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IN MEMORIAM 
 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 EXERCISES AT THE UNVEILING OF THE MONUMENT 
 ERECTED BY THE EMPLOYEES OF THE SOUTHERN 
 RAILWAY COMPANY " 
 
 ATLANTA, GEORGIA 
 MAY TWENTY-FIRST, NINETEEN HUNDRED AND TEN 
 

 NOV 3 Ibil 
 GIFT 
 
A GEORGIAN, 
 
 A CONFEDERATE SOLDIER, 
 
 THE FIRST PRESIDENT OF THE 
 
 SOUTHERN RAILWAY COMPANY. 
 ERECTED BY THE EMPLOYEES 
 
 OF THAT COMPANY. 
 
 — From Inscription on Monument. 
 
 223771 
 
SAMUEL SPENCER. 
 
 Samuel Spencer was born March 2, 1847, at 
 Columbus, Georgia, and died November 29, 1906, at 
 Lawyer's, Virginia. 
 
 He was the only child of Lambert and Vernona 
 (Mitchell) Spencer. His father was the son of Lam- 
 bert Wickes and Anna Spencer. His mother was the 
 daughter of Isaac and Parizade Mitchell. Lambert 
 Wickes Spencer was a son of Richard Spencer, who 
 was a grandson of James Spencer, who emigrated from 
 England in 1670, and settled in Talbot County, Mary- 
 land, and of Martha Wickes, sister of Captain Lam- 
 bert Wickes of the United States Navy. 
 
 After attending the common schools of Colum- 
 bus until he was fifteen years old Samuel Spencer 
 entered the Georgia Military Institute at Marietta. The 
 following year, though but sixteen years of age, he en- 
 listed in the Confederate service as a private in the 
 " Nelson Rangers," an independent company of cav- 
 alry. His first service with this command was scout 
 and outpost duty before Vicksburg. He subsequently 
 served under General N. B. Forrest, the famous cav- 
 alry commander. He served with General Hood in 
 Atlanta, and during the campaign against Nashville, 
 
 [5] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 and remained in the service until the surrender of 
 General Johnston's army in April, 1865. 
 
 As soon as the war was over he again took up 
 his studies, and, entering the junior class in the Univer- 
 sity of Georgia, he graduated from that institution in 
 1867 with first honors. In the autumn of that year 
 he entered the University of Virginia, where he took 
 a course in Civil Engineering, and graduated in 1869 
 with the degree of C. E., again at the head of his 
 class. 
 
 Mr. Spencer began his railway career with the 
 Savannah & Memphis Railroad Company, serving 
 successively as rodman, leveler, transitman, resident 
 engineer, and principal engineer, until July, 1872, 
 when he became clerk to the Superintendent of the 
 New Jersey Southern Railroad at Long Branch. In 
 December, 1872, he went into the transportation 
 department of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, with 
 which Company he remained for four years in charge 
 of one of its divisions. 
 
 For a short time in 1877, he was Superintendent 
 of the Virginia Midland Railroad, and in January, 
 1878, he became General Superintendent of the Long 
 Island Railroad. In 1879 he returned to the Balti- 
 more & Ohio as Assistant to the President, from which 
 post he was advanced to the offices of Third Vice- 
 President in 1881 ; Second Vice-President in 1882, 
 
 [6] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUKL SPENCKR 
 
 and First Vice-President in 1884. In December, 
 1887, he was elected President of the Baltimore & 
 Ohio, and piloted that Company successfully through 
 one of the most trying and difficult periods in its 
 history. 
 
 In March, 1889, he entered the banking house 
 of Drexel, Morgan & Company (now J. P. Morgan & 
 Company,) as railroad expert and representative of 
 their large railroad interests. 
 
 In July, 1893, Mr. Spencer was appointed re- 
 ceiver of the Richmond & Danville Railroad Company, 
 and of the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia Rail- 
 way Company, and in June, 1894, when the Southern 
 Railway Company was organized to take over the 
 properties of the old Richmond Terminal and East 
 Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia System, he was made 
 its President and served as such until his death. The 
 Southern Railway System, under his administration, 
 was built up from 4,391 miles to 7,515 miles of 
 directly operated lines, and controlled subordinate 
 companies, operated separately, with 2,038 miles of 
 line. At the time of his death Mr. Spencer was at the 
 head of an organization of more than 40,000 men 
 in the employ of the Southern Railway Company alone. 
 He was President of the following railway companies : 
 
 The Southern Railway Company, 
 
 Mobile and Ohio Railroad Company, 
 
 [7] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 Alabama Great Southern Railroad Company, 
 Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Rail- 
 way Company, 
 
 Georgia Southern and Florida Railway Company, 
 Northern Alabama Railway Company. 
 At that time he was, in addition to the above, a 
 member of the Boards of Directors of the following 
 companies : 
 
 Alabama Great Southern Railway Company (Lim- 
 ited) England, 
 
 Central of Georgia Railway Company, 
 Chicago, Milwaukee and Saint Paul Railway 
 Company, 
 
 Erie Railroad Company, 
 Old Dominion Steamship Company, 
 Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad 
 Company, 
 
 The Standard Trust Company, of New York, 
 Hanover National Bank, of New York, 
 The Trust Company of America, New York, 
 Western Union Telegraph Company. 
 Mr. Spencer was married on February 6, 1872, 
 to Louisa Vivian, daughter of Henry L. Benning, a 
 Judge of the Supreme Court of Georgia and a Briga- 
 dier General in the Confederate Army, and is survived 
 by his widow and three children, Henry Benning, Ver- 
 nona Mitchell, and Vivian. 
 
 [8] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 He was a member of the University and Union 
 Clubs, of New York ; the Tuxedo Club ; the Metro- 
 politan Club, of Washington ; the Jekyl Island Club ; 
 the Capital City Club, of Atlanta ; the Queen City 
 Club of Cincinnati, and the Chicago Club. He was 
 also a member of the New York Chamber of Com- 
 merce ; the American Academy of Political Science ; 
 the American Forestry Association; the Metropoli- 
 tan Museum of Art ; the Municipal Art Society and 
 the American Museum of Natural History, of New 
 York ; the New York Zoological Society ; the Associa- 
 tion for the Protection of the Adirondacks, and the 
 American Society of Civil Engineers. 
 
 Mr. Spencer had rare capacity as an executive 
 officer and organizer. He was an excellent judge of 
 men, and, a tireless and energetic worker himself, he 
 had the faculty of securing the efficient co-operation 
 of his subordinates. He was a man of the highest 
 integrity and was noted for consistent honesty of pur- 
 pose and fair dealing. He was uniformly just and gen- 
 erous in his dealings with his subordinates and always 
 had their fullest confidence and their highest respect. 
 With his friends he was jovial and companionable and 
 won their affection. 
 
 As a writer and public speaker Mr. Spencer ranked 
 high. His addresses on public questions, and more 
 particularly on the relations of the railways to the pub- 
 
 [9] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 lie, were admirable examples of clear thinking and 
 sound reasoning, and stamped him as an economic 
 statesman of high order. 
 
 A Joint Meeting of the Voting Trustees and the 
 Board of Directors of the Southern Railway Company 
 was held at its office in Washington, D. C, on Sunday, 
 December 2nd, 1906, immediately after the funeral 
 service of Samuel Spencer, late President of the Com- 
 pany, Alexander B. Andrews, First Vice-President, 
 presiding. 
 
 Upon motion of Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, the fol- 
 lowing minute was adopted, and was ordered to be 
 entered on the records and published at length in the 
 press upon the lines of the Southern Railway : 
 
 Samuel Spencer, bom in Columbus, Georgia, March 2nd, 1847, died 
 November 29th, 1906, near Lawyer's Station, Virginia, upon the railroad of 
 the Southern Railway Company of which he was the first and only President. 
 
