The American “Civilizing Mission:”

The Tuskegee Institute and its Involvement in African Colonialism

by

Kenneth Smith

B.S., Pennsylvania State University, 2015

A THESIS

submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of History
College of Arts and Sciences

KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY

Manhattan, Kansas

2018

Approved by:

Major Professor
Dr. Andrew Orr
 Copyright

© Kenneth Smith 2018.

 Abstract

Many historians believe that the United States did not play a major role in the European

colonial affairs of Africa. The “civilizing mission” in Africa was largely a European matter that

the United States did not have any involvement in and instead stayed out of African affairs.

However, this is in fact not true. Industrial education was a new way of managing and

“civilizing” African populations after the global end of slavery and the archetype of industrial

education was in Tuskegee, Alabama at the Tuskegee Institute.

The Tuskegee Institute was the pinnacle of industrial education. Students came not just

from the United States, but from around the world as well to learn a trade or improved

technologies in agriculture. It allowed students to attend the school for free in exchange for

working the farms at the school and general upkeep while training them to be better farmers and

tradesmen. On the surface, it offered an avenue for blacks to carve their own economic path.

Implicitly, however, it did not offer African Americans and Africans a path towards upward

mobility as it continued to relegate them to menial labor jobs and worked within the confines of

the established racial hierarchy in which blacks were not granted the same opportunities as

whites, in this instance it was education.

This thesis argues that the Tuskegee Institute’s (now Tuskegee University) method of

industrial education became an influential model for managing the African colonies via industrial

education and that the United States was thus more involved in the “civilizing mission” than

previously thought. The Tuskegee Institute first ventured into Africa when it assisted the German

Colonial Government in Togo in establishing industrial education which helped to develop

infrastructure and modern technology in the colony. Second, I examine Tuskegee’s role in

Liberia as it established the Booker Washington Institute which is still in existence today. Lastly,
I illustrate the diverse effects of the Tuskegee Model of education in Africa and how it correlated

to Tuskegee education in the United States and how events in both Africa and the United States

led to the collapse of the Tuskegee Model.

 Table of Contents

List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ vi

List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ vii
Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................... viii
Dedication ....................................................................................................................................... x
Chapter 1 – Tuskegee in the Works of Scholarship ........................................................................ 1
Chapter 2 – Modernizing the Masses: The Introduction of New Concepts in Large-Scale Cotton
Cultivation in Togo ................................................................................................................ 23
Chapter 3 – Tuskegee in Africa: Implementing the Tuskegee Model Globally as Part of the
Civilizing Mission ................................................................................................................. 44
Chapter 4 – Past its Prime: The End of the Tuskegee Model of Education.................................. 65
Chapter 5 - Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 85
Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………..88

v
 List of Figures

Figure 1.1 Newly Built Railroad in Togo, 1905. .......................................................................... 38

Figure 1.2 Booker T. Washington Institute, Liberia. .................................................................... 61
Figure 1.3 Ambidexter Industrial and Normal Institute, Springfield, Illinois. ............................. 74

vi
 List of Tables

Table 1.1 Cotton Exports from Togo, 1902-1913......................................................................... 42

Table 1.2 Enrollments in Institutions of Higher Education of African Americans. ..................... 72

vii
 Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I would like to acknowledge my family. When I told them my plans

to return to college and pursue both a bachelor’s degree and a graduate degree, they supported

me wholeheartedly. They have always been my biggest supporters and this paper will hopefully

prove that their support and encouragement did not go to waste.

I would also like to thank Kevin Burks, my best friend and the reason I went back to

school. When I was unsure whether I should pursue a graduate degree or not and did not believe

in myself, he encouraged me. I am eternally grateful to him. I would also like acknowledge my

girlfriend Patricia Ochonski. She has helped me cope with the workload of graduate school and

offered me advice as she is pursuing her Ph.D. in Animal Science. From late night food and

coffee runs, to maintaining the house during my busy time, she has always been there for me.

I would also like to thank the members of my committee. Dr. Andrew Orr was the reason

I became invested in African history and his guidance has been invaluable. My first semester in

graduate school was not an easy one and once I was referred to him based on my previous work

on this paper’s subject, he made the transition to grad school much easier. I am grateful for all of

his guidance throughout this project. I would also like to thank Dr. Marsha Frey. Her help in this

paper and expertise has been incredible. She has helped me develop my writing and I have

always been appreciative of the time out of her day she takes to meet. Lastly, I would always like

to thank Dr. Charles Sanders. His teaching style made learning engaging and it is evident why

his students enjoy him. His knowledge on Southern history has also been a huge help in my

research.

viii
 Lastly, I would like to thank the Graduate School and the Kansas State History

Department for my admission into the graduate program and a special thank you to Tuskegee

University for their help in this project.

ix
 Dedication

This paper is dedicated to my friends, family, and to those who question whether they

have what it takes to pursue a graduate degree.

x
 Chapter 1 - Tuskegee in the Works of Scholarship

The traditional narrative of colonialism in Africa assumes that the United States was

uninvolved because it did not participate in the partition of Africa. Various European states had

their own idea of what the “civilizing mission” should be and thus kept to their own devices. The

“civilizing mission” referred to European efforts to better manage the indigenous peoples in their

African colonies and exploit their colonies while investing the minimum possible amount of

resources and manpower as possible, which necessitated minimizing the level of military force

necessary to control a colony. While European powers did carve up the continent, they looked

outwards to the United States’ South as a model of how to exploit a class of people they viewed

as inferior. Industrial education under the Tuskegee Model offered a possible solution to

Europe’s problem because, in the South, it offered African Americans a sense of autonomy and

economic independence without upsetting the racial hierarchy. The thought was that the

Tuskegee Model could be adopted in Africa and the results would yield the same results. Even

though the Tuskegee Model ultimately failed, it left a lasting impression in the United States and

Africa. This paper will show the legacy of the Tuskegee Model of Education in Africa and how it

promised an efficient method of managing indigenous populations while granting Africans more

economic possibilities through industrial education. This thesis will also argue how the United

States was more influential in the “civilizing mission” than previously thought by introducing

Washington’s Tuskegee Model.

Tuskegee’s earliest involvement in Africa began in the German colony of Togo after it

sent students there with the Kolonial-Wirtschaftliches Komitee (German Colonial Economic

Committee) backing to train the Togolese in large-scale cotton farming and train them in new

1
technologies through industrial education. Mary Evelyn Townsend’s The Rise and Fall of

Germany’s Colonial Empire 1884-1918 fits into an early cluster of scholarship that views the

Tuskegee Model as a positive form of colonial management and less exploitative than other

European states, such as Britain and France. She notes that Togo was both self-supporting and

the most developed of the German colonies because of the German development plan led by the

Tuskegee Institute’s Expedition to Togo. She also claims that it was the most peaceful because

there were few native uprisings and mostly cooperation between the Togolese and German

colonial officials.1 Townsend claims that Germany helped establish technical schools with the

aid of Tuskegee to modernize the Togolese economy which later expanded under French

colonial rule after Germany conceded its African territories to Britain and France.

Harry Rudin is another scholar that fits into the group of scholars that claimed that during

Germany’s short-lived colonial period it was the most successful because it was less exploitative

and managed to modernize its colonies in a shorter period of time than other European states

who had colonies. 2 One of these accomplishments was the successful growing of cotton in

Cameroon and implementing modern cotton growing techniques which were influenced by the

Tuskegee Model. He claimed that Secretary of Colonial Affairs Bernhard Dernburg was the

driving force behind cotton growing in Cameroon, much like he did in Togo because it was

necessary to end Germany’s reliance on cotton imports from the United States.3 Wanting to end

its reliance on American cotton imports, Germany still imported American cotton seed from

America to the colony for experimentation. Rudin concluded that although cotton from

1
Ibid., 145.
2
Harry Rudin, Germans in the Cameroons, 1884-1914: A Case Study in Modern Imperialism (New York:
Greenwood Press, 1968), 11.
3
Ibid., 136.

2
Cameroon did not become a stable commodity for Germany, it did gain attention for its

modernization of the agricultural industry in Cameroon.4

The praise in the scholarship of success in both Germany’s colonial history and the

Tuskegee Model continue in Lewis H. Gann and Peter Duignan’s The Rulers of German Africa,

1884-1914. This work claimed that although Germany attempted to establish Togo as a “cotton

empire” it failed at doing so but in the process, accomplished modernizing the Togolese state.

Both argued that Germany’s attempts to establish Togo as a cotton empire introduced Africans to

the benefits of industrial education. In economic terms, the impact of German colonialism was

far from insignificant. Within less than one generation the Germans accomplished a great deal

despite the obstacles of distance, climate, disease, and their own ignorance concerning African

conditions. With initial support from the Tuskegee Institute, they introduced modern methods of

scientific research, set up new industries, and improved infrastructure. Gann and Duignan further

argued that German colonial governments enhanced agronomic productivity by working through

the traditional agricultural framework and with aid from Tuskegee, introduced innovations such

as plows and new crops.5 Cash-cropping also helped in transforming the peoples and economies

of Togo. Germany’s attempt at establishing Togo as a “model colony” was based on reshaping

Togolese society around technological progress and the cotton industry. As prices of American

cotton imports increased, the which oversaw management of the colony, considered how to

develop it into a reliable and profitable source of cotton. To do this, they looked to the

sharecropping system in the American South as a model and so the KWK enlisted the assistance

of six African-Americans from the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. They chose the Tuskegee

4
Ibid., 147.
5
Lewis H. Gann, and Peter Duignan, The Rulers of German Africa: 1884-1914 (Stanford: Stanford University Press,
1977), 243-245.

3
Institute since it focused on training African-Americans to be better farmers by teaching new

concepts in large-scale cotton farming. The Tuskegee graduates succeeded in helping the

Togolese develop a new type of cotton that would surpass the native cotton in quality and yield

and introduced them to more modern efficient ways to cultivate cotton.6 The Tuskegee

Expedition highlights the arguments made by Gann and Duignan that Germany helped introduce

new technologies in farming and infrastructure in Togo. Scholars like Ralph Austen from the

University of Chicago make that same argument. Austen notes that Gann and Duignan argued

that Germany successfully increased cotton productivity in Togo without directly oppressing the

Togolese. This, however, was not the case as the Tuskegee Model was oppressive of black self-

determination and upward mobility which was prevalent in more recent scholarship. Austen,

however, further makes the point that because economic progress overshadowed the minimal

amount of violent coercion, Gann and Duignan’s study showed the benefits of German

colonialism.7

Lewis Gann and Arthur Knoll’s Germans in the Tropics: Essays in German Colonial

History goes beyond the technical assistance program in Togo and evaluated the effects of

German colonialism which as scholarship started to evolve, became viewed as a failure by other

scholars.8 The authors argue that the forced labor and underpaid wage labor enforced by

Germany stunted the development of the Togolese state after colonialism had ended.9 It is also

pointed out that German colonial endeavors in Togo received little backing from investors and

6
Ibid., 165.
7
Ralph A. Austen, "Herrschaft," Review of The Rulers of German Africa: 1884-1914, by Lewis H. Gann and Peter
Duignan, The Journal of African History 20, 2 (1979): 302. http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-state.edu/stable/181528.
8
Arthur J. Knoll, and Lewis H. Gann, Germans in the Tropics: Essays in German Colonial History, (New York:
Greenwood Press, 1987), xiv.
9
Ibid., 88.

4
the Reichstag because of the extraordinary cost forced the colonies to operate outside the

German government; a downside to the Tuskegee Model.10 Even though both Knoll and Gann

dig deeper than Germany merely providing technical assistance to the Togolese, the central

argument remains the same which is that Germany rapidly modernized the Togolese state by

providing technical assistance. They also make the argument that by doing this, Germany

liberated the Togolese in a way that differed from other western powers.11 Scholars like Roger

Chickering from the University of Oregon, agree with the arguments made by both Gann and

Knoll but critiques their work because it follows the same path as Gann’s previous work with

Duignan and does not add anything new to the scholarship.12

Arthur Knoll’s Togo Under Imperial Germany: 1884-1914, follows along the same path

as Germans in the Tropics in that it glorifies the German colonizing mission in Togo. Knoll

claims that earlier scholarship looks at the German colonialism through a “European lens” by

emphasizing the merits of German actions in Togo. Knoll focused on the Tuskegee Model’s

introduction of wage labor, modern farming methods, and infrastructure, but this work follows

the same path as his earlier scholarship. Knoll also argued that Germany succeeded in

establishing a Musterkolonie (master colony) because it was less coercive and destructive than

other colonial powers.13 He gave the example that since the German government did not possess

unlimited power in the colonies, it could not ruthlessly impose its will upon people and instead

made concessions and resorted to more economic incentives rather than coercion. Since the

10
Ibid., 144.
11
Ibid., 162.
12
Roger Chickering, “Review of Germans in the Tropics: Essays in German Colonial History, by Arthur Knoll and
Lewis Gann,” The International History Review 11, 1 (1989): 146-48, http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-
state.edu/stable/40105973, 148.
13
Arthur Knoll, Togo Under Imperial Germany 1884-1914, A Case Study in Colonial Rule, (Stanford: Hoover
Institution Press, 1978), ix.

5
Germans had no real colonial ideology to build from, they chose a style of rule which seemed to

fit best with current economic needs and thus chose to emulate the system of education they had

learned about from the Tuskegee Institute. Knoll also made the claim that many Togolese were

more willing to accept this method of labor and subjugation because it gave them new economic

skills that were useful for development.14 His work looks at German colonialism in Togo through

the same lens as his earlier work with Lewis Gann and Peter Duignan. Wolfe Schmokel from the

University of Vermont reinforced this critique in noting that German colonizers were focused on

developing the state’s economy and establishing a “model colony.” Schmokel did note that Knoll

adds a paternalistic element to the scholarship by noting that the KWK sought to develop Togo’s

resources and people without the extremely violent measures used in Southwest Africa.15

Throughout the subsequent years, the scholarship shifted to looking at the impact on Togolese

society from a European perspective to a more critical view of Germany’s implementation of

industrial education.

In D. E. K. Amenumey’s “German Administration in Southern Togo,” he challenges the

argument made by historian Manfred Nussbaum that Germany was able to establish a “model

colony” in Togo by assisting it in become economically self-supporting through taxation and

new labor practices.16 Amenumey notes that the German colonial administration oversaw the

colony and did not leave it at the hands of private trading companies, like other colonial states,

because local labor was the most successful and best suited for the area.17 Still, the German

14
Ibid., 163
15
Wolfe W. Schmokel, “Review of Togo Under Imperial Germany, 1884-1914: A Case Study in Colonial Rule, by
Arthur Knoll,” The American Historical Review 84, 1 (1979): 225, doi:10.2307/1855819.
16
D. E. K. Amenumey, "German Administration in Southern Togo," The Journal of African History 10, 4 (1969):
623, http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-state.edu/stable/179902.
17
Ibid., 633.

6
colonial administration aimed towards protecting the interests of private trading firms which

made limited the commercial opportunity for the Togolese. Amnumey agrees with Nussbaum’s

argument that Germany succeeded in making Togo self-supporting without the use of violent

coercion.18

Other scholars during the 1970s continued to keep the focus on German imperialism from

an economic standpoint. Woodruff Smith in The Ideology on German Imperialism, 1840-1906,

placed German imperialist needs into two categories: emigration and economic.19 Smith argues

that German economic needs drove the desire to establish develop Africa to meet the needs of

Germany’s growing industry and end its reliance on imports of raw materials, such as cotton. 20

By exporting raw materials to Germany, it formed part of Tuskegee’s plans to use African

colonies to help Germany industry.21 Smith intertwines emigration and economic needs by

arguing Germans who wanted to emigrate to its African colonies would be encouraged to

establish farms, most notably small cash crop farms to support German industry. When this idea

was abandoned, the Tuskegee Expedition tried to achieve the same end by making the Togolese

adopt a culture that revolved around cotton cultivation and introduce a wage labor system that

was dominated by men rather than women. This again coincides with Smith’s argument that

economic development drove colonial rule in Togo.22 Although Smith’s argument does mention

the effect of encouraging the local male population to adopt a “cotton culture” which took away

the autonomy of women in the local cotton industry, the focus remains on economic

18
Ibid., 639.
19
Woodruff D. Smith, "The Ideology of German Colonialism, 1840-1906," The Journal of Modern History 46, 4
(1974): 642, http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-state.edu/stable/1877789.
20
Ibid., 645.
21
Ibid., 662.
22
Ibid., 655.

7
development like other scholars such as Gann, Knoll, and Duignan. Smith does, however,

introduce the nature of colonial policy into his arguments which is evident in his emigration

versus economic standpoints.

As scholarship about German imperialism in Togo continued to evolve, it took on a more

critical approach to what previous authors had written about the subject. Scholars like Carol

Aisha Blackshire-Belay criticized previous scholarship for not focusing on the brutality and

coerciveness of German conquest. She argued that although the Togolese received technical

assistance which laid the foundation for the modern Togolese state, earlier scholars on the

subject had created a false perception of Germany’s rule and the role of the Tuskegee Model.23

She noted that scholars had long overlooked the fact that Germans did not “settle” in Togo but in

fact “exploited” the area and argued that future scholarship about the subject should focus on

how German colonial administration affects the condition of the modern Togolese state.24

Benjamin Lawrance focuses on the rural and urban colonial experiences in Togo in

Locality, Mobility, and ‘Nation’: Periurban Colonialism in Togo’s Eweland, 1900-1960. He

noted the struggles that Togo had in trying to establish an Ewe controlled government. The

movement grew in the hinterlands against colonial politics that were more prevalent in the urban

areas in Southern Togo. In both areas, social and political shifts evolved separately as colonial

power shaped each path.25 Lawrance’s book also addressed gender at its role in shaping politics

and society. He strengthened his argument by showing how large-scale farming, such as cotton,

23
Carol Aisha Blackshire-Belay, "German Imperialism in Africa: The Distorted Images of Cameroon, Namibia,
Tanzania, and Togo," Journal of Black Studies 23, 2 (1992): 242,
http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.kstate.edu/stable/2784532.
24
Ibid., 245.
25
Benjamin Lawrence, Locality, Mobility, and “Nation”: Periurban Colonialism in Togo’s Eweland, 1900-1960,
(New York: University of Rochester Press, 2007), vii.

