Washington was renowned for having an excellent sense of humor

To end the list of ten most interesting facts about Booker T. Washington he was famous for his great sense of humor. Together with his students, Booker T. Washington committed themselves to create the budding Tuskeegee Institute, constructing the campus, and teaching a course that combined intellectual and practical training. Washington's efforts to fundraise and travel to maintain Tuskegee viable and expanding increased as the college progressed. Washington rose to prominence as an effective public speaker for both black and white audiences, using humor to put people who might disagree with him at ease.

For both black and white audiences, Booker T. Washington was a dynamic public speaker of his era. He frequently employed comedy as a calming technique, especially for those who didn't share his viewpoints. James Hardy Dillard, a biographer of Washington at the time, claimed that he could "not only tell a good joke well but tell what was simply the shadow of a joke so skillfully that his audience would be shaking with laughter." Many of Washington's recorded one-liners make use of accents and racial stereotypes that are now deemed improper, sometimes humorously. A kinder illustration of this was when Washington said, "I feel like a huckleberry in a bowl of milk," during the ceremony in which he became the first African American to receive an honorary master's degree from Harvard.