Scope and Contents Donated by Ms. Bessie M. Foster, the pictures have been held by her family for many years. There’s a remarkable story behind Valdosta State University’s portrait of Tuskegee Institute founder Dr. Booker T. Washington. The passage of the portrait from Tuskegee Institute to Valdosta State University nearly a hundred years later is a tale of a rural African-American family’s embrace of Washington’s philosophy of self-improvement and achievement. The story – and the picture – come to us from...