Arizona republican., 1921-09-12

l. III bf VI ilth E0 O61 Hb | AS LOSS TO NATION.
 An account of the tribute paid Col. Epes Randolph, president of the Ari-
 zona Eastern and Southern Pacific of
 Mexico railroads, who died recently at his home in Tucson, throughout Mexico as well as in Arizona, and of the regret universally expressed >on his death. was given by A. H. Lyon. editor of the Tucson Citizen, in that newspaper Friday afternoon. It fol- lows:
 Tucson has been so long accus- toned to the affability, the geniality, the bonhomie of Colonel Epes Ran dolph that the mourning in this city has been more the mourning for the loss of friend, the loss a first citi- zen. than thus far it has been for the loss of one of the great leaders of his day.
 Without detracting from that sense of personal deprivation, without seeking to obscure in any way the admirable grief which animates all of Arizona, where. Colonel Randolph lived and wrought as a simple man among his fellows, there is a larger and a broader deprivation in his sud- den passing which ought not go un- chronicled.
 Contiguity between Arizona and 1 Sonora, habkual contemplation of the relations between the states on the two sides of the border, have somewhat served to glaze over the international character of those l things which have had to do jointly with them. In some such fashion | the work of Colonel Randolph in the amaigation of the Sud Pacifico and his sterling direction of it through the years of travail which have been spun through the hour glass these past 10 years has come to appear as one of those things, big 1t is true, unique it is true, but none the less
 more a result of hard work rather than of vision which a country, still hardly out of it's pioneer swaddling
 clothes views with serenity and with out a thrill.
 But something more than a great citizen has gone, something more than a great constructor of railroads, something more than a great trans portation executive, something more than the chief dreamer of the great
 line which was one day to have con- nected San Francisco with Mexico City in one long rib of steel.
 Before discussing the larger aspect l of a real calamity we may pause moment to say that the great drama of Colonel Randolphs earlier years was the completion of the Sud 1 Pacifico to the point where 1t would connect with the main line into Qua dalajara. That road is now a few kilometers soutr of Roseta in the state of Nayarit and there is no I doubt that it will be extended into | Topic some time this winter. There | the consummated plans end. When l they will go through the fastnesses of the Barancas over to Guadalajara,
 now Omnipotence only knows.
 l But those plans, their present con- l struction and the things their reali- 1 zation was to do for two nations are
 not quite appreciated in Tucson. The l enlarged and completed Sud Pacifico was to be the bridegroom's ring I which would unite the destinies of l the southwest of the United States and the west coast of Mexico in an l indissoluble bond.
 l The writer was in the City of Mex I leo when intelligence reached George l Jackson, the agent of the Sud Paci- l fico there, of the death of Colonel l Randolph. It would be understanding I it to say that there was any less sense of grief there than there was in l Tucson. That day he talked with l former President de la Huerta, now the secretary of hacienda. and the
 coming statesman of the republici he 1 talked with other public officials in | the national palace and, in every in- terview, the first thing that was mentioned by these leaders of Mexico
 was their poignant regret at the sad news.
 They were not chary of comment l They frankly said that in an era
 when rejuvenating Mexico was hop 1 ing for a better understanding with | the United States, they had relied much on the charity. the benignity I and the understanding of the Tucson railroad chieftain. Bear in mind that 1 the government of Mexico is today | Sonoran government. The president. 1 the secretary of war, the secretary of I hacienda, the comptroller general, the l chief justice of the supreme court are l from Sonora. They knew the colonel. l They loved him. They trusted him. 1 They knew that he loved Mexico and sympathized with Mexico They knew I that his great brain and his great heart, his ability to construct. his | genius as an empire builder were all devoted to the development of their wonderful possibilities and that l whenever the day came that his hand
 and influence could be lifted to help l them, it would not hesitate. = So that, what to Tucson i l per- l sonal bereavement, what to the pub-l l lie affairs of Arizona, her transpor- tation, her university, her Masonry, her better things in every walk of | life, is a great loss. is mourned by l the whole nation of Mexico. From
 Hermosillo to Campeche, from Ma
 zatlan to Tampico, Colonel Randolph 1 was known as the friend of Mexico. l The writer came back to Tucson by l way of the west coast. Everywhere they still talked of their great loss. 1 Carruaje drivers, hotel men, the we'll l to-do Mexicans who travel in Pull mans, young college men back from | the states, students of agriculture
 and dairying, anxious to take into their states the improved American I methods for rebuilding the country. so soon as in the course of converse
 tion they found the writer was from i Tucson, hastened to express thescom- l mon thought that the entire republic
 of Mexico had lost mighty influence | and support
 It would be unfair D the memory 1 of one so directly affecting the per
 sonal habit of thought of so many l people in Arizona not to voice the l fact that his death has had more than 1 local depressive effect, that his is I not a Tucson loss. is not a state loss. l is not loss to the great system of
 which he was one of the greatest | parts, but that 1t is a loss that is re- l garded by a great nation as one that 1 is we'll nigh irreparable.
 They say that republics are un-