, is business. Business, we discover, when properly defined, leads in its various ramifications to all roads to success.

Business defined.--"The state of being anxious; anxiety; care. The act of engaging industriously in certain occupations. The act of forming mercantile or financial bargains, more generally an abundance of such acts done by separate individuals."

Crabb thus distinguishes between business, occupation, employment, engagement, and avocation: "Business occupies all of a person's thoughts, as well as his time and powers; occupation and employment occupy only his time and strength; the first is most regular--it is the object of his choice; the second is causal--it depends on the will of another. Engagement is a partial employment; avocation a particular engagement; an engagement prevents us from doing anything else; an avocation calls off or prevents us from doing what we wish. A person who is busy has much to attend to, and attends to it closely; a person who is occupied has a full share of business without any pressure; he is opposed to one who is idle; a person who is employed has the present moment filled up; he is not in a state of inaction; the person who is engaged is not at liberty to be otherwise employed--his time is not his own--he is opposed to one at leisure."

Business, trade, profession, and art are thus discriminated: "The words are synonymous in the sense of a calling, for the purpose of a livelihood; business is general; business, trade and profession are particular; all trade is business, but all business is not trade. Buying and selling of merchandise is inseparable from trade; but the exercise of one's knowledge and experience, for the purpose of gain, constitutes a business; when particular skill is required, it is a profession; and when there is a particular exercise of art, it is an art; every shopkeeper and retail dealer carries on a trade; brokers, manufacturers, bankers, and others, carry on a business; clergymen, medical or military men follow a profession; musicians and painters follow an art."

The distinction between business, office, and duty: "Business is what one prescribes to one's self; office is prescribed by another; duty is prescribed or enjoined by a fixed rule of propriety; mercantile concerns are the business which a man takes upon himself; the management of parish concerns is an office imposed upon him, often much against his inclination; the maintenance of his family is a duty which his conscience enjoins upon him to perform. Business and duty are public or private; office is mostly of a public nature; a minister of state, by virtue of office, has always public business to perform; but men in general have only private business to transact; a minister of religion has always public duties to perform in his ministerial capacity; every other man has personal or relative duties which he is called upon to discharge according to his station."--Crabb: Eng. Synon.

There has been a vast number of theories advanced as regards the solving of the Negro problem. But the idea of business seems to have only a minor place, which, to our mind, should be one of the leading factors. It seems that the race has been educated away from itself. It is not an uncommon thing to see young men who have splendid educational abilities, versed in the languages, with check aprons on, scrubbing marble steps, and doing other menial labor. Their plea is, when questioned along this line, "I cannot get anything else to do." To what advantage then, has the hard earned money of their parents and friends been expended to educate them? Their fathers did as well as, if not better, than they without it, and cannot this man, with the advantage of education, "turn up something"? There is something radically wrong with the plan of education. The old man could plod over the farm in his antiquated way, and earn money enough to keep things going, and educate his son, but when that son's education has been completed, he has not the ability, or business tact, with modern improvements, to build upon the foundation laid by his less cultured father. Let this cultured boy get down to business. For him, here is the route laid down.

Secretary of Agriculture, Hon. Mr. Wilson, in discussing the productive possibilities of the South and the problem of Negro labor, makes the following observations: "The pressing question is, what is the laborer down South who has been growing cotton, and is not getting enough for his product, to do in the future to enable him to live comfortably, not to speak of the improvement of his condition, education, and all that?"

The cotton crop leaves very little that is valuable for domestic animals after the picking is done, thus differing from the corn crop of the Northwestern states. There is a by-product, the cotton seed, that is exceedingly valuable, and much good work is being done by scientists at experiment stations to show how valuable cotton seed is for feeding purposes.

The nitrogen element in cotton-seed is greater than that of any of the grains; it is richer in nitrogenous matter than peas or beans; richer than gluten, meat or oil cake. The Northern feeder and the European feeder have been using this by-product of the cottonfields with great advantage, while the loss of its fertilizing qualities to the South has been very great.

