Booker T. Washington
American educator, author and orator (1856 to 1915); the primary leader of the African-American community from 1890 to 1915; author of Up from Slavery.
Booker T. Washington did not write this page.
We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.
The line under a date shows how recently it was said: empty within a month, full after three years.
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Our reading
No race can prosper until it sees as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem
Their wordsNo race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem. It is at the bottom of life we must begin, and not at the top.
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Their wordsNor should we permit our grievances to overshadow our opportunities.
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Their wordsIn all things that are purely social we can be as separate as the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to mutual progress.
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Our reading
There is no security for anyone except in the highest intelligence and development of all
Their wordsThere is no defence or security for any of us except in the highest intelligence and development of all.
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Their wordsThe wisest among my race understand that the agitation of questions of social equality is the extremest folly, and that progress in the enjoyment of all the privileges that will come to us must be the result of severe and constant struggle rather than of artificial forcing.
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Their wordsNo race that has anything to contribute to the markets of the world is long in any degree ostracized.
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Their wordsIt is important and right that all privileges of the law be ours, but it is vastly more important that we be prepared for the exercises of these privileges. The opportunity to earn a dollar in a factory just now is worth infinitely more than the opportunity to spend a dollar in an opera-house.
The line under a date fills as the words age, a quarter at a time: past a month, six months, a year, and three years. Empty means said within the last month; full, more than three years ago. It says when, not whether it still holds — a change of mind is marked on the claim itself.
Dashed means we only know the words existed by that date; they may be older.