USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Cambridge > Harvard College class of ninety-seven : fiftieth anniversary report, 1897 > Part 16
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On January 10, 1908, at Portland, Oregon, Davis married Mary Montague, now deceased. Their children were Malcolm Brooks, Jr., born September 10, 1909, and Montague, born January 8, 1911 (died February 5, 1911). Malcolm Brooks Davis, Jr., married Erika Wasserburger. Their child was named Malcolm Montague Davis.
+ ROBERT CHARLES DAVIS
R OBERT CHARLES DAVIS was born June 11, 1875, at Fall River, Massachusetts, where he attended the B. M. C. Durfee High School before going to Phillips Exeter Academy and subsequently to Harvard. His parents were Robert Thomson and Susan Anna (Haight) Davis. After taking an A.B. with the Class, he attended the Law School for three years and received an A.M. in 1900. He
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became a member of the firm of Jackson, Slade & Borden of Fall River, but left law practice in 1907 to devote himself to business matters and the handling of estates which had been placed in his hands.
He was president of the Fall River Country Club, the Fall River Chamber of Commerce, and the Fall River Anti-Tuberculosis Society. He served on the boards of the Fall River Children's Home and Boys' Club, was vice-president of the Stafford Mills, and was a director of the Wampanoag, Luther, and Cornell Manu- facturing Companies. During the first World War he was chair- man of the Fall River Public Safety Committee, a member of the Public Safety Committee of Massachusetts, chief of the Volunteer Division of the Fall River District of the U. S. Secret Service for Southeastern Massachusetts, including part of Rhode Island, and chief of the American Protective League for the same district. On September 10, 1900, at Fall River, he married Edith Braw, who died in 1922. He later moved to Providence, and in 1924 married Bertha Borden of Fall River, who survived him. He died on February 18, 1926, at Providence.
WALTER GEE DAVIS
D AVIS is still living in Cambridge, but told the Secretary that he has nothing to add to the last Report. After leaving college he became assistant cashier of the Cambridgeport Na- tional Bank and also wrote articles, correspondence, and editorials for financial publications. In 1905 he organized the Central Trust Company, which succeeded to the business of the Cambridge- port National Bank. There he filled the offices of secretary, treas- urer, and director. He was elected president of the Associated Savings Trust Companies of Massachusetts in 1911 and served on the legislative committee of that organization. In 1913-14 he was president of the Cambridge Board of Trade.
The son of Thomas Mason and Esther Maria (Gee) Davis, he was born in Cambridge on March 21, 1870. He prepared for Harvard at the Harvard Grammar School and through home study and was in college from 1893 to 1897. He received an LL.B. at
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Northeastern University in 1923. He married Lizzie Gertrude Cheney, January 27, 1891, in Cambridge.
+ JAMES DEAN
J AMES DEAN was born December 17, 1876, at Lowell, Massachu- setts, the son of Benjamin Chase and Emily Steer (Evans) Dean. He died March 1, 1942, at his home in Brookline. Coming to Harvard from St. Paul's School, he played on the freshman football eleven, captained the varsity baseball team, and was on the staff of the Crimson. After graduation he entered the stock brokerage office of F. S. Mead & Company, Boston, which he left after six months to form a small real estate and insurance business of his own. In 1900 he entered the Boston office of Vermilye & Company as bond salesman, a business which proved more to his liking. With the dissolution of this firm in 1905, he became manager of the Boston office of William A. Read & Com- pany, later Dillon, Read & Company, into which he was admitted as a partner in 1909. He retired from commercial business in 1924, but remained very active in the financial world.
He was treasurer of Wellesley College for seventeen years and held several offices, among them chairmanship of the board of directors, in the Boston Safe Deposit and Trust Company. He was at one time president of the Boston Stock Exchange and was treasurer of the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary. He was also a director of the New England Mutual Life Insurance Com- pany and the Brookline Trust Company, a trustee and member of the finance committee of the Brookline Savings Bank, treasurer of trustees of the Fund for the Defenders of Public Safety ( started at the time of the Boston Police Strike ), trustee of Northeastern University, and trustee of several private trusts. He found time from his business activities for a full social life. An ardent sports- man, he was particularly fond of cruising. The tributes paid him on his death reveal the deep regard in which he was held by his associates and friends, a regard founded not only on respect for his great business ability but also on real affection. This same
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affection and loyalty his classmates gave him throughout the years in Cambridge and up to his death.
