George Washington Carver

port of harlem gambian education partnership

George Washington Carver
Agriculturist Extraordinaire
(1860? – 1943)
United States

Moses Carver owned George from birth, and as a youngster, George would refer to himself as Carver’s George. After slavery ended, George continued to pursue his education and became the first Black graduate of Iowa State University. In 1896, Booker T. Washington, the first principal and president of the Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University), invited George to head its Agriculture Department. George Carver taught at Tuskegee Institute for 47 years where he gained international fame by promoting crop rotation, mobile classrooms, peanuts, and sweet potatoes.

There are many memorials to Carver including the George Washington Carver National Monument where he spent time in his childhood. It was the first national monument dedicated to an African American and the first to honor someone other than a president

“Watercolors were actually my first foray into multiple colors. I love its unpredictability. I got away from watercolor when I picked up oils and acrylics. When starting this project, I was not sure how my current style of layering colors in patches with oils and acrylics would work with watercolor. If I use less water, it’s not much different from using acrylics, but that's no fun. When using watercolor, you want your colors to freely flow, but not with too much water, or you will create a muddy image.”

- Artist Jay Durrah

Like Us On

See Us On

Send Us an Email

Our Business Sponsor

This Way to More of "From These Shores"