St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1946-04-26
BY Robert Durr

Like millions of others / sus-
tanned a feeling of indescribable
loss when Wendell L. Willkie died.
/ shared the grief Of millions when
Franklin D. Roosevelt died, but
listening to Secretary Of Commerce
Henry A. Wallace deliver the
Founders Day address at Tuskegee
recently made me realize that in
him we have a reincarnation of
both Wendell l.. Willkie and Roose-
welt, and more of what is needed
for this very hour.
have heard almost every Found
er's Day address at Tuskegee for
the past ten years. Wallace took
his hearers-an audience of over
5000 whites and blacks who forgot
they were white and black-into
his hands, and held them SPELL
bound and overwhelmed them by
the force Of the truth and sincerity
Of his message. No other speaker
on Founders Day had done that in
my memory.
An editorial in The Montgomery
(Alabama) Advertiser said on the
following morning:
Henry Wallace flew into Tuske-
gee in a little two-place plane
about noon. There was excite
ment over his coming. The Negro
students were neatly dressed in
their blue uniforms, and many
visiting friends Of the institution,
both white and colOred, were wait
ing on the campus.
wallace was hatless, and in the
Alabama sun his hair showed lots
Of gray. He is a strongly built
man, about average height, but he
walks heavily and always appears |
to be leaning forward in a kind of |
half-crouch. When you meet him
he Is courteous but restrained, and |
he makes no effort whatever to
make himself pleasing. That re-
straint may have prevented him
from being president Of the United
States.
Behind a crack band, students
and faculty at 2 o'clock filed into
the Institute chapel. They packed
it to the rafters, for there were
several hundred visitors, including
many distinguished Alabamians.
Wallace sat in the center chair
on the rostrum. On his left was
ruddy-faced William Jay Schief-
felin, of New York, who the day
before had resigned after 30 years |
as member Of the Tuskegee
Board Of Trustees, % Of them as
chairman. To the right of Wallace |
sat Basil O'Connor, also of New
York, who heads both the Ameri- |
can Red Cross and the Infantile
Paralysis Foundation, and is the
new chairman of Tuskegee's board.
He was a great friend of Franklin
Roosevelt.
Amply filling his chair, Henry
Wallace crossed dusty black socks
and looked through the battery of
photographers lights out into the
sea of black faces, eager, worship
ing. When the choir sang IN
Never Turn Back No More and
Lord, | Want To Be a Christian
there was a beauty and symbolism
that nobody could miss. They were
singing to Henry Wallace and to all
the white men who have helped to
lift them up from slavery-to men
like Josephus Daniel, James A.
Farley, DIR. Frank P. Graham and
Alabama's own Governor Chauncey
Sparks, all Of whom had delivered
this same address in years past,
and while differing widely in their
approach to the Negroes problems,
had been helpful.
"Mr. Schieffelin introduced Wal
lace as a fearless man to speak
out for the suffering. His popu-
larity grows every year The old
man read piece of humorous verse
about Wallace's achievements, and
his subject laughed heartily.
"At the microphones. Wallace
first said that his pleasure in COM
ing was 'tinctured with grief at
the loss Of DR.. George Carver since
his last visit to the campus. He
said he had met Carver 81 years
ago when Carver was a student
in Iowa. He paid tribute to Car
ver's philosophy, which he said the
scientist often expressed in the
question, Wherefore are We born?
TO add joy in creation, to have
faith in the future, and to believe