The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-06-09
FRIDAY, JUNE 9, 1899.
TWELVE PAGES.
Richard Parks Bland.

~ RIOR to the hour of last night
when warning bulletin came
over the press wires, there had
been no tidings to the effect that the
supreme hour was approaching in the
career of Richard Parks Bland. The
word that then came was to the effect
/ that the stricken statesman was rapid
ly nearing the fatal ending of his
illness. .
A Kentuckian by birth, Mr. BANDS
varied experience made him cosmopoIi-
tan. He was born in 1885. His father
died when Richard was an infant; in
early .boyhood he was motherless. He
knew what poverty was. He worked on
farm, getting what he could in the
way of a scant education by putting his
leisure time to the utmost account
When he was twenty years old, in
1856, in company with relatives, Bland
took up the overland trail and contin-
ued his journeys until he reached the
Pacific coast. He taught school and
studied law. With others he aband-
oned California to try his fortunes in
Nevada, and at Carson City he started
in the practice of law. Mr.. BANDS
western experience covered a period of
about ten years. He engaged, of course,
in mining, but it never was told of him
that his ventures in this field were
profitable.
In 1865 Mr.. Bland retraced his steps
to Missouri. Here, meeting his fate he
a ND OF
They made their home, later on, at
Lebanon, and the people of the Eighth
, congressional district of Missouri picked
out Mr.. Bland as the man whom they
wanted to be their representative in
congress-he had already won the lead
/ ership at the local bar.
Mr.. Bland began his long congress
sional career, in 1873, as member of
the Forty-third congress. He served
ten consecutive terms, holding high
rank almost from the outset. He was
defeated, as silvers friends we'll remem-
Der, for membership in the Fifty-fourth
4 congress: he was handsomely elected to
membership in the Fifty-fifth congress
which ended it's career last March
Richard P. Bland was silver's sturdy
and steadfast champion at time when
the metal found it hard work to rally
many friends among men in public life.
He was a conspicuous pioneer in the
crusade for silver's restoration, He was
an unf1inching fighter in times when
present defeat was as good as certain,
but he nevertheless had, in season and
out of season, the courage of his con-
victions-he Is one of a very small
group Of men in public life who car
ried the banner when the days were
darkest and to whose steadfast advo-
cacy was wholly due the awakening
for the restoration of silver that came
upon this country in 1896
Indeed, it will be remembered that,
in the weeks Immediately preceding the
democratic national convention, Mr.
Bland was, perhaps, the most promis-
ing candidate on the list. He accepted
the decision of the Chicago convention
with good grace and Loyalty supported
the Bryan ticket Mr.. Bland made him
self thoroughly a master of the silver
question. He was a practical, matter
of-fact talker, and he knew how to
present silver's side of the argument
In effective speech. His untrng fight
for free coinage is a matter of history;
no man lives to whom the struggle for
silver's restoration is a greater debtor
He was in no sense a rash leader; on
the contrary, his conduct had caution
for one of its distinguishing traits. But
he was fearless in the advocacy of
what he believed to be right, and there
never was doubt as to his tenacity of
purpose.
From first to last. Mr.. Bland was a
man of modest financial resources. He
was a public servant of scrupulous in