Review of Booker T. Washington's "Story of My Life and Work"

Date Published: February 8, 2024

The description of Booker T. Washington's funeral as pictured above is described as follows:

​“Dr. Booker T. Washington, most famous Negro in the world, the man who climbed 'Up from Slavery,' until he stood before kings and nobles in Europe and had received more distinguished honors in America than have ever been accorded to any other Negro, was buried at Tuskegee on a Wednesday with simplicity and lack of studied pomp and ceremony. …

​"No labored eulogies; no boastings of his great work; no gorgeous trappings of horses; no streaming banners; no mysterious ceremonies of lodges—just the usual line of teachers, trustees, graduates, students, and visitors which so often marched to the chapel. …
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“Any other kind of service less simple would have mocked the kind of life that Dr. Washington had lived.”

"The Funeral," Booker T. Washington's Own Story of His Life and Work, 1915

A Review of Booker T. Washington’s “My Life and Work” and “His Life and Work”

• Reviews of the Day: 1900–02, 1915
• Insights from Booker T. Washington’s “My Life and Work” and “His Life and Work”
• This Author’s Thoughts and Perceptions
• ​Images from "The Story of My Life and Work"

Reviews of the Day: 1900–02, 1915​

-     Which Book is Being Reviewed: “My Life and Work” or “His Life and Work”​

It took some research to determine if the title of this book was “The Story of My Life and Work” or “Booker T. Washington’s Own Story of His Life and Work.” When the book arrived it was as shown in the included image. The spine imprint was “The Story of My Life and Work” while the front cover displayed “Booker T. Washington’s Own Story of His Life and Work.”

“My Life and Work” was first published in the 1900–02 timeframe while this issue of the book entitled “Booker T. Washington’s Own Story of His Life and Work” was published in 1915.

The latter version of the book does contain this insight:

“ ‘The Story of My Life and Work’ deals with the lamented educator’s activities up to, and including a part of the year 1902. … Therefore, in order to clearly understand the magnitude of his accomplishments during the last fourteen years of his life, we must make comparisons between the Tuskegee Institute of that period and the present Tuskegee [1915].”

This book contains both the biography and autobiography of Booker T. Washington.

So this book was published to also include Booker T. Washington’s “Life and Work” from 1902 onward—including important information such his death and funeral. It appears to this author that the difference between the two books is the addition of everything after Chapter XXIII—entitled “Looking Backward.”

​The end of this chapter includes the summary paragraph that ends “The Story of My Life and Work:”

“I end this volume as I began, with an apology for writing it. It is always highly distasteful to me to speak about myself, and in writing what I have, I have attempted in a small degree, at least, to subordinate my own personal feelings with a view to giving the public as much information as possible.

​"I hope that some permanent good will result from my effort.”

The lack of proper editing is apparent at this point as the Table of Contents reflects that the next chapter, Chapter XXIV, starts a new “Supplement Section,” but within the actual pages of the book, this “Supplement Section” starts with  Chapter XXV. A little sloppy but not concerning anything that is of great importance—just an editing error.
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No reviews were found for this 1915 release of the book—“His Life and Work,” just comments which appear to be more along the line of advertisements as shown here. Therefore our “Reviews of the Day” will include those reviews found in the press in 1900–02 timeframe for “The Story of My Life and Work,” which are, from all indications, the first twenty-three chapters of this book.

-     Book Reviews of “The Story of My Life and Work” by Booker T. Washington​

This first excerpt is not a review, but is included here to show that even in the South, Booker T. Washington’s life and stories were well received and expected to be successful by many in the southern press.

“The Story of My Life and Work” is the title of Booker T. Washington’s next volume which will shortly be published. … The account of his life and work will be read with eager interest by thousands of admirers, who applaud his practical and wisely directed efforts to improve the status of the negro race through the medium of industrial education.”​

“In the Literary World,” The Atlanta Constitution, April 8, 1900

“The best portion of the book is the first few chapters. No man has written with more candor than Washington in recounting his early days. … He speaks … with candor saying: ‘Who my father was, or is, I have never been able to learn with any degree of certainty. I only know that he was a white man.’ ”

“The Story of His Life and His Great Work Told by Himself,”
​The Birmingham News, July 21, 1900

“ ‘A remarkable book by a remarkable man,’ is the first comment that the reader invariably give expression to after having read ‘The Story of My Life and Work.’ … He is the only Negro in two decades to earn a leadership position outside of the church and politics, and one of the two of any race below the Mason–Dixon line to win a national reputation in the same period. …

“There is no effort to exploit the gewgaws of rhetoric; not a superfluous word is used with the idea of arousing the ‘galleries.’ … His principal speeches are so admirably selected and arranged, that the book gives to those who have had little opportunity to follow him heretofore, a clear and comprehensive view of his actual position on all the great questions. … The spirit of candor … pervades each of the twenty-two chapters into which the book is divided. …
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“This book cannot but be read with pleasure and profit.”

