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Chapter II. Boyhood Days
After the coming of freedom there were two points upon which
practically all the people on our place were agreed, and I found
that this was generally true throughout the South: that they must
change their names, and that they must leave the old plantation
for at least a few days or weeks in order that they might really
feel sure that they were free.
In some way a feeling got among the coloured people that it was
far from proper for them to bear the surname of their former
owners, and a great many of them took other surnames. This was
one of the first signs of freedom. When they were slaves, a
coloured person was simply called "John" or "Susan." There was
seldom occasion for more than the use of the one name. If "John"
or "Susan" belonged to a white man by the name of "Hatcher,"
sometimes he was called "John Hatcher," or as often "Hatcher's
John." But there was a feeling that "John Hatcher" or "Hatcher's
John" was not the proper title by which to denote a freeman; and
so in many cases "John Hatcher" was changed to "John S. Lincoln"
or "John S. Sherman," the initial "S" standing for no name, it
being simply a part of what the coloured man proudly called his
"entitles."
As I have stated, most of the coloured people left the old
plantation for a short while at least, so as to be sure, it
seemed, that they could leave and try their freedom on to see how
it felt. After they had remained away for a while, many of the
older slaves, especially, returned to their old homes and made
some kind of contract with their former owners by which they
remained on the estate.
My mother's husband, who was the stepfather of my brother John
and myself, did not belong to the same owners as did my mother.
In fact, he seldom came to our plantation. I remember seeing his
there perhaps once a year, that being about Christmas time. In
some way, during the war, by running away and following the
Federal soldiers, it seems, he found his way into the new state
of West Virginia. As soon as freedom was declared, he sent for my
mother to come to the Kanawha Valley, in West Virginia. At that
time a journey from Virginia over the mountains to West Virginia
was rather a tedious and in some cases a painful undertaking.
What little clothing and few household goods we had were placed
in a cart, but the children walked the greater portion of the
distance, which was several hundred miles.
I do not think any of us ever had been very far from the
plantation, and the taking of a long journey into another state
was quite an event. The parting from our former owners and the
members of our own race on the plantation was a serious occasion.
From the time of our parting till their death we kept up a
correspondence with the older members of the family, and in later
years we have kept in touch with those who were the younger
members. We were several weeks making the trip, and most of the
time we slept in the open air and did our cooking over a log fire
out-of-doors. One night I recall that we camped near an abandoned
log cabin, and my mother decided to build a fire in that for
cooking, and afterward to make a "pallet" on the floor for our
sleeping. Just as the fire had gotten well started a large black
snake fully a yard and a half long dropped down the chimney and
ran out on the floor. Of course we at once abandoned that cabin.
Finally we reached our destination--a little town called Malden,
which is about five miles from Charleston, the present capital of
the state.
At that time salt-mining was the great industry in that part of
West Virginia, and the little town of Malden was right in the
midst of the salt-furnaces. My stepfather had already secured a
job at a salt-furnace, and he had also secured a little cabin for
us to live in. Our new house was no better than the one we had
left on the old plantation in Virginia. In fact, in one respect
it was worse. Notwithstanding the poor condition of our
plantation cabin, we were at all times sure of pure air. Our new
home was in the midst of a cluster of cabins crowded closely
together, and as there were no sanitary regulations, the filth
about the cabins was often intolerable. Some of our neighbours
were coloured people, and some were the poorest and most ignorant
and degraded white people. It was a motley mixture. Drinking,
gambling, quarrels, fights, and shockingly immoral practices were
frequent. All who lived in the little town were in one way or
another connected with the salt business. Though I was a mere
child, my stepfather put me and my brother at work in one of the
furnaces. Often I began work as early as four o'clock in the
morning.
The first thing I ever learned in the way of book knowledge was
while working in this salt-furnace. Each salt-packer had his
barrels marked with a certain number. The number allotted to my
stepfather was "18." At the close of the day's work the boss of
the packers would come around and put "18" on each of our
barrels, and I soon learned to recognize that figure wherever I
saw it, and after a while got to the point where I could make
that figure, though I knew nothing about any other figures or
letters.
