William Gaines: "African American Leadership: Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois"

William E. Gaines has a long-standing interest in African-American
leadership, both historical and for the future. His talk on W.E.B. Du Bois and
Booker T. Washington will include: background of the two leaders (early life,
education and race relations); Booker T. Washington’s Atlanta Compromise Speech
and W.E.B. Du Bois’s reaction to the speech; Technical Education vs. Higher
Education; obstacles in achieving civil rights; lynching; Southern Democrats;
and the impact of the two leaders on race relations in the 20th and 21st
century.

Mr. Gaines did his undergraduate work at Lincoln University in
Pennsylvania and later earned Master's Degrees in History and in Education
Administration. He has taught at Union County College and Essex County College
as well as for 26 years at Columbia High School in Maplewood, New Jersey, where
he teaches World History and African History. In 1989, as a German Marshall
Fund Exchange Recipient, he traveled to Germany where he lectured on W.E.B.
Dubois and Booker T. Washington. A resident of the Maplewood-South Orange
communities for 30 years, he was a South Orange Villager of the Month in 1996.
In 2002, he was honored with a NAACP Community Award and was profiled in the
“Neat Things Done By Teachers” column in the New Jersey Education Association
Review. He was chair of the Discipline Review Committee at Columbia High School
that wrote the report resulting in a successful alternative high school program
in South Orange-Maplewood, and he is the Coordinator for the Columbia High
School African-American History Challenge Bowl team that has won 4 of 5
competitions at the state level.

The
Ethical Culture Society of Essex County is a progressive non-theist religion
dedicated to living ethically in a complex world. Founded in l876 and
established in Maplewood in l945, over the years the ethical culture movement
(known as The American Ethical Union) has been instrumental in launching
Planned Parenthood, the NAACP, Visiting Nurses, New York Settlement House,
Fieldston School, and National Ethical Service at the UN. The Society began a
long-running Ethics for Children program and most recently, Time Essex Exchange
(a time bank facilitating the exchange of services) among other initiatives.
The Maplewood Society was the first peace site in the country. Its motto is: to
act so as to bring out the best in ourselves by bringing out the best in
others.  

Contact
information: 973-763-1905; www.essexethical.org. Join us for weekly programs, discussions,
and fellowship Sundays at 11 am. All are welcome.