Editing Booker T. Washington (section)

== Wealthy friends and benefactors ==

[[File:Tuskegee Institute - faculty.jpg|thumb|Andrew Carnegie and Robert Curtis Ogden with the faculty of the Tuskegee Institute in 1906]]

State and local governments historically underfunded black schools, although they were ostensibly providing "separate but equal" segregated facilities. White philanthropists strongly supported education financially. Washington encouraged them and directed millions of their money to projects all across the South that Washington thought best reflected his self-help philosophy. Washington associated with the richest and most powerful businessmen and politicians of the era, as well as many other educational leaders, such as [[William Rainey Harper]], president of the [[University of Chicago]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Davies |first1=Vanessa |title=Booker T. Washington's Challenge for Egyptology: African-Centered Research in the Nile Valley |journal=Dotawo: A Journal of Nubian Studies |date=2023 |issue=Miscellanea |doi=10.5070/D60060622 |s2cid=257961196 |url=https://escholarship.org/uc/item/89x8s164 |access-date=April 5, 2023 |doi-access=free |archive-date=April 5, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230405233904/https://escholarship.org/uc/item/89x8s164 |url-status=live }}</ref> He was seen as a spokesperson for African Americans and became a conduit for funding educational programs.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gardner |first1=Booker |title=The Educational Contributions of Booker T. Washington |journal=The Journal of Negro Education |date=1975 |volume=44 |issue=4 |pages=502–518 |doi=10.2307/2966635 |jstor=2966635}}</ref>

His contacts included such diverse and well known entrepreneurs and philanthropists as [[Andrew Carnegie]], [[William Howard Taft]], [[John D. Rockefeller]], [[Henry H. Rogers|Henry Huttleston Rogers]], [[George Eastman]], [[Julius Rosenwald]], [[Robert Curtis Ogden]], [[Collis Potter Huntington]] and [[William Henry Baldwin Jr.]] The latter donated large sums of money to agencies such as the Jeanes and Slater Funds. As a result, countless small rural schools were established through Washington's efforts, under programs that continued many years after his death. Along with rich white men, the black communities helped their communities directly by donating time, money and labor to schools to match the funds required.{{sfn|Norrell |2009 |pp=273–275, 368–370}}

=== Henry Huttleston Rogers ===

[[File:BookerTWashington1909VAVWtour.jpg|thumb|upright|right|Handbill during his 1909 tour of southern Virginia and West Virginia]]

A representative case of an exceptional relationship was Washington's friendship with millionaire industrialist and financier [[Henry H. Rogers]] (1840–1909). Henry Rogers was a [[self-made man]], who had risen from a modest working-class family to become a principal officer of [[Standard Oil]], and one of the richest men in the United States. Around 1894, Rogers heard Washington speak at [[Madison Square Garden (1890)|Madison Square Garden]]. The next day, he contacted Washington and requested a meeting, during which Washington later recounted that he was told that Rogers "was surprised that no one had 'passed the hat' after the speech".{{citation needed|date=April 2014}} The meeting began a close relationship that extended over a period of 15 years. Although Washington and the very private Rogers were seen as friends, the true depth and scope of their relationship was not publicly revealed until after Rogers's sudden death of a stroke in May 1909. Washington was a frequent guest at Rogers's New York office, his [[Fairhaven, Massachusetts]] summer home, and aboard his steam yacht [[Kanawha (1899)|''Kanawha'']].{{Citation needed|date=January 2020}}

A few weeks later, Washington went on a previously planned speaking tour along the newly completed [[Virginian Railway]], a $40-million enterprise that had been built almost entirely from Rogers's personal fortune. As Washington rode in the late financier's [[private railroad car]], ''Dixie'', he stopped and made speeches at many locations. His companions later recounted that he had been warmly welcomed by both black and white citizens at each stop.{{citation needed|date=April 2018}}

Washington revealed <!-- to whom? -->that Rogers had been quietly funding operations of 65 small country schools for African Americans, and had given substantial sums of money to support Tuskegee and Hampton institutes. He also noted that Rogers had encouraged programs with [[matching funds]] requirements so the recipients had a stake in the outcome.{{citation needed|date=April 2014}}

=== Anna T. Jeanes ===
In 1907 [[Philadelphia]] [[Quaker]] [[Anna T. Jeanes]] (1822–1907) donated one million dollars to Washington for elementary schools for black children in the South. Her contributions and those of Henry Rogers and others funded schools in many poor communities.{{Citation needed|date=January 2020}}

=== Julius Rosenwald ===
[[Julius Rosenwald]] (1862–1932) was a Jewish American self-made wealthy man with whom Washington found common ground. By 1908, Rosenwald, son of an immigrant clothier, had become part-owner and president of [[Sears, Roebuck and Company]] in Chicago. Rosenwald was a philanthropist who was deeply concerned about the poor state of African-American education, especially in the segregated Southern states, where their schools were underfunded.<ref name= Williams>{{cite news|last1=Williams|first1=Juan|title=Educating a Nation|url=http://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/topic/excellence_in_philanthropy/educating_a_nation|access-date=June 6, 2012|newspaper=Philanthropy|date=Spring 2012|archive-date=May 11, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120511110640/http://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/topic/excellence_in_philanthropy/educating_a_nation|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 1912, Rosenwald was asked to serve on the Board of Directors of Tuskegee Institute, a position he held for the remainder of his life. Rosenwald endowed Tuskegee so that Washington could spend less time fundraising and more managing the school. Later in 1912, Rosenwald provided funds to Tuskegee for a pilot program to build six new small schools in rural Alabama. They were designed, constructed and opened in 1913 and 1914, and overseen by Tuskegee architects and staff; the model proved successful.{{Citation needed|date=January 2020}}

After Washington died in 1915, Rosenwald established [[Rosenwald Fund|the Rosenwald Fund]] in 1917, primarily to serve African-American students in rural areas throughout the South. The school building program was one of its largest programs. Using the architectural model plans developed by professors at Tuskegee Institute, the Rosenwald Fund spent over $4&nbsp;million to help build 4,977 schools, 217 teachers' homes, and 163 shop buildings in 883 counties in 15 states, from Maryland to Texas.<ref>{{cite press release|url= http://www.nationaltrust.org/news/docs/20020606_rosenwald.html|publisher= National Trust for Historic Preservation|date=June 6, 2002|title= National Trust Names Rosenwald Schools One of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places|access-date=March 26, 2006|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20051230203445/http://www.nationaltrust.org/news/docs/20020606_rosenwald.html|archive-date=December 30, 2005|url-status= dead|website= History Is in Our Hands}}</ref> The Rosenwald Fund made [[matching funds|matching grants]], requiring community support, cooperation from the white school boards, and local fundraising. Black communities raised more than $4.7&nbsp;million to aid the construction and sometimes donated land and labor; essentially they taxed themselves twice to do so.<ref>{{cite web|title= The Herbert S. Ford Memorial Museum|url= http://ford.claiborneone.org/|publisher= Claiborneone|url-status=dead|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20060515144853/http://ford.claiborneone.org/|archive-date=May 15, 2006}}</ref> These schools became informally known as [[Rosenwald Schools]]. But the philanthropist did not want them to be named for him, as they belonged to their communities. By his death in 1932, these newer facilities could accommodate one-third of all African-American children in Southern U.S. schools.{{Citation needed|date=January 2020}}