The South has more marked advantages over the North with regard to production. It has heat and moisture, the two great factors of production, and if the cotton grower is to diversify his crops, he must use those natural advantages. The dairy cow and mutton sheep would succeed admirably in the South, but something for them to eat must be provided first. The winters in the South are mild, grasses, grains, legumen can be sown in the fall and grow abundantly in the winter, upon which the dairy cow and mutton sheep may thrive and prosper. From one-fifth to one-fourth of all the fat of the milk on the farms of the United States is lost because people do not thoroughly understand when to churn cream. The churning process is an art, having much science underlying it. But the cotton grower of the South only needs to learn the way, while the man who teaches him can understand the science. Much yet remains to be discovered in the art of breeding animals, but enough is known to indicate to the instructor of the colored cotton grower of the South, who is to be diverted into work of this kind, to enable him to breed his herd intelligently. The South can prepare the spring lamb much earlier than the North can. The Southern land owner understands horse raising. There is always a greater demand for saddle horses than is supplied. The world wants carriage and draft horses, and good roadsters. Early spring chickens--the broilers--can be produced down there because of the milder winters, and milder springs than we have, and the Northern market can be supplied. Should the market be over supplied we can send this product abroad in the refrigerating compartments of steamships.

The colored man is learning the trades at Tuskegee; he is mining coal, and working the manufacture of iron at Birmingham. We quote this gentleman, who is without doubt authority on this special line, and therefore worthy of serious and careful consideration, to support the point we make, that this problem must be worked out along lines, especially along business lines.

BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES.

Hawaii, Porto Rico, and the Philippines are absolutely ours. The Philippines are said to be as large as the New England States, including New York and New Jersey; Hawaii about the size of New England; Porto Rico the size of Connecticut. Hawaii, with a population of 109,000; Porto Rico, 900,000; Philippines, 8,000,000, and very few whites; a climate in which the Anglo Saxon, it is said, cannot stay for any great length of time. And it is rich in all those thing which are desirable by the white man. These acquisitions must be developed by American genius and capital, and as the white American cannot stay there the year round to develop the same, what better agent to do this work than the Afro-American who has been schooled in American ideas and customs and usages. Is not this an opportunity given by Providence to commence business building? The race should cease pleading to be "The Wards of the Nation;" cease waiting for something to turn up, or have somebody to do something for them, but should unite their forces and turn up something for themselves. The people who own the country, if intelligent and thrifty, will rule and run it. What Coleman has done in North Carolina in a business way, could be done in a majority of the states to a greater or less extent. Small factories could be arranged for, where our people could be employed in producing the commodities of life. Some time ago it was said that a large tract of land had been arranged for, backed by a number of Tammany Hall capitalists; factories were to be built to give employment to the settlers, deeds for lots were to be given at a nominal cost. The project was opposed by some of our so-called leaders, because it was backed by Tammany; but it is the very thing needed, no matter who backs it up; it is the business men who run the country; it is they who put the millions to work and keep the mighty dollar in circulation; we must enter the business world and by pluck, tact and thrift, live while we are living, and die when we cannot do otherwise. The man who thanks Almighty God when the news of disaster comes from land or sea that no loss comes to him is not so wise in the sight of God, or man, as he who can thank God that the interest on accrued stock had advanced an hundred fold before the crash came.

TOPIC XXVI.

THE NEGRO AS A FARMER

BY PROF. GEORGE W. CARVER.

PROF. GEORGE W. CARVER, M. AG.

A few years ago there was graduated at the Iowa Agricultural
College a young colored man of unusual promise. His name was
G. W. Carver, and his specialty the care and production of
plants. Not long after graduation he was engaged by Booker
T. Washington as a teacher and assistant in his famous
industrial school, and to-day the young man is Mr.
Washington's most trusted adviser, while his reputation has
gone abroad as a scientist and an original investigator of
no mean order.

Born during the period of the Civil War, he was separated
from his parents when but six weeks old, they having been
sold to some distant slaveholders. The infant was puny and
ailing, and his master regarded him as worthless. A family
named Carver took the babe and his brother, a little older.
It was with them the child had a home for nine years. About
that time the little black boy developed a remarkable love
for plants, and so much knowledge of their structure and
life, that he was given the name of "the plant doctor." Mr.
and Mrs. Carver were proud of the boy's talents and made
much of him, and it was their evident satisfaction in him
that aroused the jealousy of their own children, who at last
drove the two colored boys away from home. Northward they
turned their faces, to the land where white and black have
equal chances in life, as they fondly believed. The little
"plant doctor," who had picked up the elements of an
education, wanted, above all else, to enter some good
school. The boys were driven from pillar to post, but, being
devotedly attached to each other they held together, until
in Kansas they thought best to separate.

During these years, young Carver had tried many kinds of
work. At length he found himself at Winterset, Iowa. It was
there the wife of a physician encouraged him to go to
Indianola where she thought he could enter college and earn
his way by doing laundry work. He went there, but didn't get
the work, and it was while there that a young lady, a well
known Iowa artist, became interested in him. Under the
pretext of securing his help in correcting some drawings,
she went to the mean quarters he occupied and found him
starving to death. There was no work for him, no money. For
weeks, he had subsisted upon corn bread and tallow. She then
arranged for him to go to the Iowa Agricultural College,
where she had influential friends and where she believed he
would have a chance.

