The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1925-02-17

Elihu Root At 80 Virile Patrician
Ripe In Wisdom, Unfailing in Powers
BY GEORGE BRITT
NEA Service Writer


born Feb. Is, 1S45, has reached his
eightieth birthday.
Eighty years old, to almost any
ones thinking, means feeble wreck,
rocking in front of the fire or doz-
ing in the sunshine, babbling Of
trivial memories, stated with life and
ready for the benediction.
But Mr.. Root still has not had
enough Of living. He races through
a crowded schedule which men 80
years younger might find overpower-
ipg.
He speaks from the knowledge of
his seasoned maturity when he ad-
vises:
"As men grow older and live less
exclusively in the future and meas
urably more in the past, they learn
what inestimable wealth has he who,
blessed by host of memories, pre-
serves the generous and noble stand
ards created in him without his
knowledge.
"There are millions of working
men with shorter hours and more
money who don't know what to do
with their time and are unhappy and
discontented, more so now than
when their hours were filled with
labor, because they have no capacity
for extracting happiness from their
surroundings. There are thousands
OF rich men who don't know what to
do with their riches, who found that
the chief effect of having so much
money is that their children are 60
ing to the devil because they never
acquired the capacity to extract hap
'piness from their surroundings eX-
cept through spending money"
Happiness is to be sought, he tells
one, through the spiritual re-en-
, thronement of those powers of civil
ization that depend upon what men
really are. upon the heart and soul
and character of men,"
Keeping busy seems to be his own
private formula for happiness. On
birthdays it is different. Then he
can be found usually in his library
of morning. taking a walk in the
afternoon and celebrating at little
dinner with his family in the eve
ming. If the day is stormy, he puts
on a heavy overcoat and walks any
how.
1t is a little more than 25 years
since he became President McKin-
ley's secretary of war, going, as he
says. "to perform a lawyers duty
lupon the call Of the greatest of all
our clients, the government Of our
country" He had then ahead of him
service as secretary of state and
Isenator, and a host. of. distinguished
accomplishments in and out Of office
All those things before 1916 when
he reached the limiting age of three
score years and ten! Since that age
however, he presided over the New
York constitutional convention, was
president Of the American Bar As
isociation, was special ambassador to
Russia, drafted the plan for the Per
manent Court of International JUS
,tice for the League of Nations, and
gave his active attention to dozens
,of organizations and movements as
president, director or trustee.
Blot out the mental picture of an
octogenarian and look at Elihu Root
as he may be seen some night of
every week and several nights on a
normal week.
A straight. shapely, vigorous, geni-
al patrician in evening clothes, he
sits ut the head Of a banquet table
! There is no senile fussiness over
the good food. no trembling of the
match as he>lights his long cigar, nc
, hands to the ear as he follows the
speakers, no implied begging of odds
on account of his year. There is a
delicacy in his features, accented by
the suggestion of "bangs" in his
! closccut. white-grav hair. but it is
the keen delicacy Of steel.
He speaks with fire and pointed
ness apd humor. He fences with the
toastmaster in extemporaneous quips
reminisces perhaps about what Doug
Fairbanks once said when they met
at the Hague, reveals speaking
knowledge of whatever is the occa.
sion of the meeting, be it medicine
art, education, sport or what not
In the end he. gets around to real
ideas of originality, depth and con-
sequence.
A year and half ago England
was eager for the honor of receiving
him as ambassador, not because of
! his age nor in spite Of it, but for
, the distinction and wisdom the years
had brought to this perennially Wig
orous spirit.
Such is the man today about whom,
President Roosevelt remarked years
ago. "The greatest man that has
arisen on either side of the Atlantic
in my lifetime"