 The personal qualities of Mr. Spencer, his integrity in hezirt and mind, 
 his affectionate and genial disposition, his loyal and courageous spirit, his 
 untiring devotion to duty, his persistent achievement of worthy ends and his 
 comradeship on the fields of battle, of affairs, and of manly sport, combined 
 to establish him in the loving regard of hosts of friends in every section of 
 his country, and nowhere more securely than in the affection of his fellow 
 workers in the service of the Southern Railway Company. 
 
 The importance of his service to this Company is matter of common 
 knowledge throughout the railroad world, but the character, the extent, and 
 the consequence of that service are and can be appreciated at their full 
 worth only by his associates now gathered here to attest their regard for him, 
 and to record their high estimate of his life and work. 
 
 Upon June 18th, 1894, on the completion of the Richmond Terminal 
 Reorganization conceived by J. Pierpont Morgan, and conducted by his part- 
 ner, Charles H. Coster, the first meeting of the Southern Railway Company 
 was called to order at Richmond by Samuel Spencer as President. 
 
 [10] 
 
IN MF.MORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 In the first fiscal year the Southern Railway System embraced 4,391 
 miles of road, with 623 locomotives and 19,694 cars, which carried 3,427, 
 858 passengers, and 6,675,750 tons of freight and earned $17,114,791. 
 
 In the last fiscal year the Southern Railway System embraced 7,515 
 miles of road, with 1,429 locomotives and 50,119 cars, which carried 
 11,663,550 passengers, 27,339,377 tons of freight and earned $53,641, 
 438. 
 
 The number of employees had increased from 16,718, June 30, 1895, 
 to 37.003, June 30, 1906, and the wages paid from $6,712,796 to 
 $21,198,020. 
 
 The full details and the impressive character of this remarkable advcmce, 
 too extended for present recital, are exhibited in the masterly communication 
 which, upon February 1st, 1906, Mr. Spencer addressed to the Voting 
 Trustees as the basis of the Development and General Mortgage. 
 
 In this progress every step had been initiated and conducted by Mr. 
 Spencer with the cordial concurrence of the Voting Trustees and the 
 Board of Directors ; and it is significant of the conservative and cautious 
 disposition of Mr. Spencer and his supporters that this phenominal enlarge- 
 ment of the System and its business was not made the bcisis of any incre2ise 
 of stock, or even of any increase of dividends beyond the amount contemplat- 
 ed and stated in the Plan of 1893 with reference to the properties originally 
 reorganized. Every dollar that could be borrowed under President Spen- 
 cer's management was put into the property in the effort to enable it to meet 
 the ever increasing demands of the vigorous and wonderful growth of the 
 South and its industries. 
 
 The mighty fabric which for twelve years he has been moulding must 
 continue under others to develop, and to improve in the service that it shall 
 render to the public, but never can it cease to bear the impress, or to reveal 
 the continuing impulse of the master mind of its first President. In the 
 height of his usefulness and his powers he has been called away, but the 
 inspiration of his shining example and his lofty standards must ever animate 
 his successors. 
 
 To many other corporations conducting the commerce of the country, 
 as well as to the Southern Railway, did Mr. Spencer render invaluable ser- 
 vice, and all of them will share in our sense of loss and personal grief. As 
 their chosen spokesman in the tremendous agitation culminating in the Con- 
 gressional action of 1906, his mastery of his subject, his dignity of bearing 
 and his integrity of character commanded the confidence and approval of 
 the vast interests whose constitutional rights it became his duty to assert and 
 to protect. 
 
 To the great public not less than to the commercial interests did he rec- 
 ognize his obligation. How well he conceived, how admirably he performed 
 that duty, was indicated in the last of his public addresses, his last message 
 
 [11] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 to his friends in the South, delivered at Montgomery, Alabama, on October 
 25th, 1906; an address which deserves wide circulation and close consider- 
 ation, not only in his own South that he loved so well, but throughout the 
 whole country which he had learned to know far better than most of its citi- 
 zens wherever bom. 
 
 His chosen career has closed, but the wisdom and the virtues that char- 
 acterized that career will abide as long as there shall be a regard for duty 
 bravely done and for high service gallantly rendered. 
 
 To his family we extend our deep and most respectful sympathy, and 
 our assurance that for them, as well as for his associates, honor <utd happi- 
 ness will ever result from their relation to Samuel Spencer, that just and 
 upright man and officer. 
 
 [12] 
 
HOW THE MONUMENT WAS BUILT. 
 
 The high esteem in which Mr. Spencer was held 
 by the employees of the Southern Railway system was 
 evidenced when, within a few days after his death, 
 suggestions were received by the executive officers of 
 the Company from many individuals, that the whole 
 body of employees be permitted to testify to their 
 appreciation of him as a railway executive and their 
 affection for him as a man, by the erection of a suita- 
 ble and enduring memorial. 
 
 This suggestion met with the approval of the ex- 
 ecutive officers who promised their aid and co-opera- 
 tion, with the understanding that no employee was 
 to be urged to contribute, but that the memorial was 
 to be a voluntary and spontaneous expression of the 
 regard in which the contributors held their great leader. 
 The matter was taken up enthusiastically by the em- 
 ployees of every department on all parts of the system. 
 Meetings were held and resolutions were adopted. 
 After a careful consideration of several propositions 
 as to the character of the memorial to be erected and 
 
 [13] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 its location, it was decided that a statue of Mr. Spen- 
 cer would be most appropriate and that the ideal loca- 
 tion for it was on the plaza in front of the Terminal 
 Station in Atlanta. The selection of Atlanta wcis 
 governed by the fact that it is the Capital of the 
 State of Georgia, in which Mr. Spencer was born, and 
 a central and important city on the Southern Railway 
 system. 
 
 In order to systematize the movement, a General 
 Committee of employees was appointed, under the 
 Chairmanship of Mr. J. W. Connelly, Chief Special 
 Agent, and embracing the following representatives 
 of every branch of the service : 
 
 STATION AGENTS. 
 G. A. Barnes, Chattanooga, Tenn. C. L. Candler, Norfolk, Va. 
 D. L. Bryan, Columbia, S. C. T. L. Hill, Birmingham, Ala. 
 
 E. H. Lea, Richmond, Va. 
 
 FREIGHT CLAIM DEPARTMENT. 
 J. J. Hooper, Washington, D. C. 
 
 FREIGHT TRAFFIC DEPARTMENT. 
 F. H. Behring, Louisville, Ky. Randall Clifton, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 L. L. McClesky, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 PASSENGER TRAFFIC DEPARTMENT. 
 George B. Allen, Atlanta, Ga. L. S. Brown, Washington, D, C. 
 
 J. C. Beam, St. Louis, Mo. J. L. Meeks, Atlanta. Ga. 
 
 LAW AGENTS' DEPARTMENT. 
 W. F. Combs, Macon, Ga. M. H. Dooley, Washington, D. C. 
 
 SPECIAL AGENTS' DEPARTMENT. 
 J. W. Connelly, Washington, D. D. P. G. Cropper, Louisville, Ky. 
 
 RIGHT OF WAY DEPARTMENT. 
 C. J. Shelverton, Austell, Ga. 
 
 [14] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 TIE AND TIMBER DEPARTMENT. 
 C. A. Slater. Washington, D. C. 
 
 DINING CAR CONDUCTORS 
 G. L. Best, Charlotte, N. C. 
 
 TELEGRAPH OPERATORS. 
 O. R. Doyle, Calhoun, S. C. A. L. McDaniel, Forest City, S. C. 
 
 C. G. VVhitworth, Bon Air, Va. 
 
 TRAIN CONDUCTORS. 
 C. T. Laughlin, Princeton, Ind. R. W. Moore, Washington, D. C. 
 
 TRAINMEN. 
 M. V. Hamilton, Knoxville. Tenn. 
 
 ENGINEERS. 
 J. I. Whiddon, Macon, Ga. 
 
 FIREMEN. 
 C. A. Loftin, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 ROADWAY DEPARTMENT. 
 H. D. Knight, Greensboro, N. C. C. J. Murphy, Louisville, Ky. 
 
