George Washington Carver (1860s–1943) was an esteemed African American scientist, educator, and inventor renowned for his agricultural innovations. Born into slavery, he overcame adversity to become a pioneering figure in agricultural science. Carver’s research focused on crop rotation, soil conservation, and alternative crops, particularly peanuts and sweet potatoes. He developed hundreds of innovative products from these crops, contributing to the economic prosperity of Southern farmers. Carver’s work revolutionized agricultural practices and diversified the Southern economy. Additionally, he was a dedicated educator at the Tuskegee Institute, inspiring future generations through his teachings and advocacy for agricultural education. Carver’s legacy continues to inspire advancements in agriculture and sustainable farming practices worldwide.

George Washington Carver Quotes

1. “Where there is no vision, there is no hope.”
— George Washington Carver

2. “How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these.”
— George Washington Carver

3. “Start where you are, with what you have. Make something of it and never be satisfied.”
— George Washington Carver

4. “Ninety-nine percent of the failures come from people who have the habit of making excuses.”
— George Washington Carver

5. “I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we will only tune in.”
— George Washington Carver

6. “There is no shortcut to achievement.”
— George Washington Carver

7. “Education is understanding relationships.”
— George Washington Carver

8. “When you can do the common things of life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world.”
— George Washington Carver

9. “Anything will give up its secrets if you love it enough.”
— George Washington Carver

10. “Do what you can, with what you have and do it now!”
— George Washington Carver

11. “Learn to do the common things uncommonly well.”
— George Washington Carver

12. “Nothing is more beautiful than the loveliness of the woods before sunrise.”
— George Washington Carver

13. “No individual has any right to come into the world and go out of it without leaving behind him distinct and legitimate reasons for having passed through it.”
— George Washington Carver

14. “If you listen carefully enough to anything, it will talk to you.”
— George Washington Carver

15. “It is simply service that measures success.”
— George Washington Carver

16. “Fear of something is at the root of hate for others, and hate within will eventually destroy the hater.”
— George Washington Carver

17. “The secret of my success? It is simple. It is found in the Bible.”
— George Washington Carver

18. “My purpose alone must be God’s purpose.”
— George Washington Carver

19. “When I was young, I said to God, ‘God, tell me the mystery of the universe.’ But God answered, ‘That knowledge is for me alone.’ So I said, ‘God, tell me the mystery of the peanut.’ Then God said, ‘Well George, that’s more nearly your size.’ And he told me.”
— George Washington Carver

20. “We get closer to God as we get more intimately and understandingly acquainted with the things He has created. I know of nothing more inspiring than that of making discoveries for one’s self.”
— George Washington Carver

21. “Education, in the broadest of truest sense, will make an individual seek to help all people, regardless of race, regardless of color, regardless of condition.”
— George Washington Carver

22. “Most people search high and wide for the key to success. If they only knew, the key to their dreams lies within.”
— George Washington Carver

23. “When I touch that flower, I am not merely touching that flower. I am touching infinity. That little flower existed long before there were human beings on this earth. It will continue to exist for thousands, yes, millions of years to come.”
— George Washington Carver

24. “To those who have not yet learned the secret of true happiness, begin now to study the little things in your own door yard.”
— George Washington Carver

25. “More and more as we come closer and closer in touch with nature and its teachings are we able to see the Divine and are therefore fitted to interpret correctly the various languages spoken by all forms of nature about us.”
— George Washington Carver

26. “All my life I have risen regularly at four o’clock and have gone into the woods and talked to God. There He gives me my orders for the day.”
— George Washington Carver

27. “It is not the style of clothes one wears, neither the kind of automobile one drives, nor the amount of money one has in the bank, that counts. These mean nothing. It is simply service that measures success.”
— George Washington Carver

28. “How far you go in life depends on…”
— George Washington Carver

29. “Anything will give up its secrets if you love it enough. Not only have I found that when I talk to the little flower or to the little peanut they will give up their secrets, but I have found that when I silently commune with people they give up their secrets also – if you love them enough.”
— George Washington Carver

