Up from Slavery Book Summary

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Up from Slavery by Booker T. Washington

My Favorite Quotes

  • The older I grow, the more I am convinced that there is no education one can get from books and costly apparatus that is equal to that which can be gotten from contact with great men and women.
  • Great men practice love.
  • There is a physical, mental and spiritual enjoyment that comes from a consciousness of being the absolute master of ones work, in all it’s details, that is very satisfactory and inspiring.

Booker T. Washington’s Personal Work Rules

  1. Plan for each days work. Not merely to go through the same routine of daily duties. Get rid of the routine work as early in the day as possible, then to enter on some new or advanced work.
  2. Clear my desk every day, before leaving my office, of all correspondence and memorandum, so that tomorrow I can begin a new day of work.
  3. Never let my work drive me, but to so master it and keep it in complete control and to keep so far ahead of it that I will be the master instead of the servant.

There is a physical, mental and spiritual enjoyment that comes from a consciousness of being the absolute master of ones work, in all it’s details, that is very satisfactory and inspiring.
If one can learn to follow this plan; he gets a freshness of mind and vigor of mind out of work that goes a long way towards keeping him strong and healthy.

Booker’s Three Goals of Tuskegee University Educational Program

  1. Each student shall be so educated, that he shall be enabled to meet conditions as they exist now. To be able to do the thing which the world wants done.
  2. Every student that graduates shall have enough skill, coupled with intelligence and moral character, to enable him to make a living for himself and others.
  3. To send every graduate out feeling and knowing that labor is dignified and beautiful; to make each one love labor instead of trying to escape it.

Tuskegee University Daily Schedule Under Booker T. Washington

  • 5:00 am: rising bell
  • 5:50 am: warning breakfast bell
  • 6:00 am: breakfast bell
  • 6:20 am: breakfast over
  • 6:20-6:50 am: rooms are cleaned
  • 6:50 am: work bell
  • 7:30 am: morning study hour
  • 8:20 am: morning school bell
  • 8:25 am: inspection
  • 8:40 am: devotional exercises and chapel
  • 8:55 am: daily news
  • 9:00 am: class work begins
  • 12:00 pm: class work closes
  • 12:15 pm: dinner (lunch)
  • 1:00 pm: work bell
  • 1:30 pm: class work begins
  • 3:30 pm: class work ends
  • 5:30 pm: bell to knock off work
  • 6:00 pm: supper
  • 7:10 pm: evening prayers
  • 7:30 pm: evening study hour
  • 8:45 pm: evening study hour closes
  • 9:20 pm: warning retiring bell
  • 9:30 pm: retiring bell

Related Summaries

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This is the 96th book read in my 2018 reading list.
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