Foreword

In casting about for stories to read to a little friend, one day I drew from the Library "My Life and Times" by Frederick Douglass. I knew that the book was written for grown-ups and that it contained many pages, but I did not know that in it was bound up a world of inspiration; for I had never read the book, although I had spent five years in college and university.

This story and the other stories in "Unsung Heroes", telling of the victories in spite of the hardships and struggles of Negroes whom the world has failed to sing about, have so inspired me, even after I am grown, that I pass them on to you, my little friends. May you with all of your years ahead of you be so inspired by them that you will succeed in spite of all odds, that you will:

     "Go on and up! Our souls and eyes
     Shall follow thy continuous rise;
     Our ears shall list thy story
     From bards who from thy root shall spring,
     And proudly tune their lyres to sing
     Of Ethiopia's glory."

The Author

Washington, D.C.
April 10, 1921