Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee Institute, Typewritten Letter Signed 1909 w/ COA

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Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee Institute, Typewritten Letter Signed 1909 w/ COA:
$1235.00

Typewritten letter on Tuskegee Institute letterhead signed by Booker T. Washington. Letter is written to the Editor, Post-Intelligencer, Seattle Washington with a copy of his last annual report, not previously made public. Measures 5.5\" x 7\". Comes complete with Certificate of Authenticity.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Booker Taliaferro Washington(April 5, 1856 – November 14, 1915) was an African-American educator, author, orator, and advisor to presidents of the United States. Between 1890 and 1915, Washington was the dominant leader in theAfrican-Americancommunity.

Washington was of the last generation of black American leaders born into slavery and became the leading voice of the former slaves and their descendants, who were newly oppressed bydisfranchisementand theJim Crowdiscriminatory laws enacted in the post-ReconstructionSouthern states in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In 1895 hisAtlanta compromisecalled for avoiding confrontation over segregation and instead putting more reliance on long-term educational and economic advancement in the black community.

His base was theTuskegee Institute, ahistorically black collegein Alabama. Aslynchingsin the South reached a peak in 1895, Washington gave a speech in Atlanta that made him nationally famous. The speech called for black progress through education and entrepreneurship. His message was that it was not the time to challengeJim Crowsegregation and the disfranchisement of black voters in the South. Washington mobilized a nationwide coalition of middle-class blacks, church leaders, and white philanthropists and politicians, with a long-term goal of building the community\'s economic strength and pride by a focus on self-help and schooling. Secretly, he supported court challenges to segregation.[1]Black militants in the North, led byW.E.B. Du Bois, at first supported theAtlanta Compromisebut after 1909 they set up theNAACPand tried with little success to challenge Washington\'s political machine for leadership in the black community.[2]Decades after Washington\'s death in 1915, theCivil Rights movementgenerally moved away from his policies to take the more militant NAACP approach.