The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-12-24
KANSAS NEGROES
 WOULD AID RACE Large Project is Started for h. duStriaI Development PLAN TO BUILD FACTORIES Movement, If Successful, Will Be Rap idly Extended Throughout the Southern States-Has Prac-
 tical Features.
PLAN TO BUILD FACTORIES

1 Cherryvale, Kan, Saturday.-The ne-
 groes of Kansas are organizing an indus i trial movement which they intend to
 spread into all the southern and south western states The plan is to raise
 money and establish factories to employ | negroes to buy farms and sell small lots | to negroes on small monthly payments
 and to encourage In negroes generally a spirit of industry, giving the members of the race chance to do something for themselves and be independent I Mass meetings are now being held in | towns in Kansas, and funds are being col | lected to carry out the scheme An or | ganization has been effected and a com pany chartered with an authorized capital | of s1, ,000,0t0. The shares are being sold at par
 Charles D. Glenn, one of the organizers, ] said in an address here:
 | "A few years ago there were many ave- | nues of employment open b the negro
 which are absolutely barred to him now. Where you used to see negroes in the bar 1 Der shops, in the dining rooms, on cabs
 and on railroad trains as porters. brake
 men and firemen, you rarely see a negro | now.
 White girls have taken the place of
 negro girls as servants, and white boys l have taken the place of negro boys for all
 sorts of general work As consequence,
 when negro boy or a negro girl comes
 out of school these days there is nothing
 for them to do. and they drift into mis-
 chievousness and crime. The solution of
 the negro question is not to be found in
 Legislation, but in giving the negro an op- l portunity to go to work. The negro must 1 do this for himself. Before he earns the ! respect of his white brothers he must ] show a capacity to take care of himself l and to provide employment for his boys | and his girls. This movement is not for l the purpose of making money, but for
 giving every member of our race some- 1 thing useful to do.
 l We purpose the establishment of small ] factories, laundries and the like, which many of our race are competent to oper- I ate. We prpose to buy tracts of farming | lands, cut them up into small tracts of ] from four to five acres, sell them on l long time and encourage the development
 of truck farming throughout the section. ! On the heels of the truck farming will | naturally follow canning factories, which I do not require a great amount of skill in their operation. These industries scatter | ed throughout the country south of Mason | and Dxon's line will tend to stop the | congestion of the negro race in the cities | and to decrease the percentage of negroes | in the penltentaries and jails of the coun-
 try.
 We have already bought a printing | office in Comeyville. and are now operat- 1 ing it. The force is made up entirely of | negroes, and up to the time of the pur- l chase of the plant by ourselves all of l these negroes were out of work though | qualified to serve The result of the l operation of the Vindicator plant is that we have six industrious negroes, where l before we had six idle negroes We also 1 have an option on some farming lands in 1 Western Kansas and some timber lands l in Arkansas, and expect to conclude the 1 purchase of these tracts In few weeks. 1 We also have purchased the site for a 1 laundry in Chanute. The negroes at Par l sons Kan, have offered to give enough l to buy a site for some sort of a plant l there.
 Tn this work we have received and are receiving daily the heartiest encourage
 ment from the white people. Many white people have contributed to our funds well | knowing that only negroes will be em- l ployed in the industries to be established I by us. But the white people, even more 1 strongly than the negroes, realize that the I true solution of the negro question IS to | give the negro a chance to work.