"Every man and woman is born into the world to do something unique and something distinctive, and if he or she does not do it, it will never be done."
"It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life does not lie in not reaching your goals; the tragedy lies in not having any goals to reach."
- Benjamin E. Mays
Benjamin E. Mays
Dr. Benjamin Elijah Mays was born on August 1, 1894 near Rambo, South Carolina, the youngest of eight children. His parents were tenant farmers and former slaves.
STRUGGLING TO GET AN EDUCATION
Young Benjamin grew up in his birthplace home (pictured here) in the rural
South where whites segregated and disfranchised Blacks by law. [Dr. Mays was not allowed to vote until 1945 when he was 51 years old.]
At an early age Mays had an insatiable desire for education. But to obtain schooling he had to deal with racial discrimination, poverty, and his own father who wanted him to remain on the farm. By age 17, he had been in school no more than 4 months a year. In spite of this, in 1916 Benjamin Mays graduated valedictorian from the high school of the black South Carolina College in Orangeburg.
FINALLY GETTING THE PH.D.
& MEETING MAHATMA GANDHI
After spending a year at Virginia Union University, Mays moved north to attend Bates College in Maine, where he obtained his B.A. in 1920. Then, he entered the University of Chicago as a graduate student, earning an M.A. in 1925. While in graduate school Mays worked on a train as a Pullman Porter. After a ten-year interrupted struggle, in 1935 he attained his goal of receiving his PhD. from the School of Religion at the University of Chicago.
His education at Chicago was interrupted when he became an ordained Baptist minister in 1922 and accepted a pastorate at the Shiloh Baptist Church of Atlanta. Then, he taught at Morehouse College and at South Carolina State College. In 1926 he was appointed executive secretary of the Tampa, Florida Urban League. In 1928 he became National Student Secretary of the YMCA. And, in 1934 Dr. Mays accepted the position of Dean of the School of Religion at Howard University in Washington, D.C.. During his six years at Howard, he traveled to India where he spoke at some length with Mahatma Gandhi ... a meeting that would have long-term consequences for Mays, a future student of his, and for America.
THE MOREHOUSE YEARS:
INSPIRING STUDENTS
TO STRIVE FOR EXCELLENCE & RACIAL JUSTICE
In 1940 Dr. Benjamin Mays became the president of Morehouse College. From that post until his retirement in 1967, Mays inspired
generations of students to strive for moral and academic excellence and to work for racial justice in America. At one of his chapel addresses, Mays introduced a young student to Gandhi's philosophy of nonviolence. That student was Martin Luther King, Jr., who entered Morehouse at age 15 and graduated at age 19 in 1948. This and other contributions from his teacher led King to call Mays his most important "spiritual and intellectual mentor." Benjamin Mays delivered the eulogy at Dr. King's funeral in 1968.
TWO GREAT THEMES:
DIGNIITY OF ALL
& GAP BETWEEN aMERICAN iDEAL & pRACTICE
Dr. Mays emphasized two themes throughout his life: the dignity of all human beings, and the gap between American democratic ideals and American social practices. They became key elements of the message of King and the American civil rights movement. Mays initially explored these themes at length in his 1957 book, Seeking to Be a Christian in Race Relations, and in his 1971 autobiography, Born To Rebel.
Born to Rebel is the moving chronicle of the life of Benjamin Mays, a story that interlaces achievement with the rebuke he confronted. In it he recalls his earliest memory of a lynching party storming through his county, taunting but not killing his father. It became for Mays an enduring image of what he characterizes as the snake-like progress of black-white relations in the South. The book is a very personal description of his struggles for dignity, respect and integrity, while simultaneously touching upon the collective struggle of African-Americans.
After his retirement from Morehouse in 1967, Mays was elected president of the Atlanta Public Schools Board of Education, where he supervised the peaceful desegregation of Atlanta's public schools. Dr. Mays died in Atlanta on March 28,1984.
As a minister, educator, mentor and counselor, civil rights activist, and author, Dr. Benjamin E. Mays achieved national and international renown, leaving a legacy as one of the most influential educators of twentieth century America.