**Chap­ter Fif­teen: William James Edwards | Alaba­ma, 1869, The Small and the Mighty**

William James Edwards was born at the end of the Civ­il War in Snow Hill, Alaba­ma, soon after his fam­i­ly had been eman­ci­pat­ed from enslave­ment. Orig­i­nal­ly named Ulysses Grant Edwards, his name was changed to William by his grand­moth­er after the death of his moth­er. Fol­low­ing a seri­ous ill­ness in child­hood that caused parts of his bones to die, William strug­gled with mobil­i­ty, often crawl­ing around due to his inca­pac­i­ty. Left to fend for him­self after the pass­ing of his grand­moth­er and finan­cial­ly strained liv­ing with his aunt Rina, he spent hours alone at home, teach­ing him­self read­ing and arith­metic.

Rina’s des­per­ate efforts to care for William led her to beg for med­ical assis­tance in the com­mu­ni­ty. Observ­ing the adults dis­cussing William’s fate one Sun­day, he over­heard sen­ti­ments sug­gest­ing he should be sent to a poor­house, which led him to despair. This week-long peri­od of hope­less­ness end­ed as mys­te­ri­ous­ly as it began; instead of death, he found renewed vig­or. With Rina’s dili­gence, she man­aged to earn enough mon­ey to take him to Dr. George Keyser for treat­ment.

Under Dr. Key­ser’s care, who not­ed the extent of William’s med­ical issues, William endured sev­er­al oper­a­tions that would even­tu­al­ly allow him to walk again. Over four years, he per­se­vered, sav­ing mon­ey through cot­ton pick­ing to afford fur­ther med­ical care and even­tu­al­ly fund­ing his edu­ca­tion at the Tuskegee Insti­tute, where he became a teacher and devel­oped plans to estab­lish his own school.

Dur­ing out­reach for Tuskegee, he met Anna Jeanes, whose inter­est in his sto­ry and edu­ca­tion­al vision prompt­ed gen­er­ous finan­cial sup­port for build­ing a school in Snow Hill. Over time, Anna finan­cial­ly sup­port­ed the edu­ca­tion of rur­al Black chil­dren through the Jeanes Fund, which she estab­lished, advo­cat­ing for mixed-race gov­er­nance to decide how funds would ben­e­fit their com­mu­ni­ties.

As strug­gles over seg­re­ga­tion and inte­gra­tion began to deeply affect edu­ca­tion for African Amer­i­cans, the Jeanes teach­ers worked tire­less­ly in the South, fac­ing sys­temic racism while striv­ing to uplift their com­mu­ni­ties. Even in per­ilous con­di­tions, includ­ing threats from the KKK and the chal­lenges posed by the Civ­il Rights Move­ment, these edu­ca­tors remained stead­fast, embody­ing hope and resilience.

William Edwards’ and Anna Jeanes’ lega­cies live on, illu­mi­nat­ing the pow­er of edu­ca­tion as a path­way to progress amidst strug­gle, reflect­ing a com­mit­ment that each gen­er­a­tion must car­ry for­ward to ensure equal­i­ty and oppor­tu­ni­ty for all .