 A. P. New, Birmingham, Ala. 
 
 CIVIL ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT. 
 Thomas Bernard, Greensboro, N. C. W. B. Crenshaw, Knoxville, Tenn. 
 
 BRIDGE AND BUILDING DEPARTMENT. 
 
 Bernard Herman, Washington, D. C. 
 
 MACHINISTS. 
 A. McGillivray, Birmingham, Ala. 
 
 BLACKSMITHS. 
 
 A. Gledhill, Birmingham, Ala. George E. Saywell, Sheffield, Ala. 
 
 BOILERMAKERS. 
 
 T. J. Garvey, Manchester, Va. M. W. Harris, Birmingham, Ala. 
 
 CAR REPAIRERS. 
 Frank A. Jones, Richmond, Va. S. L. Shaver, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 E. S. Smith, Princeton, Ind. 
 
 COPPERSMITHS AND PIPEFITTERS. 
 W. L. Allen, Birmingham, Ala. W. F. Bronson, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 [15] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 STOREKEEPERS. 
 W. M. Netherland, Washington, D. C. 
 
 LAND AND INDUSTRIAL DEPARTMENT. 
 H. E. Waernicke, Washington, D. C. 
 
 AUDITING DEPARTMENT. 
 F. B. Clements, Washington, D. C. T. L. Shelton, Washington, D. C. 
 
 LAW DEPARTMENT. 
 
 Daniel Kelly, Washington, D. C. 
 
 SURGEONS. 
 
 Dr. W. A. Applegate, Washington, D. C. 
 
 PURCHASING DEPARTMENT. 
 Joseph Angel, Washington, D. C. J. A. Turner, Washington, D. C. 
 
 GENERAL YARD MASTERS. 
 R. L. Avery, Spencer, N. C. J. A. McDougle, Birmingham, Ala. 
 
 W. W. Barber, Columbia, S. C. J. J. Patton, Knoxville, Tenn. 
 
 J. Fritz, E. St. Louis, 111. W. W. Waits, Atlanta, Ga. 
 
 GENERAL OFFICES. 
 E. D. Duncan, Atlanta, Ga. Guy E. Mauldin, Washington, D. C^ 
 
 J. L. Edwards, Birmingham, Ala. L. C. Ullrich, Washington, D. C. 
 
 This Committee formulated a plan by which each 
 employee, from the President down, was afforded an 
 opportunity to contribute in proportion to his rate of 
 compensation from the Company. Many employees 
 were anxious to contribute much larger amounts, but 
 they were not permitted to do so, it having been found 
 that, by reason of the large number of contributors, a 
 sufficient fund would be provided by strict adherence 
 to the plan adopted and it being desired that among 
 all the thousands of subscribers each should feel that, 
 in proportion to his earnings, he had contributed as 
 much to the erection of the monument as any other.. 
 
 [16] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 Each employee who wished to contribute sent an 
 order on the Paymaster requesting him to deduct from 
 his pay the amount he was entitled to give under the 
 plan adopted. All moneys were paid to Mr. H. C. 
 Ansley, Treasurer of the Southern Railway Company, 
 who, at the request of the employees, consented to act 
 as Treasurer of the fund. The names of all contrib- 
 utors were listed for a permanent record ; two copies 
 of this record being made, one being given to Mr. 
 Spencer's family and the other filed in the office of 
 the Chairman of the General Committee. When the 
 base of the monument was being built the thousands 
 of slips bearing the original signatures of the em- 
 ployees were securely sealed in a metal box and placed 
 in the corner stone. 
 
 After the fund had been collected, Mr. Daniel 
 Chester French, of New York, was commissioned to 
 execute the bronze statue of Mr. Spencer, and Mr. 
 Henry Bacon was employed to design its pedestal. 
 The beautiful monument as it stands today bears tes- 
 timony to the wisdom of the selection of these men 
 as sculptor and architect. 
 
 The monument having been completed and placed 
 in position, arrangements were made for unveiling it 
 on May 21, 1910. Invitations in the following form 
 were sent to railway officers and other prominent citi- 
 zens of the United States : 
 
 [17] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 The Employees of the Southern Railway Company 
 
 request the honor of your presence 
 
 at the Unveiling of the 
 
 Monument to Samuel Spencer 
 
 First President of the Company 
 
 at the Terminal Station 
 
 Atlanta, Georgia 
 
 Saturday afternoon, May twenty-first 
 
 nineteen hundred and ten 
 
 at two o'clock. 
 
 [18] 
 
UNVEILING THE MONUMENT. 
 
 At the hour fixed for the unveiling there was a 
 large and distinguished gathering of invited guests, and 
 several thousand employees of the Company were 
 present as hosts. The programme of the unveiling 
 exercises was as follows: 
 
 MUSIC. 
 Introduction of the Presiding Officer Mr. J. S. B. Thompson, 
 By Mr. J. W. Connelly, 
 
 Chairman of the General Committee. 
 
 PRAYER. 
 
 Rt. Rev. Cleland Kinlock Nelson, 
 
 Bishop of Atlanta. 
 
 Address on the Life and Character of Samuel Spencer, 
 Hon. Alexander P. Humphrey. 
 
 Unveiling of the Monument, 
 
 Miss Violet Spencer. 
 
 MUSIC. 
 
 Presentation of Monument on Behalf of the Employees, 
 
 To the State of Georgia and City of Atlanta. 
 
 Mr. W. W. Finley. 
 
 Acceptance for the State of Georgia, 
 
 Hon. Joseph M. Brown, 
 
 Governor. 
 
 Acceptance for City of Atlanta, 
 
 Hon. Robert F. Maddox, 
 
 Mayor. 
 
 BENEDICTION. 
 
 Rev. John E. White, D. D., 
 
 Pastor Second Baptist Church, Atlanta. 
 
 MUSIC. 
 
 [19] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 Just before the exercises began, one hundred little 
 girls, daughters of employees of the Southern Railway 
 Company, led by Mrs. E. E. Norris, wife of Superin- 
 tendent Norris, of the Atlanta Division, carrying arm- 
 fulls of cut flowers and wreaths, marched across the 
 plaza and deposited the flowers at the base of the 
 monument. 
 
 The assembly was called to order by Mr. J. W. 
 Connelly, Chief Special Agent of the Southern Rail- 
 way Company, as Chairman of the General Commit- 
 tee, who, introducing Mr. J. S. B. Thompson, Assistant 
 to the President of the Southern Railway Company, 
 as the presiding officer, spoke as follows : 
 
 ** Ladies and Gentlemen : We have met here to- 
 day to do honor to the memory of our beloved First 
 President, Samuel Spencer. 
 
 ''It would be impossible to say who first sug- 
 gested the erection of this monument. Within a few 
 days after the death of Mr. Spencer, suggestions for 
 the erection of a suitable memorial were received by 
 the management from individual employees. The idea 
 spread spontaneously. It was taken up in meetings 
 of employees and resolutions were adopted. The man- 
 agement gave the movement its hearty approval on 
 condition that contributions should be made freely and 
 voluntarily. The movement took shape in the organ- 
 ization of a General Committee of Employees of which 
 
 [20] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUKL SPENCER 
 
 I have had the honor of serving as Chairman. From 
 the start its success was assured. A plan was devised 
 which gave every employee from President down an 
 opportunity to contribute in proportion to his wages. 
 That this method of collecting the funds was a proper 
 one is evidenced by the thousands of slips bearing the 
 signatures of employees which were received and 
 which have been sealed in a metal box and placed in 
 the corner stone of the monument. The necessary 
 funds having been raised, and the movement having 
 been carried to a successful conclusion, I wish to thank 
 all of my fellow employees, and especially those who 
 served with me on the General Committee, for their 
 support and co-operation. 
 
