Rabbi Charles P. Sherman
January 18, 2002
A Story That Needs Telling
My friends, as we begin the Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, I want to share with you a slice of American history which I believe most of us do not know. Seventy years ago, in 1932, when Julius Rosenwald died, a prominent Black leader called him "one the greatest friends of the Negro race since Abraham Lincoln." In the South, Rosenwald's photograph hung side-by-side with those of Booker T. Washington and President Abraham Lincoln on the walls of many Black schools and homes. With the passing of this Jewish businessman, grief swept the Black communities of the South as well as the rest of America.
Who was Julius Rosenwald? Son of German Jewish immigrants, Rosenwald was born in 1862 and reared in Springfield, Illinois - which had also been the home of Abraham Lincoln. Julius' parents owned and operated a small retail store. At the age of 17 and without completing high school, Julius entered the clothing business as an apprentice to his uncle in New York City. Within five years he had saved enough money to open his own clothing store in New York and soon started to manufacture lightweight summer clothing. He moved the business to Chicago, where it was fairly successful. In 1895 he bought a one-quarter interest in the recently established mail order firm of Sears, Roebuck and Company, and the following year became Vice President of Sears, moving quickly to establish a new standard of quality control which enhanced the firm's reputation and profitability. He initiated the policy of "Your money back if not satisfied" - a radical innovation at that time.
Rosenwald was a pioneer in the field of mail order merchandising, instituting new systems to insure that Sears' catalogue orders were processed promptly. By 1906, when Sears moved into a vast new plant in Chicago, orders were averaging 20,000 a day, 100,000 a day during the Christmas season. Conveyor belts and gravity chutes were installed to speed the flow of orders and merchandise, bringing everything together at an assembly point. Henry Ford was so impressed with the system that the following year he adapted the assembly line principle to automobile manufacturing, revolutionizing modern industry.
When Richard Sears retired in 1908, Rosenwald became president and quickly opened scores of mail order centers across the country. By 1909 Sears was recording annual sales of more than $50 million. Under the direction of Rosenwald, Sears became the largest mail-order house in the world.
Julius Rosenwald turned Sears, Roebuck and Company into a rapidly expanding retailing giant. He stressed recreational facilities for his employees and introduced a profit-sharing plan. He was recognized by his peers at the famous Pioneers of America Industry Dinner in 1928. The eight men honored were George Eastman, photography; Henry Ford, automobiles; Orville Wright and Glen Curtis, aviation; Thomas Edison, inventions; Charles Schwab, iron and steel; Harvey S. Firestone, rubber; and Julius Rosenwald, merchandising.
But the reason for discussing Julius Rosenwald tonight is not his business acumen or success. Although he amassed a huge fortune, Julius' attitude was that of a man who never regarded the money as his own. He looked upon himself as a public servant, temporarily the trustee of wealth which must, in some way, be used for the common good. He said: "It is almost always easier to make a million dollars honestly than to dispose of it wisely."
The habits which made him such a successful businessman were used in his philanthropy. In 1917 he established the Julius Rosenwald Fund, chartered simply for the "well-being of mankind." Rosenwald was adamantly opposed to placing funds in perpetuity; he stipulated that all the capital - and he began this Fund with $30 million - was be expended within 25 years after his death and the Fund liquidated. Thus Rosenwald and his Fund made larger donations than other foundations with more sizeable endowments, because most foundations donate only the interest from their capital. (Hereafter, when I speak about dollars, I am going to be speaking of their value in the late 20th century rather than the amounts as given in the earlier part of the 20th century.)
So what motivated this Jewish high school drop out to devote so much of his wealth for the education and welfare of the Black community? In his own words: "Race prejudice . . . offers nothing but a hopeless warfare and a blank pessimism. To my mind, no man can in any way render greater service to mankind than by devoting his energy toward a removal of this mighty obstacle. The destruction of race prejudice is the beginning of the higher civilization."
