On April 5, 1856, Booker Taliaferro Washington was born into slavery on a plantation in central Virginia. While he didn’t know his father, his mother was a cook.

Hi, I'm Booker!

When Booker was 10 years old, all the slaves in the United States were freed, so he and his family left the plantation and moved to Malden, West Virginia. There, he helped his stepfather in a salt mine.

HAMPTON

After learning to read and write, teenage Booker realized he loved to learn.

So, he traveled 300 miles by wagon and by foot to Hampton Agriculture Institute, a college in Virginia. He was a very good student!

Five years after Booker graduated, the president of Hampton Agriculture Institute was asked to choose someone to start a new college. He said:

I know just the man for the job!

BOOKER T. WASHINGTON!

Booker helped create the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. It was a college for black people. 

The education focused on useful skills, such as farming, wood-working, and bricklaying. Booker hoped that these skills would help black people become successful in their hometowns.

The Tuskegee Institute became very popular. President William McKinley even visited it in 1898!

Wow, Booker, your institute is amazing!

However, at the time, African-Americans were not being treated fairly in the U.S. For example, they were given less opportunities in jobs, politics, and everyday life. Many Black leaders wanted to end this inequality… but how?

 ...Booker had an idea!

“Cast down your buckets where you are!” he proclaimed during a speech in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1895.  

What he meant was that black people should stay where they are and improve the conditions there, instead of fleeing somewhere else.

If black people focus on working hard and earning money, society will begin to respect us as equals. 

Then, we will gain equality.