One curious thing that happened in connection with the students was, as additional pupils began to come in, some of them had been attending schools taught by some of those who came to the Tuskegee school, and, in several cases, it happened that former pupils entered higher classes than their former teachers.
CHAPTER VI.
THE FIRST YEAR AT TUSKEGEE.
After the school had been in session in the old church and little shanty for several months, I began to see the necessity of having a permanent location for the institution, where we could have the students not only in their class rooms, but get hold of them in their home life, and teach them how to take care of their bodies in the matter of bathing, care of the teeth, and in general cleanliness. We also felt that we must not only teach the students how to prepare their food but how to serve and eat it properly. So long as we only had the students a few hours in the class room during the day we could give attention to none of these important matters, which our students had not had an opportunity of learning before leaving their homes. Few of the students who came during the first year were able to remain during the nine months’ session for lack of money, so we felt the necessity of having industries where the students could pay a part of their board in cash. It was rather noticeable that, notwithstanding the poverty of most of the students who came to us in the earlier months of the institution, most of them had the idea of getting an education in order that they might find some method of living without manual labor; that is, they had the feeling that to work with the hands was not conducive to being of the highest type of lady or gentleman. This feeling we wanted to change as fast as possible by teaching students the dignity, beauty and civilizing power of intelligent labor.
After a few months had passed by, I wrote Gen. J. F. B. Marshall, at that time treasurer of the Hampton Institute, and put our condition before him, telling him that there was an abandoned farm about a mile from the town of Tuskegee in the market which I could secure at a very cheap price for our institution. As I had absolutely no money with which to make the first payment on the farm, I summoned the courage to ask Gen. Marshall to lend me $500 with which to make the first payment. To my surprise a letter came back in a few days enclosing a check for $500. A contract was made for the purchase of the farm, which at that time consisted of 100 acres. Subsequent purchases and gifts of adjacent lands have increased the number of acres at this place to 700, and this is the present site of the Tuskegee Institute. This has again been enlarged from time to time by purchases and gifts of land not adjacent until at present
A GROUP OF MR. WASHINGTON’S WARM FRIENDS AND SUPPORTERS.
