Working With the Hands

The effort to make an industry profitable should not be the aim of first importance. The teaching should be most emphasised. Our policy at Tuskegee is to make an industry pay its way if possible, but at the same time not to sacrifice the training to mere economic gain. Those who undertake such an endeavour, with the expectation to getting much money out of an industry, will find themselves disappointed, unless they realise that the institution must be, all the time, working upon new material. At Tuskegee, for example, when a student is trained to the point of efficiency where he can construct a first-class wagon, we do not keep him there to build more vehicles, but send him out into the world to exert his trained influence and capabilities in lifting others to his level; and we begin our work with the raw material all over again.