Sun March 11, 2012 'Schoolhouse': Rosenwald Schools In The South
Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington came from vastly
different backgrounds. Rosenwald, president of Sears, Roebuck
and Co., was one of the richest men in America; Washington rose
out of slavery to become a civil rights leader. But their
meeting led eventually to the construction of thousands of
schools for black children in the segregated South. Stephanie
Deutsch tells the story of their friendship in her new book You
Need a Schoolhouse: Booker T. Washington, Julius Rosenwald, and
the Building of Schools for the Segregated South. When Rosenwald
decided to start giving his money away, he started within the
Jewish community — funding schools and hospitals. But Deutsch
tells Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered, that a
1908 race riot in Rosenwald's hometown of Springfield, Ill.,
made him think twice about the treatment of African-Americans in
the United States. "In one of his speeches, he said, 'We like to
look down on the Russi