Booker+T.+Washington

Demetri Decoulos History

Booker T. Washington was born in 1856, and was a successful political leader. He was a very dominant man in the African American community, and was the most influential spokesman for the black Americans in the early 1900’s. Booker T. was born in a slave hut, but he tried not to let his families’ poverty affect him. He began working in a coal mine at age nine, and after that he was determined to get an education. He 1872 enrolled at the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Virginia. Booker graduated in 1875 and then studied at Wayland Seminary, in Washington, D.C. and joined the staff of Hampton ( Booker). In 1881 Washington was elected to head newly established schools for blacks at Tuskegee. Before this the schools for blacks were small, had no equipment, and very litter money. The Tuskegee Industrial Institute became one of Booker’s best life works. When he died in 1915, this Institute had 100 buildings, 1,500 students, a faculty of 200 teachers, and a fund of around $2 million dollars.



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On September 18, 1895, leader Booker T. Washington spoke in front of a larger white audience at the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta. His “Atlanta Compromise” address, was one of the most important and influential speeches in American history. Although the organizers of the exposition worried that the public was not prepared for an advanced step like this, they decided that inviting a black speaker would impress Northern visitors with the evidence of racial progress in the South. Booker T. strategy of black response to southern racial tensions, was widely regarded as one of the most significant speeches in history ( Booker).

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Works Cited "Booker T. Washington Biography." //Bio.com//. A&E Networks Television. Web. 27 Mar. 2012. . "Booker T. Washington Delivers the 1895 Atlanta Compromise Speech." //History Matters: The U.S. Survey Course on the Web//. Web. 28 Mar. 2012.