30. “Without my Savior, I am nothing.”
— George Washington Carver

31. “I think I’ll sleep now.”
— George Washington Carver

32. “God is going to reveal to us things He never revealed before if we put our hands in His.”
— George Washington Carver

33. “Since new developments are the products of a creative mind, we must therefore stimulate and encourage that type of mind in every way possible.”
— George Washington Carver

34. “Nature is the greatest teacher and I learn from her best when others are asleep. In the still dark hours before sunrise God tells me of the plans I am to fulfill.”
— George Washington Carver

35. “There is a use for almost everything.”
— George Washington Carver

36. “I know that my Redeemer lives. Thank God I love humanity, complexion doesn’t interest me one single a bit.”
— George Washington Carver

37. “Our creator is the same and never changes despite the names given Him by people here and in all parts of the world. Even if we gave Him no name at all, He would still be there, within us, waiting to give us good on this earth.”
— George Washington Carver

38. “I know of nothing more inspiring than that of making discoveries for ones self.”
— George Washington Carver

39. “You can’t teach people anything. You can only draw out.”
— George Washington Carver

40. “We have become ninety-nine percent money mad. The method of living at home modestly and within our income, laying a little by systematically for the proverbial rainy day which is due to come, can almost be listed among the lost arts.”
— George Washington Carver

41. “Nothing is more beautiful than the loveliness of the woods before sunrise. At no other time have I so sharp an understanding of what God means to do with me as in these hours of dawn.”
— George Washington Carver

42. “Reading about nature is fine, but if a person walks in the woods and listens carefully, he can learn more than what is in books, for they speak with the voice of God.”
— George Washington Carver

43. “There is no short cut to achievement. Life requires thorough preparation – veneer isn’t worth anything.”
— George Washington Carver

44. “Young people, I want to beg of you always keep your eyes open to what Mother Nature has to teach you. By so doing you will learn many valuable things every day of your life.”
— George Washington Carver

45. “90% of all failures in life are those who have the habit of making excuses.”
— George Washington Carver

46. “There are two ways, one is right; the other is wrong. If your work is only about right, then it is wrong.”
— George Washington Carver

47. “Learn to do common things uncommonly well; we must always keep in mind that anything that helps fill the dinner pail is valuable.”
— George Washington Carver

48. “Believe. The promise of God are real. They are as real, as solid, yes infinitely more solid than this table which the materialist so thoroughly believes in. If you would only believe, O ye of little faith.”
— George Washington Carver

49. “Look about you. Take hold of the things that are here. Let them talk to you. You learn to talk to them.”
— George Washington Carver

50. “Never a day passes but that I do myself the honor to commune with some of nature’s varied forms.”
— George Washington Carver

51. “There is literally nothing that I ever asked to do, that I asked the blessed Creator to help me to do, that I have not been able to accomplish.”
— George Washington Carver

52. “One of the things that has helped me as much as any other is not how long I am going to live, but how much I can do while living.”
— George Washington Carver

53. “One reason I never patent my products is that if I did it would take so much time, I would get nothing else done. But mainly I don’t want my discoveries to benefit specific favored persons.”
— George Washington Carver

54. “Neither look up to the rich nor down on the poor.”
— George Washington Carver

55. “All flowers talk to me and so do hundreds of little living things in the woods. I learn what I know by watching and loving everything.”
— George Washington Carver

56. “The centre of his world was the south where he was born in slavery some 79 years ago and where he did his work as a creative scientist.”
— George Washington Carver

57. “I wanted to know the name of every stone and flower and insect and bird and beast. I wanted to know where it got its color, where it got its life – but there was no one to tell me.”
— George Washington Carver

58. “If you love it enough, anything will talk to you.”
— George Washington Carver

59. “He who puts a product upon the market as it demands, controls that market, regardless of color. It is simply a survival of the fittest.”
— George Washington Carver

60. “The beating on the tail of the snake may stop his progress a little, but the more vital parts must be struck before his poisonous death-dealing venom will be wiped out.”
— George Washington Carver

61. “Whatever you love opens its secrets to you.”
— George Washington Carver

62. “NOTE-Always remove the brown hull from the peanuts even though the recipe does not say so.”
— George Washington Carver