 '' We have erected a monument that is a fitting 
 testimonial of the high regard in which our First Presi- 
 dent was held by the entire body of employees. Our 
 task is done, and I now have the pleasure of present- 
 ing to you, as the presiding officer on this occasion, 
 one who needs no introduction to a Georgia audience, 
 Mr. J. S. B. Thompson." 
 
 Rt. Rev. Cleland Kinloch Nelson, D. D., Bishop 
 of Atlanta, offered the following prayer : 
 
 " Almighty God, Father of all mercies, we, Thine 
 unworthy servants, do give Thee most humble and 
 hearty thanks for all Thy goodness and loving kindness 
 to us, and to all men ; we bless Thee for our creation, 
 
 [21] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but 
 above all, for Thine inestimable love in the redemp- 
 tion of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ ; for the 
 means of grace and for the hope of glory, the benefit 
 of mankind and the peace of the world. We humbly 
 beseech Thee to guard and protect this nation. Grant 
 to our rulers righteousness and true holiness. To our 
 judges wisdom, justice and truth. To men in every 
 department of life honour, probity, virtue and rever- 
 ence. Root out all vices and wickedness from among 
 us and grant us consideration one of another, with fer- 
 vent charity among ourselves. And, we beseech Thee, 
 give us that due sense of all Thy mercies, that our 
 hearts may be unfeignedly thankful ; and that we show 
 forth Thy praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives, 
 by giving up ourselves to Thy service, and by walking 
 before Thee in holiness and righteousness all our days ; 
 through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with Thee 
 and the Holy Ghost, be all honour and glory, world 
 without end. Amen." 
 
 Hon. Alexander P. Humphrey, General Counsel 
 of the Southern Railway Company at Louisville, Ky., 
 a friend from boyhood of Mr. Spencer, delivered the 
 principal address of the day on " The Life and Char- 
 acter of Samuel Spencer," speaking as follows: 
 Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 On every such occasion as this there comes to 
 
 [22] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPKNCER 
 
 me the Latin line, which holds a note musical and 
 solemn : 
 
 " Vita enim mortuorum in memoria vivorum posita." 
 
 It is difficult to give an English equivalent com- 
 plete at once in voice and sense. It is sufficient to 
 express the thought. In the memory of the living is 
 the life of the dead, not all of it, we trust, but much of 
 it. Let us think of the converse. The life of the liv- 
 ing is in the memory of the dead. There is no one 
 of us to whom this does not apply. As we pass the 
 half-way line of life given by nature and measured by 
 the Psalmist, year by year, with increasing volume, 
 our life seems filled with the memory of the dead. 
 It could not be otherwise. It is well that it is so. It is 
 a primal source of inspiration. Themistocles, upon 
 thinking on the deeds of his ancestors, could not sleep. 
 The touch of the vanished hand still leads us ; the 
 voice may be still to sense but it guides our life. 
 
 More than forty years ago I was a fellow-student 
 with Samuel Spencer at the University of Virginia. 
 The Civil War had closed only two years. One-half 
 of the students had been soldiers in the Confederate 
 Army, a preparatory school quite out of the ordinary, 
 but one which taught many things well worth knowing 
 and useful in the conflicts of life. While he was a 
 student of one professional school and I of another, yet 
 circumstances threw us together, and impressionable 
 
 [23] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 youth easily took the mould of boyhood friendship. 
 As many miles separated our homes and diverse pur- 
 suits our lives, we did not again come in dose relations 
 until 1894. From that time until his death there ex- 
 isted an intimate friendship. In my memory of the 
 dead, then, I have youth and hope as well cis mature 
 life and famous achievement. From this it follows 
 that, were the choice open, it were much simpler for me 
 to speak of him in terms of affection than of admira- 
 tion, and to recall and dwell upon those things which 
 bound him close to his home and his friends, rather 
 than those which enabled him to rank as peer with the 
 great men which the South has given to our common 
 country. 
 
 To borrow the thought and, in some degree, the 
 language of Pericles — when a man's deeds have been 
 great it is enough for him to be honored in deed only. 
 This gathering, this assembly of people — those who 
 have been lifted into high office and public gaze, and 
 those who, in the daily round of toil, no less perform 
 the public service, the statue here to be unveiled — this 
 tells his story in the simplest and most effective way. 
 When there is an attempt to add speech to this we im- 
 peril great reputation " on the eloquence or want of 
 eloquence of another, and virtues are believed or not 
 as such one may speak well or ill. For it is difficult to 
 say neither too little nor too much. The friend of the 
 
 [24] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 dead who knows the facts is likely to think the words 
 of the speaker fall short of his knowledge and his 
 wishes, and another who is not so well informed will 
 suspect exaggeration." 
 
 But, as we are here to accomplish the erection of 
 a monument which shall still exist when all of us shall 
 have ceased to be, custom requires that we justify to 
 ourselves, to the American people and to posterity the 
 singling out of this man for so high honor. 
 
 It is natural, in beginning what is to be said of the 
 life of Samuel Spencer, that we should recall that he 
 was born in 1847 and died in 1906. This is, indeed, 
 to say very little. A famous writer, in describing a 
 visit to Westminster Abbey, recalled how many tombs 
 were there upon which were recorded simply the date 
 of the birth and the death of him who slept beneath, 
 as if there had been, perforce, nothing to record except 
 the two circumstances common to all men. Such a 
 life, he says, is aptly described in Holy Writ as the path 
 of an arrow which quickly closes and is swallowed up. 
 But when we go further and say that he was a Confed- 
 erate soldier ; that he was the first President of the 
 Southern Railway Company, and that this statue is 
 erected by his fellow-employees you at once see that 
 this is an outline of a life pregnant with interest. 
 
 In what has been aptly called ** Samuel Spencer's 
 Last Message to the South," he said : 
 
 [25] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 " Born and reared in the South and identified by 
 my life's work with Southern interests, I feel I have a 
 right to speak to you as one of your own people." 
 
 He was born in Georgia ; he was taught in her 
 schools ; he served in her army ; and here he found 
 the helpmeet whom God had ordained for him, and 
 who is present with us to-day with their children and 
 their children's children about her knees. 
 
 As Paul boasted that he was a citizen of no mean 
 city, so Samuel Spencer was an imperial son of an im- 
 perial state. It is altogether meet that his present- 
 ment should be placed here in this Capital City of his 
 native state — a city once reduced by the heat of con- 
 flict literally to a heap of ashes. You need only to 
 look about to see how like the day-star new risen she 
 " flames in the forehead of the morning sky." 
 
 When a mere stripling he dropped his books, put 
 on his uniform and rode away to battle. How absurd 
 it is to suppose that this multitude of gallant lads had 
 grave consultation of the right of secession, or held 
 high debate as to the correct interpretation of the Con- 
 stitution of the United States, He was a Georgian and 
 he saw her invaded by an armed force. He was of the 
 South and he saw her resisting a fierce attack. Some 
 there are who suppose that the young men of the 
 South came from the battle-field and camp broken in 
 spirit and crushed under the burden of defeat. This 
 
 [26] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 is far from the truth. Recall what was said of an an- 
 cient people and see how aptly it pictures the Southern 
 soldier of which he was the best type : *' Bold beyond 
 their strength, they run risks which prudence would con- 
 demn, and in the midst of misfortune are full of hope. 
 When they fail in an enterprise they at once conceive 
 new hopes and so fill up the void ; and they deem the 
 quiet of inaction to be as disagreeable as the most tire- 
 some business." 
 
 He was eighteen years old when the debacle 
 came. 
 
 Time would fail if I attempted to recite how he 
 prepared for his life work and how from stage to stage 
 he moved steadily forward, never hasting, never rest- 
 ing. From rodman to president took many years, 
 much labor, infinite patience. Every opportunity 
 found him ready, and every task of increased import- 
 ance found him equcd to it. 
 
