Hi! For our last Community Spotlight this month, I wanted to focus on an organization that fought for the same things civil rights activists fought for, but in a different way. What I love about the idea of the organization was the thought that we could just show our capability in the areas we were previously shut off from. I also enjoy the thought of supporting each other in an effort to uplift each other, something that I have noticed isn't quite as strong in current times. Let's get to today's entrant!
Name: National Negro Business League
Date of establishment and founders: 1900 by Booker T. Washington, with support from Andrew Carnegie
Purpose of organization: To help African-Americans develop and prosper economically, professionally and financially
Why is the Spotlight on it today? For its efforts to empower African-Americans to do better for themselves and the effort to provide minorities with a platform and support for launching ideas
Notables and accomplishments:
--Is still functional today but was absorbed into the National Business League in 1966
--Promoted and encouraged the business and economic advancement of African-Americans all over the country but primarily in the South, where there was the most civil unrest at the time
--Established over 300 chapters throughout the country during its tenure
--Was partially financed through the support of White businessmen who agreed with the development of the organization
--Thrived off of League meetings, which allowed the members to network and share with each other
--Was Booker T. Washington's signature creation and his primary effort to fight for racial equality
--Was based on the belief that African-Americans would eventually win the fight for equality by proving their capabilities, business and economic strengths and intelligence
--Was affiliated with a number of African-American professional associations, some of which were the Negro Bar Association, the Negro Press Association, and the Negro Bankers Association
Research resources and further reading links:
AA Registry | Wikipedia | BTW Society | Gale Archives | PBS
Quote of the Day:
"We believe that while the world may pity a whining, crying race, it seldom respects it. In a word, the National Negro Business League, while not overlooking or justifying injustice or wrong or failing to recognize the value of other methods seeking to reach the same end, feels that the race can make progress and secure the greatest protection by its efforts in progressive, constructive directions, by constantly presenting to the world tangible, and visible evidences of our worth as a race. We believe that the influence of one great success in really accomplishing something that the world respects will go furthest in promoting our interests. Let constructive progress be the dominant note among us in every section of America. An inch of progress is worth more than a yard of fault-finding. The races that have grown strong and useful have not done so by depending upon finding fault with others, but by presenting to the world evidences of their progress in agriculture, industrial and business life, as well as through religious, educational and civic growth."
--an excerpt from Booker T. Washington's keynote speech to the NNBL
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