The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-03-24


 |TNHERE died in Montgomery last week
 a Scotchman who did a noble work
 X in the education of the negro race in Alabama, and his passing has made vacancy that will not be easy to fill. His name was W. B. Paterson; his fame was purely local, for he did not make the big noise, and because he was white man conducting a negro school he did not get the notoriety that has been such a factor in the upbuilding of the noted ne- gro educators of the south.
 Professor Paterson drifted in Alabama about 1870, looking for work. He was homeless and friendless, afflicted with an incurable deafness that made social inter- course an impossibility with him. He had tramped from New York to Omaha and then back east looking for work, but could find none. By trade he was gar dener His forebears before him had been gardeners on the estate of a Scotch Laird Albemarle, or some such name, and he had learned their trade, He got job at Marion, on a plantation, dig ging ditches and doing ordinary farm work along with the negroes, and this proximity taught him the exact condition of the negro's intelligence and educational advancement. Out of it came negro school that grew until it became state normal with large patronage. The plan- tation owner for whom he worked took fancy to him and helped him on with the first school, and with this encourage ment he built up an establishment that was too large for Marion. The Scotch gardener had his eye on the state capital, and he made his plans to move his school there.
 When it became known in Montgomery that a white man was going to move a negro school to that city, mass meet ing of the citizens was held and speeches were made, as Professor Paterson often afterward said, they almost tarred and | feathcred him." This latter was in a l figurative sense only. Nothing daunted, the sshoolmaster moved his school to Montgomery, and went quietly about his business. He conducted an orderly insti- tuition: he taught the negroes domestic science, manual training, trades, the dig nity of labor, the value of keeping in the pace the white people of the south said the negro must keep. There was nc social equality of the races there, and never in the more than 40 years of the life of the school under Professor Pater- son was there so much as an intimation that he taught such or practiced it. The negroes had great and grave reverence for him, that was almost patriarchal IT it's simplicity.
 l Montgomery quieted down after the school was settled, and in few years pe- gan to look upon it as an asset ana or | Professor Paterson as a public bene factor Year by year he increased tht member ship of his school, and in order tt
 make it self-sustaining and to make | possible for the students to pay their way through, he placed them in the homes o' Montgomery as servants, fixing ths
 school hours so that they could do theil domestic work and carry on their studies too. His training made itself felt for tho servants in Montgomery, and they were in demand. Montgomery is now full oi them, and they all command high wages because they can earn them. That ir itself is tribute enough for the schoo and for the memory of this good man.
 Of the thousands that went through | his school. some were found to possess Intelligence and scholarship enough foi higher training. and they were given it ! and today they fill placessof responsible ity as teachers and principals and super intendents of negro public schools il the large cities of Alabama and neighbor ing states.
 Professor Paterson married 2 northern