 In 1887 he was at the head of the Baltimore & 
 Ohio Company ; then, for a season, he filled the place 
 of railroad expert in a great banking house ; then, in 
 1894, came the final call. This was to become the 
 first President of the Southern Railway. It was a 
 task no less grateful than difficult. The South had 
 become like Samson's lion. He left it dead by the 
 wayside, but when he came that way again lo, a swarm 
 of bees had made of its body their hive. *' Out of the 
 
 [27] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 eater came forth meat and out of the strong came 
 forth sweetness." 
 
 With an eye that could look through the veil of 
 the future, Samuel Spencer saw that this was but a 
 beginning, and that there was in this, his native state, 
 and these other states of the South, a promise and a 
 potency of industrial development undreamed of in the 
 olden days. The need of the hour was the creation 
 of a strong, compact and coherent system of transpor- 
 tation which should bind together every state south of 
 the Potomac and the Ohio, from the Atlantic Sea- 
 board to the Mississippi, in a confederacy of commerce, 
 industry and peace. The materials to his hand were 
 numerous short lines of railroad, bankrupt in credit 
 and of whose track and equipment it could only be said 
 that they were fitly mated. There were also to be met 
 and satisfied the diverse claims of disappointed holders 
 of conflicting securities and the jealous and not always 
 reasonable demands of rival communities. The task, 
 I repeat, was a grateful one to him. It called into 
 play every faculty of his mind and character. Imagin- 
 ation, will, courage, tact, justice, perseverance, patience. 
 What an inspiring thing it is to see a strong man put 
 forth his strength — his many-sided strength — of imagi- 
 nation, to see in the material the building ; of will, to 
 bend others to it ; of courage, to be afraid of no man ; 
 of tact, to yield where gentleness demands ; of justice, 
 
 [28] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 to regard the rights of others; of perseverance, to 
 push on against every obstacle ; of patience, to chal- 
 lenge the verdict of time. 
 
 The twelve years that elapsed from 1894 to 1906 
 were strenuous years, no one without its peculiar diffi- 
 culty to be encountered or obstacle to be overcome. In 
 the accomplishment of this great work his fame is 
 secure. For it is a work that takes hold not alone 
 upon the present day but upon a future of broad ex- 
 panse. It belongs to few men to have such an oppor- 
 tunity, and to only a handful to meet and fulfill its every 
 demand. 
 
 There is something more than this. Samuel 
 Spencer was not only a man of thought, of imagina- 
 tion and of action ; he was a man of speech— timely 
 and sympathetic speech. Born in the old order he 
 grew up and was a leader in the new. It is only the 
 present generation that has known an industrial South. 
 It is the men of his time that have created and fos- 
 tered this change : an absolutely necessary one if the 
 South was to continue to hold a place of influence in 
 the national life. So long as there existed here a dis- 
 tinct system of labor there also existed a distinct sys- 
 tem of leisure. I do not mean by leisure, idleness, 
 but freedom from toil and money-getting. 
 
 In the old days of the South the publicist, the law- 
 yer, the preacher and the soldier well-nigh had the 
 
 [29] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 monopoly of admiration, power and influence. There 
 were few great merchants ; no great railroad ; and our 
 minercil wealth was practically unknown. 
 
 In 1904 Samuel Spencer was called upon to 
 speak to the students of the Georgia School of Tech- 
 nology. No one can read this address without seeing 
 what was his power of sympathetic speech. Uncon- 
 sciously the speaker unfolds his own life. His hearers 
 could mark him as one of their own number, then as 
 enduring with patience the time of small things ; then 
 the slow promotion with no retrograding step, the sure 
 making-ready for large opportunity. There is, in all he 
 says, no depreciation of literciry pursuit or culture ; no 
 vaunting of the practical above the spiritual. After 
 stating what had been the industrial progress of the 
 nation since 1870, he shows how much more marvel- 
 ous in proportion had been that of the South. From 
 pointing out how, in one section, there had been con- 
 stant effort to make ready for such tasks those fitted 
 for it, he passes to the necessity of the South's doing 
 likewise ; and at the last he strikes the highest note. 
 
 "In all your purposes and dealings be true. 
 There is a truth in action ; a truth of achievement, a 
 truth of execution — all included, of course, in moral 
 truth. There is a truth of accuracy, of soundness, of 
 genuineness. See that every article you make and 
 every action of your lives are all they purport to be. 
 
 [30] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 Apply in your individual lives the great moral injunc- 
 tion which years ago the then honored Chancellor of 
 the State University impressed upon his audience: 
 ' Let truth be the spinal column of your character, into 
 which every rib is set and on which the brain itself 
 reposes.' " 
 
 There belongs to every really great man, whose 
 character is built on sure foundations, a certain moral 
 shyness which accompanies his every word and work. 
 Such an one makes no appeal for himself, no claim to 
 public gratitude or manifestation of personal approval. 
 He thinks and works and speaks for his cause alone, 
 and is content for that to stand as his interpreter. 
 And at last it is true of every man who has served his 
 generation, that we must arise " from the knowledge 
 of what he did to the knowledge of what he was." 
 
 It was, as I have stated, in 1887 that Samuel 
 Spencer became President of the Baltimore & Ohio 
 Railroad Company. Whether he took any part in the 
 discussions which preceded the enactment that year 
 of the Interstate Commerce Act I do not know ; but, 
 when the question was again opened in 1905 and 
 1906 and the Hepburn Bill was under consideration, 
 he made most notable contributions to the debate 
 which preceded its passage. There is one thread 
 which runs through all his argument. This is that the 
 railroads of the country are entitled to justice. He 
 
 [31] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 did not dispute their public character nor yet that 
 there had been abuses, nor yet that the great power 
 which attends strong organizations had been some- 
 times misused. Against rebates and every form of dis- 
 crimination he set his face ; but, on the other hand, 
 he pointed out the great part which the railroads had 
 in building up trade, and showed how absolutely essen- 
 tial to the development of the nation it was to increase 
 their efficiency and their ability to keep pace with the 
 country's growth. He showed that, exactly like other 
 business enterprises, neither time nor money would be 
 embarked except upon the promise of adequate returns. 
 In every instance he asked his hearers to believe that 
 railroad men and railroad companies were not things 
 apart ; that there was here no more greed of wealth 
 and no less integrity of management than is common 
 to all commercial life. He sometimes seemed to fear 
 that his voice was as one crying in a wilderness, but 
 for all that he had such strong faith in his own truth 
 that he could not believe, if the people only under- 
 stood, they would refuse justice. There was some- 
 thing more than this. What he argued for with con- 
 stant insistence was a right understanding of the 
 relation which existed between those who needed and 
 those who furnished transportation ; that it was in no 
 way different from the ordinary relation of buyer and 
 seller, consumer and producer ; that beyond an assur- 
 
 [32] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 ance of honest dealing and fair and equal treatment — 
 enforced by law, if need be — there was no reason for 
 popular prejudice or governmental interference. His 
 effort was to bring every man to think what would 
 be his attitude if, instead of being engaged in some 
 other activity, he were a railroad manager or a rail- 
 road investor— not a selfish or grasping one, not a 
 rude or arrogant one, but one who had conscience 
 and justice as his business guides. From such a stand- 
 point he welcomed discussion, invited suggestion and 
 did not shrink from criticism. 
 
 We are always to remember that, although Samuel 
 Spencer was a leader and a guide in the new order, he 
 was born in the old. No man entirely gets away from 
 his ancestors. So that there was ever present with 
 him a degree of sentiment, of emotion, of aspiration, 
 the spiritual unsatisfied by the practical, which gave 
 character to the old order. There also belonged to 
 him a spirit of independence and of individualism 
 which struggled hard against the contrary force so 
 marked in the day of his greatest activity. Tacitus 
 declares that an unhappy period in the life of a state 
 when there are many laws. We may interpret this 
 that as offenses multiply so must increase the " thou- 
 shalt-nots" of the law. But this is not the meaning 
 of Tacitus. It is that the state has become prone 
 more and more to interfere with, guide, govern and 
 
 [ -'^3 ] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 prescribe the life and activities of the individual man. 
 In the last twenty years our transportation lines have 
 been especially selected for this profusion of govern- 
 ance. Subject as they are to a dual control, the 
 states are exhorted to use their full power, under the 
 threat that any unused portion will be added to and 
 employed by Federal enactment. Against this ten- 
 dency Samuel Spencer put forth all his opposing 
 strength. He did not, I repeat, object to any regula- 
 tion which secured equality and justice; but he 
 insisted that what the public was entitled to have the 
 public was bound to give ; and especially he showed 
 that, while the older sections might endure these at- 
 tacks, yet they made absolutely unsafe the struggling 
 commercial life of the new. 
 
