February 10, 1881

The Tuskegee Normal School for Colored Teachers, now known as Tuskegee University, was established by the Legislature. The second black college in the state, the school soon hired Booker T. Washington and, through his leadership, rose to national prominence during the industrial education movement. While the school is best known for international icons such as George Washington Carver and the Tuskegee Airmen, the university also created the first marching band at a historically black college and is home to the only black college school of veterinary science, which produces about 75 percent of the nation’s African-American veterinarians. In 1974, the campus was designated as the Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site.

Read more at Encyclopedia of Alabama.

Tuskegee Institute, Tuskegee, April 5th, 1918. (Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division)

The Oaks, home of Booker T. Washington. “Here students applied their skills to one of the most visible structures at Tuskegee. From designing the house to making the bricks to crafting the furniture, students and faculty helped build The Oaks,” NPS. (Erin Harney)

Booker T. Washington Monument. (Erin Harney)

History class at the Tuskegee Institute, 1902. (Library of Congress)

The clock tower was added to White Hall in 1913. The school’s campus, including White Hall, was designed by Robert Robinson Taylor, the first African-American to graduate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). As part of the curriculum, students built many of the original campus buildings, with bricks they had made themselves.

Commencement day parade, Tuskegee, Inst., Alabama, 1913-1914. (A.P. Bedou, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division)

Milbank Hall, built in 1909. “This building housed the Agriculture Department’s classrooms and laboratories and George Washington Carver’s personal laboratory,” NPS. (Erin Harney)

George Washington Carver, 1906. (Library of Congress)

George Washington Carver Museum. The building originally served as a laundry for the Tuskegee Institute and was converted into a museum in 1938. (Erin Harney)

The Moveable School, designed by Washington and Carver. (Erin Harney)

Museum display at the George Washington Carver Museum. (Erin Harney)

Map of the Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site. (National Park Service)

For more on Alabama’s Bicentennial, visit Alabama 200.