The crucible, a southerner's impression of Hampton . a mediatorbetween the whites and blacks, in those dark, perplexing daysfollowing the close of the Civil War. He found hundreds of Negroes, homeless, hungry, andunskilled in any manual art, eking out a miserable existenceand daily falling lower and lower in the social scale. Free-dom had merely turned them loose under new conditions towhich they were in nowise able to rise. The plantations onwhich they had worked as slaves were in ruins, and they werementally and physically unfit to secure or retain any position requiring the least modicum of
The crucible, a southerner's impression of Hampton . a mediatorbetween the whites and blacks, in those dark, perplexing daysfollowing the close of the Civil War. He found hundreds of Negroes, homeless, hungry, andunskilled in any manual art, eking out a miserable existenceand daily falling lower and lower in the social scale. Free-dom had merely turned them loose under new conditions towhich they were in nowise able to rise. The plantations onwhich they had worked as slaves were in ruins, and they werementally and physically unfit to secure or retain any position requiring the least modicum of manual skill or meet this situation, and avert the tragedy of a race thatmust live and yet could not earn its bread, was the tremendoustask General Armstrong set for himself. With the aid of theAmerican Missionary Association, he established a smallindustrial school on the site of the present institute, with twoassistants and fifteen pupils. No thought of social equality orthe higher education befogged his mind. The only end sought. Correlation of Arithmetic and Bricklaying was to teach the Negro how to work, that he might earn hisliving honestly, and adjust himself to the new conditions oflife thrust upon him. For twenty-five years General Armstrong labored at histask, and under his firm hand and steadfast purpose the Hamp-ton Institute lived and thrived. Then Death called him fromhis work, and Dr. H. B. Frissell, for many years his assistantstepped into the breach and the work went on. So much for the past, of which might be written manyvolumes replete with stories of heart-bieaking struggles, almostdivine patience, and heroic self-sacrifice. To-day there are fourteen hundred students, about equallydivided as to sex, working and studying under a corps of onehundred and twenty-five teachers and instructors. The recordsshow that over seventy-five hundred students have gone fromHampton, ably equipped to earn an honest living, rehabilitatethe barren farms, and st
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookidcruciblesout, bookyear1910