On April 17, 1907, at Brookline, he married Agnes Williams Lincoln, who, with three children - James, Jr., born February 6, 1908; Dorothea, born April 26, 1913; and Philip, born April 27, 1915 - survived him.
KARL DE LAITTRE
I WISH to express here my appreciation to those classmates living near Cambridge," writes de Laittre, "for the painstaking work they have done during the last fifty years in keeping track of such a variegated and far-flung lot of classmates. This is one of the liabilities, amidst the many assets, of living near the good old University.
"A big factor in my four years in college was that, in order to go to Harvard from the East Minneapolis High School on short notice, I entered the Lawrence Scientific School as a special stu- dent, thanks to the sympathetic interest of its dean, Nathaniel Shaler. In order to graduate, I was obliged to give up one full course each of my four years in place of entrance examinations, in addition to other examinations I passed after remaining in Cambridge an extra month after my sophomore year. This, of course, kept me rather busy, and although my marks were not up to the honor grade, I have always been glad to have covered so much ground. I wish I could go back now for more - maybe sometime!
"Within a fortnight after entering the Scientific School, I at- tended several classes in the College as an observer. I was so interested in such men as Charles Eliot Norton, Albert Bushnell Hart, Taussig, Royce and 'Copey' that I soon changed over to the College so far as my work was concerned, reducing my classes in science principally to geology. This almost caused me to become a resident of Cambridge, as it was suggested that I remain there, in that department, after graduation. Geology proved useful to me later as the Bovey-DeLaittre Lumber Company, of which I
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am now president, is the fee owner of some operating iron prop- erties on the Mesabi Range.
"From Bloody Monday until graduation, my college work and experiences were happy. I enjoyed the work in the annual the- atricals given by the Pi Eta Society. The 'Pop' concerts were one of my hobbies. The Metropolitan Opera Company, when they appeared annually in Mechanics Hall, allowed a number of stu- dents, upon payment of $1, to serve as 'supers.' I signed up for Carmen, a part which was sung by Emma Calve, greatest of all Carmens. While I, as one of the chorus, was resting on a stage boulder I found that Emma Calve was seated on the same 'prop.' As a result of this I was so enthusiastic that I signed up for Aida which ended my enthusiasm as I was smeared with black make-up and carried a spear as one of the Ethiopian chorus.
"To balance such experiences, I helped organize, as secretary, the Harvard Republican Club, which came to a grand finale with a parade which was reviewed by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge from the balcony of his home in Boston. The members of our club, having made a good showing, were all invited to the in- auguration in Washington. I attended this without permission from University 5, and tasted a stern rebuke from the Dean's Office when I returned, but I managed to survive.
"With walks on Sundays through the interesting country and towns near Cambridge, rowing on the Charles and canoeing at Riverside, geologizing in the Middlesex Fells, a spring recess in the home of a former sea captain at Provincetown, bicycle trips in the Conway District of New Hampshire, the home town of my mother, a trip to the Frenchman's Bay country in Maine, the birthplace of my father and the landing place of his ancestors, delightful walks along the coast of Marblehead, and finally marrying in Salem - all these made me think that there were real values for those students coming from a distance in not having nearby homes for their week-ends. All this made me feel that there will always be a New England with its gleaming white churches on guard, and that it will have many more golden ages.
My experience in business affairs has been varied. I began with two years' work on coal dock construction at Duluth, then
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some time in the lumber business and a year cruising and buying timber on the Pacific Coast. Later I entered the wholesale grocery business. For many years I have been a trustee of the Farmers & Mechanics Savings Bank, of which my father was at one time president, and my son, John, '29, LL.B. '33, is now one of the vice-presidents. I am a director of the Northwestern Bell Tele- phone Company as well as some other corporations. I was elected to the State Legislature in 1904 and directly afterwards was elected to fill an unexpired term as an alderman of Minneapolis and served a second term. During this seven-year period I was chairman of the Ways and Means Committee and president of the City Council for one term.
