Dr. H. B. Frissell, of Hampton Institute, a Northerner, whose work and residence has long been in the South.
George Foster Peabody, treasurer, a Georgian, trustee of the University of Georgia, who resides in the North.
Walter H. Page, the editor of the World’s Work, a North Carolinian who has long lived in the North.
Negro membership:
Booker T. Washington.
Bishop Abraham Grant, of Kan.
R. R. Moton, of Hampton Institute, secretary of the board.
J. C. Napier, a banker of Nashville, Tenn.
R. D. Smith, a farmer of Paris, Tex.
In a true sense the Southern Education Board and the Jeanes Fund Board represent organisations of working idealists. Such coöperation as this, between reasonable, broad-minded, and unselfish men of the entire country, is, at the present moment, the real solution of our problems. It is the solution of the Negro problem—all the solution there ever will be. For there is no finality in human endeavour: there is only activity; and when that activity is informed with the truth and inspired with faith and courage, it is not otherwise than success, for it is the best that human nature at any given time can do.
In making this statement, I do not, of course wish to infer that conditions are as good as can be expected, and that nothing remains to be done. As a matter of fact, the struggle is just beginning; as I have shown in previous chapters, all the forces of entrenched prejudice and ignorance are against the movement, the political leaders who still dominate the South are as hostile as they dare to be. The task is, indeed, too big for the South alone, or the North alone, or the white man alone: it will require all the strength and courage the nation possesses.
Universities Feel the New Impulse
Besides the campaign for better common schools, the educational revival has also renewed and revivified all the higher institutions of learning in the South. The state universities, especially, have been making extraordinary progress. I shall not soon forget my visit to the University of Georgia, at Athens, nor the impression I received while there of strong men at work, not merely erecting buildings of mortar and brick, but establishing a new sort of university system, which shall unify and direct to one common end all of the educational activities of the state: beginning with the common school and reaching upward to the university itself; including the agricultural and industrial schools, and even the Negro college of agriculture. The University of Georgia is one of the oldest state colleges in America, and the ambition of its leaders is to make it one of the greatest. Mr. Hodgson drove me around the campus, which has recently been extended until it contains nearly 1,000 acres. He showed me where the new buildings are to be, the drives and the bridges. Much of it is yet a vision of the future, but it is the sort of vision that comes true. I spent a day with President Soule of the Agricultural College, on his special educational train, which covered a considerable part of the state of Georgia, stopping at scores of towns where the speakers appeared before great audiences of farmers and made practical addresses on cotton and corn and cattle-raising, and on education generally. And everywhere the practical work of these public educators was greeted with enthusiasm.
I heard from Professor Stewart of his work in organising rural high schools, in encouraging local taxation, and in bringing the work of the public schools into closer correlation with that of the university.