George Carver

George Washington Carver was born in 1864 near Diamond Grove, Missouri on the farm of Moses Carver. He was born into difficult and changing times near the end of the Civil War. Carver began his formal education at the age of twelve and at thirty, he gained acceptance to Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa, where he was the first black student.

As an agricultural chemist, he discovered three hundred uses for peanuts and hundreds more uses for soybeans, pecans and sweet potatoes. Among the listed items that he suggested to southern farmers to help them economically were his recipes and improvements to/for: adhesives, axle grease, bleach, buttermilk, chili sauce, fuel briquettes, ink, instant coffee,linoleum, mayonnaise, meat tenderizer, metal polish, paper, plastic, pavement, shaving cream, shoe polish, synthetic rubber, talcum powder and wood stain.

Money, stylish clothes, and fine cars were not important to him. He thought the truly successful person was the one who had learned to serve others.

More Interesting Facts about George Washington Carver
• He found a way to replace the textile dyes formerly imported from Europe by producing dyes of 500 different shades.
• He was responsible for the invention in 1927 of a process for producing paints and stains from soybeans. For that he received three separate patents.
• Carver also worked at developing industrial applications from agricultural crops during World War 1.

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