From the time that I can remember having any thoughts about
anything, I recall that I had an intense longing to learn to
read. I determined, when quite a small child, that, if I
accomplished nothing else in life, I would in some way get enough
education to enable me to read common books and newspapers. Soon
after we got settled in some manner in our new cabin in West
Virginia, I induced my mother to get hold of a book for me. How
or where she got it I do not know, but in some way she procured
an old copy of Webster's "blue-back" spelling-book, which
contained the alphabet, followed by such meaningless words as
"ab," "ba," "ca," "da." I began at once to devour this book, and
I think that it was the first one I ever had in my hands. I had
learned from somebody that the way to begin to read was to learn
the alphabet, so I tried in all the ways I could think of to
learn it,--all of course without a teacher, for I could find no
one to teach me. At that time there was not a single member of my
race anywhere near us who could read, and I was too timid to
approach any of the white people. In some way, within a few
weeks, I mastered the greater portion of the alphabet. In all my
efforts to learn to read my mother shared fully my ambition, and
sympathized with me and aided me in every way that she could.
Though she was totally ignorant, she had high ambitions for her
children, and a large fund of good, hard, common sense, which
seemed to enable her to meet and master every situation. If I
have done anything in life worth attention, I feel sure that I
inherited the disposition from my mother.
In the midst of my struggles and longing for an education, a
young coloured boy who had learned to read in the state of Ohio
came to Malden. As soon as the coloured people found out that he
could read, a newspaper was secured, and at the close of nearly
every day's work this young man would be surrounded by a group of
men and women who were anxious to hear him read the news
contained in the papers. How I used to envy this man! He seemed
to me to be the one young man in all the world who ought to be
satisfied with his attainments.
About this time the question of having some kind of a school
opened for the coloured children in the village began to be
discussed by members of the race. As it would be the first school
for Negro children that had ever been opened in that part of
Virginia, it was, of course, to be a great event, and the
discussion excited the wildest interest. The most perplexing
question was where to find a teacher. The young man from Ohio who
had learned to read the papers was considered, but his age was
against him. In the midst of the discussion about a teacher,
another young coloured man from Ohio, who had been a soldier, in
some way found his way into town. It was soon learned that he
possessed considerable education, and he was engaged by the
coloured people to teach their first school. As yet no free
schools had been started for coloured people in that section,
hence each family agreed to pay a certain amount per month, with
the understanding that the teacher was to "board 'round"--that
is, spend a day with each family. This was not bad for the
teacher, for each family tried to provide the very best on the
day the teacher was to be its guest. I recall that I looked
forward with an anxious appetite to the "teacher's day" at our
little cabin.
This experience of a whole race beginning to go to school for the
first time, presents one of the most interesting studies that has
ever occurred in connection with the development of any race. Few
people who were not right in the midst of the scenes can form any
exact idea of the intense desire which the people of my race
showed for an education. As I have stated, it was a whole race
trying to go to school. Few were too young, and none too old, to
make the attempt to learn. As fast as any kind of teachers could
be secured, not only were day-schools filled, but night-schools
as well. The great ambition of the older people was to try to
learn to read the Bible before they died. With this end in view
men and women who were fifty or seventy-five years old would
often be found in the night-school. Some day-schools were formed
soon after freedom, but the principal book studied in the
Sunday-school was the spelling-book. Day-school, night-school,
Sunday-school, were always crowded, and often many had to be
turned away for want of room.
The opening of the school in the Kanawha Valley, however, brought
to me one of the keenest disappointments that I ever experienced.
I had been working in a salt-furnace for several months, and my
stepfather had discovered that I had a financial value, and so,
when the school opened, he decided that he could not spare me
from my work. This decision seemed to cloud my every ambition.
The disappointment was made all the more severe by reason of the
fact that my place of work was where I could see the happy
children passing to and from school mornings and afternoons.
Despite this disappointment, however, I determined that I would
learn something, anyway. I applied myself with greater
earnestness than ever to the mastering of what was in the
"blue-back" speller.
My mother sympathized with me in my disappointment, and sought to
comfort me in all the ways she could, and to help me find a way
to learn. After a while I succeeded in making arrangements with
the teacher to give me some lessons at night, after the day's
work was done. These night lessons were so welcome that I think I
learned more at night than the other children did during the day.
My own experiences in the night-school gave me faith in the
night-school idea, with which, in after years, I had to do both
at Hampton and Tuskegee. But my boyish heart was still set upon
going to the day-school, and I let no opportunity slip to push my
case. Finally I won, and was permitted to go to the school in the
day for a few months, with the understanding that I was to rise
early in the morning and work in the furnace till nine o'clock,
and return immediately after school closed in the afternoon for
at least two more hours of work.
