The Argentine statesman, educator, and gifted journalist Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (1811-1888) was known as the "Teacher President" for his unremitting efforts to foster education in his country. He was also an intuitive writer with a prophetic gift who created a classic of Argentine literature.

Domingo Sarmiento was born on Feb. 15, 1811, in San Juan, an old and primitive town of western Argentina near the Andes, of humble, hardworking parents living in near poverty. His formal education was scanty, and he was largely self-taught, reading whatever came within his reach. Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography exercised a powerful influence on his young mind, and in later life he wrote, "No other book has done me more good than that one." At the age of 15 Sarmiento taught in a country school; later he clerked briefly in a general store with little success, tried his hand at surveying, and entered politics at a youthful...