"Someone put the question to me recently as to what was the most exciting work I had ever done. My reply was the work as director of the Bureau of Research and Statistics of the War Trade Board during the first World War. This was under the guidance of my good and inspiring friend, the late Edwin F. Gay, an outstanding member of the War Trade Board and formerly organizer and dean of the Harvard School of Business Adminis- tration.
"For many years civic affairs were very interesting to me and claimed a good part of my time. Prior to World War I, I organized the Red Cross Chapter in Minneapolis and remained as its chair- man until I went to Washington in March, 1917, to serve on the Shipping Board and later on the War Trade Board. I was asso- ciated with the Minneapolis Civic and Commerce Association from its inception, and for a period of fifteen years served as a director, vice-president, or president. Later, I became a director of the United States Chamber of Commerce and a vice-president representing the Northwest District.
"If you are ever in the other corner of this grand country of ours, remember that our winter home is now at Smoke Tree Ranch, about three miles east of Palm Springs, California, where YOU are welcome."
De Laittre was born June 23, 1874, at Minneapolis, Minnesota, the son of John and Clarissa Towle (Eastman) de Laittre. As an undergraduate he attended the Congregational Church and
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Wayzata Community Church. He married Rosamond Kimball Little, November 22, 1906, at Salem, Massachusetts. They had four children: John, born September 7, 1907; Karl, Jr., born July 11, 1909 (died August 22, 1939); Eleanor, born April 3, 1911; and Rosamond, born December 9, 1918. There are four grand- children, three girls and one boy. During World War II, de Laittre's son, John, served as assistant director of foreign affairs for the American National Red Cross in Washington, D. C.
De Laittre's clubs are the Minneapolis Club, Beaver Bay Club, Beaver Bay, Minnesota, Rotary Club of Minnesota, Woodhill Club, Wayzata, Minnesota, Harvard Clubs of Minnesota and New York, Tennis Club and Racquet Club of Palm Springs, Cali- fornia, and Lafayette Club, Minnetonka Beach, Minnesota.
STEPHEN DOUGLAS DEMMON
I AM a pure and unadulterated, unadjectived follower of the Gettysburg philosophy of Democracy," writes Demmon.
"My forebears settled in Connecticut in 1641 and later in Ver- mont. After several generations, they came to the Middle West when St. Paul was known as Carver's Cavern Fur Station and Madison, Wisconsin, was Four Lakes Fur Station.
"They later operated stage lines in the Middle West when travelers thought this section should be returned to the Indians as worthless."
Demmon, the son of John Farnsworth and Elizabeth (Van Patten) Demmon, was born September 3, 1872, at Fair Haven, Illinois. He was privately prepared for college. As a special stu- dent he was with our Class during freshman year only.
He married Tessa Regal, December 18, 1898, at Ann Arbor, Michigan. She has since died. Their children are: Theodore, born February 20, 1901; Rose Eleanor, born June 6, 1903; and Stephen, born October 12, 1905. There are three grandchildren.
Demmon is a member of the Catholic Church. After leaving college, he was a cattle rancher in Wyoming.
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+ WILLIAM JAMES DENHOLM
W ILLIAM JAMES DENHOLM, one of the outstanding track men of the Class, died November 17, 1928, at Worcester, Massa- chusetts. He was born there April 24, 1873, the son of William Alexander and Grace (McLay) Denholm, and prepared for col- lege at the Worcester High School and Dalzell's School in that city. After graduation, he entered the employ of Norcross Brothers Company, one of the great building and construction companies in the country, and was its vice-president from 1901 to 1917. He then left his official position in the company, while re- taining a financial interest in it. Thereafter ill health limited his active participation in business, but he remained affiliated with it, giving expert advice on construction enterprises. He was at one time vice-president of the National Sales Machine Company.
On April 11, 1898, at Worcester, he married Mabel Ellen Nor- cross, who, with their daughter, Margaret (Mrs. William Ellery Bright, Jr.), born April 17, 1909, and two grandchildren, survived him. A son, Alexander Norcross, born February 12, 1903, died October 12, 1903.
WILLIAM CULLEN DENNIS
I HAVE had a happy, a very happy life, for which I try to render thanks to the giver of all good things," writes Dennis.