8
shaped the coastal economies of Togo but was slower to develop inland as local chiefs resisted

colonial influence.26 Germany moved the capital from Zébé to Lomé which shifted the power

from the inland Ewe groups to the coastal Ewe groups as those closer to the coast were

modernized more quickly and were influenced more by colonial politics while those Ewe groups

more inland were influenced less by colonial powers.27Peter Buhler of Boise State University

added to Lawrence’s argument by noting the importance women played in rural Ewe politics as

their roles in local economic markets changed during the German colonial period and continued

to be undercut during French rule. Women helped lead the nationalist movement because they

wanted to reclaim their role in the market economy, such as the cotton market which women

controlled virtually every aspect of the local market prior to colonial rule.28

Other modern scholars go deeper into Germany’s colonization of Togo and take an

overall different approach than the positive German spin on the colonizing mission. Andrew

Zimmerman claimed that although Germany helped modernize the Togolese economy, they had

more of an impact in shaping Togolese society. In the “A German Alabama in Africa: The

Tuskegee Expedition to German Togo and the Transnational Origins of West African Cotton

Growers,” he denounced Gann and Duignan’s position that Germany merely provided technical

assistance to teach the Togolese more efficient farming methods and promote economic

26
Ibid., 30.
27
Ibid., 33.

28
Peter Buhler, " Review of Locality, Mobility, and ‘Nation’: Periurban Colonialism in Togo's Eweland, 1900–
1960, by Benjamin N. Lawrance," Historian 71, 1 (2009): 95, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost, accessed
December 3, 2016.

9
advancement.29 Zimmerman’s article compared Germany’s treatment of Togolese to African

Americans in the South and how Germany sought to emulate the Tuskegee model of education

by trying to globalize the term “negro” and apply it in Togo.30 This was one of the first works to

address the connection of the impacts of industrial education under Tuskegee Model in both the

United States and Africa.

Zimmerman takes the argument made in his article and expands it in his book Alabama in

Africa: Booker T. Washington, the German Empire, and the Globalization of the New South by

noting the methods used to implement new cotton cultivation methods, destroyed local political

autonomy.31 The attempts at establishing the “New South” in Togo by German colonial officials

threatened notions of race and sexuality in the region.32 Efforts to impose traditional gender roles

on the Togolese also threatened their economy. Middle-Class Western gender roles were very

different from traditional gender roles in Togo. Men, women, and children worked side by side

with women performing the bulk of cotton farming while men merely sold the fabric and put up

the collateral. The KWK tried to alter this by relegating women to the domestic sphere and

pushing men to the farms as wage earners. Zimmerman further argues that Germany’s attempt to

turn the Togolese into large-scale cotton farmers stemmed from its fascination with

sharecropping labor in the American South and how they believed that Africans were natural

cotton farmers. This goes further than Gann and Duignan’s argument but also denounces the

notion that German intervention in Togo was good for the Togolese. Laura Wildenthal notes that

29
Andrew Zimmerman, “A German Alabama in Africa: The Tuskegee Expedition to German Togo and the
Transnational Origins of West African Cotton Growers,” The American Historical Review 110, 5 (2005): 1362,
accessed July 6, 2016. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/ahr.110.5.1362.
30
Ibid., 1368.
31
Andrew Zimmerman, Alabama in Africa: Booker T. Washington, The German Empire, and the Globalization of
the New South, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010), 237.
32
Ibid., 239.

10
Zimmerman’s work shows how German administrators ended Togolese-controlled cotton

production forcing them to adopt Western techniques and to compete in the global cotton market.

She also noted that Zimmerman showed how Germany sought to apply the labor and identity of

the “Negro in the New South” from the United States by creating a “global south” through

technical assistance provided by African American students from the Tuskegee Institute.

Wildenthal stated that Zimmerman showed how Germany altered notions of Togolese society,

gender, and labor during its colonial rule with the help of Tuskegee.33

Sven Beckert’s argument builds on Zimmerman’s and shows the larger scope of the

cotton industry in his book Empire of Cotton: A Global History (2014). His work argued how the

cotton industry played an important role in modernizing labor and the economy on a global scale.

He also claims how the need for more cotton led European states to expand their empires.34 The

transformative power of cotton in the world is a central theme in his work. His book parallels

Zimmerman’s works in showing this in German Togoland. Beckert further noted how the cotton

industry continues the same practice today.35 The methods of coercion and capitalism continue to

show how powerful states can shape the societies of the areas it exploits. The Tuskegee Model

encapsulated the core of Beckert’s argument because it was implemented to exploit Togolese

cotton production and in the process altered the infrastructure and society of Togo.

Beckert’s article “Bringing Western Culture from Tuskegee to Togo” is a microcosm of

The Empire of Cotton. His argument explained how the expanding textile industry and

overreliance on American cotton pushed Germany to look to its colonies for developing its own

33
Lora Wildenthal, “Review on Alabama in Africa: Booker T. Washington, the German Empire, and the
Globalization of the New South, by Andrew Zimmerman,” Central European History 44, 2 (2011): 346,
http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-state.edu/stable/41238437.
34
Sven Beckert, Empire of Cotton: A Global History, (New York: Vintage Books, 2014), xi.
35
Ibid., 442.

11
source of cotton. Togo was chosen based on earlier studies in cotton growing in the colony and

because the natives were familiar with growing it. Beckert argued that Germany sought to

capitalize on these findings and modernize cultivation techniques using technical assistance from

the Tuskegee Institute and labor methods seen in the American South to effectively manage the

Togolese as planters in the American South managed their African American laborers.36 Beckert

further explained that instituting a culture that revolved around cotton was the key to effectively

expanding Germany’s cotton empire in Togo which also goes back to his earlier argument in The

Empire of Cotton that the cotton industry controlled all aspects of society and the economy and

was able to evolve with changing labor practices.37 Scholars like Edward Baptist noted another

argument that Beckert makes is the emergence of what he calls “war capitalism.” “War

capitalism” is defined by Beckert as slavery, the appropriation of indigenous peoples, imperial

expansion, armed trade, and the assertion of sovereignty over people and land by entrepreneurs.

Baptist also addresses how “war capitalism” assisted in the collection and exploitation of forced

labor which undercut free labor.38 This was most evident in the United States in the use of chattel

slavery and later the sharecropping system as white planters exploited the labor of black farmers.

The Tuskegee Model is often viewed as a third example of “war capitalism” because of its

exploitative ideals. Baptist agreed with Beckert’s argument that the United States was the most

successful in adopting the fundamentals of “war capitalism” which led them to become the most

powerful cotton economy in the world.39 This ties into why Germany wanted to model the

36
Sven Beckert, “From Tuskegee to Togo: The Problem of Freedom in the Empire of Cotton,” The Journal of
American History 92, 2 (2005): 506, accessed July 3, 2016, Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3659276.
37
Ibid., 525.
38
Edward Baptist, "Review of Empire of Cotton: A Global History, by Sven Beckert," The Journal of American
History 102, 3 (2015): 825, doi:10.1093/jahist/jav525.
39
Ibid., 826.

12
United States system of labor in the South and apply it in Togo. It also helps show the

progression in scholarship as it displays the universal power of the cotton industry and industrial

education.

Other scholars take a different approach to Germany’s colonizing mission in Togo. Jens-

Uwe Guettel argued in his book German Expansionism, Imperial Liberalism, and the United

States, 1776-1945 that ideas of colonial expansion from the late eighteenth century onward

played important roles in liberal and progressive circles which looked to the United States for

inspiration and concrete examples. In the early part of the twentieth century, American-inspired

liberalism dominated German colonial discourse. Guettel reinforced this argument by noting that

earlier scholars, such as Carl Peters, looked at the treatment of the Native Americans by English

settlers in North America and preached that Germany should do the same in its African

colonies.40 German liberal colonialists viewed America as an unexceptional colonial empire and

argued for the emulation of American methods, such as adopting the system of farming and

education found in the American South and apply it to the Togolese.41 Guettel further argued that

much like their American counterparts, most German liberals were racists and die-hard

expansionists which helped add a level of nationalism to their politics; an argument that led to

the belief of establishing Togo as a model colony.42 This argument was a break from previous

works on German colonialism in Africa because it chooses to challenge the idea of German

exceptionalism rather than focus on Germany’s actions in Togo, which is found in both

Zimmerman and Gann’s books. Shelley Baranowski from the University of Akron agreed with

40
Jens-Uwe Guettel, German Expansionism, Imperial Liberalism, and the United States, 1776-1945 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2012), 80.
41
Ibid., 124.
42
Ibid., 218.

13
Guettel’s point. She noted Guettel’s approach to comparing Germany to the United States and

how the U.S. influenced Germany’s discourse, such as in Togo, by adding a new depth to the

scholarship on understanding German politics and German colonial policy.43 Baranowski paid

special attention to Guettel’s focus on how German liberal policy followed different paths in

Africa as it pertained to treatment of the local populations. For instance, German liberals

borrowed the Native American policy that the United States had evoked during the nineteenth

century and applied it to its policy towards the Herrero. Germany also borrowed the system of

labor in the American South after the Civil War and applied it to its treatment of the Togolese. 44

In The “Baumwollfrage:” Cotton Colonialism in German East Africa, Thaddeus Sunseri

argued that both colonial policy and Germany polity was more intertwined than previously

written which is illustrated by using examples of colonial labor policy and gender. Labor in the

Metropole in Germany influenced labor in the colonies. The initial approach to the “colonial

labor question” was forced labor on cotton plantations but the Maji Maji Rebellion that had

occurred in British India caused German officials to reconsider their approach. Laborers in the

German textile industry were wage laborers and so the colonial officials sought to introduce the

same method of wage labor in Togo.45 Women in the labor force in both Togo and Germany

mirrored each other as well. Sunseri explained that women in Germany entered the workforce

out of necessity. As labor practices changed and the textile industry grew, it was necessary for

women to join the workforce. This was the same attitude taken towards women in Togo as

gender roles began to change. Women in Togo found it difficult to continue growing foodstuffs

43
Shelley Baranowski,"Review of German Expansionism, Imperial Liberalism, and the United States, 1776–1945,
by Jens-Uwe Guettel." American Historical Review 118, 5 (2013): 1618, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost,
accessed November 24, 2016.
44
Ibid., 1619.
45
Ibid., 34.

14
and maintain the households as they were tasked with assisting in cultivating cotton.46 Both

German and Togolese societies saw a decline in birth rates and increase in social tensions.

Sunseri’s work was one of the first to deal with comparing German and colonial politics as well

as noting the reasons for overlooking the German colonizing mission.

V.P. Franklin focuses on labor and race and how Germany transplanted these ideas from

the United States to show how education facilitated the subservience of Africans to German

colonizers as it did at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. Franklin states that the Tuskegee

Institute was not designed to teach negroes to compete with white workers but provide them with

the education necessary to aid their white superiors in the cash crop industry. 47 Franklin further

argues that the education provided to the Togolese by the Tuskegee Institute later influenced the

drive to establish schools that were not solely focused on teaching technical assistance. The

funds funneled into the technical schools in Togo were eventually used to establish vocational

education devoid of economic and technical education.48 This argument takes Zimmerman’s

point on technical education and expands it to show how education in Togo evolved after

German colonial control and into the later part of the twentieth century.

Cotton, Colonialism, and Social History in Sub-Saharan Africa by Allen Isaacman and

Richard Roberts offered more of a social history of cotton growing in Africa and how the local

populations dealt with colonial rule. Other scholars with backgrounds in African history also

collaborated in this book which is part of a larger series of works. The book argued that in the

case of Togo, the Togolese could adapt to colonial measures imposed by Germany. The

46
Ibid., 50.
47
Vincent P. Franklin, "Pan-African Connections, Transnational Education, Collective Cultural Capital, and
Opportunities Industrialization Centers International," The Journal of African American History 96, 1 (2011): 45,
doi:10.5323/jafriamerhist.96.1.0044.
48
Ibid., 59.

15
modernization of cotton farming techniques and the local economy changed social dynamics by

removing some of the control women had on cotton production because prior to colonial

intervention.49 The authors also argued that colonial administration of the cotton industry

disadvantaged the Togolese in the world economy because Germany controlled the means of

production but it did not, however, control the local economy which grew over the following

years.50 Scholars like Martin Klein from the University of Toronto noted that the arguments

made by Isaacman and Roberts showed how the cotton quotas imposed Sub-Saharan Africans

were unattainable and so various forms of coercion were carried out to extract more labor but

instead caused resentment among the local peoples and the systems left in place after colonial

intervention left the Togolese disadvantaged in the global market.51 The large quotas were unable

to support industrial education in Togo; one of the major flaws of the Tuskegee Model. Industrial

schools were at a disadvantage because students attended the schools for free and paid for their

tuition through labor. Unfortunately, the schools could never turn a profit and were therefore

unsustainable long-term. The arguments made by Isaacman and Roberts show how scholarship

about German colonialism in Togo evolved to illustrate how German methods to coerce the

Togolese to grow more cotton, like in the Tuskegee Expedition, altered various aspects of

Togolese society including gender and the local economy.

The model of industry education was the Tuskegee Institute in Tuskegee, Alabama. The

head of the school was Booker T. Washington who was appealing to whites because of his stance

49
Allen Isaacman, and Richard Roberts, Cotton, Colonialism, and Social History in Sub-Saharan Africa,
(Portsmouth: Heinemann), 1995, 94.
50
Ibid., 95.
51
Martin A Klein, "Colonial Cotton," Review of Cotton, Colonialism, and Social History in Sub-Saharan Africa, by
Allen Isaacman and Richard Roberts,” The Journal of African History 38, 2 (1997): 330,
http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-state.edu/stable/182845.

16
on race. He believed that blacks should not challenge the racial hierarchy and work on uplifting

themselves through labor and education in trades. This type of education became known as the

“Tuskegee Model.” The “Tuskegee Model” was first implemented on a global scale in Togo as

Germany looked at a new way to manage the Togolese population and end its reliance on

American cotton. Washington’s beliefs on education and race were met with support by white

elites but criticism by his contemporaries and scholars over the decades after the Tuskegee

expedition to Togo.

Sir Harry Johnson was one of the biggest supporters of the “Tuskegee Model” of

education because of his view on race and his stance on the inferiority of blacks to whites. He

argued that Tuskegee played an important part in “civilizing” blacks globally and had the

potential to raise them to the likeness of whites.52 He also argued for the establishment of more

Tuskegee model schools throughout the world and believed that Africa should be a primary

focus of the project. Scholars of the time, like Mary White Ovington, supported Johnson’s ideas

of race and support of the Tuskegee Model because it reflected the global racial divide. She

noted how Johnson’s view of Tuskegee’s “civilizing mission” was key to uplifting blacks around

the world.53 This support of the Tuskegee Model was common among supporters of Tuskegee

but became outdated as movements such as the Pan-African Movement sought to uplift blacks

through education and self-determination. Over time, criticism of the Tuskegee Model’s

shortcomings started to become evident throughout scholarship.

Donald Spivey claimed how industrial education was like slavery in his work Schooling

for the New Slavery: Black Industrial Education, 1868-1915. Spivey, an African American

52
Harry Johnson, The Negro in the New World (New York: Johnson Reprint Corporation, 1969), ix.
53
Mary White Ovington. American Journal of Sociology 17, no. 2 (1911): 270-72. http://www.jstor.org.er.lib.k-
state.edu/stable/2762953.

17
historian at the University of Miami, argued that industrial education became a neo-slave system

under which whites could maintain the racial hierarchy and restrict African Americans to

continue performing menial labor under the guise of education. He also argues how industrial

education was replicated from America and implemented in Africa to maintain the racial

hierarchy abroad.54 Spivey concluded that Booker T. Washington’s death did not bring about the

end of industrial education under the Tuskegee Model. The legacy of Tuskegee carried on under

Tuskegee’s new president Robert Russa Moton and in Africa under the Phelps-Stokes Fund.55

The Tuskegee Model was in many ways like slavery because it subjugated blacks under the yoke

of menial labor and did not offer much in terms of upward mobility.

American philanthropy missions like the Phelps-Stokes Fund wanted to carry on the

moral and technical education of Tuskegee and apply it to Africa. White philanthropists and

colonial governments wanted to protect their interests and exploit African labor much like whites

were doing in the United States. This is evident in Edward Berman’s “Educational Colonialism

in Africa: The Role of American Foundations, 1910-1945.” This piece is found in a larger work

titled, Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism: The Foundations at Home and Abroad. In his

piece, Berman argued how the Phelps-Stokes Fund was able to appeal to philanthropic parties by

promoting Tuskegee education to help protect their interests.56 Berman concluded that the

implementation of the Tuskegee Model by the Phelps-Stokes Fund negatively altered Africa’s

history and set movements for self-determination back several decades.57

54
Donald Spivey, Schooling for the New Slavery: Black Industrial Education, 1868-1915 (London: Greenwood
Press, 1978), ix.
55
Ibid., 128.
56
Ed., Robert Arnove, Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism: The Foundations at Home and Abroad
(Massachusetts: G.K. Hall & Co., 1980), 179.
57
Ibid., 197.

