The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1917-02-08

TION RECALLED
E. l. SMITH AT GREAT CONVENTION
Oregon Said to Have Indirectly Named
the Great Emancipator- Greeley
Held Oregon Proxy

hCpu III SuiSdBO uuliiIR Mdys icUO,
when Abraham Lincoln was chosen the
party's presidential standard bearer,
subsequently the Unions honored and
revered helmsman through the great
crisis of the Civil War.
Oregon, says Mr.. Smith, docs
not make so important as she should
the part she played indirectly in the
nomination of the great Lincoln. Per-
haps it was through some whim of
fate-at least Leander Holmes, chosen
at the Oregon State Republican Con-
vention, held at Oregon City, as one of
the state three delegates to the Ma
tional Republican Convention, not pos
sessing the funds necessary for the Iona
journey by the lsthmus of Panama and
thence by way of New York City to
Chicago, and not able to spare the
time, sent his proxy to Horace Gree
ley.
"Abaham Lincoln, more than to any
other one man, owed his choice as Re-
publican presidential nominee to Hor-
ace Greeley. Mr.. Greeley's influential
newspaper, the New York Tribune, was
at that time the political Bible for the
mass of the Republican party in the
Middle West. Some five years before
the Chicago convention, for some rea.
son that no one seems ever to have
ascertained, Greeley and William H.
Seward became bitter enemies. Just
prior to the Chicago convention, Sew
ard was backed by strong support, and
his nomination seemed probable.
But armed with Leander Holmes
proxy, Greeley came to the convention,
and he was determined, whatever the
cost, to defeat his old enemy. Prior to
the time of the nomination saw the
great editor marching up and down
among the different delegations, and
it was apparent that he was appealing
to the members to vote against Sew
ard. | overheard Greeley addressing
one delegation. He said: If you nom.
mate William II. Seward he cannot
carry the state of New York. Without
New York your cause is lost.
Possessed as he was of the Oregon
delegates proxy, Greeley was able to
participate actively in his campaign
against Seward and by his earnest per-
sonal appeals to turn the strong tide
away from the choice of the Empire
state delegation. The popularity of
Lincoln manifested itself at the psy-
Geological moment, and thus through
the dislike of Horace Greeley for Will
lam H. Seward we were given the no.
blest man the nation has ever had for
president.
Mr.. Smith celebrated his 10th
birthday on September II just passed.
He was perhaps an impressionable
young man at the time of the great
Chicago convention, but those infu-
ences of over half century ago have
lasted him through lifetime, and to.
day Abraham Lincoln is just as truly
the ideal of E. l.. Smith as on that
momentous May day when he heard the
shouts OF thousands cheering the newly
found leader, who sprang from the
masses to preserve the Union. So
great an admirer was Mr.. Smith of
Lincoln that at his request his we'd
ding to Miss Georgiana Slocom was
postponed from the morning of March
4, 1861, to the afternoon that day.
II was out of sympathy with the
Buchanan administration says Mr..
Smith, land then, too, wanted to be
able to say that we were married after
Abraham Lincoln had begun to serve
as the chief executive of the United
States.
Immediately following the wedding
ceremony Mr.. Smith and his bride set
boldly out on honeymoon trip that
was to terminate in Ell Dorado county,
California, where the bridegroom had
been persuaded to try his fortune by an
uncle. Charles Barker. Since those
days of his young manhood, Mr.. Smith
has held many positions of trust and
honor and has become known through
out the three states of the Pacific
Coast. He served as a member of the
General Assembly of California during
the years 1916. In '87 he was ap-
pointed territorial secretary of Wash
ington Territory. For the greater part
of this time here was acting territorial
governor. At the expiration of his
official duties, Mr.. Smith, associated
with Geo. A. Barnes, member of the
first city council of Portland, and Will
lam H. Avery, established Olympia's
first banking institution.
Mr.. Smith came to Hood River with
his family in '87. The family resided
in home erected in the Frankton dis
trict, about two miles west of the pres
ent site of Hood River. Except for
time when he was register of the
United States Land Office at The
Dalles, Mr.. Smith has made his home
here. In 1889 he was speaker of the
House of Representatives of the Ore
gon legislature. He developed one of
the first commercial orchards here, and
because of his interest in the predom-
inant fruit industry, he has become
known in other fruit communities as
Hood River" Smith. For many years
he was president of the Oregon Horti-
cultural Society.
Of all the incidents of former days,
Mr.. Smith prefers to talk of his per-
sonal contact with Abraham Lincoln.
No topic of conversation is more ap-
pealng to him than that dealing with
the Chicago Republican Convention,
from which today but single delegate
survives-Col. Sawyer, of Hyde's Park,
Vt.
81 can close my eyes now," says Mr..
Smith, land see the surging masses at
the Wigwam, built especially by the
enterprising Chicagoans for the great
event and with seating capacity for
Is, 900, just as plainly as on the day of
the nomination, and never shall | for
get that strange, prolonged shout of
human voices.
"At the time of the convention was
a student of Lombard University at
Galesburg, Ill. Some four or five of
us students, all admirers of Lincoln,
secured leave of absence that we
might attend the convention. Although
the city was overcowded we were for
tunate in getting accommodations at
the Randolph hotel but a short distance