This task fell to the lot
of Frederick Douglass, who, wiser in his generation than most of his
contemporaries, advocated actual vocational training as the greatest
leverage for the elevation of the colored people. Douglass was given
an opportunity to bring his ideas before the public on the occasion of
a visit to Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe. She was then preparing to go
to England in response to an invitation from her admirers, who were
anxious to see this famous author of _Uncle Tom's Cabin_ and to give
her a testimonial. Thinking that she would receive large sums of money
in England she desired to get Mr. Douglass's views as to how it could
be most profitably spent for the advancement of the free people of
color. She was especially interested in those who had become free by
their own exertions. Mrs. Stowe informed her guest that several had
suggested the establishment of an educational institution pure and
simple, but that she had not been able to concur with them, thinking
that it would be better to open an industrial school. Douglass was
opposed both to the establishment of such a college as was suggested,
and to that of an ordinary industrial school where pupils should
merely "earn the means of obtaining an education in books.
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