 It is a good thing to bear the yoke in one's youth, 
 and in the time of great things to remember the day 
 of small things. So Samuel Spencer never forgot 
 that he too had been at the bottom of the ladder ; and 
 he also recognized that among other changes in the 
 world of industry there has come a marked change in 
 the relation of employer and employed. Especially is 
 this true in the case of a great organization such as 
 one of our railroads. The engineer, the fireman, the 
 conductor, the brakeman, the mechanic, the section 
 man — are all parts of one great whole, just as much a 
 part as the higher officials; and they have come by 
 
 [34] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 common consent to have a tenure of place quite as 
 secure, and a full right to fair return for honest labor. 
 Yonder statue is erected by the employees of the South- 
 em Railway. This lays emphasis upon two facts — one 
 that the employees of the Southern Railway feel con- 
 fident that Samuel Spencer recognized that he was at 
 last only one of them ; the other fact is that we are all 
 bound together in a strong but sacred fellowship when 
 that fellowship is one of respect and honor to our be- 
 loved dead. 
 
 This place was chosen for the erection of this 
 monument not only because it was within the native 
 state of Samuel Spencer and midway of the line of the 
 Southern Railway but also because this site for a sta- 
 tion was chosen at his instance and this building erect- 
 ed according to his plan. 
 
 Here we may imagine him through the years, 
 calmly seated while before him passes the whole 
 drama of human life. For this shall be a place of joy 
 and of sorrow, of laughter and of tears, of hope and 
 disappointment, of meeting and of parting, of hearts 
 made glad in coming home, and again made sick by 
 leaving all that makes life dear. Here will come the 
 bridegroom and the bride, circled by a happy throng ; 
 and here again will walk alone the figure clothed in 
 black behind the truck which bears all that remains of 
 of what was once strong and loving support. Every- 
 
 [35] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 thing that makes life dear ; everything that makes life 
 a burden; success, anticipated or achieved; failure, 
 foreshadowed or pronounced, will be represented in 
 the multitude that passes by this silent figure. 
 
 But if here there are eyes which see not, and ears 
 which hear not, we revert to the question I asked at 
 first : Is the life of the dead in the memory of the liv- 
 ing and nothing more ? 
 
 May I relate to you a simple incident which 
 brought before me this question in a way that has 
 never faded from my memory ? Some years ago I was 
 at a railroad station in Pana, Illinois, waiting for a 
 train. A newsboy sold me a local paper. In glanc- 
 ing through it I came across a telegram which told of 
 the sudden death of one with whom I had a lifelong 
 friendship. Walking along with the thought of my 
 friend filling my mind, I came to the edge of the plat- 
 form. It was a beautiful afternoon — the sun almost 
 at its setting and the heavens full of light, clear and 
 soft. Below there was the throbbing of a stationary 
 engine, the steam rising like a pure white cloud in the 
 still air. Beyond was a high platform and on it ap- 
 peared, from moment to moment, dark figures, each 
 with a small twinkling light. The figures were miners 
 coming out of the mine after the day's toil, and the 
 lights were the little lamps carried in their caps. As 
 each came within the circle and the influence of the 
 
 [36] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 day he at once took off his cap and blew out the little 
 lamp. It seemed to me that there was something 
 typical in this. Down there in the dark and narrow 
 mine the miner had this little lamp, which lighted only 
 a narrow circle. Coming into the day, as his eye took 
 in at a glance the wide horizon, he was in the midst 
 of and bathed in an ocean of light. 
 
 If by death light and immortality are indeed 
 brought to life how must the lamp by which our steps 
 have been guided while on this earth seem dim and 
 insignificant in comparison with the glory of that 
 supernal effulgence into which we shall be ushered 
 when once we have passed the dark portal of the 
 grave! 
 
 And so, in conclusion, may we not say of him as 
 was said of a great king, that, '* having served his gen- 
 eration, he fell on sleep and was gathered to his fathers." 
 
 At the conclusion of Judge Humphrey's address, 
 the monument was unveiled by Miss Violet Spencer, 
 daughter of Mr. Henry B. Spencer, and grand-daughter 
 of the late Samuel Spencer. 
 
 After appropriate music by the band of the Fifth 
 Regiment of the Georgia National Guard the presid- 
 ing officer, Mr. J. S. B. Thompson, introduced Mr. W. 
 W. Finley, President of the Southern Railway Comp- 
 any, saying: 
 
 [37] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 " Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 
 " In this age of great undertakings, that close 
 personal contact between man and man which charac- 
 terized the smaller enterprises of former times is impossi- 
 ble. Especially is this true of a great railway system 
 with its employees distributed over thousands of miles 
 of line. The directing head of such an institution can 
 come into personal relations with but relatively a very 
 few of his co-workers. Many of them may never even 
 see him. That, under such circumstances, Samuel 
 Spencer should have so administered the affairs of 
 the Southern Railway Company as to inspire in the 
 vast army of employees who worked under his direction 
 the high respect and the personal esteem of which 
 this beautiful monument is the visible expression 
 marks him as no ordinary man. No higher tribute 
 could be paid to his character than this evidence in 
 lasting bronze and marble that his death was felt as a 
 personal loss by thousands of employees throughout 
 every branch of the service. 
 
 " This monument is the result of a movement 
 that had its inception in the ranks of the employees of 
 the Southern Railway system and it was strictly their 
 affair from its inception to its successful completion. 
 The officers of the Company bore the same relation 
 to it as the men in the ranks. They were given an 
 opportunity to contribute on the basis of the plan 
 
 [ 38 ] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 adopted by the General Committee. Friends and ad- 
 mirers of Mr. Spencer outside our ranks asked for 
 the privilege of making contributions but their cissist- 
 ance was declined with thanks. This was exclusively 
 a family affair of the employees of our Company from 
 which all outsiders were excluded. When sufficient 
 contributions were assured the Committee selected 
 Mr. Daniel Chester French, one of the foremost sculp- 
 tors of the United States, to execute the statue of Mr. 
 Spencer, and Mr. Henry Bacon, an architect of high 
 reputation, to design the base. The wisdom of their 
 selection is evidenced by the splendid work of art before 
 us; and in this connection I know that I voice the 
 sentiments of all my fellow employees when, on their 
 behalf, I thank most heartily the members of our 
 General Committee and especially their energetic and 
 efficient Chairman, Mr. J. W. Connelly, for the capable 
 way in which they have carried out the wishes of the 
 many thousands of contributors to the monument 
 fund. 
 
 " When the selection of a man to present the 
 monument to the keeping of the State of Georgia and 
 the City of Atlanta was taken up it was the unanimous 
 opinion of the employees, speaking through the repre- 
 sentatives of all departments on the General Committee, 
 that the man who could most properly speak for the 
 entire body of Southern Railway workers was he who 
 
 [39] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 was one of Mr. Spencer's trusted lieutenants. Their 
 unanimous request, voiced through their Committee, 
 was presented to him and he gladly consented to per- 
 form this service. 
 
 " I have the honor to introduce Mr. W. W. Finley." 
 Mr. Finley, acting at the request of the whole 
 body of employees, expressed through their General 
 Committee, and on their behalf, presented the mon- 
 ument to the State of Georgia and the City of Atlanta 
 in the following address : 
 
 "Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: 
 " I appreciate most highly being selected by my fel- 
 low employees as their representative to present to the 
 State of Georgia and the City of Atlanta this monu- 
 ment to Samuel Spencer. 
 
