H. A. TANDY.
Mr. Tandy has made himself both helpful and useful to his race, not only by giving employment to many of them, but he has taken an active part in church and Sunday-school work in the A. M. E. Church. He has also been active in the Masonic Order, and is serving his second term as State Grand Master of the Order known as U. B. F. and S. M. T. Mr. Tandy is also connected with the Colored Fair Association of Lexington, which is the largest thing of its kind in the world carried on by colored people.
DANIEL PURDY.
DANIEL PURDY, CHESTER, PA.
Mr. Daniel Purdy, of Chester, Pa., is another of the men I regard as being worthy of special mention. He was born a slave, left Virginia when a small boy in 1864, was brought to Washington, D. C., and was bound out until he was eighteen years of age, with the understanding that he was to have three months of schooling each year, and when he arrived at his eighteenth year, was to have $100. But none of these conditions were fulfilled by those who had taken the boy to raise. So that at eighteen he found himself without education and without money. From the time Mr. Purdy was eighteen years of age until he was twenty, he worked at whatever he could find in the State of Maryland. He then came to Chester, his present home. His first wages in Chester were about $1.00 per day, but by close application to his work, he so gained the confidence of his employers that they advanced his salary from time to time until he received $18 per week, which was regarded as very large pay for a colored man. In 1886, Mr. Purdy, after working in the iron mills for several years, had saved quite a sum of money, and decided to go into business for himself. He has built up a large grocery trade and owns the building in which his store is situated, also his residence. It is a fine brick structure on the corner of two prominent streets. In addition to his grocery store he does a general contracting business, employing during the summer months about twenty-five men, owns six horses, and keeps two clerks employed in the store. He tells me that the principal part of his trade is among the white people. I did not press him as to what he is really worth, but he said I could safely say $15,000, and that he does a business of from $20,000 to $25,000 per year. Who will say that Mr. Purdy should not be classed among the successful business men, both white and colored, and especially when we take into consideration the fact that all of his success has been accomplished without education or business experience. I only wish some of our white college graduates would do as well.
DR. W. T. DINWIDDIE.
DR. W. T. DINWIDDIE.
Dr. W. T. Dinwiddie, a young man who is engaged in the practice of dentistry at Lexington, Ky., is a credit to the race. He is a native of Danville, Ky., where he attended the public schools of that city, afterwards taking a two years' course in the Knoxville College at Knoxville, Tenn. Dr. Dinwiddie first learned the carpenter's trade, and was regarded as a very fine workman; but, having a natural desire to practice dentistry, he decided to enter Meharry Medical and Dental College at Nashville, Tenn., and fit himself for the practice of that profession. After a three years' course he graduated with high honors, and was called by the President and Faculty of Meharry Dental College to accept a professorship; and he took the chair of Prosthetic Dentistry, which position he held with both success and honor, until he resigned to enter into the practice of his profession at Lexington, Ky., where he has by his most excellent workmanship and genial manners built up a very large practice.