18
 Kenneth King was one of the scholars critical of the Tuskegee Model which is evident in

his work Pan-Africanism and Education: A Study of Race, Philanthropy, and Education in the

Southern States of America and East Africa. He argues that the Tuskegee Model of education

failed to uplift Africans and African Americans because it did not teach them the skills necessary

to succeed in society. In fact, industrial education under this model limited the success of

uplifting blacks above their status. By failing to achieve this, King argued that this helped lead

movements towards making higher education more attainable for blacks and movements towards

self-determination.58 King concluded that industrial education perpetuated under the Tuskegee

Model and afterward by the Phelps-Stokes Fund, played an integral part in stifling blacks for

decades in America and Africa but by doing so it led towards movements of self-determination.59

The Tuskegee Model of education did indeed lead to movements in black self-determination and

it began at schools like Tuskegee, Hampton, and other African American schools.

Raymond Wolters in The New Negro on Campus: Black College Rebellions of the 1920s

argued the point that self-determination movements began to evoke change at African American

colleges, like Tuskegee and Hampton, thanks in large part to student movements. His work

focuses on how issues involved in protests, like the end industrial education, forced resignations

of school presidents and led to student unrest. Behind the protests were the aspirations that

blacks had the right to control their educational possibilities and have more say in the curriculum

they could learn.60 Wolters concluded that the rebellions were not meant to lead to integration

between African Americans and whites but were intended to make education more equal and

58
Kenneth King, Pan-Africanism and Education: A Study of Race Philanthropy and Education in the Southern
States of America and East Africa (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), 3.
59
Ibid., 253.
60
Raymond Wolters, The New Negro on Campus: Black College Rebellions of the 1920s (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1975), vii.

19
increase the possibilities for African Americans.61 Providing equal educational opportunities for

African Americans was what led to the collapse of the Tuskegee Model in the United States. The

Myth of Tuskegee and black education continued to influence Africa long after Washington had

died and other prominent black proponents of higher education like Du Bois and Garvey also

influenced education in Africa.

In Africans on African-Americans: The Creation and Uses of an African-American Myth

by Yekutiel Gershoni, he argues that the impacts of Washington, Du Bois, and Garvey were key

in shaping education and politics. The legends of these men enhanced their prestige and their

contradictory educational philosophies became attractive models for how to manage Africa.62

Gershoni concluded that Africans viewed as having more advantages and possibilities than they

had and so they welcomed various educational ideas like Tuskegee.63 The myth perpetuated

about African American possibilities by Washington, Du Bois, and Garvey spread not just in

large part of Americans but by Africans as well.64 This idea of the “African American myth” was

also supported by other scholars.

Washington’s ideas about industrial education and race relations bridged the gap between

white views on race relations and politics. In his work The Education of Booker T. Washington:

American Democracy and the Idea of Race Relations, Michael West argued that the Tuskegee

Model perpetuated the Jim Crow but also led to the eventual dismantling of industrial education

and Jim Crow.65 This argument holds true as it is noted by scholars about how Tuskegee

61
Ibid., 348.
62
Yekutiel Gershoni, Africans on African-Americans: The Creation and Uses of an African-American Myth (New
York: New York University Press, 1997), 6.
63
Ibid., 176.
64
Ibid., 180.
65
Michael West, The Education of Booker T. Washington: American Democracy and the idea of Race Relations
(New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), x.

20
inadvertently supported Jim Crow and how movements towards black self-determination led to

the dismantling of industrial education and opened up more possibilities for African Americans.

Reforming the black educational system was the key in ending the Tuskegee Model and

in ending Jim Crow. In Reforming Jim Crow: Southern Politics and State in the Age Before

Brown, Kimberley Johnson argues that the growth of higher education institutions served as the

basis for development in black social capital and offered more career opportunities for African

Americans beyond the farm.66 Johnson concludes that pressure from whites on Tuskegee and

Hampton to improve their educational training program led to curriculum change along with

upheaval from students and faculty that felt they were at a disadvantage when compared to other

higher institutions.67 The incidents in the United States influenced events in Africa as industrial

education there shifted in the decades after its collapse in the United States.

The work will address the rise and fall of the Tuskegee Model in America and Africa and

the impact of industrial education. It fits into the current historiography by explaining how the

“Tuskegee Model” was more exploitative than beneficial. The model was chosen by colonial

powers because of its exploitative nature and support of the racial hierarchy during that time.

This paper also adds another layer to the current scholarship to show how involved the United

States was in the “civilizing mission” which is not a clear theme in much of the previous

scholarship. The first part will focus on Tuskegee’s initial involvement in the colony of Togo

under the guise of Germany’s colonial government. The second part of this paper will focus on

Tuskegee’s most successful involvement in Africa which was its role in Liberia and the

establishment of the Booker T. Washington Industrial School. It will also examine the role of the

66
Kimberley Johnson, Reforming Jim Crow: Southern Politics and State in the Age before Brown (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2010), 16.
67
Ibid., 149.

21
Phelps-Stokes Fund, a philanthropic organization that wanted to carry on the work of

Washington after his death and implement it globally. The third part of this paper will focus on

the demise of Tuskegee in the United States and Africa as movements towards black self-

determination and dissatisfaction with the model’s long-term success grew.

22
 Chapter 2 - Modernizing the Masses: The Introduction of New

Concepts in Large-Scale Cotton Cultivation in Togo

When Germany acquired Togo in 1884 it wanted to develop the colony into a stable

source of cotton exportation that would be able to compete on the world market and end

Germany’s reliance on American cotton. Another goal was to establish a system in which they

could reap the maximum agricultural output from its colonies while still limiting the resources

devoted to the colony, which included manpower and money. The German colonial officials,

already aware that the Togolese were familiar with growing a variety of agricultural goods, most

notably cotton, enlisted the aid of graduates from the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, the premier

industrial agricultural school in the United States, to teach the Togolese modern concepts of

large-scale cotton production.

When German colonial officials first arrived in Togo in September 1889, they examined

ways of increasing cotton production.68 Because the Germans knew that the Togolese were

familiar with subsistence cotton farming they thought the Togolese could make the transition to

large-scale cotton production. Subsistence farming dominated Togo as it did in other African

states in which women were economically dependent on men. Women controlled the means of

production in the local cotton market; they cultivated and spun the cotton, then wove and sold

the fabric to market. Men, on the other hand, were responsible for putting up the collateral

necessary for local farming and bought the fabric from women thus reinforcing the cycle of the

local cotton industry.69 The Togoleses’s familiarity with the means of cotton production proved

something to German colonial officials when they launched their first cotton expedition to Togo

68
“The German Colonies,” The Standard, January 1896.
69
James Nathan Calloway, “Tuskegee Cotton-Planters in Africa,” Outlook, March 29, 1902, 773.

23
in 1890 which was it showed that Togo was suitable for cotton farming and could be developed

into a large-scale cotton empire. Training the Togolese in modern cotton plantation farming was

the next step in establishing a successful cotton colony.

German interest in transforming Togo into a stable cotton empire developed after the

acquisition of Togo in part because of shortages of cotton during the Civil War in the United

States. Prior to the war in the late 1850s, Prussia imported 69 million pounds of cotton from the

United States. 70 The trade embargo placed on the American South by the North during the war

resulted in global cotton shortages, especially in Germany where the cotton industry had grown

from 60,000 workers in 1800 to 250,000 by 1860.71 During the American Civil War, Prussia,

however, still imported roughly 16 million pounds of cotton. 72 Throughout the 1880’s, Germany

imported more than 800 million pounds of cotton annually from the United States at a cost of

300 million Marks.73 Germany suffered considerably from the embargo because it relied on

American cotton and the reliance on American cotton imports was viewed as an economic

weakness.74 Because German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck considered the growing of cotton in

the colonies as one of the most important ways of achieving self-sufficiency he saw the need to

form a committee to research the viability of large-scale farming in its newly acquired territories.

Early endeavors were launched in Germany’s Pacific territories in the 1850s and 1860s that were

70
Germany. Statistisches Reichsamt, and Germany. Kaiserliches Statistisches Amt. Statistisches Jahrbuch Für Das
Deutsche Reich. Berlin: Puttkammer & Mühlbrecht, 1880-1942, 87.
71
Sven Beckert, Empire of Cotton: A Global History (New York: Alfred A. Knoff, 2014), 214.
72
United States. Dept. of the Treasury. Bureau of Statistics, “Cotton in Commerce.: Statistics of United States,
United Kingdom, France, Germany, Egypt, And British India,” Washington: Government Printing Office, 1895, 31.
73
Pierre Ali-Napo, Togo, Land of International Technical Assistance Experimentation: 1900-1909 (Accra: Onyase
Press, 2002), 5.
74
“Deutsche Baumwolle,” Tägliche Rundschau (Berlin), February 27, 1913, BArch R8024/58, Bl.86.

24
managed by the Kolonialabteilung (Imperial Colonial Office) but a formal committee dedicated

to colonial economic endeavors was not formed until 1896.

The Kolonialabteilung at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs oversaw the first expedition in

Togo, appointing Ferdinand Goldberg, a specialist in cotton cultivation and former head of

Handels-und-Plantagen Gesellschaft (Trade and Plantation Company). Goldberg was appointed

to head the expedition because earlier he had successfully overseen the establishment of cotton

plantations in the German colony of Samoa; on 21 June 1890, Goldberg arrived in Togo.75 In

Goldberg’s first report on the progress of the expedition, he pointed out the potential for success

for large-scale cotton farming in Togo. From 1865 to 1870 the Togolese had been growing large

quantities of cotton which was bought by the French who cleaned and exported it. Cotton is

graded by both color and how fibrous it is and “middling” is an average grade for cotton. The

experimental farm at Zebe produced “middling” grade cotton by world cotton standards. Further,

the surrounding areas along the Zio River appeared to be possible sites for future establishments

of cotton plantations. Improving the methods of cotton cultivation was an important step in

building a sustainable cotton store that would be able to compete with other cotton markets, such

as Egypt, which happened to be ranked third in the world at the time in quantity behind the

United States and India.76

The first expedition had proven successful in growing cotton on a large-scale but

problems ensued; first, the high cost of the first expedition which included paying numerous

officials and laborers from Germany, setting up the experimental plantation, and providing the

necessary supplies, and second, the yield proved of good quality but was not enough to offset the

75
Pierre Ali-Napo, Togo, Land of International Technical Assistance Experimentation: 1900-1909 (Accra: Onyase
Press, 2002), 6.
76
Supf, Baumwoll-Expedition nach Togo 1900, 8.

25
cost.77 The Kolonialrat (Colonial Assembly) established in 1891 as an advisory committee to

oversee the colonies, developed methods to reduce the cost. The Colonial Assembly had a

variety of constituents: aristocrats with colonial connections, missionaries, civil servants,

academics, and plantation owners. They recommended: first, promote the growing of cotton

where it was most likely to succeed; second, recruiting more Togolese to work on the

plantations; third, appeal to foreign governments to help secure production of the seeds best

adapted for the area and find the best planting methods.78 In addition to helping reduce the cost

of future expeditions, the suggestions put forward by the Colonial Assembly were also designed

to promote better farming methods by the Togolese. Changing the small-scale subsistence

farming, already prevalent in Togo, to a large-scale plantation farming culture was an integral

part of Germany’s “civilizing” mission but also crucial in increasing cotton production.

German colonial officials wanted to promote the idea of developing large-scale farming

in Togo to establish a reliable cotton store. The German Colonial Assembly evolved into the

Kolonial-Wirtschaftliche Komittee [KWK] (Colonial Economic Committee) in 1898, led by

Berlin businessman Karl Supf, which continued to develop ways to exploit the area. The

committee decided to launch another expedition called the Baumwolle-Expedition (Cotton

Expedition) in 1900 because of their desire to transform the cotton industry in Togo.79 German

officials learned from the poor examples of the British in India and the Russians in Central Asia

who had forced colonial subjects to work in certain industries. For that reason, they followed the

77
Ibid., 16.
78
Ibid., 9.
79
Deutscher Kolonialkongress, Verhandlungen des Deutschen Kolonialkongresses, 1905: zu Berlin am 5. 6. und 7.
Oktober 1905 (Berlin: D. Reimer, E. Vohsen), 603.

26
successful example prevalent in the American South of establishing large-scale farms and relying

on a system of labor that resembled sharecropping.80

German officials hoped to answer the “colonial workers’ question by looking at the

sharecropping system in the United States. The “colonial workers’ question” dealt with how to

persuade workers to work on plantations as slavery had been abolished in the colonies since the

1830s. German colonial officials became fascinated with the sharecropping system of labor after

reading German geographer Friedrich Ratzel’s description of his trip in 1893 to the American

South, studying ethnicity and culture in North America. Ratzel noted that managing “the negro”

was dependent on controlling and overseeing economic productivity through the sharecropping

system.81 That same attention to agricultural productivity was shared by the students of the

Tuskegee Institute as they looked to instill the values of labor onto their Togolese students.82

Accordingly, Germany looked at the United States as a model for managing the Togolese labor;

they strove to improve the methods of farming and establish a cotton labor force. Because the

American system of labor in the South appealed to German colonial officials they looked to an

authority in Booker T. Washington to assist them in implementing such a system in the colonies.

Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) was both a famed author and educator during the

later nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Born into slavery, he gained his freedom after

emancipation. His ideas about race differed from most African Americans at the time because he

felt that blacks needed the assistance of whites to help them advance. In his Atlanta Exposition

Address (1895), Washington proposed that African Americans should develop better farming

80
“Cotton Growing in Togo-Land: Negroes from Tuskegee Institute Show that the Soil is Suitable,” New York
Times, March 14, 1902, 9.
81
Friedrich Ratzel, Die Vereinigten Staaten von Nord-America, 2 (München: Oldenbourg, 1893), 292.
82
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 6, 1901-1902, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 26.

27
methods to become economically independent.83 Booker T. Washington was put in charge of the

Tuskegee Institute in Alabama to develop it into a technical school for modern farming methods.

The institute trained black students in new farming techniques and planting methods designed for

large-scale farming. European colonial officials, especially those in Germany, were familiar with

Washington’s work at Tuskegee and his views on race relations. Although other European states,

such as Britain and France, were skeptical about Washington’s views on labor in Africa the

KWK decided to proceed because they wanted to implement sharecropping in Togo to develop

the colony into a reliable cotton source.84 The appeal of Tuskegee to the KWK went beyond

agriculture; Washington’s support of industrial education under Tuskegee Model and its implicit

support of the racial hierarchy was equally as appealing.

In September 1900, the KWK sent its first representative to meet with Washington about

offering aid in the cotton expedition to Togo. Baron Beno von Herman auf Wain, a member of

the KWK, met with Washington and asked him to select students from the Tuskegee Institute to

teach the Togolese how to plant and harvest cotton in a rational and scientific way, that is a more

efficient way under the supervision of the colonial officials in Togo. 85 The KWK used African

American aid in Togo to help integrate the culture of large-scale cotton growing into Togolese

society.86

83
Booker T. Washington, “Atlanta Exposition Address,” 1895. Black History Bulletin, 68,1 (2006): 18-20. Retrieved
from: http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.kstate.edu/docview/233504639?accountid=11789.
84
Der Tropenflanzer: Zeitschrift für Tropische Landwirtschaft, Vol. 1 (1900), 224.
85
“Prince Henry's Visit. Its Significance Explained by John A. Kanson, Ex-Minister to the German Court,” The
Washington Bee, March 15, 1902, 3. America's Historical Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016.
86
"Cotton Growing in Togoland," The African Mail, October 13, 1905, 690. Nineteenth Century Collections Online.
Accessed September 5, 2016. Also seen in “Race Gleanings,” The Freeman, November 10, 1900, 13: 45, 3.
America’s Historical Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016.

28
 The relationship between Southern African Americans and Africans contained a sense of

familial obligation. This idea of “Pan-Africanism” was not a nuanced idea but contributed to the

involvement in Africa by African Americans. Interests in Africa by African Americans during

the nineteenth century started with the founding of the Liberian state as they believed that they

would have more opportunities to succeed than they could in the United States as slavery was

still instituted. Many African Americans saw Africa as their job to help modernize and develop it

to its economic potential by providing it with what technical and material assistance it could

provide and the knowledge they had gained from their labors over centuries of being in the

United States.87

Industrial education had practical ties to slavery and the Tuskegee Institute embraced

that. Although slavery was degrading, demeaning, and coercive toward African Americans, it

was during the slavery era that men and women learned the basics of industrial labor. However,

rather than embrace that skills gained from it, the men and women wanted to separate from

industrial labor and attain a white-collar education and job.88 The Tuskegee Institute was

established not solely to provide an education to its students but to show them the value of

industrial labor. This mission statement of college was what Washington and the students sent to

Togo sought to bestow on the Togolese.89

Some of the men from the Tuskegee Institute viewed the venture to Togo as a chance to

show how far blacks had progressed since leaving Africa. As one of the students sent on the

expedition initially enthused, “I feel as if I were going back to my old home to spread some part

87
C. H. Thompson, "The Colored American and Africa," The African Repository (1850-1892) 61, no. 4 (10, 1885):
117, http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.k-state.edu/docview/89587633?accountid=11789.
88
BTW Papers, Reel 992, 1.
89
Ibid., 2.