 " There have been monuments erected to great 
 military chieftains by their followers in war, but this is 
 one of the few instances that I know of in which an 
 industrial army has thus honored its leader. This 
 monument testifies not only to the high esteem in 
 which President Spencer was held by his associates 
 but also to the loyalty with which he was followed by 
 the body of employees which he had organized and 
 which his genius directed in the building up and oper- 
 ation of one of the most important railway systems of 
 the South. It symbolizes the ideal relations between 
 the manager of a railway and those who serve under 
 
 [40 J 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 his direction, in which each one, in his particular 
 sphere, gives to the property the best service of which 
 he is capable and co-operates loyally and intelligently 
 with his fellow employees to secure the best general 
 results. 
 
 " The management of the Company appreciates at 
 its full worth the spirit of co-operative loyalty that per- 
 vades our organization and makes it one that any man 
 might be proud to lead. It is an organization which, 
 man for man, I do not believe has its superior on any 
 railway in the United States. It is an organization in 
 which men are constantly showing high capacity and 
 in which vacancies occurring in the service, including 
 the more responsible posts, are being filled by promo- 
 tion from the ranks. 
 
 ** To all of us in the service of the Company this 
 statue of our great organizer and leader will be a con- 
 stant inspiration to more intense loyalty and higher 
 efficiency. Standing as it does at a central point on 
 our system, in the midst of the busy commercial life of 
 the South, it will symbolize for us the identity of our 
 interests with those of the communities traversed by 
 our lines, and will ever remind us that our value to the 
 Company is measured by the efficiency of our service 
 to the public. 
 
 " It is fitting that this monument to Samuel Spen- 
 cer should have been erected in Atlanta— the Capital 
 
 [41] 
 
IN MEMORJAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 of his native State and one of the principal cities on 
 the Southern Railway system. It was the flag of 
 Georgia that he followed into war, and throughout his 
 administration of the Southern Railway Company the 
 transportation needs of this State were among his 
 chief concerns. It is fitting that his statue should be 
 placed before this terminal station, which is the result 
 of years of close personal study by him of the problem 
 of providing for Atlanta adequate terminal facilities. 
 It was a problem to the solution of which he brought 
 his ripe experience and great knowledge. It was he 
 who selected the location and determined the charac- 
 ter of the building with a view to providing a terminal 
 that would afford adequate and convenient accom- 
 modations and that, at the same time, would be an 
 architectural ornament to the city. This passenger 
 station is only a part of the great terminal scheme 
 which Mr. Spencer had planned for Atlanta and which 
 involves the utilization of adjacent property for the 
 development of a great freight terminal. The only 
 things that have prevented the carrying out of this 
 plan in its entirety have been the later development 
 of the necessity for providing facilities for increasing 
 the carrying capacity of our lines and the business de- 
 pression which made it necessary for the Company to 
 postpone this and other projected improvements. It 
 is peculiarly appropriate that I should be able, at this 
 
 [42] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 time, to announce that the immediate completion of 
 this great project in its entirety, so dear to the heart 
 of Mr. Spencer, has been authorized. 
 
 " Mr. Spencer was essentially an organizer and a 
 builder. His highest ambition was the development 
 of the Southern Railway into a more efficient trans- 
 portation system, and thus making it a still more im- 
 portant factor in the upbuilding and prosperity of the 
 South. It was to this problem that Mr. Spencer was 
 constantly devoting the best energies of his construc- 
 tive mind, and, as we, his successors, carry forward the 
 great work which he had planned, I believe that the 
 people of the South will recognize, even more fully 
 than they do to-day, the inestimable value to our en- 
 tire section of the crowning work of his life. 
 
 " Standing before this terminal station, this monu- 
 ment will be seen daily by thousands of the citizens of 
 Georgia and the other Southern States. It will stand 
 as a perpetual inspiration to the youth of Georgia and 
 of the South — portraying a Georgian who, by patriot- 
 ism, strict integrity, a high Christian character, and 
 untiring industry, won honor and success in life and 
 a reputation that endures after death. 
 
 " And so. Governor Brown and Mayor Maddox, on 
 behalf of my fellow employees of the Southern Rail- 
 way Company, I present to you, as representing the 
 State of Georgia and the City of Atlanta, this monu- 
 
 [43] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 ment to Samuel Spencer — a Georgian, a Confederate 
 soldier, and the first President of the Southern Rail- 
 way Company — in full confidence that it will be cher- 
 ished and safeguarded, not merely as a beautiful work 
 of art, but as a memorial of one of Georgia's most dis- 
 tinguished and most useful sons." 
 
 Hon. Joseph M. Brown, Governor of the State of 
 Georgia, in accepting the monument on behalf of the 
 State, said : 
 
 " Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 " Honoring the devotion of the tens of thousands 
 of employees of the greatest railway system of the 
 South to the memory of their President, and honoring 
 the brain-power, the indomitable energy, the partiotism 
 and the fidelity to trusts placed in his keeping, in the 
 name and in behalf of the people of Georgia, I accept 
 this monument to one of Georgia's greatest sons — 
 Samuel Spencer." 
 
 Hon. Robert F. Maddox, Mayor of the City of 
 Atlanta, in accepting the monument for the City of 
 Atlanta, said : 
 
 '' Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 '* From the beginning of historic times, we have 
 record that nations, states, cities and individuals have 
 exemplified a happy custom of making enduring me- 
 morials, in some fashion, of their illustrious dead. 
 
 [44] 
 
1^^ 
 
 A Georgian" 
 
 A CONFEDERATE SOLDIER. 
 AND 
 THE FIRST PRESIDLNT 
 ' OF THE 
 ' SO.UTMERN RAILWAY COMP^^ 
 
 tRiCTED BY THE EMPLOYEES 
 OF THAT COMPANY 
 
m MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 " It is unnecessary in the presence of this enlight- 
 ened gathering, to dwell at length upon celebrated 
 memorials of times that are far distant. It will 
 suffice here to recall a few of the more recent and most 
 striking instances of the kind, and to apply them 
 to the memory of the man whom to-day we are met 
 here to honor. 
 
 "Trafalgar Square in London is a noble testimonial 
 of England's pride in her brave sailors, and upon the 
 tall shaft which ornaments its center, stands the figure 
 of that country's greatest admiral, Horatio Nelson. 
 
 " No one who has ever visited Paris, fails to search 
 first for the great white marble sepulcher with the 
 
 golden dome which keeps the dust of Napoleon Bona- 
 parte. 
 
 ** Our own Capital city of Washington, one of the 
 most beautiful cities of the earth, is made doubly at- 
 tractive by the monuments and squares and circles 
 which commemorate the valiant deeds of Washington, 
 of Jackson, of Lafayette, of Kosciusko, and of others 
 whose names are chiseled on Fame's everlasting tablet. 
 The unique city of Richmond, Va., ever redolent with 
 the tender memories of the Lost Cause, has adorned 
 herself with immortal bronzes and marbles commem- 
 orative of Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, Stonewall 
 Jackson, Jeb Stuart, and others who have shed im- 
 perishable luster on American valor. 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 " In the National Hall of Fame in Washington, 
 Georgia has shown her appreciation of statesmanship 
 by voting the first place to Alexander H. Stephens, 
 who, throughout a life of physical suffering and constant 
 bodily infirmity, maintained a mind so clear and a 
 logic so relentless as to place him forever among the 
 foremost statesmen of America. 
 
 " By the side of Mr. Stephens, Georgia voted its 
 second place in the home of the immortals, to Dr. 
 Crawford W. Long, who made the revolutionary dis- 
 covery of anaesthesia or of making surgical operations 
 painless. 
 
