The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 89, July 1985 - April, 1986 Page: 566

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Southwestern Historical Quarterly

jects and the liberal arts. Few colleges, however, established large-scale,
expensive programs in vocational education, although courses existed
at some of them in agriculture, woodwork, metalwork, and home
economics.
Heintze is strongest in his treatment of student life and weakest in his
discussion of the financing of these schools. Private institutions, he in-
forms us, received most of their funding from tuition and fees, contri-
butions from denominations, housing and board charges, and special
projects. Philanthropy, so vital to schools in some other states, played
only a small role in sustaining private education in Texas. The General
Education Board did give substantial gifts to private schools in the
Lone Star State, but the largest educational foundations favored such
colleges as Tuskegee and Hampton, which placed heavy emphasis upon
vocational education. Despite severe financial limitations, private in-
stitutions produced a number of outstanding graduates who helped to
alter southern society, and who gave strength and leadership to the
black community. Among those were Heman M. Sweatt, who inte-
grated the law school at the University of Texas, the writer J. Mason
Brewer, and James Farmer, the civil-rights activist of the 196os.
Despite its strengths, Private Black Colleges has shortcomings. The re-
search is creditable, to be sure, but in places the book reads much like a
catalogue, with fact piled on top of fact as if to convince a dissertation
committee of the author's mastery of his subject. Narrative and inter-
pretation should meet more equitably. Quoted material from cata-
logues and institutional sources sometimes overwhelms the reader as
he or she struggles for meaning. The inclusion of subheadings in some
chapters and their omission in others also proves troubling. Finally, the
revisionist view that Heintze expounds does have merit, but his analy-
sis, like that of others who support it, focuses too heavily upon those
blacks who survived the educational system in the South and too little
on the millions who were crippled or ruined by poor training. Heintze
is no apologist for the old southern system that restricted the educa-
tional rights and opportunities of black people, and his book should en-
able us to comprehend better the role private education played in the
black community.
Vanderbilt University JIMMIE LEWIS FRANKLIN
A Field Guide to American Windmills. By T. Lindsay Baker. (Norman: Uni-
versity of Oklahoma Press, 1985. Pp. xii+516. Foreword, preface,
illustrations, photographs, notes, appendices, bibliography, index.
$65.)

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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 89, July 1985 - April, 1986, periodical, 1985/1986; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth117151/m1/636/ocr/: accessed March 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.

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