29
of what I have learned in this country [the United States].” Others viewed the expedition as the

most important step in the development in the cotton industry since Eli Whitney invented the

cotton gin.90

The other men that were chosen from Tuskegee to lead the expedition saw the endeavor

as an important step in showcasing what the institute had to offer. John Robinson, who was one

of two agricultural scientists on the expedition, saw that the education he had gained from his

time at Tuskegee provided more than industrial education. He saw the values instilled unto the

students shaped their character and provided a practical education and education was what made

African Americans feel almost equal to whites. The education provided at Tuskegee taught

students to be proud of who they were, to look forwards rather than backward to their future, and

embrace their hard labor background.91 When Robinson was hired by the KWK to train the

Togolese in Africa, he saw this to share the values of Tuskegee with them. Training the Togolese

in modern farming techniques and teaching them the importance of agricultural education was

viewed by Robinson as a way uniting blacks across the globe which is why he saw the

expedition as an enriching experience.92

Building a society that revolved around large-scale cotton cultivation required the

establishment of schools to provide education for the Togolese. In 1901, the graduates from

Tuskegee and locally hired workers established an experimental farm in Tové, a town in the

interior of Togo which had been cited as a possibility for further cotton experimentation during

Goldberg’s expedition in the previous decade. Heading the experimental farm and the Tuskegee

90
“To Teach Cotton Raising. Negroes from Booker T. Washington's School Sail for West Coast of Africa,”
American Citizen, November 9, 1900. America’s Historical Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016.
91
Tuskegee and its People, 22.
92
Ibid., 199.

30
Expedition was James Nathan Calloway, a professor at the Tuskegee Institute, who had managed

the experimental Marshall Farm at the Institute. In addition to his experience in farm

management, he was also fluent in German which he learned at Fisk University.93 Calloway was

chosen by Booker T. Washington for these reasons and because he knew that Calloway would

meet the needs of the KWK who were looking for someone to head the expedition who was

knowledgeable about large-scale cotton farming. German colonial officials enlisted the Tuskegee

graduates to establish schools in Lomé and Tové to train the Togolese in large-scale cotton

farming and end Germany’s reliance on foreign cotton.94

On 4 November 1900, four graduates from Tuskegee traveled from New York to Togo to

assist the German colonial government in teaching the Togolese large-scale farming techniques.

The four men selected to go were James Nathan Calloway, John Robinson, Allen Burke, and

Sheppard Harris. 95 Robinson and Burke were scientific agriculturalists at the Tuskegee Institute

and were chosen as the scientists on the expedition; Harris served as the mechanic. These men

were chosen for the expedition by James Nathan Calloway because of their expertise in cotton

farming and their willingness to go. The excitement and pride of the men equaled those in the

African American community who saw it as an import step in raising the status of their race.96

Calloway and the other men on the expedition were under contract for two years and could be

replaced by new members from the expedition if they chose to leave. The biggest obstacles they

93
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 5, 1899-1900, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 640.
94
“To Raise Cotton in Africa: Booker T. Washington Hints at Great Results if the Work Succeeds,” New York
Times, January 3, 1901.
95
“To Teach Cotton Raising. Negroes from Booker T. Washington's School Sail for West Coast of Africa,”
American Citizen, November 9, 1900. America’s Historical Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016.
96
“Tuskegee Men in Africa,” The Colored American, November 10, 1900, 8: 33,11. America’s Historical
Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016. Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee & Its People: Their Ideals and
Achievements, (New York: Negro Universities Press, 1905), 184-199.

31
faced were malaria, but quinine was provided by the German colonial officials. Despite frequent

bouts of malaria, they remained in high spirits and committed to carrying out their mission.97 The

expedition did suffer disaster when in 1902 two new graduates on their way from New York died

after their boat capsized. Calloway asked Washington for two new graduates, funded by the

KWK, to be sent from the institute.98 The expedition continued until its end in 1911 but finding

graduates willing to go to Togo became increasingly difficult.

The men from Tuskegee were sent to carry on Washington’s vision of showcasing the

importance of agricultural education and industrial training. Washington’s message in the

Atlanta Exposition Address stated that African Americans should take pride in their agricultural

roots and knowhow and must not reach too far in trying to become equal to whites by gaining

knowledge in areas they are unfamiliar with. By sticking to their own realm of agricultural labor,

they eventually will live in harmony with their white neighbors.99 The men sent to Togo were

sent to teach the Togolese modern farming techniques and cotton development and additionally,

the belief in black self-progress was taught to them as well. The findings of the expedition

recommended that the Togolese should be given the means to manage the colony after they had

properly been trained in using draft animals, how to find the best type of cotton seed for each

region, and introduced to the European market system and how to price their cotton exports.

John Robinson who headed the expedition also noted that more plantation farms should be

established to help grow the cotton economy. The expedition brought modern farming

technologies, economic know-how, and farming practices that put the Togolese in charge of their

97
“Cotton Cultivation in Africa. Experiences of Mr. J. N. Calloway, who is Teaching Agricultural Development,”
Colored American (March 15, 1902): 4.48.3, America's Historical Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016.
98
Booker T. Washington, The Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 6, 1901-1902, (Chicago: University of Illinois
Press, 1977), 456.
99
Atlanta Exposition Address, 19.

32
own farms.100 Something drastically different from plantation farming that existed in the United

States and what Germany had in mind when they first hired Tuskegee advisors.

The expedition faced certain challenges in developing the first farm in Tove. Disease was

an issue when it came to the use of draft animals, such as cattle and horses. The Togolese could

not rely on draft animals which had to constantly be imported because the mortality rate was so

high. Although draft animals were imported for the first year of the expedition, they were

discontinued after that.101 The high mortality among them convinced the graduates that draft

animals could not be maintained in the colony. Additionally, the Togolese were not accustomed

to accommodating draft animals. Because draft animals were difficult to maintain and did not

exist in other areas of Togo prior to the Tuskegee Expedition, the Togolese were unfamiliar with

them. When the Tuskegee students first introduced draft animals to the Togolese, the animals

frightened and astonished them. Without the use of them, cultivating cotton would be less

productive and more difficult. 102 Togo lies in the equatorial zone of Africa which experiences

wet seasons and tropical climates that facilitate diseases, particularly sleeping sickness carried by

the tsetse fly, that was deadly to draft animals making their use nearly impossible.103

The Tuskegee Expedition had also helped develop a new type of cotton that was best

suited for the area. The first harvest from the plantation at Tové yielded a small amount of

cotton. One bale of Egyptian cotton and four bales of American cotton during the first summer

and another five bales of American cotton in November and December. The yield was small but

James Nathan Calloway, “Baumwoll-Expedition nach Togo Bericht, 1901,” (1902): Nineteenth Century
100

Collections Online: Europe and Africa: Commerce, Christianity, Civilization, and Conquest, 26.
101
James Nathan Calloway, “Baumwoll-Expedition nach Togo Bericht, 1901,” (1902): Nineteenth Century
Collections Online: Europe and Africa: Commerce, Christianity, Civilization, and Conquest, 18.
102
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 6, 1901-1902, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 128.
103
Calloway, “Tuskegee Cotton Planters in Africa,” 775.

33
the KWK viewed it as a success. They argued that with the favorable climate, the willingness of

the Togolese to embrace large-scale cotton growing, and a vast amount of land, further cotton

endeavors were promising. The KWK concluded that it was more important for the Togolese to

learn about the methods of large-scale farming than it was for the farm to yield large quantities

of cotton during the expedition.104 This knowledge included developing a type of cotton that

would produce both the highest yield and quality which the Tuskegee experiment succeeded

ultimately in doing.105

The Tuskegee graduates began working on a seed that was a cross between American

cotton, Egyptian cotton, and the native cotton found in Togo. The first experiment that combined

these species achieved the goal of yielding the highest quality of cotton.106 The examination of

the various types of cotton were as follows: the native Togolese cotton was clean, contained fiber

similar to American cotton, yellow in color, and worth about the same value as middling grade

American Cotton; American cotton was not as clean as Togolese cotton, soft and weak,

yellowish/gray in color, but yielded the highest value; finally, Egyptian cotton was less well-

cleaned than American cotton, soft fiber and mature, yellow color, and yielded slightly less than

American cotton.107 The success of creating a seed that was of a higher quality than what had

been grown in the region previously and its potential for producing a high yield, excited both the

KWK and the Tuskegee instructors. Improving the methods of cultivation by the utilization of

draft animals and planting better seeds was an enormous step in the direction of creating a large-

104
Supf, Baumwoll-Expedition nach Togo 1901, 28.
105
Ibid, 22.
106
"Germany and Cotton Growing," The African Standard, July 4, 1903, 3. Nineteenth Century Collections Online.
Accessed September 5, 2016, 3.
107
Kolonial-Wirtschaftliches Komitee, Baumwoll-Expedition nach Togo: Bericht 1901 (Mittler, 1901), Nineteenth
Century Collections Online, http://tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/5ixqb4, Accessed August 23, 2016, 5.

34
scale cotton culture among the Togolese. Continued modernization was necessary to help

facilitate large-scale farming which included upgrading transportation and establishing a school

that would provide formal education in large-scale farming.

Notsé was chosen as the location for the technical school to provide classroom education

about large-scale cotton farming. It was located near Tové so that after the students finished

school, they could continue their education at the experimental farm.108 The purpose of the

school at Notsé was to provide the Togolese with a formal education on how to grow cotton

more efficiently. John Robinson, one of the Tuskegee graduates, was in put in charge of the

school by the KWK because he originally put forth the idea of establishing a technical school

like the Tuskegee Institute. The school also trained German missionaries as instructors to teach

large-scale cotton farming methods and stress the importance of it. The curriculum taught in the

Notsé school included further training in what had been taught on the experimental farm at Tové

such as the handling of draft animals, cotton cultivation methods, soil preparation, and finding

the best seed. A ginning station was established at the school to teach the Togolese about the

ginning process and to gin the cotton that came from the farm at Tové. 109 The school was first

managed by Robinson in 1904 and then by G.H. Pape, a graduate of Texas A&M University who

had initially been sent to Togo as an American government cotton inspector. Pape was put in

charge of the school after Robinson died in a boating accident near Lomé. Booker T. Washington

was asked by Julius Zech, German governor of Togo, to appoint someone who could get the

Togolese to grow more cotton and retain the labor necessary to work on the farms after many

108
Der Tropenflanzer (1900), 233.
109
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 6, 1901-1902, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 110.

35
had left.110 Zech had toured Texas in 1902 and found that the strict discipline Texas cotton

farmers could enforce was successful. Booker T. Washington chose Pape to head the school after

Robinson because he knew he would be able to fulfill Zech’s needs. Under Pape’s tenure,

however, many more Togolese returned home because of Pape’s continued use of violent

coercion.111 This caused a decrease in production as the initial quota of two thousand bales was

not met and roughly 400 bales could be secured. Under the direction of Pape, the Togolese

worked under a plantation style of labor as seen in the American South. This was vastly different

from the neighboring British West African colonies that promoted the natives to grow cotton for

themselves as a native industry.112 The school remained in operation until 1911 when the KWK

closed it. The school had been successful in providing formal education to the Togolese. The

education provided at Notsé taught the Togolese fundamental large-scale farming techniques to

make them better farmers and ways to produce more cotton.

The Catholic missionaries in Togo were trained by the Tuskegee graduates to teach large-

scale farming to the local peoples. In 1847, the missionaries arrived in Togo establishing mission

schools which taught English and helped standardize the Ewe language, the language of the

region. Booker T. Washington believed that the missionaries would be a good fit to teach the

Togolese modern farming concepts because of their familiarity with the Togolese people and

they were accustomed to teaching. According to Washington, the purpose of the expedition was

110
International Cotton Conference-Zürich, “Official Report of the Proceedings of the First International Congress
of Delegated Representatives of Master Cotton Spinners' and Manufacturers' Associations Held at the Tonhalle,
Zürich, May 23 to 27, 1904, (Manchester: Marsden and Co., ltd., printers, 1904), 21.
111
Pape is just one example of an official using violence to coerce the Togolese population. There were many
German officials who also used violent coercion to increase production and maintain obedience. This can be seen in
“For Six Days the German Reichstag has been…,” The Times, December 6, 1909, 9, The Times Digital Archive,
http://tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/3f9Dk6.
112
“German: The Development of Togoland,” West African Mail, September 22, 1905, Nineteenth Century
Collections Online, Accessed September 5, 2016, 617.

36
to “educate and not subjugate.” The missionaries were an obvious choice because their goal was

to offer education to help “civilize” the Togolese; the ideology behind the Tuskegee Expedition.

Washington saw his goal of offering technical assistance in modernizing large-scale cotton

farming to the Togolese as equal to the missionaries teaching the curriculum.113 Many

missionaries refused to teach a large-scale farming curriculum because that was not their

intended purpose and because the students did not want to learn about large-scale farming.

Nevertheless, after the school in Notsé and the farm in Tové had been established, the KWK

developed a trading facility at Lomé to export the Togolese cotton.

Lomé was chosen as the site of the processing plantation because it lay on the coast of

Togo and had easy access to Tové and Notsé. The roads that led into Lomé were in good

condition after the KWK hired local laborers to make them suitable for wagons traveling to and

from the plantation.114 Roads were important in large-scale cotton farming because they

facilitated the cotton trade. Improved roads meant that cotton and equipment could be

transported more efficiently and quickly to Lomé where it would then be exported. In addition,

Lomé served as the central station of the railroad that ran throughout the colony connecting it to

Tové and Notsé. Instead of taking several days to move supplies from the coast to the farms,

which took two weeks when Calloway first arrived, the trip now only took a couple of hours.115

The KWK relied on the railroad to transport cotton. The Togolese would haul the cotton by

113
Booker T. Washington, “Industrial Education in Africa. The Independent ...Devoted to the Consideration of
Politics, Social and Economic Tendencies, History, Literature, and the Arts 1848-1921 60,16: (1906).
http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.k-state.edu/docview/90541899?accountid=11789.
114
“Tuskegee Men in Africa,” The Colored American, November 10, 1900, 8: 33,11. America’s Historical
Newspapers. Accessed August 31, 2016.
115
Kolonialwirtschaftliches Komitee, Der Tropenpflanzer: Zeitschrift für tropische Landwirtschaft, Vol. 7, (Berlin:
KolonialWirtschaftliche Komitee), 1903, 599.

37
wagon but did not like using draft animals and preferred to pull the wagons by hand.116 This

reluctance to use animals stemmed from their first encounters with both cattle and horses. Over

time they became more accustomed to using draft animals because it made cultivation easier.

Figure 1.1

The leaders of the expedition had introduced the cotton gin to modernize production in

Togo. The invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney revolutionized large-scale cotton farming

because it made the process of cultivation more efficient. The KWK financed gins for the

Tuskegee Expedition because they not only wanted the expedition to run more efficiently but

also wanted to increase the yield of cotton. The first gins which arrived in Togo in 1900 were

large and difficult to operate. They required about 25 people to move and then operate because

of the scarcity of draft animals.117 Because of these problems, more mobile gins were developed

116
James Nathan Calloway. “Baumwoll-Expedition Nach Togo Bericht, 1901,” (1902): Nineteenth Century
Collections Online: Europe and Africa: Commerce, Christianity, Civilization, and Conquest, 24
117
Ibid., 24.

38
over the subsequent years, so they could be moved more quickly and efficiently.118 Between

1905 and 1907 seven motorized gins were built as well as numerous hand operated gins.119 The

Togolese were trained on how to operate them at the Notsé school and they were used in Lomé

and Tové to process the cotton. The KWK appealed to industry leaders in Germany to

manufacture cotton gins and develop new ones to make cotton cultivation more efficient.120

The introduction of new technologies and farming methods were important in teaching

the Togolese to adopt a large-scale cotton farming culture. The KWK wanted to develop a

culture that revolved around cotton to make them better farmers.121 German colonial officials

recruited wage laborers from the region between 1899-1913 to work the farms but on occasion

resorted to forced labor, such as in 1902, when there were labor shortages.122 The overall

willingness of the Togolese to learn large-scale cotton farming was apparent in Goldberg’s

Expedition which led to the Tuskegee Expedition. For the KWK, establishing a culture that

centered around large-scale cotton farming was equally as important as new farming techniques

because it promoted the production of more cotton. After their instruction at the schools in Notsé

and Tove, the Togolese would receive their own equipment, plot of land, and seed to establish

their own cotton farms.123 The introduction of new technologies and cultivation methods were

118
C.A. Birtwistle, "An Admirably-Managed German Colony," The African Mail, April 16, 1909, 273, Nineteenth
Century Collections Online, Accessed September 5, 2016.
119
Kolonialwirtschaftliches Komitee, Der Tropenpflanzer: Zeitschrift für tropische Landwirtschaft, Vol. 10, (Berlin:
KolonialWirtschaftliche Komitee), 1906, 358.
120
M. Birtwistle, “An Admirably Managed German Colony,” African Mail, April 16, 1909,
tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/3f8Ab0.
121
Kolonialwirtschaftliches Komitee, Der Tropenpflanzer: Zeitschrift für tropische Landwirtschaft, Vol. 12, (Berlin:
KolonialWirtschaftliche Komitee), 1908, 154.
122
“German,” The African Mail, September 22, 1905, 617, Nineteenth Century Collections Online, Accessed
September 25, 2016, tinyurl.galegroup.com/tinyurl/3f8Tn1.
123
Birtwistle, “An Admirably Managed German Colony.”

39
well received by the natives because they realized how much easier it made cultivating cotton.124

Although Togo was less problematic than Germany’s other colonies, like Namibia, there were

still reports of violence by German officials.125 However, the preferred method by German

colonial officials was to persuade rather than coerce.126 Through the introduction of new

technologies, cultivation techniques, and a culture based on large-scale cotton farming, the KWK

hoped to create a self-sustaining more productive labor force.

