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Emmett Scott appointed to reduce racial tension
On this day in 1917, Secretary of War Newton D. Baker appointed Emmett
Jay Scott his special assistant to urge the equal and impartial
application of Selective Service regulations, to improve the morale of
black servicemen, and to investigate racial incidents and charges of
unfair treatment. For Scott, born in Houston in 1873, the appointment
became a small part of an outstanding career as a public servant,
editor, and author. He was awarded a master of arts degree from Wiley
College in 1901 and an LL.D. by Wiley College and Wilberforce University
(Ohio) in 1918. He founded the Houston Texas Freeman, the oldest
black newspaper published west of the Mississippi, which he edited from
1894 to 1897. He then moved to Tuskegee, Alabama, where he worked with
Booker T. Washington until 1915; he became Washington's chief adviser,
confidant, and even ghostwriter. Scott also served as secretary of the
National Negro Business League from 1902 to 1922, as a member of the
American Commission to Liberia in 1909, as secretary to the
International Conference on the Negro in 1912, and as
secretary-treasurer of Howard University from 1919 to 1934. During World
War II he was personnel director for the Sun Shipbuilding Company in
Chester, Pennsylvania. His books include Booker T. Washington:
Builder of a Civilization (1916), which he coauthored with Lyman
Beecher Stowe; Scott's Official History of the American Negro in the
World War (1919); and Negro Migration During the War (1920).
Scott died on December 11, 1957, at Freedmen's Hospital in Washington,
D.C., after a long illness.
- Links to Related Handbook of Texas Online Articles
- SCOTT, EMMETT JAY
- WORLD WAR I
- WILEY COLLEGE
- HOUSTON INFORMER AND TEXAS FREEMAN
- Other Texas Day by Day Articles for This Date
- Texas native given command of both American air forces in England (1943)
- Hearst hosts New York benefit for Galveston orphans (1900)
- First state Sängerfest held in New Braunfels (1853)
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