Evidences of Progress Among Colored People

by G. F. Richings

IMMANUEL TRAINING SCHOOL.

This work was begun in a small dilapidated frame building at Aiken, S. C., in 1882. That building constituted a part of the first real estate, which, through the aid of Dr. Derby, Mrs. H. G. Burlingame, Miss E. M. Greenleaf, and many other friends, was purchased for the colored people's use in April, 1882. As witnesses to the lawful execution of the deed, Dr. Derby and his brother-in-law, Mr. George H. Kennedy, who was spending the season in Aiken, signed their names to it.

That unfinished boarding house, which has since been used as a home, church, school and boarding hall for students, all at the same time, was, in a sense, the foundation of what is now Derby Hall—one of the best buildings of the school. To accommodate it to the various demands of the work, changes were made from time to time. But after the erection of a house of worship and a school building, there remained but one thing more to do, and that was to reconvert the entire structure into a boarding hall principally for the accommodation of students from a distance. The new mansard roof was put on and other necessary alterations and improvements made during the summer of 1891, at a cost of $1,600. The building now contains twenty-six rooms.

All of the helpful branches of industry are taught in this school.

REV. W. R. COLES.

Rev. W. R. Coles, the superintendent of the Immanuel Training School, and pastor of Immanuel Presbyterian Church, of Aiken, S. C., was one of the first graduates of Lincoln University. Speaking of his work as founder of the Immanuel Church, he had the following to say:

REV. W. R. COLES.

"Laboring as Synodical Missionary, by appointment of the Synod of Atlantic (and approved by the Presbyterian Committee of Missions for Freedmen), I came to Aiken on the 23d day of May, A. D. 1881, seeking a home for my family, and to look after the general interests of our work. While here (June 10, 1881), I received a communication from the Freedmen's Committee, informing me that my work as Synodical Missionary would terminate with June 30, and that it was the will of the Committee that I locate again in the pastorate.