George Washington Carver

==Legacy==
[[File:George Washington Carver, 3c, 1948 issue.jpg|upright=1.1|thumb|In 1948 the U.S. Government released a [[commemorative stamp]] issued on Carver's birthday, five years after his death.]]
[[File:1951 Carver-Washington half dollar commemorative, obverse.jpg|thumb|A 1951 [[Carver-Washington half dollar|Carver-Washington commemorative half dollar]]]]
[[File:2024 Missouri American Innovation Dollar.jpg|thumb|Carver is featured on the reverse of Missouri's 2024 [[American Innovation dollars|American Innovation dollar]]]]
A movement to establish a U.S. national monument to Carver began before his death. Because of [[World War II]], such non-war expenditures had been banned by presidential order. Missouri senator [[Harry S. Truman]] sponsored a bill in favor of a monument. In a committee hearing on the bill, one supporter said:

<blockquote>The bill is not simply a momentary pause on the part of busy men engaged in the conduct of the war, to do honor to one of the truly great Americans of this country, but it is in essence a blow against the [[Axis Powers|Axis]], it is in essence a war measure in the sense that it will further unleash and release the energies of roughly 15,000,000 Negro people in this country for full support of our war effort.<ref name="Special_History_Study" /></blockquote>

The bill passed unanimously in both houses.

On July 14, 1943,<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.nps.gov/gwca/index.htm |title=George Washington Carver National Monument (U.S. National Park Service)<!-- Bot generated title --> |access-date=July 12, 2005 |archive-date=December 13, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201213014204/https://www.nps.gov/gwca/index.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] dedicated $30,000 (~${{Format price|{{Inflation|index=US-GDP|value=30000|start_year=1943}}}} in {{Inflation/year|US-GDP}}) for the [[George Washington Carver National Monument]] west-southwest of [[Diamond, Missouri]], the area where Carver had spent time in his childhood. This was the first national monument dedicated to an African American and the first to honor someone other than a president. The {{convert|210|acre|km2|1|adj=on}} [[U.S. National Monument|national monument]] complex includes a [[Bust (sculpture)|bust]] of Carver, a {{fraction|3|4}}-mile nature trail, a museum, the 1881 Moses Carver house, and the Carver cemetery. The national monument opened in July 1953.

In December 1947, a fire broke out in the Carver Museum, and much of the collection was unfortunately damaged. ''Time'' magazine reported that all but 3 of the 48 Carver paintings at the museum were destroyed. His best-known painting, displayed at the [[World's Columbian Exposition of 1893]] in Chicago, depicts a yucca and cactus. This canvas survived and has undergone conservation. It is displayed together with several of his other paintings.<ref>{{cite magazine
|title=Change Without Revolution
|date=January 5, 1948
|magazine=Time
|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,794072,00.html
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071021050800/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,794072,00.html
|url-status=dead
|archive-date=October 21, 2007
|access-date=August 10, 2008
}}</ref>
Carver was featured on U.S. 1948 commemorative stamps. From 1951 to 1954, he was depicted on the commemorative [[Carver-Washington half dollar]] coin along with Booker T. Washington. A second stamp honoring Carver, of face value 32¢, was issued on February 3, 1998, as part of the [[Celebrate the Century]] stamp sheet series. Two ships, the [[Liberty ship]] [[SS George Washington Carver|SS ''George Washington Carver'']] and the [[nuclear submarine]] [[USS George Washington Carver (SSBN-656)|USS ''George Washington Carver'' (SSBN-656)]], were named in his honor.

In 1977, Carver was elected to the [[Hall of Fame for Great Americans]]. In 1990, he was inducted into the [[National Inventors Hall of Fame]]. In 1994, Iowa State University awarded Carver a [[Doctor of Humane Letters]]. In 2000, Carver was a charter inductee in the [[USDA]] Hall of Heroes as the "Father of Chemurgy".<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.usda.gov/da/hallofheroes/|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20060925105945/http://www.usda.gov/da/hallofheroes/|url-status=dead|title=USDA Hall of Heroes<!-- Bot generated title -->|archivedate=September 25, 2006}}</ref>

In 2002, scholar [[Molefi Kete Asante]] listed George Washington Carver as one of [[100 Greatest African Americans]].<ref>Asante, Molefi Kete (2002). ''100 Greatest African Americans: A Biographical Encyclopedia''. Amherst, New York. Prometheus Books. {{ISBN|1573929638}}.</ref>

In 2005, Carver's research at the Tuskegee Institute was designated a [[ACS National Historical Chemical Landmarks|National Historic Chemical Landmark]] by the [[American Chemical Society]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_SUPERARTICLE&node_id=604&use_sec=false&sec_url_var=region1&__uuid=e6752a14-c3b5-425d-bd7b-9f46c4691b13|title=George Washington Carver: Chemist, Teacher, Symbol|first=Judah|last=Ginsberg|date=January 27, 2005|publisher=[[American Chemical Society]]|access-date=March 2, 2012|archive-date=November 7, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121107072612/http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true|url-status=live}}</ref> On February 15, 2005, an episode of ''[[Modern Marvels]]'' included scenes from within Iowa State University's Food Sciences Building and about Carver's work. In 2005, the [[Missouri Botanical Garden]] in St. Louis, Missouri, opened a George Washington Carver garden in his honor, which includes a life-size statue of him.

Many institutions continue to honor George Washington Carver. Dozens of elementary schools and high schools are named after him. [[National Basketball Association]] star [[David Robinson (basketball)|David Robinson]] and his wife, Valerie, founded an academy named after Carver; it opened on September 17, 2001, in San Antonio, Texas.<ref name="carver_academy">[http://www.thecarveracademy.org/page.cfm?p=10 History] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120607210643/http://www.thecarveracademy.org/page.cfm?p=10 |date=June 7, 2012}} from the [[Carver Academy]] website.</ref> The Carver Community Cultural Center, a historic center located in San Antonio, is named for him.