OTHER WORK AT AUGUSTA.
Not only was the Rev. Mr. Walker notably successful as a pastor while
he lived in Augusta, but he was also a very active citizen, taking a
prominent part in all enterprises looking to the betterment of the
people along educational, religious and business lines. It may be said
with truth that his public spirit, his generous concern for the welfare
of all the people, was one of the things that gave point and power to
his preaching and caused “the common people” to hear him gladly.
In 1884, the Augusta Sentinel, a weekly paper, was established by
Prof. R. R. Wright, A. M. (afterwards Major R. R. Wright, LL. D.), who
was at that time Principal of the Ware High School. The Rev. Mr. Walker
was one of its largest stockholders and was elected Business Manager.
In 1891, Prof. Wright left the editorship of the paper to become the
first President of the Georgia State Industrial College, near Savannah,
Ga., a position which he still holds. Major Wright was and is one
of Georgia’s leading educators and most representative citizens. He
has represented his State four or five times in Republican National
Conventions, and was appointed a “Major and Additional Paymaster” in
the U. S. V. by the late President McKinley during the Spanish-American
war. When Prof. Wright left the editorial chair, he was succeeded by
the late Rev. E. K. Love, D. D., of Savannah, Ga. Dr. Love retired
in 1892, and was succeeded by Prof. Silas X. Floyd. But, through all
these changes, the Rev. Dr. Walker remained in charge of the business
department of the paper until it died a natural death in 1896. In 1891,
while Dr. Walker was traveling in Europe and the Holy Land, he sent a
weekly letter to the Sentinel, and these letters did much in adding to
the popularity of the paper. On his return, these letters were compiled
and published in a volume of 148 pp. 16mo. under the name and title of
“A Colored Man Abroad.” The book had a wide sale and found many readers.
The Walker Baptist Association in 1880 passed a resolution to
establish a high and normal school for colored children. Dr. Walker
was the author of that resolution. The school was at first located at
Waynesboro, Ga., where it remained for about three years. Dr. Walker
became convinced that the school would thrive better if it was moved
to Augusta, and he was specially anxious to have the school removed
to that place, because he desired to see a good school conducted by
Baptists in Augusta, a city of Baptists, and in which the Methodists
and Presbyterians were already conducting creditable normal schools.
It was mainly through Dr. Walker’s efforts that the school was finally
moved to Augusta in 1891, and even the most doubtful have been led
by subsequent events to appreciate the wisdom of his suggestion.
The school is now a large and flourishing institution, occupying a
commanding site, the chapel, class rooms, dormitory and grounds being
valued at something over $5,000. The school is unencumbered, owned and
controlled by the colored Baptists, assisted to a very limited extent
by the American Baptist Home Mission Society. From the beginning, Dr.
Walker has been the Financial Agent of the school, which position he
still holds. He has succeeded in bringing to its support a large number
of friends, both white and black, North and South. It is one of his
fond dreams for the future to establish in connection with this school
a large Industrial School and Business College. His friends believe
that it will not be difficult for him to accomplish this, because the
work already done by the colored people themselves in connection with
this school, the excellent showing they have made in the direction of
self-help, will commend itself to a generous public wherever it is told.
[Illustration: THE WALKER BAPTIST INSTITUTE, AUGUSTA, GA., FOUNDED BY
DR. CHARLES T. WALKER.]
In 1893, the colored people of Augusta organized an exposition
company. This company held an exposition that year, commencing
December 18 and running through one week. The officers of the company
were Bishop R. S. Williams, of the C. M. E. Church, President; Prof.
Silas X. Floyd, Editor Augusta Sentinel, Secretary; Mr. Charles J.