The Tuskegee Expedition was not designed to yield a large amount of cotton. Instead, it

was designed to train the Togolese in large-scale cotton farming with the belief that Togolese

would be able to eventually grow large amounts of cotton using the techniques the Tuskegee

experts had taught them. The first yield of the expedition produced 14,285 Kgs. of cotton. That

number doubled the next year and continued to grow until the end of the expedition in 1907

when the Togolese exported 275,000 Kgs. By 1913, that number would double again.127 The

only dip in cotton exports was in 1910 and was due to a few factors. First, the heavy rain seasons

destroyed much of the crop throughout the colony. Second, much of the cotton crop fell subject

to disease which severely impacted the crop yield.128 Despite this sharp decrease, cotton exports

rose steadily afterward. New technologies, like the expansion of the railroad, made assistance

124
"Cotton Prospects in Togoland," The African Mail, March 16, 1906, 1208. Nineteenth Century Collections
Online. Accessed September 5, 2016.
125
“Togoland,” Diamond Fields Advertiser, December 24, 1907, 5. Nineteenth Century Collections Online.
Accessed September 5, 2016.
German colonial official Herr Horn was fined for causing the death of a native and was dismissed from the colony.
126
"Agricultural Development in Togo," The African Mail, April 16, 1909, 272. Nineteenth Century Collections
Online. Accessed September 5, 2016.
127
International Congress of Delegated Representatives of Master Cotton Spinners' and Manufacturers'
Associations, The Ninth International Congress of Delegated Representatives of Master Cotton Spinners' and
Manufacturers' Associations: Held in Scheveningen, June 9th, 10th, and 11th, 1913. (Manchester: Taylor, Garnett,
Evans, & Co., Ltd., 1913), 356.
128
Der Tropenflanzer 1910, 150.

40
and exportation easier and more efficient. The modernization of Togo through infrastructure,

farming technology, and teaching, steadily increased cotton production throughout the

expedition.

After Germany’s colonies were ceded over to Britain and France after World War I, Togo

was divided between the two. France controlled Lomé, Notsé, and Tove and tore down the

schools in the aftermath of the end of the German occupation. In 1923, the French equivalent of

the German KWK called the Colonial Economic Committee sought to do the same thing as the

German KWK: find a way to manage the colony while also exploiting the colony. The French

Colonial Committee settled on following the Tuskegee Institute and continuing to train the

Togolese in agricultural technology and modern farming techniques.129 In 1926, the Colonial

Economic Committee evolved into the West African Cotton Company with the sole purpose of

continuing the work of the work that the Colonial Economic Committee had started and

increasing the number of trained cotton farmers in the colony.130 The French system claimed to

be an improvement from the German system but it actually was more corrupt and made the

locals long for the days of German occupation because, under the French system, local elites

were tasked with running the schools and controlling the cotton market. This mostly upset the

local market women who had hopes of reclaiming their status in the market economy under the

French system. As a result, this led to widespread protests from the women in Lomé.131 Even

under a new system, France was met with the same fate as Germany was during its occupation in

129
Henry Bloud, Le Problème Cottonier et L’Afrique Occidentale Française: Une Solution Nationale (Paris:
Librairie Emile Lrose, 1925), 89.
130
Ibid., 91.
131
For more information on the Lomé market uprisings, see Benjamin Lawrance, “Les Révoltes des Femmes:
Economic Upheaval and the Gender of Political Authority in Lomé, Togo, 1931-1933, African Studies Review 46,
no. 1 (April 2003), 43-67, Accessed August 11, 2017. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1514980.

41
that it too failed to establish Togo as a profitable contributor to the world cotton market which is

why today it mostly operates on a small-scale trade network.

Table 1.1

Although Germany failed to transform Togo into a sustainable cotton supply to satisfy its

needs, its biggest success was the construction of the railroad that linked the country from the

coast to the interior which helped facilitate the movement of cotton and was beneficial for itself,

France, and the future of independent Togolese trade. The modernization of the colony and the

establishment of the industrial school were a major success for the Tuskegee Institute. Over the

course of a decade, the industrial school was successful in teaching the Togolese scientific

methods in farming and train them in new technologies to make cotton farming easier and more

efficient. Another the success for Booker T. Washington and the Tuskegee Institute was its

improved perception on a global scale. Prior to the Tuskegee Expedition, Washington’s views on

agriculture and its relation to race were viewed as too outlandish. The successes in Togo changed

42
that as other European states, like Britain, looked to the guidance of Booker T. Washington to

help establish schools of their own to increase production from their colonies and make them

self-sufficient yet subservient to their overseers. Numerous committees reached out to Tuskegee

to help reform areas such as the Congo, Liberia, and South Africa to see if agricultural education

was the key as to how to successfully manage the colonies.

43
 Chapter 3 - Tuskegee in Africa: Implementing the Tuskegee Model

Globally as Part of the Civilizing Mission

While the Tuskegee Expedition was gaining attention for its successes in Togo, other

European states looked to replicate these successes by instituting what was deemed as the

“Tuskegee Model;” establishing schools to train native populations in the agricultural industry

and in technical assistance. The work of Tuskegee in Togo and the in the United States had led

other international representatives to see how Tuskegee could benefit their African colonies and

elsewhere. A letter by Booker T. Washington to other European delegates read, “For years past I

have had in mind to invite…persons who are directly engaged or interested in the work that is

going on in Africa…for the education and upbuilding of the African peoples.”132 Another letter

written about Washington’s invite, further detailed what Washington had in mind when he called

for the “Friends of Africa” conference, “[Washington] issued invitations for an international

conference at Tuskegee of all persons in Europe or America who are directly or indirectly

interested in the education and improvement of the negro peoples of Africa…The conference

will meet at Tuskegee [January 1912]. Its purpose will be to get…a more definitive notion of the

actual problems involved in the redemption of the African peoples, to enable those who are

engaged in work in Africa to see for themselves what is being done at Tuskegee in the way of

educating black men, and to enable them to decide for themselves to what extent the methods

employed at the Tuskegee school can be used to advantage in Africa.”133 The aid of the

132
BTW Papers, January 1912.
133
BTW Papers, December 1912.

44
Tuskegee Institute was called upon to consider establishing schools in South Africa, Namibia,

the Soudan, the Congo, Liberia, and other areas of Africa.

The work of Tuskegee in Africa caught the ire of Great Britain. A letter written to Booker

T. Washington regarding the matter read, “Those…in the confines of the British Empire are very

much interested in the development of the natural facilities of the outlying dependencies, and

regard with considerable interest the experiment of cotton growing in Africa.”134 Great Britain

looked at what the Tuskegee Institute was accomplishing in Togo and sought to replicate that in

South Africa. After finally gaining control on the South African state in 1902 after its victory

over the Dutch in the Second Boer War (1899-1902), the British wanted to develop the colony’s

agricultural output and manage the colony in a way that would benefit both themselves and the

black laborers. Lord Albert Henry George Grey, the 4th Earl Grey, was the administrator in South

Africa that not only wanted an agricultural school like Tuskegee established in South Africa but

wanted Booker T. Washington to head the school. Washington declined the offer but maintained

the belief that agricultural education and labor was essential to the advancement of blacks in the

world and helped bridge the racial divide.135

Establishing technical schools in Africa to train local populations large-scale farming

techniques was not unique to Tuskegee. There was a school in Lovedale, South Africa that had

been in operation prior to the establishment of Tuskegee in Alabama. Britain had been in the

forefront of agricultural education, but Tuskegee was unique for one in particular reason: it was a

school that was founded and operated by African Americans who did not need to be coerced into

agricultural education, but they instead saw this kind of education as a step towards progress and

134
BTW Papers, Reel 259, February 10, 1905.
135
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 7, 1903-1904, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 181.

45
pride.136 For colonizers, they saw the opposite of progress when establishing technical schools

and saw it as a means of civilizing and developing a means of increasing agricultural output.137

The Tuskegee Model was appealing for operating within the confines of the racial hierarchy;

something both Washington and Tuskegee implicitly supported. Washington was appealing to

British government officials because of his views on civilizing through agricultural which is why

in 1910 he was invited to London to speak about his views on the topic. In his speech, he voiced

that Africans will only work if incentivized and what better of an incentive than the possibility of

improving one’s own standing in society through reaping what they sow.138 Booker T.

Washington’s ideas were appealing to other British colonies like Sudan (then known as Anglo-

Egyptian Soudan).

Among considering the further development of South Africa, Great Britain also

considered developing Sudan. President of the World Evangelization Company Levi Lupton

reached out to Washington to inquire about sending students to Sudan to train the local

populations in large-scale agricultural farming techniques and establishing a technical school that

also served as a mission. The goal was a two-fold civilizing mission: civilize the local

populations by both agricultural education and Christianity.139 Playing to both Washington’s

strong Christian beliefs and dedication to agricultural education, Washington agreed to send

students to the Sudan to take part in the “Sudanese mission.”140 In charge of the expedition to

136
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 8, 1904-1906, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 550.
137
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 10, 1909-1911, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 378.
138
Ibid., 381.
139
Levi Lupton to Booker T. Washington, July 13, 1905, Booker T. Washington Papers, Library of Congress, Reel
258.
140
Levi Lupton to Booker T. Washington, July 19, 1905, Booker T. Washington Papers, Library of Congress, Reel
258.

46
Sudan was John Perry Powell, a graduate of Tuskegee in 1903. Powell arrived in 1905 to oversee

one of the missionary farms. After its success, the farm was closed, and Powell continued his

instruction at a much larger farm with more students. The first farm Powell was put in charge of

was one hundred acres in size and Powell oversaw thirty students. The second farm was more

than three thousand acres and Powell’s student numbers increased to more than seven hundred.

The farm in Sudan differed from the farms in Togo because the focus was not mainly in cotton

but in other crops such as wheat, barley, clover, and corn; cotton was more of an aside.

Nevertheless, cotton could be grown and the bit that was grown was of good quality.141

The plan for agricultural development in Sudan was like the Togolese plan in that to

expedite agricultural output to the world market and make transportation of said products easier,

the need for a rail line was needed. A rail line was indeed constructed and was another step in

modernizing the Egyptian-Sudan. The school in Sudan showcased more of what Tuskegee had to

offer which was more than just raising cotton. The same applications towards cotton growing

were also applied to other more regionally suited crops which included scientific research into

growing the best and highest yielding crop. The school that Powell oversaw also taught the local

populations blacksmithing and machine work, so they could manufacture their own tools;

something not taught at the schools in Togo.142 The work done in Africa continued to gain

attention from Great Britain as the school continued to produce and grow. With the successes of

Tuskegee in Egyptian-Sudan and Togo, Britain wanted to continue establishing schools in its

other colonies. The Tuskegee approach to civilizing excited Britain and gratified Washington but

the main issue of procuring enough students to go to Africa to train the local populations was

141
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 9, 1906-1908, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 232.
142
Ibid., 232.

47
still a major problem. Out of the ten students spread across various colonies, six were already in

Egypt-Sudan.143 Despite the difficulties in procuring students to go to Africa, the prospects of

developing the colonies into profitable and functional economies excited Great Britain. On the

other hand, continuing the success of bestowing agricultural education unto the local African

populations excited the Tuskegee graduates.144 These two motivators inspired the next venture

which was reforming the Congo after King Leopold’s terror.

The carving up of Africa that resulted from the Berlin Conference in 1884, partitioned the

Congo to Belgium. King Leopold of Belgium had promised the global community that the

Congo would be the new standard of the civilizing mission and that he would showcase the

humanitarian efforts made by the Belgian colonial state. These were merely empty promises

made which were designed to distract the global community from seeing the reality of the king’s

exploits. Leopold exploited the Congo for his own benefit by raping the country of its natural

resources, such as rubber, and intimidating the local population by use of the Force Publique

(Belgian colonial army) which did the bidding of the king and exploited it for their own

individual gain as well. Leopold did not cede control of the Belgian Congo until 1908 but the

outcry for reform of the colony began years before due in large part to British journalist E.D.

Morel who witnessed the atrocities and mishandlings firsthand. In 1903, Morel established the

Congo Reform Association to address the issues in the Congo and on how to manage the colony

effectively and humanely. After reading about the successes of Tuskegee in Togo and its other

143
Booker T. Washington to Janet B.C. Marling, July 6, 1905, Booker T. Washington Papers, Library of Congress,
Reel 259.
144
“The Southern Letter,” February 10, 1905, Booker T. Washington Papers, Library of Congress, Reel 259.

48
ventures in Africa, Morel reached out to the Tuskegee Institute to see if they could help solve the

Congo Crisis.

The Congo Reform Association (CRA) appealed to Booker T. Washington’s beliefs on

free labor the importance of agriculture. The CRA cited how Leopold’s policies in the Congo

failed to uplift Africans through agricultural labor because they lacked choice and were driven

into forced labor under the toil of their white overseers.145 Robert Park reached out to

Washington in a letter that cited this global duty to act by African Americans towards other black

races. The letter stated, “As negroes we feel compelled to oppose every form of government that

seeks to perpetuate a system of dealing with the negro race that every man of negro blood must

forever look upon as fatal to the future of his race.”146 To right the wrongs of Leopold in the

Congo, the Congolese needed to be shown the benefits of labor; incentivizing the local

populations was key in managing the labor force effectively. Much like in Togo, for the

Congolese to reap the benefits of labor and become self-sufficient, they needed to be given

freedom of choice and shown the importance of agricultural production which was, in fact, one

of the goals of the Tuskegee Institute which it instilled in its own students.147 Washington

believed that Tuskegee could take on the task of reforming a country that had been ripped apart

in large part because he compared it to what happened in the United States before the repeal of

slavery. Leading the charge in reforming a colony that oppressed an African people under forced

labor and intimidation, excited Washington and led to his involvement in reforming the

Congo.148

145
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 8, 1904-1906, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 90.
146
BTW Papers, Park Reel 396, Undated 4.
147
Ibid., 87.
148
Ibid., 550.

49
 Sociologist and journalist Robert Ezra Park appeal to Booker T. Washington led to

Washington’s joining of the CRA. Park had been a member of the Congo Reform Association

and was later hired by Washington to teach sociology at Tuskegee and to be his ghostwriter.

Park’s interests in sociology focused on race relations in the United States and as a member of

the CRA, he applied a similar focus in examining the relationship between the Congolese and the

Force Publique. Examining the oppression of the Congolese under the guise of the Force

Publique caused the push to bring in Washington as his focus on agricultural education centered

around bridging the gap between whites and blacks. Park also appealed to the United States’

government and the European governments to bring awareness to reforming the Congo; the first

time that the work of Tuskegee had been used as an example of reform to the United States’

government. First and foremost, however, the Congolese needed to be free of oppression before

they could begin improving their own status.149 Park believed that Tuskegee could help reform

the Congo. In a letter to Washington, he talked about the importance of industrial education and

the uplifting ability of it. The letter read, “Furthermore, the more I look into the matter

[reforming of the Congo], the more I believe that the only possible regeneration of the black race

in Africa is through an industrial education, which you stand for….”150

Although improving the status of the Congolese was important, plans to establish a

school were just as equal. Unlike other methods of “civilizing” African populations that created

more exploitative class systems, industrial education was thought to be a universal concept in

which all aspects of the population could attend and benefit from. Education was often a

privilege which not all could afford or had access to; the “Tuskegee Model” was different. 151 The

149
BTW Papers reel 396 undated, 4.
150
BTW Papers, Reel 396, September 10, 1904, 1.
151
Robert Ezra Park, The Tuskegee Kind of Education (Alabama: Tuskegee Institute Press, 1923), 7.

50
cotton schools established by Tuskegee were viewed by the school as the premier method in the

“civilizing mission.” It gave Africans, as mentioned in other parts of Africa, the chance to

control their own economic and societal standing through agricultural education and

development. Park preached that industrial education would bind the region together by

connecting labor, education, and community working together in a symbiotic system which

forced the people to look inward and outward to better themselves and each other.152 By

choosing to pillage the Congo of its wealth and resources and instituting forced labor by means

of intimidation rather than supporting the Tuskegee Model, King Leopold failed to maximize the

productivity and potential of the colony.153 Although a cotton school was not established, the

achievements of the Tuskegee Model in other parts of Africa showed its influence on the

“civilizing mission.” Establishing a culture that centered around agriculture was beneficial to

both the colonizer and the colonized and its appeal is what attracted the Congo Reform

Association to contact Booker T. Washington because it viewed the Tuskegee Institute’s

successful work with African Americans in advancing post-slavery and something that European

states like Britain and France had failed to achieve154. The Tuskegee Model appealed to the

United States international outlook as is it looked to protect its interests in the Liberian state as

France and Britain carving it up for their own economic gains.

Liberia, although recognized by the global community as an independent state, lost some

of its territory to Britain and France due to economic claims and influence. To solve the

economic issues that plagued Liberia and limit the encroachment of European states into the

state, the Liberian Commission was founded in 1909 to protect the interests of Liberia and

152
Ibid., 7.
153
BTW Papers reel 396, 2.
154
Park, The Tuskegee Kind of Education, 5.

51
investigate interests that might benefit the United States. One such plan to achieve these goals

was establishing an industrial school like Tuskegee. By establishing these schools, it would teach

the Liberian people to become self-sufficient and productive.155 However, African Americans

who returned to Liberia looked at the native Liberians as inferior; much the same attitude White

European colonizers had toward native populations. During the International Conference of the

Negro, which looked at how African Americans could assist Africa in “modernizing”, Bishop

Heard of the Methodist Episcopal Church described the following about native Liberians and the

differences between them and African American “Returnees”, “The immigrant population

[‘Returnees’] looked down on the natives just like the white man looks down on the [negro] in

the South.156

Prior to the founding of the Liberian Commission, there was an earlier expedition to

Liberia to see if constructing an industrial school was a practical idea. Three men, R.E. Smith,

Charley Smith, and Wade Smith, arrived in Liberia and encountered a few of the same hardships

that John Robinson and his men did when they arrived in Togo. The biggest obstacle was illness

which slowed down the expedition as they pushed inward surveying the landscape. The men also

noted the familiarity that the Liberians had with raising crops but unlike in Togo, they were

unfamiliar with growing cotton and like the expedition in Togo they too noted the potential the

Liberians had in being able to grasp modernized farming methods and technology. After noticing

that the local peoples were more familiar with growing other types of agricultural goods besides

cotton and were also not employed to focus on cotton growing, they focused much of their

155
“What the Christian World is Doing,” The Congregationalist and Advance, January 17, 1918, 69.
156
Royal African Society, African Affairs (London: Published for the Royal African Society by the Oxford
University Press), 420.