"I have loved and still love the out-of-doors. Tennis, canoeing, mountain climbing and, in later years, horseback riding and farm- ing have helped me mentally and spiritually as well as physically. I have never done any spectacular climbing, but I have climbed persistently and joyously whenever I could make an opportunity wherever I have been - in the Adirondacks, the Blue Ridge, the Appalachians, the Great Smokies, the Colorado and Arizona Rockies, and the California Coast range in this country. In Eu- rope climbs in the Hartz Mountains, the Alps, the Dolomites, and on Vesuvius have enriched my life. In China I climbed Tai Shan, the sacred mountain of Confucius in Shantung, and spent my week-ends for two summers climbing on the Western Hills near
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Peking. My observation has been that in the Alps one often gives a guide fifty or one hundred francs to lead on what may well be a very conventional, even if delightful, excursion, while in the Western Hills in China, one gives a coolie fifty cents in silver to lead one on what may be a thrilling experience.
"As to my 'religious and philosophical opinions,' they are, I hope, quite widely held and, therefore, commonplace. My fifty years since graduation have left me with an abiding faith that the universe is not the product of chance but of beneficent design; that the important things in life cannot be discovered by the five senses, but are intangible and spiritual; that life's 'durable satis- factions' are the good we do to others and the friends we make and the days we spend in God's great out-of-doors.
"If you had asked me only 'of what I was most proud,' I should have answered without hesitation: 'My wife and family.' Since you interpolated the word 'modestly' before proud, I mention two things:
"First, a forty-minute argument before the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Liang Sung Wan vs. United States (1924) 266 W.S. p. 1 at p. 2 which helped to secure a decision which eventually freed a well-nigh friendless and penniless Chi- nese student who had lain in jail for seven years under sentence of death, and struck a powerful blow at the 'third degree' in Ameri- can law and police practice.
"Second, a citation presented to me by the Board of Trustees of Earlham College in making me president emeritus of the College on my retirement last July, after seventeen years' service, to re- enter the practice of law with my son.
"But I am looking to the future, not the past for myself and for all of us. Some work of noble note may yet be done."
Dennis, the son of David Worth Dennis (Earlham College, '73), and Martha Ann Curl (Indiana State Normal School), was born December 22, 1879, at Richmond, Indiana. He attended the Gym- nasium in Bonn, Germany, and Edinburgh Royal High School in Scotland before entering Earlham College, from which he received an A.B. in 1896. He took an A.B. with our Class, an A.M. in 1898, and an LL.B. cum laude, in 1901. An LL.D. was conferred upon
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him by Earlham College in 1911, by DePauw University in 1937, by Indiana University in 1939, by Wabash College in 1940, and by Butler University in 1942. He married Agnes Kirtland Barker, July 28, 1909, at Washington, D.C. Their children are: David Worth, LL.B. '36, born June 7, 1912; and Catherine Emeline (Mrs. Allan L. Grafflin), born June 29, 1914. There are three grandchildren, Mary Douglas Grafflin, William Cullen Dennis, 2d, and Dennis Grafflin.
"I could have entered the Harvard Graduate School as a grad- uate of Earlham," Dennis writes, "but I wished to obtain a regular Harvard degree. I was admitted to Harvard in the fall of 1896 as a member of the junior class (the Class of '98) upon the under- standing that if I took five approved courses during the year with an average grade of B, I would be promoted to the senior class (1897) and graduate with that class. I received three A's and two B's and, therefore, was admitted to the class of 1897, but only a few days before Commencement. It has always been a matter of real regret to me that my association with my Harvard Class of 1897 was necessarily so brief, although I had, of course, made the acquaintance of some men in the Class during the year I spent at Harvard as a member of '98. I entered the Harvard Graduate School in the fall of '97, took my A.M. in 1898, and represented the Graduate School on the Commencement program in 1898.
"In World War I, I was legal adviser to the government of China. I regard this as a war-time activity because I was recom- mended for the appointment by the U.S. minister to China be- cause of my supposed qualifications for advising the government of China in matters of international law, and the term of my ap- pointment, two years, was estimated to cover the remaining dura- tion of the war and the probable time to be consumed in the peace negotiations. My acceptance of the appointment was informally approved by the Secretary of State of the United States.