But, even at the Agricultural College of Iowa the color line
was sharply drawn by the students. Persecution and
ill-treatment were resorted to. But young Carver said, "I
will bear it. I must get an education. Here I can get work
and I will suffer anything rather than give up the one
chance of my life to obtain a schooling." His old and
intimate knowledge of plants stood him in hand, and he was
given charge of the greenhouses. True, he was shunned by
many, his place at table was with the servants, but he had
warm friends and he was, by force of character, winning the
good will of all. One day an Indianola lady, who had come to
know him before he left that place, went to visit him at his
college. Dressed in her best, she accompanied him, though
against his protestation, to dinner, taking a seat at the
servants' table.

The next time this lady visited the college the colored
student sat at the table with the faculty. In the military
drill he had taken the highest honors. When he was graduated
it was with distinction. He wrote the class poem. He had
succeeded in winning and holding friends.

Some time ago he spent several weeks in Washington, D. C.,
and there the most kindly attention was extended to him by
Secretary Wilson, who never fails to recognize merit
wherever he may find it.

The name of G. W. Carver is now enrolled on the fellowship
list of more than one scientific Institution.

The above subject is by no means an easy one to discuss, as reliable data are fragmentary and widely scattered; yet I am sure that I have been able to collect some interesting and valuable facts and figures bearing upon this important question. There is no doubt that the Negro as a tenant farmer is a failure; this we are forced to admit, but we do so with a justly proud feeling that it is not an inherent race characteristic, but the result of conditions over which we had little or no control. Failure is inevitably and indelibly stamped in the foreheads of any class of average tenant farmers, regardless of race or color.

In American agriculture the Negro has always held, and is yet holding, an important place; in fact, far more, as a rule, than has been accredited to him. Lest our judgment be too harsh in this particular, I have thought it wise to briefly scan the beginning and development of agriculture in the United States. In 1492 the first settlers found the Indians carrying on agriculture in a crude and limited way, by the women; their farm machinery consisting of their fingers, a pointed stick for planting, and the bones of animals and the shell of the clam for a hoe; with nothing more than a squatter's right as a voucher for the ownership of their farms. Prof. McMaster's History of the People of the United States, George K. Holmes, assistant statistician of the United States Department of Agriculture, in his "Progress of Agriculture in the United States," and other high authorities, tell us that the white man came, poor in the materials of wealth, a stranger in a strange land with a strange climate. His tools were but little, if any, improvement on those of the Indians, and agriculture as we know it to-day was an idealistic dream. The plow was an exceedingly crude thing and but little used, the hoe forming the principal implement of industry. After a piece of land had been continuously "cropped" until worn out, it was abandoned, or the cows turned upon it for a while. It is further said that the poor whites, who had formerly been indentured servants, were the most lazy, the most idle, the most shiftless and the most worthless of men. Their huts were scarcely better than Negro cabins, the chimneys were of logs, the chinks being filled with clay. The walls had no plaster, the windows had no glass, and the furniture was such as they themselves made.

The grain was threshed by driving horses over it in the open field. When they ground it they used a rude pestle and mortar, or placed it in the hollow of one stone and beat it with another. Beef or pork, generally salted, salt fish, dried apples, bread made of rye or Indian meal, milk, and a very limited variety of vegetables, constituted the food throughout the year. When night came on his light was derived from a few candles of home manufacture. The farmer and his family wore homespun. If linen was wanted, the flax was sown and weeded, pulled and retted, then broken and swingled, for all of which processes nearly a year was required before the flax was ready for the spinners, bleaching on the grass, and making and wearing. If woolens were wanted, sheep were sheared and the wool was dyed and spun and woven at home.

It was almost invariably true of all the settlers that the use and value of manures was little regarded. The barn was sometimes removed to get it out of the way of heaps of manure, because the owner would not go to the expense of removing the accumulations and putting them upon his fields. Such were the dreary conditions of the farmer's life in colonial days, living all the time very closely upon the margin of subsistence. Those conditions continued for some time after the Republic had been established, and were not measurably ameliorated until the present century had well advanced, until an improved intelligence--the dissemination of information, and the work of the inventor, had begun to take effect.