52
energy in training them in what they were familiar with such as coffee, palm oil, and rubber. 157

Wade Smith, a member of the expedition wrote, “…the people do not plant cotton and corn as

we did in the states…the people here have never tried to raise cotton to a success, therefore, they

don’t know just what it will do.”158 Assisting the Liberians, not the African Americans who had

returned to Africa under the American Colonization Society (ACS), was a priority of Tuskegee’s

expedition. As Smith wrote, “The people of Liberia tell me and show me that they want the

American negro to help them and they will help you. This country needs the hard-working

industrious American negro….”159 The belief of the men on the expedition carried the beliefs of

the institution in showcasing African American progress the universal duty to uplift black

peoples around the globe.

The issues that plagued Liberia and the interest of establishing an industrial school in the

state played right into Washington’s beliefs about the importance of agricultural education.

Young men were already interested in wanting a school in which they could better themselves

and showcase how Africans were able to be valuable members of society. In a letter written to

Booker T. Washington, three students expressed their desire to attend Tuskegee, which would

help lead the push towards the establishment of the Booker Washington Institute in Liberia. The

letter read, “We are three young men…employed in the government service…but our great

desire, our long looked for desire is to accomplish something that we think will be more useful to

the world: we…desire to come over to your institution [Tuskegee].”160 Emmitt J. Scott, secretary

of the Tuskegee Institute, was a member of the Liberian Commission and was tasked with

157
“Wade Smith to F.S. Miller,” Liberian Bulletin, June 5, 1901.
158
Ibid.
159
Ibid.
160
BTW Papers, July 9, 1910.

53
securing both men and resources from Washington and Tuskegee. Rather than sending students

from Tuskegee to head to Africa, like had been done in previous expeditions, five Liberian

students were sent to Tuskegee to be educated and then after graduation, teach the students

there.161 This change was due in large part to cut the cost of having to send to students to Liberia

which would have to be paid for by Tuskegee. Another reason was to alleviate the difficulty of

having to procure students to go Liberia, something that was difficult in previous expeditions.

Washington realized the potential that Liberians had in improving their economic status and

becoming self-sufficient because of how his views on the importance of industrial education.

Establishing industrial schools and gaining the knowledge that agricultural education provided,

would allow the Liberian people to unlock the bounty of their land.162 By doing so, this would

also benefit the United States because it would open trade. Benefiting the greater power was the

real motive behind the “civilizing mission;” the United States agenda being no different from its

European counterparts.

Interests in Liberia involved more than just economic gain. There were efforts to improve

race relations in Africa between the colonizer and the colonized and in Liberia between native

Liberians and African American transplants from the United States. The government of Liberia,

run by African Americans who had returned to Africa under the ACS, wanted to improve the

conditions of Liberians but were more interested in the improvement of returnees to Africa rather

than native Liberians. In a piece written by Emmitt J. Scott, member of the U.S. commission to

Liberia, he explained this in further detail, “The United States Government sent a…commission

to Liberia to investigate conditions there and to report how this country can best serve the

161
Booker T. Washington, Booker T. Washington Papers: Vol. 10, 1909-1911, ed. Louis Harlan, Raymond Smock
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1977), 190.
162
Ibid., 532.

54
republic in the present exigency…the people of the United States share…the interest of the

colored people of the United States in Liberia…and to strengthen the internal organization of the

[Liberian] government.”163 The “Returnees” [African Americans that emigrated back to Africa]

in Liberia wanted assistance from the United States for their own benefit. An article in the

Liberian Register summed Liberia’s wishes as follows: First, they wanted the United States to

take over their debt; second, they wanted the United States to supervise the Liberian treasury;

third, they wanted the US to strengthen various branches in the government including the

military, agriculture, and education; and finally, to protect Liberian interests.164

After her death in 1909, Caroline Phelps-Stokes, longtime supporter and benefactor to

improving education among the African American community and in Africa, she left her fortune

to continue her dedication to these causes. In 1911, the Phelps-Stokes Fund was created to

continue her work. The Phelps-Stokes family had been involved in Liberia dating back to 1947

and interest was renewed in 1920 as it again looked to continue and expand its work in Africa.165

The Phelps-Stokes Plan had a blueprint for developing the agriculture in Africa which consisted

of seven points: first, develop respect for the cultivation of the soil by showing the pupils the

dependence of humanity upon products of the soil, not only in Africa but throughout the world;

second, show that thoroughness and foresight in examining environmental conditions would

greatly improve farming; third teachers need to be trained in scientific farming methods and

adapt to changing ones; fourth, examine what had been done successfully in agricultural around

the globe and adapt to African needs; fifth, examine what crops would be most profitable for

163
Emmett Scott, "The American Commissioners in Liberia." The Independent: 67, 3168 (1909), 403.
164
Ibid., 405.
165
Anson Phelps-Stokes, Negro Status and Race Relations in the United States, 1911-1946: The Thirty-five Year
Report of the Phelps-Stokes Fund (New York: Phelps-Stokes Fund, 1948), 96.

55
marketing; sixth, land conservation; and seventh, show the importance of soil maintenance and

science.166 The committee also noted that wage labor was better than forced labor because it gave

Africans a sense of accomplishment and equated to both higher production and less resistance.

Industrial education was equally important as agricultural education. It taught students

the value of trades in daily activities. The “Tuskegee Model” was important in showing Africans

how blacks in America made successful use in the training of industrial labor and sciences. The

material needs of the people should be taught in an educational and economic matter and that

was the purpose of industrial education. The same attention to teaching and education as seen in

agricultural was given to industrial education in examining the needs of Africa.167 Much like

John Robinson’s views on westernized education and its role in “uplifting” the Togolese, others,

such as S.G. Ferguson of the Maryland Academy of Philosophy, shared in the idea in elevating

the economic possibilities to those of African Americans. A letter from Ferguson to Washington

read, “The Maryland Academy of Philosophy have followed with much interest the

incomparable achievements of the Tuskegee Institute which…is accomplishing much in the field

of scientific knowledge. In organizing an institution such as you have…you have placed West

Africans and the Negro under an inextinguishable debt to yourself and your coadjutors…[We]

have…decided to approach you with the view of securing free admission into the said institution

[Tuskegee] for one or more deserving Liberians.”168 Providing education, meaning Western

education and overwriting native teachings more or less, was another aspect of the “civilizing

166
African Education Commission, Education In East Africa: a Study of East, Central And South Africa by the
Second African Education Commission Under the Auspices of the Phelps-Stokes Fund, In Cooperation With the
International Education Board (New York: Phelps-Stokes Fund, 1925), 39.

167
Ibid., 43.
168
BTW Papers, Reel 259, October 20, 1905.

56
mission.” Improving infrastructure and agricultural, giving Africans a sense of pride in labor, and

making it easier for the colonizer to manage the population were also goals of the “civilizing

mission.” Aspects which made both the “Tuskegee Model” and the Phelps-Stokes fund appealing

to that mission of “helping Africa’s children grow and develop.”169 Liberia was a successful

example of this.

The combined efforts of the Liberian government and American investment paid off in

1931 as the school was finally able to begin construction. One thousand acres were allocated to

the Booker Washington Agricultural and Industrial Institute and five thousand dollars were given

annually for the next ten years for building construction and expansion. The members in charge

of the school consisted of the members who helped fund the endeavor and those from the

Liberian Government. Those members included: Henry West who was head of the American

Colonization Society in Washington, Dr. Thomas Donohugh of the Methodist Episcopal Board

of Foreign Missions, Dr. Robert Russa Moton, principal of Tuskegee after Washington passed

away, Dr. Anson Phelps-Stokes, Canon of Washington Cathedral and President of the Phelps-

Stokes Fund, President of the Republic of Liberia, and other Liberian officials. The curriculum

consisted of agriculture, technology, science, and local culture. The United States government

and the League of Nations supported the establishment of a school like Tuskegee and US

involvement assisting Liberia.170 The students later apply what they had learned and grow and

maintain their own plots of land designated by the school. Where the school in Liberia would

differ from the school in Togo was that it taught the students trades outside of farming, such as

169
"Liberating Liberia," New York Times (New York), November 21, 1933.
170
Ibid.

57
farming and blacksmithing, which showcased the full capabilities of what Tuskegee had to

offer.171

The curriculum of the school would follow the same curriculum as Tuskegee and the

schools in Togo. It would focus on practical subjects that students could apply to their work in

industrial jobs. Arithmetic, grammar, reading, and geography were taught in conjunction with the

industrial education they received and was designed around it. Arithmetic courses centered

around surface measurements and time, geography focused on the landscape of the country their

own country and less on the globe, and foreign languages were not taught whatsoever because it

had no practical application to industrial education.172 The cost of attending the school was free.

Students that were granted admission could attend for free but were required to work in lieu of

paying tuition. This work-study program gave all students the opportunity to attend college

regardless of economic status. By instituting the “Tuskegee Model,” the goals of teaching the

dignity of labor and teaching the trades of industrial labor were a strong possibility with the

given curriculum and incentives.173 Putting this into practice was the next step and the Liberians

seemed like a good fit for the school and its mission.

Upon first analysis of the Liberians attention and knowledge of farming practices, the

initial findings were rather impressive. They had knowledge of plant life, soil management, the

effects of varying weather conditions and how they affected crops, how much labor was required

to manage a farm, and pest control.174 Much like the Togolese, the Liberians needed to be

171
“‘Tuskegee in Africa': Planned in Liberia," New York Times (1923-Current File), Dec 20, 1931, N4,
http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.k-state.edu/docview/99215310?accountid=11789.
172
BTW Papers, Reel 992, 5.
173
Ibid., 6.
174
Phelps-Stokes Fund-African Education Commission. Phelps-Stokes Reports on Education in Africa (London:
Oxford University Press, 1962), 92.

58
updated in modern farming techniques to maintain better farms and produce more. To

accomplish this, the Phelps-Stokes committee gave a few suggestions: first, the Liberians needed

to be taught the importance of industrial education which would be made possible through the

construction of an industrial school, second, they needed to sell both cash crops and foodstuff

and not solely rely on the sale of cash crops to grow their economy, and third, modern farming

techniques, such as the introduction of draft animals and machinery, were important in

modernizing and advancing Liberia.175 Farming was just one of the programs taught by the

Tuskegee Institute but was the most important to teach the Liberians. For Tuskegee and the

Liberian Commission, this was important in showcasing the progress of African Americans and

the capabilities of African labor, education, and culture.176

Members on the board in Liberia realized that by offering the breadth of what Tuskegee

had to offer and applying it in Libera, they could both maximize the full potential of the Liberian

people and reap the benefits of their work. In addition, Tuskegee viewed the institute in Liberia

as a civilizing mission because they saw that the African Americans that had gone back to Africa

had gained the tools necessary to develop to a modern society and therefore should serve as an

example to the Liberian people of the benefits of agriculture.177 Heavy interest and collateral

were given to Liberia by Tuskegee because of its close connection to the American South, most

importantly the African Americans that left the south to live in Liberia.178 But African

Americans who had returned to Africa were viewed native Liberians differently. They viewed

them as Europeans had viewed native peoples: uncivilized. Scott described these differences, “It

175
Ibid., 94.
176
Ibid., 97.
177
Emmett J. Scott, "The American Commissioners in Liberia," 403.
178
"Liberating Liberia," New York Times, 1933 November 21.

59
was an interesting sight to see…the various tribes…in their varicolored costumes of dress and

undress…The natives manifested…quite as much interest in the proceedings [on the commission

to Liberia] as the more intelligent and more highly civilized Liberians [African American

“Returnees”]…The Americo-Liberians looked, for all the world, like the ordinary type of the

colored people of the United States…[and] the natives…with their loosely worn and highly

colored costumes…”179 Despite this cultural hierarchy, investment in education and

modernization through these schools was America’s contribution to the “civilizing mission” and

its major purpose in involvement in Liberia.

The Booker Washington Agricultural and Industrial Institute in Kakata, Liberia was the

first agricultural and vocational school in Liberia and is still in operation to this day. The funds

allocated to the construction of the school and the importance given to industrial and agricultural

education made it possible to grow and thrive. The school became one of the most significant

accomplishments in African American history and arguably the greatest achievement for the

Tuskegee Institute.180 The funds were used in continuing to expand the education of the Liberian

peoples and to strengthen the ties between the local population and the African Americans that

had emigrated there.181 However, even after a century of African Americans and native Liberians

living together, there was still a need to distinguish between the differences between “Negro

Americans…and indigenous Africans.”182 The school has since evolved into a community

college but still offers programs in agricultural and industrial education.

179
Scott, “American Commissioners in Liberia,” 406.
180
"Negro’s Progress Proclaimed as Epic," New York Times, Feb 12, 1949, http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.k-
state.edu/docview/105770332?accountid=11789, 9.
181
"Education is Held Africa’s Main Need," New York Times, Feb 24, 1946, http://search.proquest.com.er.lib.k-
state.edu/docview/107459123?accountid=11789, 23.
182
“Negro Progress Proclaimed as Epic,” 9.

60
 Figure1.2. Booker T. Washington Institute, Liberia, January 1940: Lictchfield House, Principal’s House,
January 1940, Call Number: LOT 11192-2 [item] [P&P] (Library of Congress, Washington D.C.), Accessed
December 6, 2017, http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3a50866.

The Phelps-Stokes Fund’s goals of improving education in Africa and improving the

overall lives of Africans beyond Liberia. The Phelps-Stokes Fund examined many areas of

Africa that could benefit from the Tuskegee Model. In Northern Rhodesia (present-day

Zimbabwe), the most underdeveloped part of the colony, the potential was dependent on outside

intervention to see that the colony could succeed. The study in 1924 showed that industrial

education had been taught in the London Missionary Society which lied in the northeast section

of the colony between Lake Mweru and the southern end of Lake Tanganyika at the Mbereshi

Boarding School. The male students were taught carpentry and ironwork and studied cotton

growing, carpentry, blacksmithing, and other trades.183 The establishment of a curriculum that

trained students in industrial education appealed to the Phelps-Stokes Fund and thus thought that

the Tuskegee Model would be a great fit to further develop the program to benefit both the

183
African Education Commission, Education in East Africa, 261.

61
students and the colony.184 In addition to exploring the possibilities of Northern Rhodesia,

Bechuanaland was another colony that had potential.

Bechuanaland (modern-day Botswana) was a small British protectorate but had numerous

agricultural possibilities. The protectorate was claimed by the British in 1885 to calm the

fighting between the local populations and the Boers. The climate of the colony is sub-tropical

and receives adequate rainfall compared to neighboring areas. The study by the Phelps-Stokes

Fund showed the local populations were familiar with growing corn, tobacco, potatoes, and

beans. Given the favorable climatic conditions, attempts were made to introduce cotton growing.

Noting that the survival and progress of the region depended on agriculture, the committee made

recommendations to see that the native population was trained to understand agricultural better

and maximize their resources. They also noted that industrial education outside of agriculture

was imperative to road construction, mechanical engineering, and other necessary trades. 185 The

“Tuskegee Model” was recommended to facilitate the progress of Bechuanaland and the

neighboring British protectorates, like Swaziland and Basutoland (modern-day Lesotho), but it

was never implemented as Britain implemented its own model which was like Tuskegee. The

“Tuskegee Model” was the standard for industrial education and served as a platform which

others could build upon.

The Tuskegee Model had been championed in Africa as it had been in the South but also

received attention in Latin America and Asia. It was viewed as an efficient way to manage the

local population, exploit its local production from the farms it had erected, and “civilized” the

peoples of the vested areas. Much the same way that wealthy white entrepreneurs wanted to

184
Ibid., 265.
185
Ibid., 383.

62
maintain the racial hierarchy wanted to exploit African Americans, colonial governments, private

enterprises, and educational leaders wanted to accomplish similar goals.

The Philippines was one of the Asiatic regions which educators that believed in the

“civilizing” qualities of Tuskegee Model would benefit from. Leading this cause was Paul

Monroe who was an educator that graduated from Columbia University and was president of the

World Federation of Educational Associations. Monroe’s views centered around “morality” and

Christian ideology which is what he admired most about the Tuskegee Model. As he wrote in an

article titled, Problems in Education, in the Educational Yearbook (1933):

“Such peoples [Filipinos] need a moral education…The education of a Hampton or

Tuskegee, not that of a New England college or high school, is needed.”186

Although there was never a school established, the “civilizing” aspect of the Tuskegee Model

spanned globally which included not just Asia, Africa, the United States, but even included Latin

America. The Tuskegee Model appealed to philanthropists invested in Puerto Rico because of its

agricultural potential, “willingness” of the natives, and its potential for “civilizing.” As early as

1902, Dr. William Torrey Harris, educator and avid supporter of the Tuskegee Model, the

potential for the “Tuskegee Model” to succeed. While agreeing that a higher education was

important, Harris believed that industrial education allowed to the Filipinos to develop the full

resources of their country by learning the trades, commerce, and agriculture. .”]187 The idea was

to develop a school like that of Tuskegee and Hampton, but it never came to fruition. Despite the

failure of an industrial school like Tuskegee to be established, this type of education was the

Paul Monroe, “Problems of Education,” in Educational Yearbook of the International Institute of Teachers
186

College, Columbia University (New York: Teachers College Columbia University, 1933), 76.
187
Samuel Mccune Lindsay, "Education in Porto Rico." The Independent vol. 54, no. 2798 (17 July 1902): 13.