Rosenwald once told a group of friends: "Whether it is because I belong to a People who have known centuries of persecution, or whether it is because I am naturally inclined to sympathize with the oppressed, I have always felt keenly for the colored race."
Rosenwald attributed much of his social vision and passion to his active membership in the Temple Sinai Congregation of Chicago. Here he was profoundly influenced by Rabbi Emil G. Hirsch, widely recognized as one of the leading rabbis in America, an outspoken man of liberal views with a deep interest in social issues.
Rosenwald also admired Dr. Booker T. Washington, his rise from slavery to the Presidency of Tuskegee Institute and his strong belief in hard work and personal initiative. The two men developed a warm friendship.
While I shall concentrate on this King Weekend on what Julius Rosenwald did for the Black community of America, I want to point out that he gave millions to the Joint Distribution Committee's efforts to aid the persecuted Jews of Eastern Europe and Russia. For many years he served as President of the Jewish Charities for Chicago, and as a Trustee of the University of Chicago to which he donated $5 million. He was a founder of the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry, pledging $3 million toward its building.
Let me remind you of what Black America looked like 100 years ago. During slavery, plantation owners made a concerted effort to prevent Blacks from obtaining an education in order to maintain greater control over them. Prior to the Civil War, almost the entire Black population of America was illiterate. During the Reconstruction Era, some funds were appropriated for Black schools by the southern states. However, the war-torn South could not afford decent public education - even for favored Whites, much less for the Black population. And, of course, all-White schools were segregated and no Blacks could attend. The Black public schools which existed were located in old churches, ramshackle huts, lodge halls and small rented homes. These structures were dilapidated and totally inadequate for educational use.
And after the Reconstruction Period, White political control was completely re-established and Blacks were virtually disenfranchised throughout the South. They were socially ostracized and economically deprived. Eighty percent of American Blacks still were concentrated in the South and most worked at menial tasks. The largest barrier to equal opportunity and racial justice remained White intolerance. No less than the Encyclopedia Britannica explained that the Negro had a "less voluminous brain as compared with the White races", was "on a lower evolutionary plain than the White man", and " was more closely related to the highest anthropoids." "After puberty," the Encyclopedia concluded, "sexual matters take the first place in the Negro's life and thoughts."
Disenfranchisement and false genetic propaganda were only some of the forms of racial discrimination suffered by Blacks. Schools in 1910 spent approximately $2.20 per Black pupil annually, while the amount spent for a southern White was more than double that - $4.90 - and for the nation at large it was $21.15. The illiteracy of Blacks in some states was four to five times that of the southern White. Three-fourths of Blacks were tenants or sharecroppers, with an annual wage of approximately $100. When Blacks complained, many in the south resorted to lynching. During the first decade of the 20th century, an average of 93 lynchings occurred per year.
In 1880, Booker T. Washington established the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute in Alabama. He was the only teacher in a rented shanty church with 30 pupils. Soon after his arrival in Alabama, Dr. Washington toured the rural districts near Tuskegee and found that the school system was wretched. The schools lacked the most basic facilities. Schools met only three to five months a year and most teachers lacked formal training; many teachers were just high school graduates. Dr. Washington believed that the salvation of Blacks lay in education and advocated needed improvements for schools.
Julius Rosenwald was convinced that Dr. Washington was right and devoted his resources toward insuring educational opportunities in the belief that this would ultimately lead to the end of discrimination and bring about equality for Blacks. Rosenwald was elected a Tuskegee Trustee in February, 1912, and remained in that post for the rest of his life. One of his first acts was to take steps to relieve Dr. Washington from his continuous travel to raise funds for Tuskegee, so that Dr. Washington could spend more time improving the Institute. In addition to his own contributions, Rosenwald also solicited funds from other Jewish philanthropists in New York and Chicago.
