1. George William Carver was born into slavery during the Civil War.
2. Growing up, he had been known as Carver’s George. When he started school, he went by George Carver.
3. He was kidnapped from Missouri and sold in Kentucky when he was just a week old.
4. He had a curious mind. He investigated insects, tree bark, leaves, ferns and seeds.
5. He earned the nickname “The Plant Doctor” and collected in earnest all manner of rocks and plants.
6. He witnessed a lynching one night as a Black man was dragged from the jail and lynched.
7. He was turned away by a Kansas University because he was Black.
8. He enrolled at Iowa’s Simpson College, where he studied piano and art, but he switched to Iowa State Agricultural College to study agriculture a year later.
9. He became the first Black student, and later the first Black faculty member, at Iowa State.
10. His successful work in plant pathology and mycology gained him countrywide acclaim and fame as a prominent botanist.