63
perfect model for controlling the local population. For this reason, it was why it was so appealing

to the Phelps-Stokes Commission.

The adoption of the Tuskegee Model was an appealing option for both European states

and US interest because it had many attractive possibilities. First, it allowed the native

populations a sense of self-government without being autonomous. Second, it did not require any

work from the colonizing party because the work was being done by both Tuskegee and various

interest groups. Third, the idea of industrial education and its relation to race appealed to African

Americans but in larger part appealed to Whites. Controlling the populations and maintaining a

racial hierarchy through labor while at the same time providing said population with an

education and a sense of autonomy with minimal collateral was an ideal situation for the parties

involved in the colony. But this ideal situation was not without its problems and was more of a

product of its time. Long-term profitability and sustainability of these schools worried many

European powers. The migration of labor to urbanized areas associated with industrialization

was the larger issue. As more African Americans moved to urbanized areas which offered more

incentives, agricultural and industrial education under the Tuskegee Model became outdated. In

addition to this, procuring students to go to Africa became more difficult to come by. Views of

segregation also tore apart the idea of industrial education as it was seen as more divisive than

helpful.

64
 Chapter 4 - Past its Prime: The End of the Tuskegee Model of

Education

Despite graduating from Tuskegee and receiving the skills necessary to become more

productive farmers and tradesmen, African American farmers still were less-favored than whites

for the same jobs. Those who were given the opportunities were at a severe disadvantage because

of the education gap between white and African American schooling in industrial training. One

of the major criticisms of contemporaries of that time about Booker T. Washington and

Tuskegee was that the school did not actually educate students to fully grasp the breadth of

technical education but more so showed them merely how to practice what they saw and train

them for a life of servitude and disadvantage.

The Tuskegee Model failed in both the United States and Africa ultimately the same

reason: it failed to meet the aspirations of both African Americans and Africans. It did not offer a

future above menial labor and servitude. Skilled labor jobs created by the Tuskegee Model did

not bridge the racial divide between whites and blacks but rather kept each respected race in their

lanes. For this reason, it appealed to whites in America and Europe but chastised by African

Americans and Africans. By maintaining the status quo, black self-determination was nearly

impossible to obtain by following the Tuskegee Model and thus it began to collapse as the “anti-

Tuskegee” movement gained steady momentum in America and then Africa beginning in the

early part of the twentieth century.

The era of Jim Crow limited the possibilities of African Americans to advance in the

South. The Tuskegee Model tried to work in the confines of Jim Crow so that African Americans

could succeed despite the severe restriction placed on them. Du Bois saw how African

65
Americans were undervalued compared to their white counterparts and how Tuskegee supported

the exploitation of black labor. The compliance of the white labor vote of the South was further

insured by throwing white and black laborers into competing economic groups. Washington

failed to understand the connection of the Tuskegee Model with the labor movement of the

world. Instead, his idea was to develop skilled labor under the benevolent leadership of white

capital.188 Jim Crow did have a negative effect on industrial education but there was another

issue that plagued industrial education and that was industrialization.

Washington’s focus on industrial education over higher learning was what appealed to

Northern whites in the United States who wanted to preserve the racial hierarchy in America and

European governments who wanted a more efficient way to manage their colonial subjects in

Africa and Asia. In Washington’s vision, African Americans would utilize the skills they had

learned from years of manual labor under slavery and apply them to jobs in which they could

earn a wage and over a period of time the differences between races would become insignificant

as they slowly occupied the same job space. This was laid out in Washington’s Atlanta

Exposition Address in 1895 where he stated:

“Ignorant and inexperienced, it is not strange that in the first years of our new life [post the
abolition of slavery] we began at the top instead of at the bottom; that a seat in congress or the
state legislature was more sought than real estate or industrial skill… “Cast down your bucket
where you are”…cast it down in agriculture, mechanics…and in the professions.”189

This speech became known as the Atlanta Compromise. This compromise, while it did

garner support from the white community, many African Americans saw a sole focus on

188
W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Folk, Then and Now (New York: Kraus-Thomson Organization, 1975), 213.
189
Booker T. Washington, “Atlanta Exposition Address 1895,” Black History Bulletin, 68.1, 18.

66
industrial education and the dismissal of higher education. This also came across as reaffirming

the racial hierarchy in which African Americans were given an unfair chance of succeeding

compared to whites. The harshest critic of the Tuskegee Model of Education was W.E.B. Du

Bois.

William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was a graduate of Fisk University, one of the few

African American colleges that provided higher education for African Americans, and Harvard.

He was also a staunch believer in the Pan-African Movement, civil rights activist, and co-

founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909.

Du Bois was familiar with Washington and Tuskegee as he was offered a teaching position at

Tuskegee but declined because he was vehemently opposed the Hampton/Tuskegee Model

preached by Washington. Du Bois saw Washington’s Tuskegee Model of education as

detrimental to the advancement of African Americans. Du Bois criticized Washington for his

need to appease wealthy white northerners by promoting menial labor for African Americans

which continued to exploit them:

“Mr. Washington distinctly asks that black people give up, at least for the present three
things: First, political power, second, insistence on civil rights, third higher education of Negro
youths, and concentrate all their energies on industrial education, the accumulation of wealth,
and the conciliation of the South…In these years since Booker T. Washington’s Atlanta speech
there have occurred the [following]: disenfranchisement of the Negro, the legal creation of a
distinct status of civil inferiority, and the steady withdrawal of aid from institutions for the higher
training of the Negro.”190

190
W.E.B. Du Bois, W. E. B. Du Bois Speaks Volume 1: Speeches and Addresses (New York: Pathfinder Press,
1970), 128-129.

67
 Despite Du Bois’ criticism of Washington, he did believe that industrial education was

important and a valuable aspect of education. He believed that industrial education and higher

education could work in tandem to make African Americans an invaluable part of society. He

noted that the spread of intelligence alone would not solve the “Negro problem.” If African

Americans were to assume the responsibility of raising the standards of living among

themselves, then the power of intelligent work and leadership towards proper industrial ideals

needed to be placed in their hands. A system of trade schools supported by both the state and

private aid needed to be added to the secondary-school system.191

The system of education that Du Bois supported was championed by many African

Americans and white abolitionists. The Tuskegee Model was criticized for inhibiting African

Americans from upward mobility but was attractive to some because offered immediate earning

potential. Critics like Du Bois noted the narrow focus of industrial education and how its

practicality missed the most glaring reality: African Americans in the South were still viewed as

second class and were less desirable as laborers compared to whites.

Industrial education trained African Americans in manual labor and skilled labor but did

not prepare them for advancement in industry. Industrialization developed in the South after the

Civil War and remained heavily invested in agriculture. The Tuskegee Institute was designed to

prepare African Americans for a life of industry, but it did not prepare them to reach much

higher than low-end production jobs. Favoritism of white laborers over African Americans was a

harsh reality. Booker T. Washington still believed that the ordinary training that students

191
Ibid., 135.

68
received in school put too much emphasis on merely intellectual side of education.”192 Du Bois

noted limitations of industrial education in the era of industrialization and modernization:

“…the lack of success of the industrial education of Negroes has come not because of the
absence of desperate and devoted effort, but because of changes in the world which the industrial
school did not foresee… But, meantime what has happened to these vocations and trades?
Machines and new industrial organizations have remade the economic world and ousted these
trades either from old technique or their economic significance.”193

The critique of industrial education brought forth by Du Bois hit the center of one of industrial

education’s major problems and was why technical schools began to abandon a solely industrial

education curriculum and move towards a more expansive one that was more in line with Du

Bois’ ideas of African American advancement.

Robert Russa Moton succeeded Booker T. Washington as principal of Tuskegee after

Washington’s death in 1915. Moton looked to maintain the tradition of keeping Tuskegee a

strictly technical school but the pressure to change the curriculum of Tuskegee continued to

mount from African Americans and civil rights activists who argued that technical education

schools like Tuskegee were making peace with segregation and undervaluing African American

potential. Like Washington, Moton doubled down on expounding the importance of industrial

schooling and continuously assured his constituents that “The time is not yet in sight when

Tuskegee Institute will not be needed as a training school…such as it has been through all the

192
Booker T. Washington, "Relation of Industrial Education to National Progress," The Annals of the American
Academy of Political and Social Science 33, no. 1 (1909): 1-12, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1011736, 10.
193
W.E.B. Du Bois, W. E. B. Du Bois Speaks Volume 2: Speeches and Addresses (New York: Pathfinder Press,
1970), 62-64.

69
years of its history.”194 Moton’s continued stance on industrial education added fuel to Du Bois’

and other educated African Americans’ fire as they continued to speak out against the

Hampton/Tuskegee model. They continued to argue that Tuskegee did not provide adequate

training for African Americans to succeed, it undervalued their abilities, and that it merely

trained them to be subservient to whites.195 Despite the criticism of schools like Tuskegee and

Hampton, Du Bois did not want the schools to be shut down or abandon technical education but

rather make higher education a priority.196

The Tuskegee Model could not withstand the shifting dynamics in America as moves

towards self-determination for African Americans ramped up in the latter part of the 1920s and

onward. According to Du Bois, “…the industrial school has failed because with a definite object

it lacked appropriate method to gain it.”197 Industrial education was unable to adapt to “new

branches of industry, new techniques [that] are continually opening…[which] call for changing

curricula and adjustments [which are] puzzling for a school and a set course of study [like

Tuskegee].”198 Industrial education was still seen as providing African Americans with a sense of

autonomy and independence which is why it did not want to be totally abandoned by both the

likes of wealthy whites and educated African Americans like Du Bois. The difference between

Du Bois and interest groups invested in schools like Tuskegee was that interest groups still

wanted to promote technical education over higher education. They believed that the institutions

most effectively leading the way to “self-determination” of the African American race were both

194
Robert Russa Moton, Principal’s Annual Report 1929-1930, Tuskegee Archives, 3-4.
195
W. E. B. Du Bois, Letter from W.E.B. Du Bois to J. E. Davis, June 16, 1917. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312).
Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries.
196
Ibid.
197
W. E. B. Du Bois, W. E. B. Du Bois Speaks Volume 2: Speeches and Addresses (New York: Pathfinder Press,
1970, 63.
198
Ibid. 65.

70
Hampton and Tuskegee. The need of higher education colleges like Fisk and Howard were noted

but the belief was that there was a wider need of such schools as Hampton and Tuskegee to help

African Americans get on their feet economically199.

Schools like Tuskegee and Hampton faced opposition not just from educated African

Americans and proponents of African American self-determination, but also from their own

students.200 Realizing that opportunities were slim in the job market and that an industrial

education did not necessarily mean job security and success, students demanded that the system

of education at Tuskegee and Hampton change. In 1927, the students at Tuskegee went on strike

and voiced similar complaints. A letter written in The Nation noted that the ‘Hampton idea’ of

education had long and tirelessly been exploited. It was based on a program of industrial training

for African Americans, discouragement of college work, and the exploitation of methods of

‘learning by doing.’ The program was forced to change after the South established certain

standards of education for teachers, both black and white, and schools like Hampton and

Tuskegee were not meeting those standards. This change in educational standards led to

Hampton graduates becoming teachers, physicians, and lawyers instead of cooks, carpenters, and

farmers.201

The strikes that occurred at African American industrial schools and the changing

policies in educational standards for teachers finally dismantled the Tuskegee Model of

education. White philanthropists pledged large sums of financial support technical training at

schools like Tuskegee to protect their interests, but it was too late.202 Tuskegee continued to

199
"Education the Only Way," New York Times (New York, N.Y.), October 01, 1924.
200
Robert Russa Moton, “The Negro: Steady Progress,” London Times 1922 July 4, vi.
201
W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Hampton Strike,” November 2, 1927, W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312), Special
Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries.
202
"Education the Only Way," New York Times (New York, N.Y.), October 01, 1924.

71
expand its course catalog with a certain “Du Bois ambition” while exterminating the “Booker

Washington Education” and reluctantly Moton accepted the changes to Tuskegee. 203

Throughout the South, African Americans brought the attention of the public the education of

their children. Shockingly enough, they were met increasingly sympathetic and encouraging

responses both from the state and from private citizens. The change in attitude on the part of both

races had developed because of cooperation between Northern white men, Southern White men,

and African Americans.204 African American enrollment slowly began to rise despite pressures

from whites who wanted to maintain the already established hierarchy. Even though African

Americans still comprised of predominantly of the agricultural class, they sought to dismantle

the preconceived notions that the sphere of agriculture was where they should stay.205

Table 1.2

David Blose, Statistics of the Education of Negroes: (a Decade of Progress) (Washington, D.C.: Federal Security
Agency, U.S. Office of Education, 1943), 4.

203
James D. Anderson, “The Education of Blacks in the South, 1860-1935,” (Chapel Hill: University of North
Carolina Press, 2014), Accessed March 21, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, 274.
204
Robert Russa Moton, Finding a Way Out: An Autobiography, (Maryland: McGrath Pub. Co., 1920), 269.
205
“The American Negro,” London Times (1930 April 22), 11.

72
 The abandonment of the Tuskegee Model in the South was a huge step in the

advancement of African Americans. Dubois noted the drastic change in schools like Hampton

over a short period of time since his first visit. More students began attending college in the latter

part of the 1920s and into the 1930s. He noted that a speech he gave in 1906 which criticized the

Hampton model was not well received at the time but when he went back in 1936, the students

were “wondering what to do with the industrial equipment.”206

Although the Tuskegee Model was criticized since the turn of the twentieth century for

how it took advantage of African American labor, it was the first initiative to provide an

education for African Americans who could not afford to go to the higher education colleges like

Fisk. It also promoted the idea of providing African Americans a living wage which was difficult

to come by in the era of Jim Crow and for some it did make good on its promise. Despite the

failures of the Tuskegee Model, it influenced the establishment of similar schools in the United

States to continue Tuskegee’s ideology.

Although industrial education was largely a southern phenom, Tuskegee’s benefactors

hailed predominantly from northern states, therefore, it is not terribly surprising that schools

would be established in the North. One of these schools was the Ambidexter Industrial and

Normal Institute in Springfield, Illinois. The school was founded by clergyman G.H. McDaniel

in 1901 who wanted to “accomplish for the negroes in the north what Booker T. Washington’s

great school is doing for the colored people of the South.” By 1906, the school was offering

many of the same courses as Tuskegee minus agricultural education. By 1908 after the

206
W. E. B. Du Bois, The Education of Black People: Ten Critiques, 1906-1960 (Amherst: University of
Massachusetts Press), 1973, 15.

73
resignation of McDaniel, the school was to close because it too was unable to afford to maintain

itself and in 1909 it became a boarding house.207

Figure 1.3. “Ambidexter Industrial and Normal Institute. Springfield, Illinois.” Photo provided by
Sangamon Valley Collection at the Lincoln Library

Elsewhere in the United States, other Tuskegee-type schools were established. In 1919,

Floyd Brown, a graduate of Tuskegee, established the Fargo Agricultural School in Monroe

County, Arkansas. The school provided both agricultural and technical training and Brown also

held the same ideas about racial hegemony as Washington. Brown believed that as African

Americans continued to accomplish goals in trades and labor, the white populations would learn

Curtis Mann, “Another Kind of Schoolhouse,” Illinois Times, 2013 December 5, http://illinoistimes.com/article-
207

13198-another-kind-of-schoolhouse.html.

74
to accept them, and the racial divide would diminish. He further stressed that “blacks should not

be ashamed to start at the bottom of the economic ladder, nor to work with their hands.”208

Voorhees College in Denmark, South Carolina was one of the more successful models of

the Tuskegee Institute and is still functioning to this day. Originally opened as the Denmark

Industrial School in 1897, Elizabeth Evelyn Wright, a graduate of Tuskegee, opened the school

with the same mission as Booker T. Washington. Wright remained in constant contact with

Washington throughout her life as she looked at how to continuously improve the school. The

school was renamed the Voorhees Industrial School after Ralph Voorhees, a wealthy New Jersey

philanthropist who donated money to erect the school’s first building. Voorhees College became

an accredited four-year college in 1968 and is successful today by combining both Washington’s

and Du Bois’ ideas.209

The Tuskegee Model not only spawned dissatisfaction in the United States, it also caused

discontent in Africa. Movements in the United States, like the Pan-African Movement, fought to

grant the right of self-determination to blacks around the world, especially to those living in

Africa. Like in America, Africans were exploited by white Europeans under the guise of

industrial “education” and like African Americans, Africans wanted to reach for higher goals

than merely performing menial labor. The growing dissatisfaction with the Tuskegee Model in

America was similar to the discontent in Africa and thus the Tuskegee Model began to collapse.

The Phelps-Stokes Commission took the Tuskegee model and packaged it to other

European colonial governments and Liberia as the ideal form of education and native

208
Kelly Schmidt, “Ambidexterity and Ambition: The Tuskegee Model Legacy,” The Lakefront Historian, 21
February 2016, https://lakefronthistorian.com/2016/02/21/ambidexterity-and-ambition-the-tuskegee-model-legacy.
209
United States Department of the Interior Heritage Conservation and Recreation Service, National Register of
Historic Places Inventory-Nomination Form, Dec. 10, 1980.

