f AN INDEPENDENT PUBLICATION FOUNDED 1878 In this issue: Presenting Francis A. Davis, Virginia's State Highway Commissioner A Tribute to the Pioneer Spirit of Clinch Valley College J AVIKS M( )\R( )!•: Virginia Business Review Know Your Virginians-Part I of a two-part editorial on the occasion of James Monroe's Bicentennial FIFTY CENTS MARCH 1958 LAKEWOOD TRUCK CENTER Perfect Balance Essoflci'l Service—R(">i;iiii;inl SMALL enough to give prompt personalized service. Gas—Grease—Oil—Tires—Batteries BIG enough to supply technical "know how" "We Doze but Never Close" and assured supply. LEADING Independent Virginia Supplier of Kerosene, So. Boston Rd.. Rt. 58 No. 2, No. 4, No. 5 and No. 6 Fuel Oil. „. Swift 2-7752 S«ift 2-2088 PETROLEUM MARKETERS, INC. 5 miles east of p. O. Box 1656, Richmond. Virffinia. Phone Mlhon 8-7281 DANVILLE. VIRGINIA R. G. ROOP, President H. GODWIN JONES, Vice President LUCIUS F. GARY. JR., Vice President and Sales Manager New RCA Victor Recorder-"Victrola"® Stereotape Player. Combines Stereophonic Sound with High Fidelity! Lets you moke home tope recordings, too. Master unit includes tape trans• port, recorder, amplifiers and 3 speakers; 3 speakers in other unit. Matching cabinets in mahogany finish; also available in oak, maple or black mink finishes. Model STR66. Both units complete. 84.35.00 RCA trademark for record and tape players Sec Your Local RCA VICTOR Dealer "Slow Down and Live" CL T RATE WINDOW CLEANING CO. F. W. BUCKLEY, Maium.-, WINDOW CLEANING CONTRACTOR Teagle Transportation For Office BuiUlini{s—Iiidiisli ial Plants—New Coiisiruction Show Rooms—Banks—Offices—Residential 3915 Kecoughtan Rd. Established 1920 Workman's Compensation—Public Liability Coverage—State-Wide Service HAMPTON, VIRGINIA Phone Ml 4-7265 RICHMOND. VA. 224 South First Street Safwav Steel Scaffolds SUTTON COMPANY, INC. All Types of Sc affolding Office: Richmond, Virginia Shores R. F. D. 6, Box 39 Fairfield RE 7-4113 Hoist Towers ' Telescoping & Exterior Bleachers RAILROAD CONSTRUCTION 1604 MacTavish Ave. , . One of the most fully and expertly equipped companies to RICHMOND, VIRGINIA do all types of railroad construction and maintenance. Div. of Safway Steel Products Co., . Also Milwaukee Telephone EL 5-6523 EXCAVATING AND EQUIPMENT RENTAL ^ ^ Lynchburg College A Christian Liberal Arts College FULLY ACCREDITED OFFERING BACHELOR OF ARTS AND BACHELOR OF SCIENCE DEGREES A PLANNED PROGRAM OF PERSONAL GUIDANCE BALANCED AND WIDELY VARIED STUDENT ACTIVI• TIES DEMOCRATIC STUDENT GOVERNMENT BROADLY ACADEMIC AND PRE-PROFESSIONAL CUR• RICULA For Further Information, Write ADMISSIONS OFFICE LYNCHBURG COLLEGE LYNCHBURG, VIRGINIA ATIONWIDE INSURANCE Home Office: Columbus, Ohio • Regional Office: Lynchburg, Virginia NATIONWIDE MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY NATIONWIDE MUTl AL FIRE INSl RANGE COMPANY NATIONWIDE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY MARCH 1958 PAGE THREE Look of the future on newest highways calls for new-type concrete. Shown, interchange in Los Angeles. Whafs all this talk about NEW-TYPE, SOUND-CONDITIONED CONCRETE FOR THE INTERSTATE SYSTEM? It's timely talk—In a new, informative for contraction control. The "thump" series of PCA magazine messages to sound is gone—a dramatic advance! HERE TODAY! MORE COMING! create fuller appreciation by the public Drivers enjoy a quieter ride. The public is enjoying new-type, for the finer, smoother-riding concrete There's air-entrainment, too—and the granular subbase: both solved tech• sound-conditioned concrete on: highways being built today. nical problems. But by insuring a last• Ohio Turnpike Significant advances mark today's ingly smooth, level surface, they add Atlanta Expressway newest concrete pavement. Highway new pleasure to driving. These and Hollywood Freeway engineers know about them. (Actually other advances today give people a New York Thruway you may have helped develop them.) pavement that is truly new-type. and more than 3,500 miles of other But—the public? Too few know of these All this needs telling. PCA's new modern highways. advances . now so vital on the new nationwide campaign will do that—in Interstate System. non-technical talk the public can un• Take sound-conditioning. Admittedly, derstand. An informed public means an not a highway engineer's term! But it appreciative public. This can simplify lEW-TYPE literally defines what has been done to your job ... it can help speed construc• concrete by use of narrow sawed joints tion of the new Interstate System. PORTLAND CEMENT ASSOCIATION 1401 Slats Planters Bank Building, Richmond 19, Virginia A national organization to improve and extend tlie uses of concrete AN INDKI'KNDEN T I'L BLICATION -[•OrXDF'D 1II7I1 TO TELL THE VIRGLNIA STORY t;i TFKORD DOWDEY DONNA Y. LAURINO Editor Executive Editor RosEWELi. PAGE, JR. JEAN L. GLOVER Business Editoi M/truiQiufi Editor JULIA GVVIN AULT R. N. ANDERSON. JR-, AIA I'uhlhhed