The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-07-13

railway from Bellington. and he Is -
interested in the Coal and iron Hat.
way. running south from Elkins !"
White Sulphur Springs, Va
His Interest I'm Home Towns;
Mr.. Davis has always been CLOSELY
Identified with the community IN "nl.A
his business interests have oeen Ien -,
cred. His summer home was at Deoi
Park until the West Virginia enter
prise was well under way when ne
built himself handsome residence ~,
Ono OF the hills north of the town y.
Elkins, w. Va, which is his preSen'
summer home. He has USED ms ~"
in many ways for the advantage oi t,Io
Communities in which he has llVeu.
1886 he gave a new high school ~ ~.
town of Piedmont, donating pom tne
Hand and the building. In 1893 ne sase
a marx Of nine acres to the town OF
Elkins and in 1894 he and his protuei'
Col Thomas Davis, united In pulluiiis
the Davis Memorial Church, erecteu ~
Elkfns In memory of their mothel.
1900 he presented $1,000 TO tiie 80
for the purchase of the Children Ii nm,
Charleston, w. Va, making an ailo~
ance of 81 900 annually toward us 80
port. Early, in the history OF the VI
Virginia Central and Pittsburg nan
relief association was estap!lsheu'
which Mr. Davis was a liberal cohtiip
utor. This developed in later years
| in the erection by Mr.. and Mrs. DAVIS
of the Davis Memorial Hospital et "a
kins in memory of Henry q. DAVIS ill.,
their eldest son, who was washed over
| board from q ship off the coast OF Sou'h
Africa in 1896. Among other recent
gifts of Mr.. Davis is a large frespy-
| in0 erected
one of the hills just outside of the town
of Elkins.
Since he left the Senate of the Chit-
| ed States, Mr.. Davis has maintained MS
interest in the affairs OF the nation
and Of his State. One of his latest ana
| most important services to West Nlf-
ginia has been as a member OF the
| the State tax commission, which reVls-
ed the system of taxation in the state
Intercontinental Railway system.
His principal service to the nation
has been as a member of the first ana
| second international conferences of the
| American Republics and as chairman
Of the Intercontinental Railway Com
| mission. In the first Pan American con-
ference, held in Washington in 1879
so, whilo he took a lively interest In
all of the proceedings, he was chiefly
concerned with the work of the com
mittee on railway communication, oil
hich he was a member, and the report
of which--largely his work-was the
nrst real step in the direction OF car
rying out the project for uniting tht
three Americas by continuous line OF
railway. Growing out of the adop
ton of this report by the conference
was the organization of the Intercon
tinental Railway Commission and the
making of complete preliminary sur
veys under TIL, direction of that com
mission. TINE surveys showed thu
practicability of the project. Whei
President Mckinley named the dele
gates of the United States to the sec
ond Pan-American conference, which
met In the City of Mexico in the win
ter of 1901-02, the name of Mr.. Davi!
was at the head of the list He wal
unanimously chosen chairman of thu
delegation, and would have been made
permanent president of the conference
by reclamation but for the fact that
after the delegation of Colombia haC
offered motion for this purpose. which
was seconded by the Mexican delega
ton, he declined the honor. His prin
cipal service In this conference was OIL
the intercontinental railway commit
| tee, OF which he was chairman, and h
drew a report which was unanimousl!
adopted, and which provided for car
rying on the work in the interest o
the construction of the road in TIL
interval between that conference ant
the next. His intense personal inter
est In this railway project Is shown
by the fact that he and Mr.. Andrew
Carnegie advanced almost all of TIL
money necessary to send Mr.. Charlie
NJ Pepper to Central and South Amer
| lea to make report on the presen
status of railway construction and TIL
commercial prospects of an interna
tional line. 1t may truthfully be sal,
that whenever this great project /
realized, the credit for its success will
belong to Henry c. Davis than to an.
other one man or combination of men
| Always IA Conservative Democrat.
| Mr.. Davis has been a conservative
Democrat in politics. When he wa
in Congress he was not in entire har
money with the extreme low tariff
wing of his party. He believed that
as customs duties were necessary 70
the support of the government, the,
should be levied with some regard t.
the interest of American industries
He was an advocate OF the free and 'un
limited coinage of silver when tina
question was before Congress Will
he was in the Senate. South Africi
and the Klondyke were then uHSnowl
as gold fields. and the gold production
of the world showed signs of fallin:
below the need for a universal none
tary standard. In company with man.
of the leading men of both parties, MI
Davis advocated and voted for propo
sitions for AN enlarged use of silver il
the monetary system of the Unite,
States. He supported Mr.. Bryan IL
both of his campaigns for the presi
dency. though there were many thing
In the Chicago and Kansas City plat
forms that he did not regard with ia
vor. Mr. Davis went to the Democrati
convention in st. Louis. the seventh ma
tional convention that he has attend
cd. an earnest advocate of the nomina
ton OF Senator German for the Presi
dency.
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Has stood the test Twenty-Five years TIL
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