George Washington Carver National Monument!

What Is George Washington Carver National Monument?

The first national monument to a Black person and a non-president, this is the preserved farm where George Washington Carver spent the first 11 years of his life!

What Makes It Historical?

George “The Plant Doctor” Carver had a very unusual upbringing on this farm! He was born in 1864 to freshly widowed, 22-year old Mary, and within a week, he, his mom, and his sister were all kidnapped and sold in Kentucky! Moses Carver, who hadn’t believed in slavery to begin with but bought George’s parents to help out on the farm, negotiated George’s return, but they never found out what became of Mary. Consequently, when slavery ended in Missouri in 1865, Moses and Susan Carver adopted George and his brother, James!

Young George wasn’t too healthy as a kid, so while his brother worked the fields, he stayed indoors with Mrs. Carver, who taught him about gardening and herbal medicine. In the woods around the farm, George created a secret garden, where he experimented with seeds and soils! He learned so much that neighboring farmers started to call him the “Plant Doctor,” because of how good he was with plants before he even turned 11. At that age, he hit the road to find a school that would satisfy his quest for knowledge!

At first, he tried an all-Black school in Neosho, Missouri before moving on to Kansas, where “Carver” became his last name and his middle name became “W!” After homesteading and cultivating for two years after high school, George went to Simpson College for art and music, where his teacher saw his prowess with plants and redirected him to Iowa State Agricultural College. There, he became the school’s first Black student, baccalaureate, Master of Science, and faculty!

Almost immediately after he got his Masters degree, Booker T. Washington recruited him to teach agriculture at the Tuskegee Institute, and during his 47-year career there, Mr. Carver diagnosed the soil depletion that had crippled Southern agriculture, prescribed nitrogen-fixing plants like peanuts, soybeans, and sweet potatoes, then invented over 300 products to make use of surplus legumes! His work earned him little fortune, but great fame, and the push to give him a national monument began while he was still alive. Though there was a presidential ban on non-military spending during World War II, this bill passed unanimously to earn the wartime support of Black folks across the country!

How Can I #HelpTheHelpers?

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