My dear Nella. May I call you that? It seems we may as well remain on more personal terms if you continue to spit on my legacy in such intimate fashion. You and Helga Crane are the dance of death to wish our people will fall. The world continues to turn as our voices are equally misconstrued through the gaze of those who wish to exploit and set us against each other. The white man rather see us destroy each other rather than accept us as the civilized human beings that we are.  I am no stranger to ridicule due to the melanin of my skin, something you may never know. Now let me educate you before you lead yourself to ruin… 

It feels as though it was just yesterday, the The Tuskegee Institute began raising funds to build permanent grounds on what has become a fine running “Tuskegee Machine”(I rather think Harlem would like that industrial reference,no?) . With nothing but a barren field and several cabins, it was members of our community that pulled together to raise the $6,000 in funds we needed to realize this dream. You see- it was in these early 1880s I called a meeting of the most prominent elders in our community in the efforts of raising support from the larger Black community to expand and solidify Naxos and our campus.

Although many of our community members came dressed in clad rags, spoke in broken English, and were mostly illiterate they cheered: emblazoned by the prospect of educating their youth, and their honor of entrusting me in leading this vision- the key to our future rooted in a proper and industrious education. (Is that a dance enough for you?)

And during that campaign I was most moved by an antebellum colored man who had rose to speak. He announced he had come 12 miles to attend this meeting and had a large hog in the back of his oxcart. Contemplating his decades of injustice in unpaid chattel services, he expressed his hope was that this new school could bring equality to the Black community. He did not have any money to contribute, but he did have two fine hogs and intended to give one of them in return for funds to the school, concluding that anyone of his fellow neighbors who has love for their race, or any respect for themselves would bring a hog to the next meeting. (Do you love yourself Nella?) I use this anecdote to remind us of the sacrifice this farmer made in donating a substantial portion of his personal wealth for the sake of our cause. His subsequent challenge to his fellow citizens to do the same captures African American people’s desire for education, our zeal for socioeconomic mobility, racial pride, and our strong belief in self-determination. This story reminds me of our own agency and use of cultural capital for schooling in the South. What have you done Nella, except sit in your self-wallow and pity? You ran away when things got too tough. Too above it all to the world to put yourself at the level of my people, as you so righteously set yourself apart from.  

I ask we continue to look within our own communities to find economic and social resources. Segregation has allowed us the freedom to collectively create all the civic, political, social, spiritual, and economic institutions necessary for community life and it is through the educational institutions I’ve founded that will sustain the belief and power we create when we take responsibilities into our own hands and land. For someone so eager to escape to the North, it is rather ironic you’ve utilized your hands as a nurse in the disease-ridden hospitals of Harlem. You condemn my halls, and yet you traded one industry for another. Let’s stop this dance shall we? We both know you’ve always longed to come back home. Naxos still breathes on as my legacy, but can you say the same for yourself? 

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