Thomas Jordan Jarvis and African-American Education in Greenville

Before East Carolina Teachers Training School, Thomas Jordan Jarvis shaped African-American education in Greenville, albeit within the Jim Crow system he had helped to establish. In 1903, as chair of the Board of Education, Jarvis recommended that Charles Montgomery Eppes (1858-1942) be hired as principal of the Greenville Colored Schools. Eppes remained in that position for nearly 40 years, until his retirement in 1942. In 1910, knowing of Eppes’ respect for Booker T. Washington (1856-1915), Jarvis wrote that African-American educational leader expressing appreciation for his work and an interest in having him speak in Greenville. The occasion never materialized, but Jarvis’ letter quickened correspondence between Washington and Eppes marking a historic moment in African-American education as it evolved in Greenville. Relations between ECTTS and local black schools were not as salutary as those between ECTTS and Greenville’s white schools, yet through Jarvis and Eppes relatively good relations emerged during the early Jim Crow period.

Jarvis’ decision to recommend Eppes’ hiring resulted from previous associations he had had with Eppes’ father, Reverend Henry Eppes (1830-1903), an AME Zion clergy and Republican state senator representing Halifax County. In the 1870s, Jarvis and Eppes had served in the North Carolina state legislature. Although a Democrat, Jarvis respected Reverend Eppes and his Methodist beliefs, and so was prepared, despite their party differences, to have Eppes’ son, a qualified educator, hired to lead the African-American school system in Greenville.

C. M. Eppes received his higher education at Shaw Institute (later Shaw University), 1871-1874. He began teaching in 1875 in New Hanover County, and subsequently in Wayne and Edgecombe counties before becoming superintendent of the State Colored Normal School in Plymouth, 1899-1903. While in Plymouth, Eppes publicly praised Jarvis for having helped found, while governor, the Plymouth Normal School. In 1900, Eppes invited Jarvis to “deliver the annual address” there. A newspaper article paraphrasing Eppes described Jarvis as a “distinguished gentleman and firm friend of education of the masses,” adding that there was “no truer friend of the education of the people than Governor Jarvis.” Jarvis returned the complements with an address at Eppes’ school. In 1903, when the Plymouth school was consolidated with Elizabeth City State Colored Normal School (later Elizabeth City State University), Eppes was hired as principal of the Greenville Colored Schools. The ties between Eppes and Jarvis were so close that in 1905, when Eppes was reelected principal, the Tarborough Southerner reported that Eppes’ position was at “the Jarvis Industrial School in Greenville.”

Eppes was a longstanding disciple of the educational philosophy of Booker T. Washington. He had also publicly defended the work of Charles B. Aycock, a Democrat, for African-American education. One of the few registered African-American voters in his day, Eppes stated, in correspondence with U. S. Senator Lee S. Overman, that while he, Eppes, voted Republican at the national level, he had always voted for Democrats for state offices because “they have done more in North Carolina for Negro Education than any other party….” Whatever disagreements Jarvis had with Reverend Eppes, C. M. Eppes and Jarvis were close politically.

In the fall of 1910, Booker T. Washington delivered a series of lectures in North Carolina, beginning in Charlotte and concluding in Wilmington, with stops throughout the state. One stop was in nearby Washington, N.C. The day before Washington’s address there, Jarvis wrote him expressing pleasure at his presence in the East, respect for his efforts toward improving the lives of African-Americans, and regret that he could not visit Greenville. After returning to Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, Washington wrote Jarvis expressing his thanks for the governor’s letter, and his intention to visit Greenville if he returned to North Carolina in the future. As things turned out, Jarvis passed away in 1914, and Washington in 1915, before a visit could be arranged. But Jarvis’ willingness to make overtures regarding the same was exceptional.

Jarvis was possibly inspired by John C. Kilgo (1861-1922), president of Trinity College (later, Duke), who, in 1896, not only introduced Booker T. Washington when he spoke at the Durham County Colored Fair, but also dismissed classes for half a day so Trinity students could attend Washington’s talk. Kilgo even invited Washington to speak at Trinity’s Chapel exercises, which Washington did. Trinity, a Methodist school, was the first and only white campus in North Carolina to welcome Washington. Jarvis, a Methodist with ties to Trinity, surely knew this.

Knowing of Eppes’ admiration for “Dr. Washington,” Jarvis had “Professor Eppes” personally deliver his letter to him. In it, Jarvis praised Eppes as an educator, comparing him, in a small way, to Washington. This prompted Washington to write both Jarvis and Eppes. In his letter to Jarvis, Washington not only expressed intent to visit Greenville, he added that he found Eppes “a sensible, strong man,” and conveyed pleasure at learning of his good work. Writing to Eppes, Washington asked him to thank the ladies of Greenville for the flowers they had given, and the children of the colored graded school for the fountain pen they sent. Eppes was no doubt honored by the chance to present a former governor’s letter to the most respected African-American educator of the day, and then to receive a personal letter from him as well. With this personal tie, Eppes’ admiration for Washington was strengthened, enhancing his devotion to African-American education in Greenville.

