San Francisco public schools · author of the 1896 superintendent’s report
Madison Babcock wrote the superintendent’s report in the Annual Report of the Public Schools of the City and County of San Francisco for the year ending 30 June 1896 — the earliest exact appearance of this line that Quote Investigator has been able to locate. He wrote it as practical advice to teachers about how to talk to and about their pupils, not as an inspirational slogan. Beyond that report very little about him is readily documented, and Quote Investigator credits him only tentatively; the phrase became famous a century later through Alex Haley, who adopted it as his motto.