Early Life and Education
He was named April when born into slavery on a plantation near Winnsboro, South Carolina; the name indicating the month he was born, a common slave-naming practice at the time. In 1800-1802 he was documented as owned by William Ellison of Fairfield County, the son of Robert Ellison, a planter. Either man could have fathered April.
William Ellison apprenticed April at age 10 to a cotton gin maker, William McCreight of Winnsboro. This would provide him with a valuable trade to make a living as an adult. Completing his apprenticeship after six years, April continued to work at the shop. His earnings went to his master, as he was considered to be "hired out." He continued to learn the variety of complex skills related to cotton gin making and repair.
Read more about this topic: William Ellison
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or education:
“We passed the Children’s Bureau bill calculated to prevent children from being employed too early in factories.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“The work of art, just like any fragment of human life considered in its deepest meaning, seems to me devoid of value if it does not offer the hardness, the rigidity, the regularity, the luster on every interior and exterior facet, of the crystal.”
—André Breton (1896–1966)
“The proper aim of education is to promote significant learning. Significant learning entails development. Development means successively asking broader and deeper questions of the relationship between oneself and the world. This is as true for first graders as graduate students, for fledging artists as graying accountants.”
—Laurent A. Daloz (20th century)