The schoolhouse was some distance from the furnace, and as I had
to work till nine o'clock, and the school opened at nine, I found
myself in a difficulty. School would always be begun before I
reached it, and sometimes my class had recited. To get around
this difficulty I yielded to a temptation for which most people,
I suppose, will condemn me; but since it is a fact, I might as
well state it. I have great faith in the power and influence of
facts. It is seldom that anything is permanently gained by
holding back a fact. There was a large clock in a little office
in the furnace. This clock, of course, all the hundred or more
workmen depended upon to regulate their hours of beginning and
ending the day's work. I got the idea that the way for me to
reach school on time was to move the clock hands from half-past
eight up to the nine o'clock mark. This I found myself doing
morning after morning, till the furnace "boss" discovered that
something was wrong, and locked the clock in a case. I did not
mean to inconvenience anybody. I simply meant to reach that
schoolhouse in time.
When, however, I found myself at the school for the first time, I
also found myself confronted with two other difficulties. In the
first place, I found that all the other children wore hats or
caps on their heads, and I had neither hat nor cap. In fact, I do
not remember that up to the time of going to school I had ever
worn any kind of covering upon my head, nor do I recall that
either I or anybody else had even thought anything about the need
of covering for my head. But, of course, when I saw how all the
other boys were dressed, I began to feel quite uncomfortable. As
usual, I put the case before my mother, and she explained to me
that she had no money with which to buy a "store hat," which was
a rather new institution at that time among the members of my
race and was considered quite the thing for young and old to own,
but that she would find a way to help me out of the difficulty.
She accordingly got two pieces of "homespun" (jeans) and sewed
them together, and I was soon the proud possessor of my first
cap.
The lesson that my mother taught me in this has always remained
with me, and I have tried as best as I could to teach it to
others. I have always felt proud, whenever I think of the
incident, that my mother had strength of character enough not to
be led into the temptation of seeming to be that which she was
not--of trying to impress my schoolmates and others with the fact
that she was able to buy me a "store hat" when she was not. I
have always felt proud that she refused to go into debt for that
which she did not have the money to pay for. Since that time I
have owned many kinds of caps and hats, but never one of which I
have felt so proud as of the cap made of the two pieces of cloth
sewed together by my mother. I have noted the fact, but without
satisfaction, I need not add, that several of the boys who began
their careers with "store hats" and who were my schoolmates and
used to join in the sport that was made of me because I had only
a "homespun" cap, have ended their careers in the penitentiary,
while others are not able now to buy any kind of hat.
My second difficulty was with regard to my name, or rather A
name. From the time when I could remember anything, I had been
called simply "Booker." Before going to school it had never
occurred to me that it was needful or appropriate to have an
additional name. When I heard the schoolroll called, I noticed
that all of the children had at least two names, and some of them
indulged in what seemed to me the extravagance of having three. I
was in deep perplexity, because I knew that the teacher would
demand of me at least two names, and I had only one. By the time
the occasion came for the enrolling of my name, an idea occurred
to me which I thought would make me equal to the situation; and
so, when the teacher asked me what my full name was, I calmly
told him "Booker Washington," as if I had been called by that
name all my life; and by that name I have since been known. Later
in my life I found that my mother had given me the name of
"Booker Taliaferro" soon after I was born, but in some way that
part of my name seemed to disappear and for a long while was
forgotten, but as soon as I found out about it I revived it, and
made my full name "Booker Taliaferro Washington." I think there
are not many men in our country who have had the privilege of
naming themselves in the way that I have.
More than once I have tried to picture myself in the position of
a boy or man with an honoured and distinguished ancestry which I
could trace back through a period of hundreds of years, and who
had not only inherited a name, but fortune and a proud family
homestead; and yet I have sometimes had the feeling that if I had
inherited these, and had been a member of a more popular race, I
should have been inclined to yield to the temptation of depending
upon my ancestry and my colour to do that for me which I should
do for myself. Years ago I resolved that because I had no
ancestry myself I would leave a record of which my children would
be proud, and which might encourage them to still higher effort.
The world should not pass judgment upon the Negro, and especially
the Negro youth, too quickly or too harshly. The Negro boy has
obstacles, discouragements, and temptations to battle with that
are little know to those not situated as he is. When a white boy
undertakes a task, it is taken for granted that he will succeed.
On the other hand, people are usually surprised if the Negro boy
does not fail. In a word, the Negro youth starts out with the
presumption against him.
