Booker T. Washington was one of the most powerful African Americans at the turn of the twentieth century. Born a slave in Hale's Ford, Virginia, the son of a white man who did not acknowledge him and a slave woman named Jane (Burroughs) who later married a fellow slave, Booker T. Washington became a leader in black education, and a strong influence as a racial representative in national politics. He founded Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute (Now Tuskegee University) in 1881 and the National Negro Business League two decades later. Washington advised Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft. His infamous conflicts with Black leaders like W. E. B. Du Bois over segregation caused a stir, but today, he is remembered as the most influential African American speaker of his time. In his 1900 autobiography, Up From Slavery, Booker T. Washington wrote: "I had no schooling whatever while I was a slave, though I remember on several occasions I went as far as the schoolhouse door with one of my young mistresses to carry her books. The picture of several dozen boys and girls in a schoolroom engaged in study made a deep impression on me, and I had the feeling that to get into a schoolhouse and study in this way would be about the same as getting into paradise." Dr. John Henrik Clarke has a critique on Booker T. Washington, essentially stating that Booker T. Washington was a product of white philanthropy. In other words he was a chosen leader for black people. But what is notable is that Washington knew he was gonna get got, BUT more importantly he was going to, and got his more than he got got doe. This is the insidious nature of the situation Booker T. Washington was dealt with. If you have a moment listen to Dr. Clarke’s critique on Booker T. Washington’s Atlanta Compromise Speech of 1895.
enemies too.