Charles W. Chesnutt to Booker T. Washington, 11 July 1907
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CHAS. W. CHESNUTT
1105 WILLIAMSON BUILDING
CLEVELAND, O.
July 11, 1907.
Dr. Booker T. Washington,
Tuskegee, Ala.
My dear Dr. Washington:-
I write you this letter at the request of Mr. Nahum D. Brascher of this city.1 Mr. Brascher has for several years edited the Cleveland Journal, published in the interests of the colored people. The Journal, while always a consistent advocate of ‸the rights & interests of the race, has always been conservative in its tone, and has never indulged in any intemperate criticism of your policies or utterances.2 On the contrary, Mr. Brascher has been one of your ardent supporters and holds you in the highest esteem.
This is of course but the prologue. Mr. Brascher's physician has advised him that a less rigorous climate than that of Cleveland would be of benefit to his health. His newspaper too, I think, is not especially prosperous. He would like if possible to secure an appointment, some time before the end of the year, to some position in the Congressional Library at Washington, and he has requested me to write and ask you if he might command your support and interest in this matter.3 Mr. Brascher is a young man of irreproachable character, ambitious for the best things, and entirely worthy of any sympathy or encouragement‸ or interest which you can in any way extend him.
Trusting you are well and that I may have the pleasure of seeing you during a visit I shall make to New York within a few weeks,4 I remain
Sincerely yours, Chas. W. ChesnuttCorrespondent: Booker T. Washington (1856–1913), one of the most well-known Black activists of the early 20th century, was born into slavery in Virginia. In 1881, he became the president of what would become the Tuskegee Institute, advocating widely as a speaker and writer for technical education for Blacks, whose entry into American industry and business leadership he believed to be the road to equality. His political power was significant, but because he frequently argued for compromise with White Southerners, including on voting rights, he was also criticized by other Black activists, especially by W. E. B. Du Bois.
1. Nahum Daniel Brascher (1880–1945) was a Black journalist and activist in Cleveland, originally from Indiana. With two fellow Black Republicans, Welcome T. Blue (1867–1930) and Thomas Wallace Fleming (1874–1948), Brascher founded the Cleveland Journal in 1903. In 1907, he sought help from Booker T. Washington to get a position at the Congressional Library, but did not get the appointment. When Fleming became the first Black city council member in Cleveland, Brascher served as city storekeeper (1909 to 1911) and worked as a publicity manager for a Black-owned realty company. In 1918, he moved to Chicago, where he had a successful career in public relations and journalism; he helped found the Associated Negro Press in 1919 and also wrote editorials for the Chicago Defender. [back]
2. The Cleveland Journal, founded by Black businessmen and political activists Nahum D. Brascher (1880–1945), Thomas W. Fleming (1874–1948), and Welcome T. Blue (1867–1930) in 1903, as a weekly paper representing Black business interests and self-help philosophy, influenced by Booker T. Washington. It was meant as an alternative to the politically progressive, anti-accommodationist Cleveland Gazette. The Black-owned Journal Publishing Company published the weekly for nine years. [back]
3. The Library of Congress in Washington, DC, was established in 1800; despite some setbacks, extensive expansions in the post-Civil War era meant that it had effecitvely become the United States' national library by the early 20th century. At this time, the Library of Congress did not have many Black employees on staff, but Daniel A. P. Murray (1852–1925), its first Black librarian, worked there from 1871 to 1922, established a large African American archive, and brought in others to work on projects of interest to the Black community. [back]
4. In late July and early August 1907, Chesnutt traveled to New York City, residing at the Hotel Belleclaire and visiting Booker T. Washington and his family at his summer home in Huntington, New York, on Long Island. [back]