From the above we see how strikingly similar were the life, methods of agriculture, and the results obtained from the sturdy New Englander, who represented the best blood, bone and sinew of the old world, with its almost prehistoric civilization, to that of the American Negro, whose intellectual star is just beginning to rise above the horizon. Over two centuries and a half ago the Negro found his way as a slave to America, in a little Dutch trading vessel, cheap labor being the chief motive which prompted such a gigantic scheme. The experiment flourished and grew, and at about the close of the eighteenth century six million slaves had been brought to this country. The major part of all the cotton, corn, cane, potatoes, tobacco, and other agricultural products, were planted, cultivated, harvested and prepared for, and, not infrequently, marketed by, the slaves. In fact, they were the agricultural backbone of the South. Since cotton forms the largest, and has been the most important agricultural product in the South, I think a hundred and nine years of its production will prove interesting and valuable: In 1791, 8,889 bales were produced, and the second cotton mill built at Providence, Rhode Island! the first one being built at Beverly, Massachusetts, in 1787. From this time on the acreage planted, the output and the number of cotton mills and spindles increased. The estimated area planted in cotton alone in 1852, 6,300,000 acres, and the census report of 1860 showed 1,262 cotton mills and 5,235,727 spindles in the United States, with an output of 4,861,292 bales. Despite the depressing effect of the four years of civil strife, it took only five years to almost completely regain the highest point reached in previous years. In 1889 and 1890 we find in the United States 19,569,000 acres planted, giving an output of 7,311,322 bales, with 905 cotton mills operating 14,088,103 spindles. In 1898-99 the acreage increases to nearly 25,000,000, with an output of 11,189,205 bales, representing a money value of $305,467,041. Such is the history, production and growth of the cotton industry in the United States, and were we to trace the other staple products we would find them none the less interesting, since they were produced largely by Negroes as slaves before the war, and as freedmen after the war. This applies especially to Southern products.

Whatever of truth there is in Mr. Van de Graff's grave apprehensions for the Negro, he with us must admit that the ills of the black tenant farmer are simply the ills of the Southern farmer in a more or less aggravated form. It is also true that the curse of such a system falls the heaviest on the smallest and most ignorant tenant farmer, who is the least capable of self-defense. For years we have been content to let the preachers preach, the lawyers argue, the philosophers predict, the teachers and the doctors practice with scarcely a question as to our priority of right. We have, in the face of the many oppositions which come to every race similarly situated, labored with endurance, patience and forbearance, until the birth of the twentieth century dawns upon us, steadily marching on, with something over $263,000,000 worth of unencumbered property to our credit. Now as to the number owning farms and following agricultural pursuits as a livelihood, we are pleased to submit some figures from the last census report, from Crogman, in his "Progress of a Race," and from other authorities. Beginning with the little District of Columbia, with an aggregate area of 8,489 acres and 269 farms, there are seventeen Negro farmers, five of which own their land in whole or in part. Their farms contain 29 acres, of which 25 are improved. The total value of the land is $23,300, and the appurtenant buildings are worth $390; live stock to the value of $489; and farm incomes for 1899 amounting to $4,244. Ten farms, aggregating 258 acres, are operated by Negroes as cash tenants. The reported values are, land, $114,600; buildings, $9,200; implements and machinery, $1,200; and live stock, $1,383. The total incomes for these farms in 1899 were $10,300. Two farms, together consisting of 21 acres, valued at $149,630, are operated by Negroes as salaried managers. Of the 17 farms operated by Negroes, only 1 contains less than three acres; 7 contain from 3 to 9 acres; 5 from 10 to 19 acres; 2 from 20 to 49 acres; and 2 from 50 to 99 acres, giving an average size for all of 18.1 acres.

In the state of Delaware the farms constitute 85 per cent of the total land surface of the state, which is divided up into 9,687 farms, of which 8,869, or 91.6 per cent, are operated by whites, and 818, or 8.4 per cent, by Negroes. Of the latter class 297 are operated by owners, and 35 by part owners. The value of their farms, including implements, machinery and live stock, together with the value of implements, machinery and live stock on the farms which other Negroes operate as tenants, is $495,187.

In Arizona we find that three Negro farmers operate their farms as salaried managers. Twelve own farms containing 1,511 acres, with farm property valued at $60,422; one leases a 39-acre farm for cash, and has implements and live stock worth $130. The total investment by Negroes in agriculture, exclusive of farms owned by them and leased to others, is, therefore, $60,552, which is a rather encouraging showing for Arizona.