75
management. Liberia had taken the Tuskegee model and erected two industrial schools: The

Booker Washington Institute and the Suehn Industrial Academy. Both schools were had the same

outlook as Tuskegee which was to promote industrial education over higher education. It did

have the same stigma of promoting racial subordination of Africans to Liberians who were

descendants of Americans that had immigrated there. Students were recruited from Liberia to

train at Tuskegee but only if they came from well-to-do families and were sponsored by

missionaries who had been in Liberia.210 Thomas Jones, head of the Phelps-Stokes Commission,

believed wholeheartedly that industrial education was the key to strengthening ties between

America and European powers because they would be thankful to America for providing the

tools to help stabilize colonial unrest.211

Liberia established both the Suehn Academy and the Booker Washington Institute as a

replica of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. Both schools comprised of six departments: 1) a

normal school, 2) and agricultural school, 3) a trade school, 4) a business school, 5) a home-

economics school, and 6) the academic department.212 Missionaries were easy to recruit as

industrial teachers because they viewed the Tuskegee Model as “wholesome.” Unlike the

Tuskegee Institute, the shift in Liberian industrial education and the abandonment of the

Tuskegee Model was more gradual. Higher education was promoted by instructors after both

Washington’s death and the inability to find anyone to carry on his legacy. During the 1950s,

Industrial education became secondary to higher education as it was indispensable and higher

210
Phelps-Stokes Fund, Twenty Year Report of the Phelps-Stokes Fund, 1911-1931: With a Series of Studies of
Negro Progress and of Developments of Race Relations In the United States And Africa During the Period, And a
Discussion of the Present Outlook (New York City: The Phelps-Stokes fund), 1932, 26.
211
W.E.B. Du Bois, The World and Africa; An Inquiry into the Part Which Africa Has Played in World History: An
Enlarged Edition, with New Writings on Africa, 1955-1961 (New York: International Publishers, 1965), 8-12.
212
Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute, Annual Catalogue (Hampton: Hampton Institute Press), 1908, 41.

76
education supplemented that by providing a deeper understanding for the work that was being

done but also training students in science and the arts to explore other professional

opportunities.213 Scholarships from aid provided by such groups as UNESCO supported students

in higher education. Courses such as Journalism, Education, and the sciences began receiving

recognition.214 Foreign companies, such as Firestone, offered financial support in industrial

education and job placement at the Firestone plantation for individuals looking to pursue a career

in their company. Enrollment in the industrial school was only offered to students who had

completed two years at a higher education institute. The Booker Washington Institute was

chosen to provide both industrial education and higher education courses to assist the Firestone

company and students.215 The growing cost of industrial education also encouraged the shift

towards academic education. It was far cheaper to purchase materials for academic courses than

it was to maintain industrial equipment and by the 1960s, higher education became the core of

both Suehn and the Booker Washington Institute.216

The Tuskegee Model appealed mostly to British South Africa as it was the only European

state to implement the recommendations of the Phelps-Stokes Commission’s expedition through

Africa. They saw sending students to study industrial education in America as both a positive

and a negative. The positive was that the education provided to students with the means to carry

out both the economic interests of the colonial state and provide a dependent stream of educators.

The downside to sending students was they feared educated students would develop the tools

213
Dorris Ngaujah, and Donald E. Douglas, Suehn Industrial Academy, Liberia, West Africa: A Study of the Shift in
Secondary Curricular Emphasis from Industrial to Academic, 1944–1974, 2008, ProQuest Dissertations and Theses,
148.
214
Liberia Embassy (U.S.), Liberia Today (Washington, D.C.: Liberian Embassy in Washington, 1952), 8.
215
Wayne Chatfield Taylor, The Firestone Operations in Liberia (Washington: National Planning Association,
1956), 77.
216
Nguajah, Suehn Industrial Academy, 150.

77
necessary to challenge colonial authority; industrial education, however, counteracted this fear.

In 1953, The Advisory Committee on Native Education in Tropical Africa, who was appointed

by the British Colonial Office stated that the aims of industrial education were designed to

promote the advancement of community by improving agriculture and developing native

industries.217

Like Tuskegee’s support in the United States, Jones saw the Tuskegee Model as a means

of preserving the racial hierarchy and stunting the possibility of Africans to aspire for higher

education.218 Industrial education in Africa was vehemently opposed by the Pan-African

Movement especially by W.E.B. Du Bois. Du Bois opposed the Tuskegee Model because he

believed it blocked African advancement and reinforced their subjugated within racial colonial

hierarchies. Du Bois stressed his wishes during the First Pan-African Congress (1919) which was

called to discuss what could be done to uplift blacks around the world. In regard to education, Du

Bois noted that both industrial education and higher education should be more attainable for

blacks, but higher education should be the first priority.219 Another advocate for black self-

determination was Marcus Garvey. Garvey was a black nationalist who founded the Universal

Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League. Garvey was most notable for

his failed “Back to Africa” movement which called for blacks around the world to return to their

“native” Africa because he felt that they would never be accepted into white society. Garvey

believed that African Americans had a duty to Africans to help them develop their own societies,

217
W.E.F. Ward, African Education: a Study of Educational Policy and Practice in British Tropical Africa (Oxford:
University Press: to Be Obtained from the Crown Agents for the Colonies, London, 1953), 4.
218
Edward Berman, “Educational Colonialism in Africa,” in Philanthropy and Cultural Imperialism: The
Foundations at Home and Abroad, ed. Robert Arnove (Boston: G.K. Hall, 1980), 186-187.
219
Du Bois, W. E. B. Du Bois Speaks Vol. 2, 166.

78
economies, and infrastructure.220 Garvey was criticized by Du Bois for his stance on race

relations between blacks and whites and was criticized for wanting to maintain the separation of

the races. For this reason, he was favored less than Du Bois among educated African Americans

and supporters of African American self-determination.

In trying to counteract the influence of the Pan-African Movement, Thomas Jones and the

Phelps-Stokes Commission showcased James Aggrey, a model student who had been born in the

Gold Coast and studied at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama and bought into the Tuskegee

Model of education.221 Aggrey was the ideal candidate to promote the Tuskegee Model because

he did not threaten the racial hierarchy, since he bought into Washington’s ideas of race

relations, and he was proof to colonial governments that the Tuskegee Model worked.

Unfortunately, Aggrey’s death in 1927 and the inability of Phelps-Stokes to find a replacement

spokesman, marked the beginning of the end for promoting the Tuskegee Model.

The Tuskegee Model failed to attract massive European support for several reasons. In

South Africa, the model floundered due to its high cost and surplus of skilled laborers which

undermined its usefulness. In 1905, The Report of the South African Affairs Commission noted

that technical education and elementary education were incompatible to teach together and that it

was “unreasonable to make provision at the public charge without an adequate contribution from

the students….”222 Unlike the Tuskegee Institute which received endowments from wealthy

white philanthropists, colonial governments did not receive such contributions. Another reason

for the model’s failure was resentment from white South African industrial workers. Most

220
Marcus Garvey, “Africa for Africans,” Selected Writings and Writings of Marcus Garvey (New York: Dover
Publications, 2004), 97.
221
African Education Commission, Education in Africa (New York: Phelps-Stokes Fund, 1922), xxiv.
222
South African Native Affairs Commission, South African Native Affairs Commission (Cape Town: Cape Times,
1905), 73.

79
members of this class saw technical training for Africans as unfair market competition. In fact,

the students who managed the farms at the schools were not permitted to compete with

neighboring white settlements and commercial companies who were invested in Africa created a

monopoly which greatly hurt the local economy.223 The white industrial class was afraid of

upsetting the racial and economic hierarchy that existed in the colonies and at home.

The biggest reason the Tuskegee Model failed was due to opposition from the people its

proponents were trying to educate. Africans came to resent industrial education because they,

like African Americans in the United States, wanted to strive for something greater than menial

labor. Charles Loram, a member of the Phelps-Stokes Commission and ardent supporter of the

Tuskegee/Hampton Model, noted that South African peoples wanted to bridge the gap between

races. Loram noted how black South Africans believed that it was education that made the white

man what he was. Any attempt to make black South Africans perform manual labor was

regarded as a subtle attempt by white South Africans to prevent them from achieving their

goals.224

African aspirations to obtain a higher education, leave the local villages, and head to

more urbanized areas which offered more numerous and diverse jobs combined to doom the

Tuskegee Model in Africa. Colonial governments that were looking to implement the Tuskegee

Model were also promised by the Phelps-Stokes Commission that funds would be given to build

the schools, but the governments would have to foot the money for infrastructure, tools, and

resources. This was not attractive to cash-starved colonial governments because the cost of

223
Yekutiel Gershoni, Africans on African Americans: The Creation and Uses of an African-American Myth
(London: MacMillan Press, ltd., 1997), 132.
224
Charles Loram, The Education of the South African Native (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1917), 160.

80
maintaining the schools always exceeded the value of the goods produced from the schools,

making them financially unsustainable over the long-term. Finally, the experiments did not

reassure the colonial governments that industrial education would satisfy African’s aspirations

without threatening the racial hierarchies of colonial rule.

Many students that were funded to go to the United States to study industrial education at

Tuskegee and Hampton, switched going from industrial schools or programs and enrolled in

higher education ones. As one student noted, “I wanted to get an education that would make my

people do what white people do.”225 Other students, like Peter Koinange, did exactly that.

Koinange was granted admission to Hampton through funding by the Phelps-Stokes Fund but

transferred to Ohio Wesleyan University and later did his postgraduate work at Columbia

University and Cambridge University. Later, he turned down a post as principal at a government

school and established his own school, the Kenya Teachers College.226 The Tuskegee Model

failed because it underdelivered to colonial governments and was unable to gather support by the

local populations.

Despite the abandonment of the Tuskegee Model, there were still efforts to promote the

importance and “virtuosity” of industrial education. In 1953, Dr. F. J. Harlow wrote a letter

Secretary of State for Colonies and made multiple points as to why industrial education was

needed in East and Central Africa. First, to emphasize the necessity for a close connection

between technical education and industry. Second, the greatest demand was for skilled craftsmen

like builders, carpenters, farm mechanics. The greatest difficulty in technical education was

wastage. There was an overproduction of goods made and not a demand and there were also too

225
Emmett Scott, “Tuskegee in Africa and Africa at Tuskegee,” Booker T. Washington Papers, Container 334.
226
Mbiyu Koinange, The People of Kenya Speak for Themselves (Detroit: Kenya Publication Fund, 1955), 25-30.

81
many individuals trained in one area of technical assistance and not the other. The idea was that

as soon as a student was partially trained, the colonial government wanted to make immediate

use of their training to profit from their labor.227 The issue with these recommendations was the

same problem that hindered students at Tuskegee which was there were not enough jobs in these

areas. These same recommendations hindered success in other areas of Africa because it was too

costly to support industrial education schools and many of these skilled professions were

oversaturated.

The Tuskegee Model did leave a lasting impression in both Africa and the United States.

One of the most notable disciples was Reverend John Lagalabalele Dube from Natal. Dube was

educated in the United States but after touring the Tuskegee Institute and reading Washington’s

Up from Slavery, which had been translated into Zulu, he wanted to create a replica of that and

did so by establishing the Zulu Christian Industrial School at Ohlange, Natal in 1900.228 Dube

and Washington were not close but like Washington, Dube funded the industrial school with

American donors, many of whom happened to be donors to Tuskegee.229 Dube earned himself

the title of “the Booker T. Washington of South Africa” due to his similar stances on race

hegemony and appeal to white aristocrats. In South Africa, the need was to maintain “racial

harmony” by playing into the fears of the English colonial government who feared that educating

black South Africans at a higher education institution would lead to the challenging of colonial

authority. Industrial education under the Tuskegee Model was adopted because it did not

227
Colonial Office of Great Britain, African Education: A Study of Educational Policy and Practice in British
Tropical Africa (Oxford: University Press, 1953), 96-97.
228
American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, Annual Report of the American Board of
Commissioners for Foreign Missions (Boston: The Board, 1902), 36.

229
Louis Harlan, Booker T. Washington: The Wizard of Tuskegee, 1901-1915 (New York: Oxford University Press),
1983, 273.

82
challenge the colonial government politically or economically and maintained the racial

hierarchy.230

Another South African that adopted the Tuskegee Model was Davidson D.T. Jabavu.

Jabavu was more familiar with Tuskegee as he had spent three months studying there in 1913

under instructions from the South African Minister of Native Affairs to report on the adaptability

of Tuskegee methods to South Africa. He noted that although Tuskegee did not offer this same

kind of education as English schools, it provided them with an “invaluable skill” that gave

students a sense of independence.231 Jabavu viewed the Tuskegee/Hampton Model as a real

possibility for benefiting both South African students and teachers and his findings eventually

led to the establishment of the South African Native College in Fort Hare in 1916.232

The Tuskegee Model of Education failed because it was an expired product of its time.

For African Americans, industrial education was appealing because it offered them their first

feeling of freedom. For Africans, it offered them a way of earning a wage. The larger appeal and

support was by white aristocrats and colonial governments who wanted to preserve the racial

hierarchy and exploit the labor of both African Americans and Africans. As movements like the

Pan-African Movement and blacks looking to strive for something greater than limited and often

unsatisfying potential, the Tuskegee Model of education began to fade. In addition, the growing

move towards urban, industrialized areas offered more earning potential and the awe of attaining

a degree in higher education offered the potential for unimaginable opportunities. The attempts

to preserve the Tuskegee Model were made by those invested in the people it set out to control

230
Samuel Chapman Armstrong, The Southern Workman v.41: 2-6 (Virginia: Hampton Institute, 1912), 368.
231
Davidson Jabavu, The Black Problem: Papers and Addresses on Various Native Problems (Lovedale: Lovedale
Institution Press, 1920), 29.
232
Louis Harlan, and Raymond Smock. Booker T. Washington in Perspective Essays of Louis R. Harlan (Jackson:
University Press of Mississippi, 1988), 460.

83
and exploit. Even though the Tuskegee Model failed and was dissolved, it left a lasting legacy

across the globe which was seen in agricultural technology, industrial schools reformatted into

continuing to train agricultural technology, quasi-industrial schools, and even those left with the

scars of the negative impacts of industrial education.

84
 Chapter 5 - Conclusion

The embargo of American cotton during the war strained German cotton imports and

later influenced the colonial government’s desire to establish a reliable cotton supply so that they

would not be forced into the same situation. Tuskegee’s model of industrial education was

designed to offer African Americans carefully limited opportunities in the wake of

Reconstruction’s failure. To avoid directly challenging whites, Washington’s model was

designed to keep African Americans in separate spheres from whites and provide jobs and skills

that were already familiar to them. The KWK realized this and believed that this same model

could be applied to their new colonies, like Togo, and would yield the same results. Although the

Tuskegee Expedition failed to live up to Germany’s aspirations, it modernized the Togolese

agricultural economy and infrastructure. While it was exploitative by nature, from the

perspective of colonial governments the Tuskegee Model proved a possible success on how to

manage indigenous populations which attracted other colonial powers and white philanthropists

in the United States.

The success of Tuskegee in Togo and its continuing support in the United States led to

expanded interest by colonial powers but more surprisingly by U.S. philanthropists looking to

develop Liberia. While the Tuskegee Model was Washington’s brainchild, its legacy lived on

after his death. The Phelps-Stokes Fund was established to continue Washington’s legacy of

industrial education by promoting morality through labor. The Phelps-Stokes Fund funneled

money into establishing schools and determining areas that would benefit most from industrial

education. Funding from the Phelps-Stokes Fund led to the establishment of the Booker T.

85
Washington Institute in Liberia. The school was modeled after Tuskegee with the same mission:

train students in a technical skill, such as agriculture and carpentry, so they could carve out a

niche for themselves economically. The Phelps-Stokes Fund had the same “civilizing mission”

agenda as many European states because it believed it was modernization and morality in its

endeavors. Much like the nature of European colonial states, this was merely a belief because it

was exploitative and maintained a racial hierarchy to better serve the dominant power.

While the Tuskegee Model had its appeal, it was not without its problems. First,

Tuskegee was able to succeed because it had continued support from white philanthropists;

something colonial governments did not have. The school could never produce and sell enough

cotton to support itself long-term which was a major flaw. Second, although Tuskegee’s role in

the global “civilizing mission” was influential, Booker T. Washington’s death proved a turning

point in the spread of industrial education. The Phelps-Stokes Fund did try to carry on

Washington’s legacy but there was no replacement for him. The inability of the Tuskegee Model

to find a suitable replacement was a major problem for continuing the legacy of industrial

education. Finally, movements in black self-determination in the United States and Africa

thwarted the progress of industrial education and ultimately led the end of the Tuskegee Model.

Pan-Africanists like W. E. B. Du Bois heavily criticized Washington and the Tuskegee Model

because it inhibited the upward mobility of blacks. Anti-Tuskegee movements spread in the

South as students and teachers demanded more from their education and education requirements

demanded more from schools like Tuskegee. Movements in Africa followed in the United States’

footsteps as Africans, like the students in Liberia, demanded more opportunities in upward

mobility. These changes eventually led to the dismantling of the Tuskegee Model of Education.

86
 The Tuskegee Model could not survive changing dynamics in education and new

demands for racial progress, but its influence had a lasting effect globally. Its role in the United

States maintained a racial hierarchy that existed before the abolition of slavery and under the

guise of progress, succeeded in maintaining that division. In Africa, it played a vital role in

colonialism in Africa by offering an alternative to direct rule and committing massive manpower

to oversee managing the indigenous population. The idea was to make the colonies self-sufficient

and exploit them for profit without expending resources; this was the ideal result of the

“civilizing mission.” Unfortunately, this was unrealistic because it could never live up the

expectations of creating a successful and profitable colonial economy. Although it eventually

failed, the Tuskegee Model took decades to come to an end. The introduction of modern

technologies and infrastructure was less significant because it perpetuated a system of

exploitation and subordination of black populations which was inherent in the model. The legacy

of Tuskegee was that for all its problems, it led to progress in education and black upward

mobility. For these reasons, it proved that Tuskegee and groups like the Phelps-Stokes Fund

played an important role in the “civilizing mission.”

87
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