Mnnlhly Al The Slate Capilal Associate Editor Architecturnl Editor Ity Virginia I'lihli^hrrs Wing, Inc. Copyriifht 1958 By VIRGINIA RECORD Ei)iT<»RiAi. OfriCKs; 30H West Main Siii-ei Phoiick MI 4-6717 MI 4-2722 "Second Class Mail Privilrijiv. Authorized at Rirhniond, Va." SUBSCRIPTION PER YEAR $4; TWO YEARS $7 Please address all mail to: P. O. Drawer 2-Y, Richmond 5. Va. \'iH(;iM\ RKCURI) is an indrpendrnl oublication rooijpralinu with all organizations that have for their ob• jectives the welfare and development of Vinjinia. While this publication cairies authoritative articles and features on statewide and local industrial, business. Kovernniental and civic orKaniziitions, they are in no other rrsprri lespimsible lor the conlenls hereof. \ ()LL'ME LXXX MARCH 1958 NUMBER IHREE Know Your Virginians in the Nation^s History HE NATION IS HONORING the two hundredth anniversaiy of Monroe'.s birth Tthis year with the issuance of a three-cent stamp, and for a centur\'-and-a- half world politics in relation to the Western Hemisphere have been detemiined by the doctrine bearing his name. Yet, curiously little is known about the former Virginia governor who became the couniiy's Hfth jjresident. and that little is dis• torted by those generalities which label a.spects of history for convenient pigeon• A pnrtrail painted from life by Benja• holing. min West of Airs. James Monroe, A "plain man," he was called in a neat epitome of his background, and "dull" wife of the fifth president. To the summarized the personality of this last leader of die Virginia Dynasty. Yet, how left be<iins a two part editorial by plain and dull could a young man have been who at the age of nineteen was commissioned major and ajijjointed aide-de-camp on the staff of Brigadic-r- Editor Clifford Dowdey on the oc• General Lord Stirling—who at the age of twenty was personally recommended casion of Monroe's Bicentennial. by George Washington, at the age of twenty-one was selected by Thomas Jefferson as his protege and military aide when JefTerson was governor? Repeatedly selected to represent the young nation in Europe, he was a vital influence in arranging the Louisiana Purchase, and certainly the delicate maneuvering required by such as- sigrmients would not be entrusted to a statesman characterized by either plainness or dullness. Then why is James Monroe categorized with these labels and barely CONTENTS outside tlie pigeon-hole resen'cd for those faceless marchers in the presidential PrcscntinK Virginia's State Highway parade such as Millard Fillmore and Chester Arthur? Commissiont;r—Francis .\. Davis 7 A guess is tliat the strong Virginian suffered bad historical timing. In the per• spective of history he, like the second Adams, came along in the wake of Jeffer• V'irgini.i'.s Hiuhway Program 9 son's muchly publicized liberal movement and before the equally publicized An address by H. H. Harris Democratic movement in which Andrew Jackson introduced the nile of the mob. The next jump is to the often praised humanity of Lincoln, witfi liv: inaccurate .\ Tribute to Pioneer Spirit 10 label of The Great Emancipator. Thus we have a row of pinnacles that run . \'iri;inia Business Review 12 Wa.shington, Jefferson, Jackson and Lincoln . and the presidents falling be• By Rosewell Page, Jr. tween are lucky if their names are spelled right. The reputation of Jackson's succ essor. Martin van Buren, was wTeckcd in his iOVEK XtlTE own day by a label. The Western mobs chased him out of Wa.shington by calling him an "elegant dandy," too exquisite for lovers of the true democracy, when the James Monroe, a painting of whom ap• hard-working and skillful politician had begun life above his father's saloon in pears on the cover, was the la.st president in New York State and risen with the support of die Number One Democrat him.self, the Virniniii Dynasty. During his life (1758- "Old Hickor)'" Jackson. James Polk's achievements during the Mexican War 1831) he was a soldier in the .American Rev• period were dismissed in history when the label of "mediocrity," applied by olution, a U.S. senator, minister to France poHtical enemies, stuck despite all e\'idence to die contrary. and to England, twice governor of Virginia, But neither van Buren nor Polk, one-termers, made contributions comparable Secretary- of State, and Secretary of War. He to Monroe's, and no president spanned in the actions of his own life history promulgated the Monroe Doctrine and was such momentous changes in the nation's histor)'. In the nearly half-centmy from one of the negotiators of the Louisiana Pur• his 18th to 66th year, Monroe acted in all the e\ents whereby 13 British colonies chase. This Virginian, whose accomplish• on the fringe of an unexplored continent^—which was divided between three ments have earned him a place in the Hall British nations—changed into a new world power that could warn the old world of Fame, was born in Westmoreland County.