The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1918-07-31
How David j. Lewis Schooled Him.
self and Became One Of the
country's Great
Men.
ELECTED TO CONGRESS
Four Years Study of Law and Latin
Brought Results to Boy Who
Began Work at
Seven.

| UNITED Press Leased Wire Service
WASHINGTON, July Shorty
! nine years old, unusually small IN
stature, energetic, optimistic, un-
schooled. former coal miner, lawyer
and politician-that's David j. Lewis,
who at midnight tonight assumes the
responsibility of administering the
great wire systems of the country
under government control.
His life, now crowned with one OF
the greatest tasks Of our government
has been, for the most part, one OF
toll. He learned the point OF view
of labor when for fourteen years ne
mined COAL He learned the wire
business from the ground up by
studying it for many years. To-day
he is charged with applying his
knowledge of the worker to his views
on wire operation, to develop an
efficient system that will bring about
the realization Of his government
wire-control dreams.
Lewis, at the age of seven, went
to work in a coal mine in Clearfield
county, Pennsylvania, his birthplace.
His parents, Welsh immigrants,
were poor and needed his help, SO
he shouldered pick and shovel-littlle
ones his father made for him-and
marched to work with his father.
After four years at this he ran
away from home, his mother having
died. He became breaker boy at an
thracite mines and at the age of six
teen contract miner, the youngest
in the district.
When he was twenty he was work
ing in fire cay mines at Mount Saw
age, Md.
1t was a newspaper man who then
stepped in and changed his career.
Lewis was a fluent speaker, a thing
he learned from his father, who had
been a Welsh Baptist preacher.
He went to Cumberland as a labor
delegate, and after speaking there a
newspaper man said to him:
You should be a lawyer, and not
coal MINER"
The idea appealed to the young
man and he was introduced to B. A.
Richmond, lawyer, who gave him
copy of Blackstone. He read the
500 pages in week. But 1t took
only minute to convince him he
knew little. He could read, but not
write, and Of Latin he knew nothing.
So he started the study of Latin and
of law and kept at it day and night
for four years. Then he was admit.
ted to the bar, and, with little money
and few friends, began practice at
umberland.
His studies led him into the fieio
of economics and he read every book
he could lay hands on. When the
fight against the railroads was under
way in the '90s he prepared a briei
| in favor of naturalization which
went through thirty-three editions.
hltnon hut oh O.
ed his views and joined the demo
Gratis, then in a minority.
| In 1908 he was nominated for con
| gress as "forlorn hope" and ran
against his law partner. He put III
such a spirited campaign that his
election followed in the next cam
paign.
One of the biggest jobs he did ir
congress was in connection with the
parcels post law.
Friends say he read every Bit o.
literature available in all languages
Finding fundamental, theories lack
! ing, he evolved his own from the
mass OF data he collected.
Then he started intensive study o.
wires, subject that had previously
interested him, and for two year:
read and studied the ex2erien - O.
AZ Tie elIu vi tlldl lie
believed he had learned all he coulc
of the subject and began his figh-
in congress for federal control
Wires, he said-and still believes
are a natural monopoly and shoulc
not be in private hands. He though
the house was willing to adop hi:
ideas, so ran for the senate in the
hope he might convert tina. body
But he was defeated and later wa
appointed to the tariff commission b,
President Wilson.
When the government recently as
sumed control, Lewis doomed as the
man best acquainted with the qucs
ton which arose, and his selec, or
was inevitable.