The influence of ancestry, however, is important in helping
forward any individual or race, if too much reliance is not
placed upon it. Those who constantly direct attention to the
Negro youth's moral weaknesses, and compare his advancement with
that of white youths, do not consider the influence of the
memories which cling about the old family homesteads. I have no
idea, as I have stated elsewhere, who my grandmother was. I have,
or have had, uncles and aunts and cousins, but I have no
knowledge as to where most of them are. My case will illustrate
that of hundreds of thousands of black people in every part of
our country. The very fact that the white boy is conscious that,
if he fails in life, he will disgrace the whole family record,
extending back through many generations, is of tremendous value
in helping him to resist temptations. The fact that the
individual has behind and surrounding him proud family history
and connection serves as a stimulus to help him to overcome
obstacles when striving for success.
The time that I was permitted to attend school during the day was
short, and my attendance was irregular. It was not long before I
had to stop attending day-school altogether, and devote all of my
time again to work. I resorted to the night-school again. In
fact, the greater part of the education I secured in my boyhood
was gathered through the night-school after my day's work was
done. I had difficulty often in securing a satisfactory teacher.
Sometimes, after I had secured some one to teach me at night, I
would find, much to my disappointment, that the teacher knew but
little more than I did. Often I would have to walk several miles
at night in order to recite my night-school lessons. There was
never a time in my youth, no matter how dark and discouraging the
days might be, when one resolve did not continually remain with
me, and that was a determination to secure an education at any
cost.
Soon after we moved to West Virginia, my mother adopted into our
family, notwithstanding our poverty, an orphan boy, to whom
afterward we gave the name of James B. Washington. He has ever
since remained a member of the family.
After I had worked in the salt-furnace for some time, work was
secured for me in a coal-mine which was operated mainly for the
purpose of securing fuel for the salt-furnace. Work in the
coal-mine I always dreaded. One reason for this was that any one
who worked in a coal-mine was always unclean, at least while at
work, and it was a very hard job to get one's skin clean after
the day's work was over. Then it was fully a mile from the
opening of the coal-mine to the face of the coal, and all, of
course, was in the blackest darkness. I do not believe that one
ever experiences anywhere else such darkness as he does in a
coal-mine. The mine was divided into a large number of different
"rooms" or departments, and, as I never was able to learn the
location of all these "rooms," I many times found myself lost in
the mine. To add to the horror of being lost, sometimes my light
would go out, and then, if I did not happen to have a match, I
would wander about in the darkness until by chance I found some
one to give me a light. The work was not only hard, but it was
dangerous. There was always the danger of being blown to pieces
by a premature explosion of powder, or of being crushed by
falling slate. Accidents from one or the other of these causes
were frequently occurring, and this kept me in constant fear.
Many children of the tenderest years were compelled then, as is
now true I fear, in most coal-mining districts, to spend a large
part of their lives in these coal-mines, with little opportunity
to get an education; and, what is worse, I have often noted that,
as a rule, young boys who begin life in a coal-mine are often
physically and mentally dwarfed. They soon lose ambition to do
anything else than to continue as a coal-miner.
In those days, and later as a young man, I used to try to picture
in my imagination the feelings and ambitions of a white boy with
absolutely no limit placed upon his aspirations and activities. I
used to envy the white boy who had no obstacles placed in the way
of his becoming a Congressman, Governor, Bishop, or President by
reason of the accident of his birth or race. I used to picture
the way that I would act under such circumstances; how I would
begin at the bottom and keep rising until I reached the highest
round of success.
In later years, I confess that I do not envy the white boy as I
once did. I have learned that success is to be measured not so
much by the position that one has reached in life as by the
obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed. Looked
at from this standpoint, I almost reached the conclusion that
often the Negro boy's birth and connection with an unpopular race
is an advantage, so far as real life is concerned. With few
exceptions, the Negro youth must work harder and must perform his
tasks even better than a white youth in order to secure
recognition. But out of the hard and unusual struggle through
which he is compelled to pass, he gets a strength, a confidence,
that one misses whose pathway is comparatively smooth by reason
of birth and race.
From any point of view, I had rather be what I am, a member of
the Negro race, than be able to claim membership with the most
favoured of any other race. I have always been made sad when I
have heard members of any race claiming rights or privileges, or
certain badges of distinction, on the ground simply that they
were members of this or that race, regardless of their own
individual worth or attainments. I have been made to feel sad for
such persons because I am conscious of the fact that mere
connection with what is known as a superior race will not
permanently carry an individual forward unless he has individual
worth, and mere connection with what is regarded as an inferior
race will not finally hold an individual back if he possesses
intrinsic, individual merit. Every persecuted individual and race
should get much consolation out of the great human law, which is
universal and eternal, that merit, no matter under what skin
found, is, in the long run, recognized and rewarded. This I have
said here, not to call attention to myself as an individual, but
to the race to which I am proud to belong.
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