Norwich bulletin., 1909-01-23
HOME MISSIONARY MEETING
AT BROADWAY PARISH HOUSE
Miss Yeomans Tells of the Work at
Fisk University-colored Race I'm
proving,

There was a large attendance at the
| home missionary meeting held at the
| Broadway church parish house Fri
| day afternoon. The ladies of the 9TH
er churches were invited to hear the
| address given by Miss Frances Yeo-
mans of Fiske university Nashville,
| Tenn.
Rev. DR.. Pratt conducted the open
! ing devotional exercises and spoke a
! few words Of greeting and of introduce
! ton for Miss Yeomans. Her address
was extremely interesting. She has
| been working among the colored peo-
| pie for twenty-siX years-Seven wears
| at Talledega and the others at Fiske
| university-and has a thorough knowl-
! edge of the work and a deep under
| standing of the people and their needs.
! This negro problem is perhaps the
! greatest one the American people have
| to solve, she said. She noted the in
! crease from between three and four
/ millions Of slaves set free to the nine
or ten millions of negroes IN the south
| today
! Their progress in these forty years
/ has been marvellous. There is a new
/ black south as well as a new white.
| One-half of them now have school adj
vantages and many can now give their
| white neighbors points in farming
methods and other things learned in
\ their schools. Frame houses are re-
| placing their old cabins and their tax
| able property amounts to $500 100000
This change is all due to the mis-
| sion schools. Fiske is the oldest, larg
! est and most advanced of the A. NJ.
| A. schools. It became widely known
| through the Jubilee Singers. She gave
its history from the first opening in
| the old barrack at Nashville in jan
| uary, 1856. She made an eloquent plea
for the great need of a college like
Fiske for the negroes. Industrial
training such as that given at Tuske-
gee, is the best education for the
masses. But the negroes are socially
a class by themselves. The color line
is sharply drawn all thorugh the south
and probably always will be. But
they are a rising people and must have
leaders from among themselves.
These leaders must be trained in
their colleges. All the teachers at Tus-
kegee are college bred and II are grad
yates of Fisle. as is also Mrs. Booker
Washington. Fiske has 600 students
in its various rtments-grammar
grades, normal school, college prepar-
atory, and college, very few being in
the last Only two or three of these
GOO students are full black omplexion.
The brown skins predominant. Some
even have blue eyes, red hair or freck-
les. All have a certain serious and
must fight their way They know the
story and often the facts, of riots,
fights and burnings. These things
tenl to make some infdels, but more
are waiting Gods time and planning
advance instead of hatred Their pa
thence is great and their earnest effort
to make themselves worthy of respect
and to gain their right-not of social
equality with the whites, they do not
demand that, but the right to have an
equal chance to make something of
themselves. Of course there are all
kinds of negroes-as of any people
and many of the wicked and vicious
class are drifting north and west and
rousing the prejudice of the north
against their race.
When Miss Yeomans sees this and
gets discouraged she takes a trip in
the southland among the $50 graduates
of Fiske and sees the good work they
are all doing and comes back with re
newed courage and the sure conviction
that it pays to educate the negro-to
give him a Christian education.
She gave the story Of what several
Of these graduates are doing and have
DONE which left no doubt in her hear
ers minds also that the education of
these particular students surely paid.
At the close of the meeting tea was
served by the ladies of the social COM
mittee