t, Robert
R. Moton, his successor in the work at Tuskegee Institute.]

One can well imagine with what pride the simple black farmers of Macon
County displayed their products and their live stock to these
distinguished representatives of both races headed by their own great
neighbor and leader. At Mt. Andrew, one of the communities visited,
the Farmers' Improvement Club had prepared an exhibit consisting of
the best specimens of vegetables, fruits, and meats raised in the
community. A report stated that the Negro people of the town owned
over two hundred head of live stock and had over thirty houses which
were either whitewashed or painted. When called upon for remarks, Mr.
Washington expressed himself as greatly encouraged by what he had seen
and said in conclusion, "Here in Macon County you have good land that
will grow abundant crops. You have also a good citizenship, and hence
there is every opportunity for you to make your community a heaven
upon earth."

Booker Washington was always emphasizing the necessity of better
conditions right here and now instead of in a distant future or in
heaven. He was constantly combating the tendency in his people--a
tendency common to all people but naturally particularly strong in
those having a heritage of slavery--to substitute the anticipated
bliss of a future life for effective efforts to improve the conditions
of this present life. He was always telling them to put their energies
into societies for the preservation of health and improvement of
living conditions, instead of into the too numerous and popular sick
benefit and death benefit organizations.

At the next stop of the party Mr. Washington was introduced to the
assembled townspeople by a graduate of Tuskegee Institute, who was
one of their leading citizens and most successful farmers. In this
talk he urged the people to get more land and keep it and to grow
something besides cotton. He said they should not lean upon others and
should not go to town on Saturdays to "draw upon" the merchants, but
should stay at home and "draw every day from their own soil corn,
peas, beans, and hogs." He urged the men to give their wives more time
to work around the house and to raise vegetables. (This, of course,
instead of requiring them to work in the fields with the men as is so
common.) He urged especially that they take their wives into their
confidence and make them their partners as well as their companions.
He assured them th