“The Record of a Busy Life,” R. W. Thompson, The Colored American, July 21, 1900

​“The difficulties that have confronted Mr. Washington both in race prejudices and race tendencies have enlisted the sympathy and support of representative men of all sections of the country; and the courage, perseverance, and wisdom with which he is overcoming these difficulties have made a new era in the development of his people. …

“The present edition of ‘The Story of My Life and Work’ presents no new material, is greatly inferior in workmanship to the autobiography, ‘Up from Slavery,’ which appeared first in ‘The Outlook.’ ”

​“Booker Washington’s Autobiography,” The New York, December 14, 1901

Insights from Booker T. Washington’s “My Life and Work” and “His Life and Work”

-     Experience as a Child Coal Miner

“My step-father was not able to permit me to continue in school long, even for a half day at the time. I was soon taken out of school and put to work in the coal mine.

“As a child I recall now the fright which, going a long distance under the mountain into a dark and damp coal mine, gave me. It seemed to me that the distance from the opening of the mine to the place where I had to work was at least a mile and a half. Although I had to leave school, I did not give up my search for knowledge.

“I took my book into the coal mine, and during the spare minutes I tried to read by the light of the little lamp which hung on my cap.”

“The Story of My Life and Work” is the first twenty-three chapters of “Booker T. Washington’s Own Story of His Life and Work.”

-     How to Measure Success in One’s Life

“I have learned that success is to be measured, not so much by the position that one has reached in life, as by the obstacles which an individual has overcome while trying to succeed. … Out of the hard and unusual struggle through which the Negro is compelled to pass, he gets a strength, a confidence that one misses whose pathway is comparatively smooth by reason of birth and race.”

-     Colonel Wilbur F. Foster, Alabama Speaker of the House, fights to increase Tuskegee funding​

“In February, 1883, the State Legislature of Alabama recommended increasing the state appropriation for the school from two to three thousand dollars annually. … Some members raised objection to this increase at a time when, as reported only the day before, the state had lost a quarter of a million dollars. …

“The Speaker of the House, Hon. W. F. Foster, a member from Tuskegee, and an ex-Confederate soldier, left the chair, and in an eloquent and effective speech in praise of the work of the school at Tuskegee, urged the passage of the bill. On conclusion of Col. Foster’s speech the bill passed by a large majority vote.
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“Col. Foster not only interested himself in the passage of the first bill which gave support from the state to this institution, but has been one of the warmest and most helpful friends from that time until the present.”

We will elaborate on this last insight of Booker T. Washington’s into the character and actions of (Major) Colonel Wilbur F. Foster in the next section.

First some quick observations about this book.

 This Author's Thoughts and Perceptions on "The Story of My Life and Work."

This is an easy book to read.

​The chapters flow in chronological sequence and tend to be short, covering a single topic. So, pick the book up, read a chapter, and put it down. Large portions of some chapters—such as “Honored by Harvard University,” contain Booker T. Washington’s speeches on and around a particular event in his lifetime. These speeches help the reader understand Mr. Washington’s candor and thought processes on the many issues of his day.
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As one of the reviews above stated, I also found that “Up From Slavery” was a far better work than this one. Having said that, though, it is important to note that each book presented new material. In some cases the same material in “The Story of My Life and Work” was more detailed. One of the most touching revelations—elaborated on in “The Story of My Life and Work,” came from reading an account of Colonel Wilbur F. Foster, the Alabama Speaker of the House.

​His picture is included above with the insight from Washington’s book.

By chance, I decided to research if there was more information on this man who supported Booker T. Washington and the students and faculty of Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. The poem provided here—“A Name in the Sand,” was cited in Colonel Foster’s obituary. It was with material that was important to the man during his lifetime. It would seem that Mr. Washington—serving the God he believed in so deeply, immortalized this man with his “inscription” and “lasting record” within this book.

When I read this poem of Hannah Gould about how temporary our lives are on this earth, I thought of the purpose of Mr. Washington’s books. I remembered a quote of Thomas J. Watson Sr. when he spoke with his Canadian employees at the IBM Toronto Office on December 31, 1941:

“Let us determine that we, as individuals, will write the faults of ourselves and our individual neighbors in the sand and ask our neighbors to do the same, so that as the tide ebbs and flows those faults will be washed away.

“Let us carve the virtues in rock so that they will be there before our eyes for all time.”

​This chief executive officer of IBM eloquently re-expressed the thoughts of Hannah F. Gould in a new, inspiring, and surprising way! In his biography, Booker T. Washington truly tries to “carve the virtues” of those he worked with “into rock” so they could be “before our eyes for all time.” I am only highlighting one such individual here, but there are many that are on display in his multitude of works [Booker T. Washington Home Page].

This poem, “A Name in the Sand,” was pasted on the back of Major Foster’s personally compiled Masonic record and highlighted in his press obituary.​

We, as individuals of the 21st Century, need to take the time to understand that there have always been good men and women of character who stood for the betterment of their fellow citizens—regardless of race. We need to search out the carvings in the rock that men like Booker T. Washington left for us.

This is just one rock carving … preserved on paper for the reading.

This book was a pleasure.

Others to come!

Cheers,

- Peter E.

​Images from "The Story of My Life and Work"

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