Jarvis’ letter to Washington coincided with the rise of a new African-American leader, W. E. B. du Bois. Critical of Washington as an accommodationist advocating gradualism, du Bois stressed African-Americans’ pressing need for higher education and political rights. To facilitate his agenda, du Bois helped organize, in 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Du Bois considered the Jim Crow system, which Jarvis and others had legislated, a profound injustice. In that context, Jarvis found Washington to be an acceptable African-American with whom he could work, even within the Jim Crow system, to build a new future. In Jarvis’ view, Eppes admiration for Washington made Eppes all the more qualified as an educator.

Yet complicating things for Jarvis was the resistance many whites had even to Booker T. Washington. When, in 1903, Trinity College history professor John Spencer Bassett (1867-1928) praised Washington as a Southerner second only to Robert E. Lee, News and Observer editor Josephus Daniels (1862-1948) and others denounced Bassett and Trinity president Kilgo for the outrage. Though Jarvis probably would have preferred that his letter remain private, it was read in Washington, N.C., and then quoted later by the Wilmington press. Jarvis’ esteem as a segregationist most like kept critics from lambasting him as another Bassett.

While the moment connecting Jarvis, Eppes, the Greenville African-American community, and Washington was brief, it stands as a historic expression of Jarvis’ efforts toward building bridges within the segregated confines of Jim Crow society. It also reveals Jarvis’ guiding hand shaping the philosophy and practice of the Greenville Colored School system, which indeed advanced, over the next four decades, the principles and objectives of Washington’s teachings. While, admittedly, the benefits of ECTTS largely bypassed the African-American community, through Jarvis’ respect for Eppes and Washington, the founding father of ECTTS contributed to measured congeniality in educational relations between the local black and white communities during the Jim Crow era.

The letters: Jarvis to Washington

Dr. Booker T. Washington.
Dear Sir:
I have learned with great pleasure of your visit to Eastern North Carolina and of your address to our colored people and I very much regret that circumstances and conditions are such that we cannot have you visit Greenville.
The colored people are a part of the citizenship of the State, and a very important part, and I heartily welcome and endorse every movement and influence to make them better citizens. I believe the teachings contained in your address will be helpful to those who hear and heed them and I wish it were possible for you to visit more of our people and speak to more of them.
Prof. C. M. Epps [Eppes], the Principal of our Colored Graded School, is likewise doing a good work, but his sphere of activity is, of course, very limited as compared with yours. He goes to hear you and will deliver you this letter with my high regard and best wishes in your great work to lift up and improve the conditions of a race of people who have a place, a destiny and a duty in this southland of ours. I have no doubt Prof. Epps will be benefited and better prepared for his work by hearing you and I am glad that he is going to meet you.
With high regards and good wishes, I am
Very truly yours,
Thos. J. Jarvis.

The letters: Washington to Jarvis

Gov. Thomas J. Jarvis
Greenville, N.C.
Dear Sir:
I received your letter of November 2nd while I was in the state of North Carolina. It has been very seldom that I have received a letter from any human being that has ever given me more pleasure and satisfaction than your letter. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for it. The world little knows how much my race owes to the cultured, high-class type of white people in the South for the progress that we have made in the South.
If I ever come to the state again I shall certainly go to Greenville.
I was surprised, too, at the high type of colored people who came to Washington [N.C.] from Greenville to attend our meeting. I have always noticed that wherever the colored people are treated fairly and have a good example set before them by the white people that they are of a high class, useful and law-abiding.
I found Professor Epps [Eppes] to be a sensible, strong man, and I am very glad that he is doing such good work in your community.
I thank you again and again for your letter.
Yours very truly,
Booker T. Washington

The letters: Washington to Eppes

Prof. C. M. Epps
Greenville, N. C.

Dear Mr. Epps:
At the first opportunity after my return to Tuskegee, I am writing to thank through you the ladies who were kind enough to send us the beautiful flowers. I appreciated this evidence of the kindly feeling for me in the highest degree.
I still also want you to thank the school children of the Colored Graded School for the fountain pen which they sent me. Please tell them that I am sincerely grateful for this kindly remembrance.
I should like to visit the city of Greenville, and at some other time I shall try to avail myself of the pleasure of a visit there.
Thanking you for your kindly good offices in bringing to me the greetings of the good people of Greenville, I am,
Yours very truly,
Booker T. Washington