Floyd, Assistant Secretary; Mr. George J. Scott, a grocer, Treasurer,
and Dr. C. T. Walker, Director-General. Exhibits were on hand from
colored undertakers, colored cabinet makers, colored harness makers,
shoemakers, contractors, carpenters and brick masons, printers,
wheelwrights, carriage and wagon makers, farmers, who exhibited farm
products, cattle, swine, poultry and the like, dressmakers, needle
and fancy work by colored girls and young women, colored artists, who
exhibited oil paintings, landscape paintings and sketches in charcoal
and crayon, colored bakers, tailors, electricians, school-teachers,
and the like. In his address to the public, Director-General Walker
said: “Primarily, the basic principle upon which the Negro Exposition
is founded is a desire to show to the world the advancement and
progress made by the American Negro, especially the Southern Negro,
and most especially the Georgia Negro, within the past thirty years.
But no such exposition can be held in Augusta without also resulting
in a general advantage to the interests of the city.” Evidently, the
city council of Augusta, composed entirely of white Southern men,
took the view held by the Director-General, for, upon request for aid
from the Directors of the Negro Exposition Company, the city council
appropriated $200 from the city treasury for the promotion of the
enterprise, and gave six policemen and all fire protection free. The
exposition was a creditable display of the Negro’s progress, and
did much to illustrate the purposes for which it was organized. The
Director-General was present every day and had charge of the program.
The welcome address was delivered by the mayor of the city, Major J. H.
Alexander, to nearly 5,000 colored people and many hundreds of white
people on the opening day, Monday, December 18, 1893. At the conclusion
of the address of welcome, the formal opening address was delivered by
the Rev. E. R. Carter, D. D., of Atlanta, Ga., one of the most popular
Southern Negro orators. Tuesday, December 19, was Educational Day. All
the public and private schools of the city had a general holiday in
honor of the event. More than 2,000 school children marched early in
the morning of that day behind brass bands to the Exposition Grounds,
where appropriate exercises were held. Speeches were delivered by
Prof. Lawton B. Evans, Superintendent of Schools, Augusta, Ga., and
Prof. R. R. Wright, A. M. Music was furnished by a trained choir of
500 voices of public school children under the direction of Prof. A.
R. Johnson. Wednesday, December 20, was Military Day. The address
of the day was delivered by Congressman George W. Murray, of South
Carolina, after which there was a spirited prize drill by the various
companies. Thursday, December 21, was Firemen’s Day. A mammoth street
parade of twelve fire companies took place in the forenoon, and, in the
afternoon, there were reel races, foot races, bicycle races, and a base
ball game. Friday was Vaudeville Day. Mason and Johnson’s Ethiopian
Minstrels gave performances afternoon and evening. Saturday afternoon
the exhibition closed with a grand industrial parade on the Exposition
Grounds. The like had never been seen before in this country, and
probably has not been seen since. To no one was more credit due
for the success of the entire affair than to the indefatigable
Director-General, the Rev. Dr. Walker. He gave himself to the work both
night and day without receiving one cent of pay.
* * * * *
In these public ways and in others, Dr. Walker made his presence in
Augusta known and felt. But not alone for his public spirit is he
known, honored and loved by the people of Augusta, as is no other man
who has labored there, but also for the rendering of many private acts
of sympathy and help and encouragement, which the world does not know
about, and which the world cannot know about. The number of those
whom he has been instrumental in saving from the jails, chain gangs
and penitentiary; those he has had released from imprisonment, whose
fines he has paid out of his own pocket; the number whose house rent
he has paid, and furnished food, and clothing, and fuel; the number of
unhappy husbands he has reconciled to unhappy wives, thereby making
both happy again; the young people he has sent to school and has helped
to educate; the men and women for whom he has secured employment; those
he has brought to Christ by private ministrations; the number he has
encouraged and cheered by a kind act or a “word fitly spoken;” the
number he has helped and inspired in one way and another, will reach
far into the thousands. The number cannot be known
“Until the sun grows cold,
And the stars are old,
And the leaves of the Judgment Book unfold.”
Dr. Walker did these things as if by second nature, and, though now
and then friends remonstrated with him and told him that he ought not
to allow others to impose upon him, he went straight ahead, quietly
and unostentatiously, spending and being spent for the Master, and his
heart filled with the milk of human kindness, he lent a listening ear
and an outstretched arm to every cry for pity and every appeal for help.