The Athenaeum. (Atlanta, GA) 1898-1925, February 01, 1925, Image 19
THE ATHENAEUM
161
“That the truth concerning the present racial situation is system
atically kept from Fisk students as well as truth concerning the great
liberal movements of the world.
“That the colored world of Nashville is entirely out of sympathy
and out of touch with Fisk University: that it is straining every effort
to attract Southern white people and is segregating and insulting
colored auditors.”
Shortly after the participants of the demonstration had retired
President McKenzie sent in a riot call. In less time that it takes to
tell fifty typical Southern policemen were going through the rooms
of boys and girls alike, bullying, insulting, and in many cases mal
treating our finest and most cultured sons and daughters- Five were
jailed, fined $50 each, and expelled. The exact number of students
who have departed could not be determined. A large number have
taken the train and a larger number is in Nashville awaiting the
action of the board of trustees which is meeting in New York.
Fisk and the cause of higher education has sustained a blovi
that it will take years to efface.
GARVEY—The incarceration of Marcus Garvey, erstwhile Pro
visional President of Africa and President-General of the Universal
Negro Improvement Association, was, in the eyes of thousands of
black folks a martyrdom. That is the calamity of it. He stirred up
race pride by promise of a mammoth racial enterprise and the re-
demption of Africa from European land-grabbers. Hundreds gave
their (€HtTre barnirigsJ thousandai&e^g^ihemselvesjnot only of life’s
comforts' blit many of its^bare necessmS»*that the man in whom they
believed might bring about their salvation. To them he was a reli
gion, almost a God. In simple trusting faith they felt out for that
which might better their condition, remove them from the bane of
prejudice and persecution induced by prejudice. They groped blindly
for the ever-recedeing boon. In Garvey perhaps lay the fulfilment.
They clutched madly for that which offered brilliant promise, nearly
a million dollars trickled in from the sweat of Ethiopia’s brow. Be
hold! the greatest opportunity since the sailing of that “Dutch Trad
ing Vessel.” God, for a man. Reverberating chaos! Confidence a-
gain misplaced! O Lord! how long!
STANDARD LIFE—Calamities thick and fast! When it rains
it gushes. A decade of hard but glorious toil had brought Standard
into the limelight. A truly great racial enterprise hove into view.
A bee-hive of industry, an opening for Negroes of caliber! Into the
whirlpool, the swirling votrex ***** * ** *
We can not go on, the burden of three misfortunes oppresses us,
FISK, GARVEY, STANDARD. What can be the answer. Read the
next issue.
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0 Honesty, thou art a jewel!