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132  THE CRISIS

dent of the National League for the Protection of Negro Girls, one of the two Negro trustees of Hartshorn Memorial College; and first vice-president of the Virgina Federation of Colored Women's Clubs.

MISS ADELA F. RUFFIN is the secretary of the branch of the Young Women's Christian Association in Richmond.  She took special training for this work at the National Y. W. C. A., in New York City.  She studied at Norfolk Mission College and has taught in the normal schools and colleges in the South.  She is a religious asset to the young people of Richmond. 

MISS VIRGINIA E. RANDOLPH is the originator of the Randolph System used in the public schools of Richmond, and is the supervisor of the industrial schools of Henrico County.  She received her training in the Richmond public schools and started her work as an educator at Mountain Road school. This school has since been rebuilt and renamed the Virgina E. Randolph School in her honor.  Last year she founded the Colored Industrial Exchange in Richmond.

MRS. LUCY BROOKS LEWIS was born in Richmond, Virginia March 20, 1861. She was educated in the Richmond public schools. She is an active charity worker and was president of the Women's Auxiliary of the Richmond Y.M.C.A. for six years, and was also president of the Richmond Y. W. C. A. from its founding in 1912 to 1915. Mrs. Lewis is due much praise for her untiring and successful efforts in behalf of this branch of the Y. W. C. A. during its infancy.

[[photographic images with the following captions]]
Dr. G. B. SIMPSON
MRS. L. B. LEWIS
MRS. M. L. WALKER
MISS V. E. RANDOLPH
MISS A. F. RUFFIN

THE FINAL STRAIN
By G. Douglas Johnson.

I CLIMBED the craggy hill of fame,
   Heart-sore and wearily,
Stood on her gleaming goal at length.
   And sighed in ecstasy.
"O God," I cried, "what bliss"—when lo!
   Came staling like a pall,
The strains of Life's Last Symphony,
  In Prelude, to—the call.

[[page 133]

        The Looking Glass  

LITERATURE

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE AND COMPANY have issued the long-awaited "Booker," by Emmett J. Scott, and Lyman Beecher Stowe (at THE CRISIS office, tow dollars, plus postage).
   The book is handsomely done and entertainingly written and may be recommended to the general reader; to those however, who had hoped for a broad and discriminating statement of the meaning of Mr. Washington and his work, this biography will be a distinct disappointment.
The facts were furnished by a man who knew much more than he revealed and they were put into literary shape by another man who did not know or sense the real problem of the Negro in America. The result is, first, a repetition of well-known facts without any illuminating additions; second, an attempt to defend Mr. Washington where no defense is now needed. Mr. Washington's work is done. No one is attacking him. At the same time those who did disagree with him still hold to their disagreement and they find nothing in this biography to change their conclusions. 
   Finally, there are here and there misleading statements which are very unfortunate, for instance, the sneer on page twenty-four against the "numerically small and individually unimportant Negroes who opposed Mr. Washington's program" and who were filled with nothing but "Latin, Greek, and Theology, and the like;" and the statement of the reasons for the failure of the conference at Carnegie Hall, which is not true, and must be so recognized by the numbers who took part. Evidently we have still to look for the real biography of Booker T. Washington.
   Meantime, those who opposed him may take comfort in a paragraph of Theodore Roosevelt's preface:
   "In the same way, while Booker T. Washington firmly believed that the attention of the Colored race should be riveted, not on political life, but on success sought in the fields of honest business endeavor, he also felt, and I agreed with him, that it was to the interest of both races that there should be appointments to office of Black Men whose characters and abilities were such that if they were White Men their appointments would be hailed as being well above the average, and creditable from every standpoint.
   "In Spite of the Handicap," an autobiography of James D. Corrothers, is a very excellent book and one which we can recommend to our readers. (George H. Doran and Company. At THE CRISIS office, $1.25, plus postage).
   The story is most entertaining and ends with this fine word:
   "The best of my life is now. The great gift of life is so pregnant with possibilities that no one possessing it should permanently despair, but rather with an assuring hope trudge forward ever expectantly. And the morn may bring a smile, and the darkness blessed dreams, and Life be big with fulfillment for him. Truly, in my own case, I think I can say that I have tried to do my honest with that life which held for me so humble a beginning."
 M. de Zayas has isued "African Ne-


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JAMES D. CORROTHERS
When Ten Years Old

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