William T. Francis, at Home and Abroad
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RAMSEY COUNTY Primitive Simplicity and Great Truths: Peoples Church, the Reverend Samuel G. Smith, and St. Paul HıstoryA Publication of the Ramsey County Historical Society Philip J. Ramstad Winter 2017 Volume 51, Number 4 —Page 13 William T. Francis, at Home and Abroad Paul D. Nelson, page 3 The monument for the Francis family in Greenwood Cemetery, Nashville, Tennessee. In the left foreground is the grave marker for William T. (1870–1929) and on the right is the marker for Nellie G. (1874–1969). Photo by Robert Orr Jr. RAMSEY COUNTY HISTORY RAMSEY COUNTY President Chad Roberts Founding Editor (1964–2006) Virginia Brainard Kunz Editor Hıstory John M. Lindley Volume 51, Number 4 Winter 2017 RAMSEY COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY THE MISSION STATEMENT OF THE RAMSEY COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY BOARD OF DIRECTORS ADOPTED BY THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS ON JANUARY 25, 2016: James Miller Preserving our past, informing our present, inspiring our future Chair Jo Anne Driscoll First Vice Chair Carl Kuhrmeyer C O N T E N T S Second Vice Chair Susan McNeely 3 William T. Francis, at Home and Abroad Secretary Kenneth H. Johnson Paul D. Nelson Treasurer William B. Frels 13 Primitive Simplicity and Great Truths: Immediate Past Chair Peoples Church, the Reverend Samuel G. Smith, Anne Cowie, Cheryl Dickson, Mari Oyanagi and St. Paul Eggum, Thomas Fabel, Martin Fallon, John Guthmann, Richard B. Heydinger, Jr., Philip J. Ramstad Janine Joseph, Sandy Kiernat, Judy Kishel, David Kristal, Robert W. Mairs, Jeffry 20 “The West Point of the Sky” Martin, Father Kevin M. McDonough, Nancy W. The U.S. Army’s Air Service Mechanics School McKillips, Lisa Dickinson Michaux, in St. Paul’s Midway, 1917–1918 Jonathan H. Morgan, Robert Muschewske, Chad Roberts, Roxanne Sands, James A. Roger Bergerson Stolpestad, Susan Vento, Jerry Woelfel. EDITORIAL BOARD 27 Book Review Anne Cowie, chair, James B. Bell, Thomas H. Boyd, John Diers, Martin Fallon, John Publication of Ramsey County History is supported in part by a gift from Guthmann, Lisa L. Heinrich, John M. Lindley, Clara M. Claussen and Frieda H. Claussen in memory of Henry H. Cowie Jr. Greg Mackey, James Miller, John Milton, and by a contribution from the late Reuel D. Harmon Laurie M. Murphy, Robert Muschewske, Paul D. Nelson, Jay Pfaender, David Riehle, Chad Roberts, Steve Trimble, Mary Lethert Wingerd. HONORARY ADVISORY BOARD William Fallon, William Finney, George A Message from the Editorial Board Latimer, Joseph S. Micallef, Marvin J. Pertzik, James Reagan. amsey County history has yielded some fascinating lives, and in this issue RAMSEY COUNTY COMMISSIONERS R Paul Nelson looks closely at one: William T. Francis. Francis, a pioneering Commissioner Victoria Reinhardt, chair Commissioner Toni Carter African American lawyer, had a successful career in St. Paul before he departed Commissioner Blake Huffman as consul to Liberia in 1927. While there, he investigated conditions of forced Commissioner Jim McDonough Commissioner Mary Jo McGuire labor before he died tragically of yellow fever. His wife, Nellie, once spoke at Commissioner Rafael Ortega the Peoples Church, a monumental landmark near the Cathedral of St. Paul that Commissioner Janice Rettman is now gone, is the focus of another article here. Philip J. Ramstad traces the Julie Kleinschmidt, manager, Ramsey County history of that congregation, which welcomed other speakers as well-known as Ramsey County History is published quarterly Mark Twain and Winston Churchill. On the other side of the city, the former by the Ramsey County Historical Society, 323 Willys-Overland building at present-day Highway 280 and University Avenue Landmark Center, 75 W. Fifth Street, St. Paul, MN 55102 (651-222-0701). Printed in U.S.A. Copy- housed a massive training program for the army’s air service mechanics during right © 2017, Ramsey County His torical So ciety. World War I. Roger Bergerson details the operation that taught 3,000 students ISSN Number 0485-9758. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reprinted before it shut down after the Armistice. Finally, as a reminder, because RCHS or otherwise reproduced without written has now moved to a different fiscal year, its Annual Report will be included in permission from the publisher. The Society the upcoming Summer 2017 issue. assumes no responsibility for statements made by contributors. Fax 651-223-8539; e-mail address: Anne Cowie [email protected]; web site address: www.rchs.com Chair, Editorial Board 2 RAMSEY COUNTY HISTORY William T. Francis, at Home and Abroad Paul D. Nelson ragic is an overused word, but it applies to the life of St. Paul lawyer William T. Francis. He was born with talent, ambition, a mother’s love, Tand not much else. Ability and ambition drove him to an improbable position, U.S. Minister to Liberia, just at the moment when Liberia became important. Here’s the tragedy: Achieving the diplomatic post he had pursued for so long cost him his life. William Trevane Francis was born in Christmas event (and there was more.)4 Indianapolis on April 26, 1869, to Hattie He was slim and handsome; he sang, and James Francis. When he came to danced, went to church, and had a good St. Paul, probably 1887, his father was job: a golden young man. gone.1 What became of James Francis, While the William T. Francis story is and why his wife and son came to St. a tragedy, it is a love story too. One of Paul, are unknown. If Billy Francis fi n- the guests at that birthday party in April ished high school, which is uncertain, he 1887 was Nellie Griswold, age 13 or 14. did so in Indianapolis. She was there to hear the Little Four in St. Paul in the 1880s was just be- October too—the event took place at her ginning its boom as a railroad town. In house. A sentimental historian would call ten years, 1880 to 1890, its population these meetings fate. grew from 41,000 to 133,000. Its eth- Nellie matched Billy in just about nic base was Yankee, then German, then every way. She was pretty, musical, The earliest-known image of William T. Irish, and the boom brought thousands and smart. Nellie was the only African Francis. Though fi rst published in 1903, this image, of a very young Francis, is certainly of Scandinavians. Billy Francis’s ethnic American graduate of the St. Paul high much older. Appeal, May 2, 1903, p. 3. community, African Americans, com- school in 1891. Both the Pioneer Press prised a village within the city, by 1890 and Dispatch rated her graduation about 1,500 mostly laboring people.2 speech, “The Race Problem,” the fi nest be hid,” observed the Appeal, which pre- Francis got his fi rst job as a messen- of eight. dicted for Miss Griswold “a notable, bril- ger for the Northern Pacifi c railroad. He “I fail to see,” she said, “whence the liant career ere life’s fi tful dream is o’er.” moved up to offi ce boy, then stenogra- American derives that feeling of supe- Both predictions—brilliant career and fi t- pher in the legal department. This was riority, which prompts him to refuse ful dream—proved true.5 a very good job at the time for a black the Negro the panoply of citizenship The many theatrical and musical per- man in Minnesota, and there he stayed equal to his own.” She argued that it formances at the church Billy and Nellie throughout the 1890s.3 had taken the Anglo-Saxon a thousand shared, Pilgrim Baptist, thrust them to- Meanwhile, Francis matched his busi- years to rise from Norman slave to mod- gether time after time. When he played ness success with social success. The ern Englishman, but the black American the prince in “The Magic Mirror,” she life of polite St. Paul African American had made the same progress in just the played the bride. When in September society in that era was chronicled obses- twenty-eight years since Emancipation. of 1892 he starred in a comedy called sively by the Appeal weekly newspaper. America’s real “race problem” was white “Betsy Baker,” Nellie was his co-star. Francis makes his fi rst appearance there America’s misperception of the black They married on August 14, 1893.6 in April of 1887, at a birthday party. In man as dangerous and somehow “other.” For the next quarter century St. Paul October he sang at a young people’s “He aims no deadly blows at the welfare black society revolved substantially, party in a quartet called the Little Four. of our government. He is no anarchist, though not exclusively, around Nellie Over the next few years, Billy Francis no socialist, but thoroughly American, and Billy Francis. They sang, sometimes acted in a comedy, sang in an Irish trio patriotic and law-abiding.” together, sometimes separately, in count- and a Mozart quartet, played a nobleman She made this speech at St. Paul’s fi n- less musical events; they hosted parties disguised as a peddler in The Gypsies’ est performance venue, the vast and beau- and dances; they gave speeches, they Festival, starred as Knight Francis tiful sanctuary of Peoples Church. The au- served on committees, they convened William in a play called “The Magic dience of thousands responded with loud clubs. Only childlessness marred their Mirror,” and danced the schottische at a applause. “[A] light set upon a hill cannot perfection.7 RAMSEY COUNTY HISTORY 3 As William T. Francis reached age 30 Washington man, and a more conven- the ambition that would one day propel tional thinker than McGhee had been. him to his death reared up.