George Washington Carver
53 quotes
Biography
George Washington Carver was an American agricultural scientist and inventor who promoted alternative crops to cotton and methods to prevent soil depletion. He was one of the most prominent black scientists of the early 20th century.
"Where there is no vision, there is no hope."
"There is no short cut to achievement. Life requires thorough preparation - veneer isn't worth anything."
"How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these."
"When you can do the common things of life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world."
"The virgin fertility of our soils and the vast amount of unskilled labor have been more of a curse than a blessing to agriculture. This exhaustive system for cultivation, the destruction of forest, the rapid and almost constant decomposition of organic matter, have made our agricultural problem one requiring more brains than of the North, East or West."
"More and more as we come closer and closer in touch with nature and its teachings are we able to see the Divine and are therefore fitted to interpret correctly the various languages spoken by all forms of nature about us."
"I love to think of nature as unlimited broadcasting stations, through which God speaks to us every day, every hour and every moment of our lives, if we will only tune in and remain so."
"Our creator is the same and never changes despite the names given Him by people here and in all parts of the world. Even if we gave Him no name at all, He would still be there, within us, waiting to give us good on this earth."
"I do not feel capable of writing a single word of counsel to those dear young people, more than to say that my heart goes out to every one of them, regardless of the fact that I have never seen them and may never do so. I want them to find Jesus, and make Him a daily, hourly, and momently part of themselves. O how I want them to get the fullest measure of happiness and success out of life. I want them to see the Great Creator in the smallest and apparently the most insignificant things about them. How I long for each one to walk and talk with the Great Creator through the things he has created. How I thank God every day that I can walk and talk with Him."
"My beloved friend, keep your hand in that of the Master, walk daily by His side, so that you may lead others into the realms of true happiness, where a religion of hate, (which poisons both body and soul) will be unknown, having in its place the "Golden Rule" way, which is the "Jesus Way" of life, will reign supreme. Then, we can walk and talk with Jesus momentarily, because we will be attuned to His will and wishes, thus making the Creation story of the world non-debatable as to its reality. God, my beloved friend is infinite the highest embodiment of love. We are finite, surrounded and often filled with hate. We can only understand the infinite as we loose the finite and take on the infinite."
"I know that my Redeemer lives. Thank God I love humanity, complexion doesn't interest me one single a bit."
"When our thoughts — which bring actions — are filled with hate against anyone, Negro or white, we are in a living hell. That is as real as hell will ever be."
"Fear of something is at the root of hate for others, and hate within will eventually destroy the hater. Keep your thoughts free from hate, and you need have no fear from those who hate you."
"My attitude toward life was also my attitude toward science. Jesus said one must be born again, must become as a little child. He must let no laziness, no fear, no stubbornness keep him from his duty. If he were born again he would see life from such a plane he would have the energy not to be impeded in his duty by these various sidetrackers and inhibitions. My work, my life, must be in the spirit of a little child seeking only to know the truth and follow it. My purpose alone must be God's purpose - to increase the welfare and happiness of His people. Nature will not permit a vacuum. It will be filled with something. Human need is really a great spiritual vacuum which God seeks to fill... With one hand in the hand of a fellow man in need and the other in the hand of Christ, He could get across the vacuum and I became an agent. Then the passage, "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me," came to have real meaning. As I worked on projects which fulfilled a real human need forces were working through me which amazed me. I would often go to sleep with an apparently insoluble problem. When I woke the answer was there. Why, then, should we who believe in Christ be so surprised at what God can do with a willing man in a laboratory? Some things must be baffling to the critic who has never been born again."
"Professor Carver, who teaches scientific agriculture, botany, agricultural chemistry, etc., at Tuskegee, is, as regards complexion and features, an absolute Negro; but in the cut of his clothes, the accent of his speech, the soundness of his science, he might be professor of botany, not at Tuskegee, but at Oxford or Cambridge. Any European botanist of distinction, after ten minutes' conversation with this man, instinctively would treat him as a man on a level with himself."
"He is better known as the greatest Negro scientist alive, the man who pioneered new uses for Southern agricultural products, developed 285 new uses for the peanut, got 118 products, including vinegar, molasses and shoe blacking, from the South’s surplus sweet potatoes."
"The versatility of his genius and his achievements in diverse branches of the arts and sciences were truly amazing. The versatility of his genius All mankind is the beneficiary of his discoveries in the field of agricultural chemistry. The things which he achieved in the face of early handicaps will for all time afford an inspiration of youth everywhere. The things, which he achieved in the face of early handicaps, will for all time afford an inspiration of youth everywhere. I count it a great privilege to have met Dr. Carver and to have talked with him at Tuskegee on the occasion of my visit to the institute, which was the scene of his long and distinguished labors."
"From oppressive and crippling surroundings, George Washington Carver lifted his searching, creative mind to the ordinary peanut, and found therein extraordinary possibilities for goods and products unthinkable by minds of the past."
"From crippling circumstance, George Washington Carver made for himself an imperishable niche in the annals of science."
"When Dr. Carver died, the United States lost one of her finest Christian gentleman. He was a good friend of my father and mother and I had known him for forty-seven years. To the world, he was known as a scientist. Those who knew him best, however, realized that this outstanding characteristic was a strong feeling of the eminence of God. Everything he was and did found its origin in that strong ans continuous feeling."
"From Carver's small laboratory at Tuskegee came formulas in agricultural chemistry that enriched the entire Southland, indeed the whole of America and the world."
"The scientific discoveries and experiments of Dr. Carver have done more to alleviate the one-crop agricultural system in the South than any other thing that has been done in the history of the United States."
"[He] achieved a place as one of the foremost scientists of all the world for all time."
"Dr. Carver left a legacy of hope and beacon light pointing to opportunities of the future... This Negro scientist who was born of slave parents succeeded by hard work and exalted vision to the stature of one of the most outstanding agricultural research scientists in the world.""
"Dr. George Washington Carver was one of the wonders of this age... Those who believe and teach that a man's heritage determines his spiritual, mental and physical traits will be hard put to explain the source of Dr. Carver's amazing intellect."