Roscoe Conkling Bruce facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Roscoe Conkling Bruce
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| Born | 21 April 1879 Washington, D.C., U.S.
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| Died | 16 August 1950 (aged 71) New York City, New York, U.S.
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| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Educator |
| Known for | Emphasis on industrial training for African Americans |
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Roscoe Conkling Bruce, Senior (21 April 1879 – 16 August 1950) was an African-American educator who was known for stressing the value of practical industrial and business skills as opposed to academic disciplines. Later he administered the Dunbar Apartments housing complex in Harlem, New York City, and was editor in chief of the Harriet Tubman Publishing Company.
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Birth and education
Roscoe Conkling Bruce was born on 21 April 1879 in Washington, D.C., the only son of U.S. Senator Blanche Bruce and his wife Josephine Beall Willson Bruce. His father was a Republican from Mississippi. Blanche Bruce was a former slave, the second African American to be elected to the U.S. Senate, and the first to serve a full six-year term. Josephine Beall Willson was the daughter of a Cleveland dentist. She had been an elementary school teacher. In 1899 Booker T. Washington hired her as lady principal at the Tuskegee Institute. In 1901 she ran unsuccessfully for election as President of the National Association of Colored Women.
Roscoe Conkling was their only child. He was named after Senator Roscoe Conkling of New York, who supported his father against anti-black prejudice in the Senate chamber. His secondary education was first at Washington's M Street High School and then at Phillips Exeter Academy, where he was one of the editors of The Exonian, the student newspaper. He went on to Harvard University in 1898. At Harvard in 1898 he won the Pasteur Medal for debating, in 1899 was chosen as one of three men to represent Harvard in a debate against Princeton University, in 1900 represented Harvard in the oratorical contest against Yale University and won the Coolidge debating prize. He graduated with an AB degree in 1902, magna cum laude, and became a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society.
Educator
While visiting Josephine at Tuskegee, during the summer break of his senior year at Harvard, Bruce won a fan in Booker T. Washington and secured a position at Tuskegee as head of the Academic Department. Washington demoted James Dickens McCall to open the position for Bruce.
From 1902 to 1906 Bruce supervised the Academic Department of Tuskegee Institute and also taught classes. He had been hired by Washington to change the curriculum to become less academic and emphasize more practical skills, a change that was unpopular with the faculty and the students. Bruce advised Washington to expand Tuskegee to other countries, such as South Africa. He also eliminated music and Bible study courses, and threatened to eliminate other academic courses if the teachers did not "appreciably ... diminish the amount of time required of his students for the preparation of his subjects". He wanted Tuskegee to become "a first class industrial school rather than a second class academic".
After expressing desire to move into the Washington D.C. Schools, Bruce asked Washington to help him secure a position. At the time, W.E.B. Du Bois was making an effort to become the superintendent of schools in that area, which Washington greatly opposed due to their differing philosophies. So, Washington actively lobbied for Bruce to receive the position, consorting with Mary Church Terrell, a black District school board member, to lobby behind-the-scenes for the appointment of Bruce. And, following Washington's active campaign for him, Bruce became the supervising principal of a district, controlling one quarter of the black schools in 1906. Just a few months after his appointment, he was promoted to Assistant Superintendent in charge of the Colored Schools of the District of Columbia.
Bruce felt that industrial and business education were important, and tried to convert the school into a technical high school. He demanded that every student at the Dunbar High School take at least one industrial course. A boys' and a girls' vocational school were established on his recommendation. He supported reorganization of the Washington D.C. school system under the Congressional Organic Act of 1906, which gave control of the public school to a board of education whose members were appointed by the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia and who served three-year terms without pay.
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Following his resignation, he took charge of a project to organize high schools for African American children in Kimball, West Virginia and later became principal of Kimball's Browns Creek District High School.
Relationship with other African Americans
Bruce found the pentecostal worship practiced by lower-class Tuskegee students "disgusting".
Even though he had received an elite academic education, Bruce's philosophy of industrial training in Washington D.C.'s black schools, caused an uproar among black parents proud of their children's educational attainments. However, Booker T. Washington's support, and a white-dominated school board, secured Bruce's position.
Bruce endured a tug-of-war for power within the D.C. education circles and became the focal point of philosophical and public relations opposition by those who supported W.E.B. du Bois. He managed to temper both sides by appearing to serve both ideologies—he was vocal about industrial education was also a member of the NAACP, which denounced such education. The controversy led to a scathing article in the influential Washington Bee, titled "Picture For Youth," written by former ally, Ralph W. Tyler. The piece labelled Bruce a failure during his tenure at Tuskegee. While Bruce was recovering from injuries sustained in a car injury in 1915 and fighting a bout of spinal meningitis, his biggest detractor, W. Calvin Chase, the editor of the Washington Bee, published a piece branding Bruce "the most despised man in the city," portraying Bruce as officially and physically unable to do the job, and calling for Bruce's replacement. However, Bruce recovered and resumed his post until a scandal resulted, brought on by Herman M. Bernolet Moens, an obscure Dutch professor introduced to local black middle class circles by, none other than, W.E.B. du Bois.
Later career
In 1927, Bruce moved to Harlem, where he became resident manager of the Dunbar Apartments. The Dunbar Complex was financed by John D. Rockefeller and designed by architect Andrew J. Thomas, with the aim of giving decent accommodation for low-income African Americans. However, in 1936 Bruce lost his job when Rockefeller sold the Dunbar Apartments.
Early in the 1930s, Bruce became editor-in-chief of the Harriet Tubman Publishing Company. He also authored a school textbook called Just Women, which gave a history of notable African-American women.
Personal life
On June 3, 1903, Bruce married Clara Washington Burrill of Washington, D.C. at the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church. Clara was a Radcliffe and Boston University Law School graduate who was also the first woman anywhere to edit a law review. However, given her race and gender, she struggled to find work as an attorney.
They had three children, Clara Josephine, Roscoe Conkling Jr. ("Bokie"), and Burrill Kelso Bruce.
His son Roscoe Jr. embezzled money from an apartment complex he managed in New Jersey and then arranged a phony burglary to explain the absence of funds. He served a year-and-a-half in prison. The legal costs bankrupted the family. The elite whites they had befriended abandoned them, and Roscoe Sr. and Clara were reduced to living on welfare.
His daughter Clara attended Radcliffe like her mother; however, she failed to graduate when she opted to elope with a black actor instead. Clara and her husband were both white-passing African Americans. Their respective skin tones afforded them certain privileges not given to darker African Americans.
Bruce died in New York City on August 16, 1950, at the age of 71. He was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in Washington, D.C.
