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Home > Dictionary of Science Quotations > Scientist Names Index C > George Washington Carver Quotes

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George Washington Carver
(Jan 1864 - 5 Jan 1943)

American agricultural chemist and agronomist who helped revolutionize the agricultural economy of the South. Carver demonstrated diversification—planting peanuts and sweet potatoes—to replenish impoverished soil. He developed over 300 new products from peanuts.


Science Quotes by George Washington Carver (13 quotes)

Photo of George Washington Carver, middle age, head & shoulders, facing forward, colorization © todayinsci.com
Dec 1906

A life that stood out as a gospel of self-forgetting service.
He could have added fortune to fame but caring for neither he found happiness and honor in being helpful to the world.
The centre of his world was the south where he was born in slavery some 79 years ago and where he did his work as a creative scientist.
— George Washington Carver
Epitaph on tombstone at Tuskegee University Campus Cemetery, Alabama.
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By the advance of civilization, a sharper and more healthy form of competition is brought about. The markets have become more fastidious; and he who puts such a product upon the market as it demands controls that market, regardless of color. It is simply a survival of the fittest.
— George Washington Carver
In Farmer’s Leaflet 7: The Need of Scientific Agriculture in the South (1902). Reprinted in The Review of Reviews (1902), 25, 322.
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Fear of something is at the root of hate for others and hate within will eventually destroy the hater. Keep your thoughts free from hate, and you will have no fear from those who hate you. ...
David, though small, was filled with truth, right thinking and good will for others. Goliath represents one who let fear into his heart, and it stayed there long enough to grow into hate for others.
— George Washington Carver
In Alvin D. Smith, George Washington Carver: Man of God (1954), 43. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 107. Smith's book is about his recollections of G.W. Carver's Sunday School classes at Tuskegee, some 40 years earlier. Webmaster, who has not yet been able to see the original book, cautions this quote may be the gist of Carver's words, rather than a verbatim quote.
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I went to the trash pile at Tuskegee Institute and started my laboratory with bottles, old fruit jars and any other thing I found I could use. … [The early efforts were] worked out almost wholly on top of my flat topped writing desk and with teacups, glasses, bottles and reagents I made myself.
— George Washington Carver
Manuscript fragment, no date, Box 1, George Washington Carver Papers. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 130.
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In these strenuous times, we are likely to become morbid and look constantly on the dark side of life, and spend entirely too much time considering and brooding over what we can't do, rather than what we can do, and instead of growing morose and despondent over opportunities either real or imaginary that are shut from us, let us rejoice at the many unexplored fields in which there is unlimited fame and fortune to the successful explorer and upon which there is no color line; simply the survival of the fittest.
— George Washington Carver
In article urging African-Americans to engage in plant breeding to develop improved species.'A New Industry for Colored Men and Women', Colored American (Jan 1908, 14, 33. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 109.
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The American farmer should in no sense be the prototype of Edwin Markham’s brainless fellow, whom he so graphically portrays—
“Bowed by the weight of centuries, he leans
Upon his hoe and gazes on the ground,
The emptiness of ages in his face, …
A thing that grieves not and that never hopes,
Stolid and stunned, a brother to the ox.”
— George Washington Carver
In Farmer’s Leaflet 7: The Need of Scientific Agriculture in the South (1902). Reprinted in The Review of Reviews (1902), 25, 322. Edwin Markham composed his poem, Man With a Hoe, after viewing a painting of the same name by Jean-François Millet.
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The ideal chemist of the future will be an investigator, one who dares to think and work with an independent freedom not permissible heretofore, unfolding before our very eyes a veritable mystic maze of new and useful products from material almost or quite beneath our feet and now considered of little or no value. This is the work of the creative research chemist, and it is to this group of workers that the whole civilized world must look for its greatest development.
— George Washington Carver