"In World War II, my son, David Worth Dennis, 2d, submitted to voluntary induction and served for about two years as private and private first class, in the Air Corps; private, first class, in the Infantry; student in the Judge Advocate General's School at Ann Arbor, and second and first lieutenant in the Judge Advocate Gen-
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eral's Department of the Army of the United States. The last year of his service was spent in the Philippines and Okinawa.
"During World War II, I was a member of the Alien Enemy Hearing Board for the Southern District of Indiana. This appoint- ment was made by the Attorney General of the United States. No compensation was received by members of the board aside from their expenses.
"My really important war-time service, if any, was as head of a small, liberal arts, co-educational, Friends ( Quaker) college which did its bit for the government by giving between six hundred and seven hundred of its graduates or students to the armed forces of the United States or to 'work of national importance' (in the ratio of about thirteen to the armed forces to one to service of national importance with the Civilian Public Service ) and at the same time kept its doors open to all young men and women who were able to enter and to remain in college, including loyal Nisei students (American students of Japanese ancestry). It is my belief that no college was more loyal or more free, and it balanced its budget.
"My wife's 'war-time activities' were unofficial, but, to my mind, no less important. My daughter's husband, Dr. Allan L. Grafflin, assistant professor in the Harvard Medical School, volunteered for medical service with one of the Harvard Medical Units and served for forty-two months in the South Pacific as major and lieutenant colonel, being promoted to colonel on his return. My daughter and granddaughter made their home with us during his absence. My son's wife and son made their home with us. My wife man- aged our three-family home in a way which meant efficiency and happiness for all members of the families. To my mind it was as great a war-time service as that of any man in her family."
For the year 1901-1902 Dennis was secretary of the Lake Mohonk Conference on International Arbitration at Mohonk Lake, New York. He has been instructor, assistant professor, adjunct professor, or professor of law at the University of Illinois, Stan- ford University, Columbia University Law School, and George Washington University. In 1906 he became an assistant solicitor for the Department of State, and in 1910 was appointed agent of the United States in the United States and Venezuela Arbitration
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before the Hague Court. During the following year he was agent of the United States in Chamizal Arbitration with Mexico before the Mexican-American Boundary Commission at El Paso, Texas.
From 1911 to 1914 he served as secretary to Chief Justice White in his capacity as sole arbitrator in Costa Rica-Panama Arbitration in Washington, D. C. He was for six years engaged in the private practice of law, specializing in international law in Washington, D. C.
In 1920, after serving for two years as legal adviser to the Chinese government at Peking, he was made a special counsel to the Department of State in the Preliminary Conference on Com- munications at Washington, D. C. He later acted as agent of the United States in the United States-Norway Arbitration before the Hague Court, as counsel for the United States in British-American Claims Commission in London, England, as general legal adviser to the American members of the Plebicitary and Boundary Com- missions in Tacna-Arica Arbitration between Peru and Chile.
From 1920 to 1929 he was again engaged in law practice in Washington, D. C. In the latter year he was elected president of Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, and served until 1946, when he became president emeritus. At present he holds the posi- tion of professor of political science at Earlham College and serves as its counsel. He is practising law with his son, David, former prosecutor of Wayne County, Indiana.
In addition to the above-named offices, Dennis has served as a trustee of Bryn Mawr College from 1912 to 1929, and has been a member of the Board of Education of Five Years' Meeting of Friends since 1929, and a trustee of the Five Years' Meeting of Friends since 1940.
He is the author of numerous legal articles, editorials, book re- views, and the like which have appeared in the American Journal of International Law, the Columbia Law Review, the American Law Register, and other legal periodicals. Many of his addresses have been reported in the press, and the "Case," "Counter-case," and "Argument" of the United States in various international ar- bitrations have been published by the government.
Dennis was awarded the Order of the Golden Grain, second
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class, and second class with the broad ribbon, by the First Chinese Republic. He is an honorary member of Phi Beta Kappa, Phi Delta Phi, and Theta Kappa Nu. He is a member of the American So- ciety of International Law and served as its corresponding secre- tary from 1924 to 1928. He has also served as its vice-president and has been an honorary vice-president since 1946. He is a mem- ber of the Board of Editors of the American Journal of Interna- tional Law and has been an honorary member of the Board since 1946. He has done research on international law for Harvard and is a member of the American Bar Association, Indiana Bar Asso- ciation, and Wayne County Bar Association.
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