At a time when the Ku Klux Klan was politically and socially powerful, Julius Rosenwald was criticized by some Whites for "wasting" his money on a race that could not possibly be educated and for not using it for better causes such as building more court houses and jails in the south. The KKK leadership went so far as to accuse the merchandising titan Rosenwald of being a Communist because he was a proponent of improved Black education and welfare.
In 1912 Rosenwald gave Dr. Washington a gift of almost $400,000 to be used at his discretion "for the improvement and elevation of schools for Negroes." Most of this money went to offshoots of Tuskegee but, after many discussions with Booker T. Washington, Rosenwald agreed to the use of the surplus money for building rural schools in Alabama counties near the Institute. The conditions of rural education for Blacks in Alabama were shocking; they were one-half the population but only 20% of the Black children were enrolled in schools as compared to 60% of the White children. No Black rural schools operated for longer than five months during the year, and the average was four months as compared with the seven-month term for White children. The school buildings for Black children were appalling. The teachers were poorly paid and elementary school education was minimal. Rosenwald felt strongly that it was dangerous and wrong for ten million citizens of the United States to grow up in ignorance.
Thus began a remarkable school building program. In the first experiment, the land for each school house was deeded to the local school authorities and the completed building became part of the public school system. The completed schools had to be inspected by the State Superintendent of Education who reported to officials of the Rosenwald Fund. Rosenwald required a guarantee that the schools would be operated for a minimum of five consecutive months during the year. For the first six experimental schools, Rosenwald contributed just under $30,000 each. The local Blacks, in addition to some Whites in the state, contributed another $45,000. When Rosenwald visited these first schools, he was so impressed with the potential of the plan that he gave Dr. Washington enough money for the construction of 100 additional schools, which were now being called "Rosenwald Schools."
Booker T. Washington died in 1915. He was mourned by many Americans, and Rosenwald established a more than $1 million fund in his memory. In addition, he gave $3.5 million to Tuskegee's endowment.
By then, the Rosenwald Schools had begun to receive national attention, and many southern states were shamed into giving Black education more financial support. Rosenwald was so pleased with the project that in 1916 he offered to pay one-third of the cost of an additional 300 rural school houses in the south. My dear friends, from 1913 until Julius Rosenwald died 70 years ago in 1932, he helped construct 5,357 public schools in 883 counties of 15 southern states at a total cost of $300 million, of which he contributed almost $50 million. His building drive directly affected more than 650,000 Black students, and only 10% of the Black population in the south did not have at least one or more Rosenwald Schools in their county. The Rosenwald Fund benefitted nearly 200 Black schools in Oklahoma during the first half of the 20th century. Most of the all-Black towns in our state at one time had a Rosenwald School. Oh the difference one person sometimes can make.
In the early 30's school consolidation began to occur, which was good, but it meant that rural students needed to be bused to a central location, and there were not enough buses for the Blacks. The Rosenwald Fund agreed to contribute toward the establishment of bus transportation, supplying half the cost of the bus itself and part of the operating expense for three years on condition that the county authorities agreed to assume responsibility at the end of the three-year period and that the length of the school term would be not less than eight months and that no teacher in the school would be paid less than $60 a month. The Rosenwald Fund helped provide 270 buses which transported 10,000 Black students 8,000 miles a day in 128 counties in 13 southern states. Oh the difference one person can sometimes make.
In a further effort to bring Black schools up to a standard eight or nine month term, the Fund offered to help pay toward the cost of extending terms by one or two months with the understanding that the total cost after three years would be provided by public tax funds.
There were other projects, including a library service which supplied reading materials to rural schools, Black colleges and community libraries. The Fund provided more than a half million books to schools throughout the southern states. About 60% of the books went to one- and two-room schools and the remaining to southern towns with a population of less than 25,000. You see, in 1928, only two states in the south provided free textbooks. Many rural children could not afford to buy books, and more than half the rural Black school population was without the simplest materials of instruction. For them the books in Rosenwald Libraries were the only volumes of any sort available for use either in or out of school. Oh the difference one person can sometimes make.