From opening of Address at Third Session on 'Chemistry and Peace', New York (1939). Excerpted in Glenn Clarke, The Man Who Talks With the Flowers: The Intimate Life Story of Dr. George Washington Carver (1939), 62.
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The rapid growth of industry, the ever increasing population and the imperative need for more varied, wholesome and nourishing foodstuff makes it all the more necessary to exhaust every means at our command to fill the empty dinner pail, enrich our soils, bring greater wealth and influence to our beautiful South land, which is synonymous to a healthy, happy and contented people.
— George Washington Carver
Letter to Marlin E. Penn (18 Jun 1927), Box 17, George Washington Carver Papers. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 264-5. Smith's book is about his recollections of G.W. Carver's Sunday School classes at Tuskegee, some 40 years earlier. Webmaster, who has not yet been able to see the original book, cautions this quote may be the gist of Carver's words, rather than an exact quote.
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The virgin fertility of our soils, and the vast amount of unskilled labor, have been more of a curse than a blessing to agriculture. This exhaustive system for cultivation, the destruction of forests, the rapid and almost constant decomposition of organic matter, together with the problems of nitrification and denitrification, the multitudinous insects and fungus diseases which are ever increasing with marvelous rapidity year by year, make our agricultural problem one requiring more brains than of the North, East or West.
— George Washington Carver
In Farmer’s Leaflet 7: The Need of Scientific Agriculture in the South (1902). Reprinted in The Review of Reviews (1902), 25, 322.
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When I touch that flower, I am not merely touching that flower. I am touching infinity. That little flower existed long before there were human beings on this earth. It will continue to exist for thousands, yes millions of years to come.
— George Washington Carver
As quoted from a first-person conversation with the author, in Glenn Clark, The Man Who Talked With the Flowers: The Intimate Life Story of Dr. George Washington Carver (1939), 39.
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When I was young, I said to God, “God, tell me the mystery of the universe.” But God answered, “That knowledge is for me alone”. So I said, “God, tell me the mystery of the peanut.” Then God said, “Well, George, that’s more nearly your size.” And he told me.
— George Washington Carver
In Walter B. Knight, Knight’s Treasury of Illustrations (1956), 368, citing The Gospel Banner.
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When in Ames, I had charge of a football team and a track team. I was the official ‘rubber.’ Now we call them ‘Masseurs.’ But we weren’t so stylish in those days, so my title was that of a ‘rubber.’ I noticed then that there was something lacking in the oils used for such purposes, which set me thinking. When I came to Tuskegee, I found a healing strength in peanut oil not found in other oils. I have found great possibilities in it. I am simply a scientist attempting to work out a complete oil therapy. In my investigations I find that the peanut oils give better results when skillfully applied than any of the 44 other oils that I have used. So far my success is very gratifying. I have more than 6,000 letters before me on this subject, and there are people who come to consult with me every day.
— George Washington Carver
As quoted in 'Chemistry and Peace', Atlanta Daily World (3 Jan 1943), 4.
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George Washington Carver quote: When our thoughts—which bring actions—are filled with hate against anyone, Negro or white
Image credit: Fugue cc-by-2.0 (source)
When our thoughts—which bring actions—are filled with hate against anyone, Negro or white, we are in a living hell. That is as real as hell will ever be.
While hate for our fellow man puts us in a living hell, holding good thoughts for them brings us an opposite state of living, one of happiness, success, peace. We are then in heaven.
— George Washington Carver
In Alvin D. Smith, George Washington Carver: Man of God (1954), 27-28. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 107. Smith's book is about his recollections of G.W. Carver's Sunday School classes at Tuskegee, some 40 years earlier. Webmaster, who has not yet been able to see the original book, cautions this quote may be the gist of Carver's words, rather than a verbatim quote.
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George Washington Carver quote: When our thoughts—which bring actions—are filled with hate against anyone, Negro or white
Image credit: Fugue cc-by-2.0 (source)

See also:

Carl Sagan Thumbnail In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion. (1987) -- Carl Sagan
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