Tuskegee University is an American institution of higher learning located in Tuskegee, Alabama. Tuskegee is a member school of the Thurgood Marshall Scholarship Fund.

The school was the dream of Lewis Adams, a former slave and George W. Campbell, a former slave owner. Adams could read, write and speak several languages despite having no formal education. He also was an experienced tinsmith, harness-maker and shoemaker and Prince Hall Freemason an acknowledged leader of the African-American community in Macon County, Alabama.

During Reconstruction, the period following the American Civil War, the South was impoverished. Many blacks were illiterate and had few employable job skills. Adams was especially concerned that, without an education, the recently freed former slaves would not be able to support themselves. Campbell, of like-thinking, had become a merchant and a banker. He had little experience with educational institutions, but was always willing to contribute all of his resources and efforts to make the school a success.

W.F. Foster, a white candidate for the Alabama Senate, came to Adams with a question. What would Adams want in return for securing the votes of African Americans in Macon County for Foster and another white candidate? In response, Adams asked for a normal school for the free men, freed slaves and their children (a normal school, at that time, was the name for a teacher's college) to be established in the area.

Foster and the other candidate were elected. He worked with the other fellow legislator Arthur L. Brooks to draft and pass legislation authorizing $2,000 to create the school. Adams, Thomas Dyer, and M.B. Swanson formed Tuskegee's first board of commissioners. They wrote to Hampton Institute in Virginia, asking the school to recommend someone to head their new school. Former Union Army General and Hampton Principal Samuel C. Armstrong felt that he knew just the man for the job: 25 year-old Booker T. Washington.

Washington was a former slave who, after working menial labor jobs as a freedman, had sought a formal education and worked his way through Hampton Institute and had graduated from Wayland Seminary in Washington, D.C.. He had returned to Hampton, where he was working as a teacher. Sam Armstrong, who knew him well, strongly recommended him to Tuskegee's founders in Alabama.

Lewis Adams and Tuskegee's governing body agreed, and hired Washington, although such positions had always been held by whites up until that time. Under his leadership, the new normal school (for the training of teachers) opened on July 4, 1881 in space borrowed from a church.

The following year, Washington bought the grounds of a former plantation which the campus is still centered on. The buildings were constructed by students, many of whom earned all or part of their expenses. The school was a living example of Washington's dedication to the pursuit of self-reliance. In addition to training teachers, one of his great concerns was to teach the practical skills needed to succeed at farming or other trades.

1940 photo, Junior class in farm management at Tuskegee Institute.Washington had his students do not only agricultural and domestic work, but also erect buildings. This was done in order to teach his students to see labor not only as practical, but also as beautiful and dignified. One of its most noteworthy professors was George Washington Carver, who was recruited to teach there by Washington.

In addition to building Tuskegee, Washington became a famous orator and leading spokesperson for African Americans in the United States for the final 20 years of his life. He was also awarded honorary degrees, including a doctorate.

Dr. Washington used Tuskegee and a network of wealthy American philanthropists such as Andrew Carnegie, Collis P. Huntington, John D. Rockefeller, and Henry Huttleston Rogers. According to Dr. Washington's papers, Rogers who had a poor public image as a robber baron and a leader of Standard Oil, was actually warm and generous with his friends, family and what he felt were worthy causes. An early champion of the concept of matching funds, Henry Rogers was a major anonymous contributor to Tuskegee and dozens of other black schools for more than 15 years. In June 1909, Dr. Washington made a famous speaking tour along the newly-completed Virginian Railway in Rogers' personal railcar Dixie, stopping at rural points in southern Virginia and southern West Virginia where the railroad was providing a new transportation link for commerce. His traveling companion on the tour recorded that Dr. Washington was warmly received by blacks and whites alike.

Another major relationship Washington developed was with Julius Rosenwald, son of an immigrant Jewish clothier and self-made man who had risen to the top of Sears, Roebuck and Company in Chicago, Illinois. He and other Jewish friends had been long-concerned about the lack of educational resources for blacks, especially in the South. After meeting with Dr. Washington, Rosenwald agreed to serve on Tuskegee's Board of Directors. He also worked with Dr. Washington to stimulate funding to train teachers schools such as Tuskegee and Hampton Institute. Beginning with a pilot program in 1912 using technical help from Tuskegee to develop plans and build schools and matching funds to encourage local community contributions, they eventually established and operated over 5,000 small community schools and supporting resources for the betterment of blacks throughout the South in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The local schools were a source of much community pride and were of priceless value to African-American families during those troubled times in public education. This work was a major part of Dr. Washington's legacy and was continued (and expanded through the Rosenwald Fund and others) for many years after his death.

Despite his travels and widespread work, Dr. Washington remained as principal of Tuskegee. Concerned about the educator's health, Rosenwald took steps to ease his tireless pace. However, in 1915, he died at the age of 59, as a result of congestive heart failure, reportedly aggravated by overwork. At his death Tuskegee's endowment exceeded US$1.5 million. He was buried on the campus near the chapel.

In 1941, in an effort to train black aviators, a training squadron of the U.S. Army Air Corps was established at Tuskegee Institute. These aviators became known as the Tuskegee Airmen and both the Army and Air Force R.O.T.C. programs still exist there today.

The Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site is located on the campus, and includes the George Washington Carver Museum.

Tuskegee University is ranked by U.S. News & World Report as one of "America's Best Colleges".

Website: http://www.tuskegee.edu

School Legends

1. Alice Coachman