During the course of the school building program the Rosenwald Fund also actively developed projects and institutions which improved teacher education programs in the Black south in an effort to enhance the quality of education. It aimed at encouraging well-qualified teachers to make their careers in rural education while enabling the public school system to assist in setting up such a program. The Fund spend more than $17 million on teacher education.
The Rosenwald Fund also made a difference in higher education for Blacks, focusing on four universities strategically placed throughout the southern states - Howard University in Washington, D.C.; The Confederated Institute in Atlanta; Fisk University in Nashville; and Dillard University in New Orleans. Knowing the Rosenwald Fund itself would soon cease to exist, its Board help set up the United Negro College Fund in 1944.
Rosenwald Fellowships had a sizeable impact on a generation of highly talented blacks and whites who wished to study in institutions such as Harvard or Yale or aspired to go abroad for study. The Fellowships were open to Blacks of unusual talent and ability in any field and to a few equally able White Southerners who wished to work on a problem distinctive to the South and who planned to pursue their careers in the South. Almost $22 million was given to more than 1500 people. The recipient list reads like a Who's Who of Black America: W. E. B. DuBois for creative writing; Ralph Bunche for international relations; Ralph Ellison for creative writing; Zora Hurston for anthropology; and Marian Anderson for music.
I should add that, even before the school building program, Julius Rosenwald began by building YMCAs in Black urban communities. In 1910, Rosenwald offered to contribute the generous sum of almost $400,000 to every community in the United States which raised a little over a million dollars toward the construction of YMCAs in Black neighborhoods. He stipulated that part of the funds must be raised by Blacks. By 1923, 24 Rosenwald YMCAs had an aggregate membership of almost 20,000. The location of these Ys in or near Black business districts enhanced their importance to the Black community. Successful fundraising drives also brought the Black community together, gave it greater self-confidence and inspired other activities for community welfare. In the end, Rosenwald's total contribution was almost $6 million. Even more impressive was the fact that the communities across this country rose to the challenge and raised over $50 million for the Ys.
Julius Rosenwald ranks among the great philanthropists in United States history. All in all, in current value, Julius Rosenwald eventually gave away close to $2 billion and nearly half of that went to Black causes. Even though he is not as well recognized as Rockefeller and Carnegie who had more money and set up larger foundations, Rosenwald's fund was so wisely conceived, administered and targeted, that it had the most substantial influence on the Black community over the years. Julius Rosenwald gave as much if not more thought and effort to his philanthropies as he did to his business. He said his dedication to helping Blacks was because he was a Jew and the tragic experiences of many Jews had given him a sympathetic understanding for other persecuted peoples. He was also interested in Blacks because he was an American who cherished the ideals of democracy and who did not see how America could go forward if a large segment of the population were left behind.
Julius Rosenwald was in many ways a model philanthropist. He did much, much more than merely write checks. He visited potential school sites, he networked with local community leaders, leveraging his contributions so as to maximize their impact. He modeled collaboration and celebrated diversity, Blacks not only appreciated his beneficence; they respected him as a compassionate human being.
An advocate for equal rights wrote: "A little bit of land and labor were what Black folks needed to get Julius Rosenwald's money for a school. From those schools came the parents of the generation who marched and sang and risked their lives in the revolution for equal justice under the law." Martin Luther King, Jr. was three-years old when Julius Rosenwald died, and I think it is fair to say that the accomplishments of Dr. King would not have been possible had it not been for the remarkable achievements of Julius Rosenwald. Jews, Blacks, Americans of all colors and creeds should remember this man for a blessing. Amen
Much of the material in this sermon was based on a monograph by Jeffrey Sosland entitled
"A School in Every County - The Partnership of Philanthropist Julius Rosenwald and
American Black Communities" published in 1995.
