W. H. Councill was born in Fayetteville, N. C., in 1848, and brought to Alabama by the traders in 1857, through the famous Richmond Slave Pen. He is a self-made man, having had only few school advantages. He attended one of the first schools opened by kind Northern friends at Stevenson, Ala., in 1865. Here he remained about three years, and this is the basis of his education. He has been a close and earnest student ever since, often spending much of the night in study. He has accumulated quite an excellent library and the best books of the best masters are his constant companions, as well as a large supply of the best current literature. By private instruction and almost incessant study, he gained a fair knowledge of some of the languages, higher mathematics and the sciences. He read law and was admitted to the Supreme Court of Alabama in 1883. But he has never left the profession of teaching for a day, although flattering political positions have been held out to him. He has occupied high positions in church and other religious, temperance and charitable organizations, and has no mean standing as a public speaker. And thus by earnest toil, self-denial, hard study, he has made himself, built up one of the largest institutions in the South and educated scores of young people _at his own expense_. [Illustration: PROF. W. H. COUNCILL, _Principal of State Normal and Industrial School, Normal, Ala._] Just before closing this sketch, I want to say that I regard Mr. Councill as being one of the most remarkable colored men in the United States to-day. I have known him for a great many years and I recognize in him the true, honest man--in every sense a _man_. CHAPTER XII. ECKSTEIN NORTON UNIVERSITY. This school was founded by one of the most successful educators of the race, the late Rev. Wm. J. Simmons, D. D., and his associate, Rev. C. H. Parrish, A. M., who is its worthy president. In 1890 it opened under the most favorable auspices, and each year has succeeded beyond the sanguine expectations of its friends. For purity of atmosphere, for development of the physical powers, for freedom from the allurements and unwholesome amusements of city life, no better place could have been selected than Cane Spring, Bullitt county, Ky., twenty-nine miles from Louisville. [Illustration: Eckstein Norton University, Cane Spring, Ky.] The object is to teach the students how to work; to teach the dignity of labor, that hands must be used as well as heads and that both can be successfully used together. It teaches manliness and race pride; that skill tells regardless of skin or parentage. It gives, besides the industries, a literary training which begins with the primary and ends with the college. As much is required from the study of the Bible as from any other book. This school has had its adversities in deaths of teachers and conflagration of buildings, yet it has bravely struggled through all.