Messrs. Walker and Fitch, graduates of Hampton Institute, in 1896, made a careful canvass of one congressional district in Virginia, and found as follows: Out of a total acreage of 1,944,359 acres, one fifteenth, or 125,597 acres, is owned by the Colored people, roughly estimated at $1,000,000. These figures mean farm owning chiefly, as $79,611 represent the total city property. They also report that in Gloucester county, 25 years from the above date, the Colored people owned less than 100 acres of land. To-day they own 13,000 acres of land free from any encumbrance. Mr. Fitch further adds that he has traveled quite thoroughly through more than ten counties of Virginia, with horse and buggy, during the present year (1896), and that in no county through which he traveled did the Colored people own less than 5,000 acres of land. He found also that much of the improved farming was being done by Colored men, and that the strong public sentiment against moving to cities was having the desired effect.

Again, the statistician reports, in 1890, 12,690,152 homes and farms in the United States, and of this number the Negroes own 234,747 free from all encumbrance, and 29,541 mortgaged; giving the percentage of mortgaged property owned by Negroes as 10.71, while the whole percentage of mortgaged property for the whole country is 38.97. It is further stated that of all the property held by Negroes, 88.58 per cent is owned without encumbrance. Since so much has been accomplished in the Negro's pioneer days of freedom, may we not predict with a considerable degree of assurance that the next decade and a half will far exceed our most sanguine hope? The virgin fertility of our soils, and the vast amount of cheap and unskilled labor, have been a curse rather than a blessing to agriculture. This exhaustive system of cultivation, the destruction of forests, the rapid and almost constant decomposition of organic matter, together with the great multiplicity of insect and fungus diseases that appear every year, make the Southern agricultural problem one requiring more brains than that of the North, East or West. The advance of civilization has brought, and is constantly bringing, about a more healthy form of competition. The markets are becoming more fastidious, and he who puts such a product upon the market as it demands, controls that market, regardless of color. It is simply a survival of the fittest.

We are also aware that the demands upon agriculture were never so exacting as they are now. All other trades and professions are holding out their inducements to the young men and women who are ready and willing to grapple with life's responsibilities. One says, "Come and I will make you a Gould." Another, a Rockefeller; still another, an Astor--with all the luxuries their names suggest. Too many of our own farmers illy prepare their land, cultivate, harvest and market the scanty and inferior crop, selling the same for less than it cost to produce it. I need not tell you that the above conditions imperatively suggest the proverbial mule, implements more or less primitive, with frequently a vast territory of barren and furrowed hillsides and wasted valleys. Instead of the veritable Klondyke, of which their dreams are made sweet, another mortgage has been added as an unpleasant reminder of the year's hard labor. With this inevitable doom staring them in the face, is it any wonder that so many of the youth of our land flock to the cities with the hope of seeking some occupation other than farming? The above conditions, together with the seemingly higher civilization of the city folk, I claim, are largely responsible for this. But be this as it may, in the light of what has been accomplished, I see for us a very bright star of hope in the education of two-thirds of the brightest and best of our youth in scientific agriculture.

The many excellent schools, colleges, nature study leaflets, farmers' bulletins and reading courses, conferences, convocations, congresses, fairs, and the like, are all powerful educational factors designed to lead the race into higher agricultural activities. The agricultural schools, and higher institutions of that character, are wisely laying much stress upon stock raising, dairying, horticulture, landscape gardening, poultry raising, and every manipulation incident to the successful operation of this great industry. These subjects have been taught almost wholly to young men, but recent experience has taught, not only in this, but in other countries, that many of these studies seem especially suited to women; and many are taking the advantages offered by schools in the matter of learning the technique of poultry raising, dairying, horticulture, landscape gardening, and the related sciences, along with their academy or college work, and as a reward are finding pleasant, profitable and healthful employment. Nature study, with the first principles of agriculture, is compulsory in many of the primary schools, and ere another decade is indelibly placed upon the historical records of the greatest events of the greatest century, it will find us wonderfully in advance in this particular.

Every year we see a perceptible increase in the funds for public education, and magnificent schools and colleges, with better paid professors, springing up here and there, stand out as beacon lights to this new and wonderful epoch. The wisdom of spending these ever-increasing millions upon the youth of our land becomes from year to year a matter of less concern as we seek to give our boys and girls a broader education than that of a pure scientist. It is very encouraging to note the course taken by our young men and women who have gone out from those institutions--the way they have acquired land, built homes, and are devoting their entire time and talent in that direction. I have no fears but what we, in the course of time, will do our part both nobly and well in the matter of feeding a hungry world.

SECOND PAPER.

THE NEGRO AS A FARMER.

BY H. A. HUNT.

PROF. HENRY A. HUNT.