Geo Roses' tribute to Oliver Crosby Gray Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by William S. Boggess ************************************************************************ USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. http://www.usgwarchives.net ************************************************************************ (transcribed: 02/13/06 by William S. Boggess--Naples,FL) Copy courtesy of Colby College, Waterville, Maine ---------------------- The Arkansas Democrat Little Rock, Arkansas Monday December 11, 1905 OLIVER CROSBY GRAY (1832ME-1905AR) ~~~~~~~~~~ Hon George B Roses' Tribute Hon George B Rose, the eminent counselor-at-law and litterature of Little Rock, who was a pupil of Col Gray in the historic St John's College, pays his memory the following beautiful tribute: The death of Col Gray has brought a pang of sorrow to countless hearts. He was so long and so honorably connected with the educational institutions of our state, he helped so many young men and women up the steep path of culture, that those who will mourn his loss as a personal grief are many indeed. Of all the benefactors of humanity, the great teacher, he who can inspire in the youth entrusted to his charge a true love of learning and high ideals of manhood and womanhood, is perhaps the greatest. To him the future owes a debit that it can never repay. His work rarely wins brilliant recognition, and its financial reward is usually meagre, often niggardly; but in the quiet of the school-room he is laying deep and strong the foundations of our country's greatness. The sphere of Col Gay's activity was often too narrow, but he was truly a great teacher. In his power to impart his knowledge and to make others understand, he had few equals. His favorite was mathematics, and no youth who has seen him explain a problem in geometry or trigonometry can ever forget it. In is hands it became as lucid as daylight, and the very dunce of the school was made to comprehend. But his extraordinary power exposition was not his greatest merit as a teacher. That lay in his faculty of interesting his scholars, of winning their affection and esteem, of inspiring noble ideals in their breasts. Countless are the young men and young women who sat at his feet in the course of his long and honorable career, and there was not one of them who was not elevated in spirit by his companionship and example. He was so strong, so healthy in body and mind, so noncrable[?] in his conduct, so sane and wholesome, so perfect a gentleman, that association with him was a constant incitement to higher and better thing. He was a splendid disciplinarian. His long and admirable service as an officer in our Civil war had made him every inch a soldier, not merely in appearance but in his comprehension of his importance of discipline and his power to enforce it. But at the same time he was never harsh, and he had a remarkable power of maintaining the strictest order yet inspiring feelings of personal affection in his scholars. Perhaps the time he has the best opportunity to show his capacity was when he was at the head of St John's College in this city; and the numerous men of our state who in the old days attended that institution all regarded him with a love and respect that were only strengthened with the passing of the years, and with a ripened experience that enabled them to appreciate even more fully the value of his services and magnitude of their debt to him. A military school, it gave him an opportunity to display his fine qualities as a soldier; and while he never forgot his dignity as commandant, he took a personal interest in each cadet, and bound them to him with hooks of steal, whose grip time only tightened. In this solemn hour when the guide and instructor of or youth lies cold in death many a strong heart is bowed with grief for his loss, and from every corner of our state there go forth blessings from grateful hearts. Though in order to maintain discipline over a crowd of turbulent youths it was necessary for him at times to show severity, his strongest feeling was ever one of loving kindness and as he mellowed by advancing years this trait in his character became even more conspicuous, and made him finally the ideal head of our Institution for the Blind. There, among those afflicted ones to whom God's most glorious gift is denied, whose days must be passed in a night that knows no dawn, he had the best possible opportunity to grow that noble humanity which was his highest crown; and there he did all that man could do to illumine the darkness that brooded over them and to cheer their gloom. Hard indeed, will it be to supply his place; hard to find one who will be so wise, so kind, so patient and so helpful in dealing with those sorely afflicted ones. It is love that begets love, and the reason that Col Gray inspired so strong an attachment in his pupils was that he felt for them a sincere affection which did not stop at the doors of the college, but which followed them out into the world, rejoicing in their success and grieving for their sins and errors. He was what every teacher ought to be and what so few are, a large hearted man and one who realized that the most essential factor in education is not mere instruction but the building of character, the making of noble men and women, pure in heart, healthy in mind and body, who will do well and conscientiously the task which their hands find to do. And Col Gray was not merely a great teacher; he was a model in every relation of life. Strong as was the feeling of kindness in his bosom, his sense of justice was equally strong. A man could not have been a better husband and father than he, a kinder neighbor, a truer friend. As a citizen he was patriotic, taking an active and intelligent interest in public affairs, and his voice was always on the side of justice, decency and truth. After a long,laborious and most useful life, a life full of kind and gentle deeds and animated by a noble ambition to benefit his fellow and especially the youth of the land, he has passed to his reward, and many are they who were arise and call him blest. ~~~~~~~<>~~~~~~~ George B Rose (1851-1943) s/o U M Rose, one of two Arkansans with statute in Capitol Building's, Statuary Hall, Washington D C, and as of 1881, of famed Rose Law Firm, Little Rock, oldest west of Mississippi River. See: http://www.rootsweb.com/~arpulask/Col.MrsOCGray.html