 "In the City of Atlanta there now stand three mon- 
 uments to distinguished men, erected by their fellow- 
 Georgians. The first is that snow-white figure of the 
 illustrious Ben Hill, which bears silent testimony to 
 the life he lived and the record he made while repre- 
 senting his State and section in the Halls of Congress. 
 The next is that splendid figure in bronze of Henry 
 Grady, " who died literally loving a nation into peace," 
 which was erected by his friends and admirers in ap- 
 preciation of the good work he had accomplished in 
 bringing about cordial relations between all sections 
 of our common country, and for the cheerful and wise 
 editorials written to an appreciative world. The last 
 monument was erected to that brave hero in gray, 
 General Gordon, whose gallant service as a soldier of 
 
 [46] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 the Confederacy, was enough to endear our people to 
 his name and memory. 
 
 '* These three Georgian heroes played an impor- 
 tant part in the history of their times — the one a gal- 
 lant soldier, another a splendid statesman, the other a 
 journalist and philanthropist of the highest and best 
 type. But it remains for this day and hour to have 
 unveiled in this, the Gate City of the South, a monu- 
 ment to another famous Georgian, but not especially 
 for his service as a soldier, not for his work as a journal- 
 ist, nor his statesmanship, but for his gentlemenly 
 character, his ability as a captain of industry, and for 
 his universal kindness to the thousands of men employ- 
 ed by the Company of which he was the official head, 
 this monument is to-day unveiled in the heart of a sec- 
 tion for which he labored so long and loved so well. 
 
 " He had seen the South in ashes, her manufactur- 
 ing plants destroyed, her farms a wretched wilderness 
 of weeds, and her people defeated but still undaunted, 
 after a long and terrible war. But from out the gloom 
 and desolation of that hour, he caught the vision of 
 the dawning of a better day, for he knew that the cour- 
 age and spirit of the people which followed the Stars 
 and Bars for four long years, would not rest in idle 
 mourning, but would in God's own time, rebuild a 
 greater South, to the glory of this section and to the 
 credit of the nation. 
 
 [47] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCES 
 
 "He knew that an Omniscient Hand had given us a 
 soil and climate the equal of any on earth. He knew 
 that the rivers and harbors of the South would again 
 send our products to all the world. He knew that 
 our people were honest and industrious and would 
 again create credit and capital out of the shaken but 
 not shattered Southland. It was, therefore, indeed 
 fortunate that, during the years of such rebuilding, the 
 South had such a messenger as Samuel Spencer to 
 go with his optimistic heart and courageous hand to 
 the strong financial interests in the East and lay be- 
 fore them the possibilities of the New South and secure 
 their co-operation in its commercial reconstruction. 
 He told them that the God-given supremacy of the 
 southern planter to raise the cotton crop of the world, 
 would not be neglected, but that in a short time it 
 would require many more miles of transportation facili- 
 ties to market this great crop. He told them that it 
 was at the door of the plantation that the cotton mill 
 of the future would be built. He explained to the people 
 of the North that the furnaces of Alabama and the 
 forests of Georgia and the mines of Tennessee would 
 not be left sleeping in idleness, but would soon ring 
 with the music of commercial progress and prosperity. 
 He prophesied that the villages of this section would 
 grow into great cities and that the cities would in 
 time become great manufacturing centers of trade and 
 
 [48] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCr::^ 
 
 traffic, and, with the wisdom of but few men of the 
 South, he went about to do all in his power to bring 
 about the reality of this dream, and, thank God, he 
 lived to see it come true. 
 
 " Mr. Spencer was a native Georgian. He was 
 born in Columbus. He was fourteen years of age when 
 the great war broke out, and had reached but eighteen 
 when General Lee laid down his stainless sword at Ap- 
 pamatox. Yet, in spite of his youth, he gave two years 
 of hard service to the Confederate Army. While his 
 great heart swelled with pride at the complete reunion 
 of his once disunited country — a reunion in which he 
 himself was one of the principal factors — he still was 
 proud of the fact that he was a Confederate soldier, 
 and these words, so simple, yet which speak so much, 
 are cut into the marble base of this monument where 
 they may be seen until the statue crumbles into dust. 
 
 " After the war Mr. Spencer entered the University 
 of Georgia, and was graduated from that institution in 
 in the class of 1867 with the first honor. Continuing 
 his studies at the University of Virginia, he there took 
 the degree of Civil Engineer in the class of 1869. 
 
 " Soon afterward he married Miss Louisa Benning, 
 daughter of General Henry L. Benning, veteran of the 
 Mexican and Civil Wars, and later a distinguished 
 member of the Georgia Supreme Court. 
 
IN MliMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 "Mr. and Mrs. Spencer literally started life together, 
 and the noble woman sitting to-day upon this platform 
 shared all her husband's early trials, encouraged him 
 at every moment of his career, and finally tasted with 
 him the sweets of deserved success. 
 
 " Mr. Spencer commenced his railroad work as a 
 rodman. From one position to another he steadily 
 advanced, always as a result of his own work. He 
 never got a promotion on account of " pull " or out- 
 side influence, but every advance was won by him from 
 his superiors as the result of his personal fitness for the 
 place. 
 
 " In a recent conversation with one of his close 
 friends and business associates, Mr. S. M. Inman, him- 
 self universally and properly known as the first citizen 
 of Atlanta, Mr. Inman said to me : ' Mr. Spencer's en- 
 thusiasm for the upbuilding of the South amounted to 
 a pzission. Day and night he worked for the pro- 
 motion of his native section by improving the farming 
 and transportation facilities and stimulating the build- 
 ing and development of mining and manufacturing 
 plants. During the last seven years of his adminis- 
 tration, there were located along the line of the 
 Southern Railway, nearly 5,000 new manufacturing 
 and mining industries, or an average of one industry 
 to every one and one-half miles of the system proper. 
 Of this number, 300 were textile miles. At one stretch 
 
 [50] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 of 300 miles, from Danville, Va., South, it is said there 
 is an average of one cotton mill for every mile of the 
 road.' 
 
 ** One of Mr. Spencer's most striking traits was 
 his kindness of heart, and no higher tribute to his 
 make-up can be paid here to-day than the following 
 excerpt from a letter of Mr. J. W. Connelly, of date 
 January 1st, 1907, which Mr. Connelly, as Chairman 
 of the Committee which built this monument, address- 
 ed to the employees of the Southern Railway, in which 
 he said : * Mr. Spencer's kindness of heart ever led 
 him to treat with the same consideration his humblest 
 employee and his highest officer.' 
 
 "Mr. Spencer was one of the most accurate of men. 
 In the study of any subject which interested him, 
 whether historical, esthetic, or business, he went to 
 the bottom, and when he spoke, it was " ex-cathedra." 
 He was distinguished for a justness of mental vision 
 and decision rarely possessed by men concerned with 
 such a diversity of large questions. He was one of those 
 men who sought to find the just path, and having 
 found it, he walked straight forward. There were 
 times when he lamented to his nearest friends about 
 the bitter attacks against some of his railroad policies, 
 but he always said that the time would come when the 
 Southern people would understand him. 
 
 "The splendid line of railroads, amounting to nearly 
 
 [51] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 10,000 miles, which he reunited and constructed, now 
 operating successfully through the southeastern part 
 of our country, with its chief business, if not its home 
 office, in Atlanta, which, as a compliment to this sec- 
 tion, he called the Southern Railway Company, to- 
 gether with the growth of that other splendid Company 
 which another fellow-Georgian organized and called 
 the Southern Express Company, I believe are two of 
 the best illustrations to be found of the rapid develop- 
 ment of the New South, and I think these two Com- 
 panies, carrying daily the very name " Southern " into 
 the heart of the East and West, have done much to 
 encourage friendly relationships, easy commercial inter- 
 course, and profitable business between these three 
 great sections of our common country. 
 
 ** The South in her splendid struggle during the 
 past forty years, has had but little time seriously to con- 
 template the means and men through which our vic- 
 tory has been won, but, now that we have passed 
 through the days of doubt and danger, we may well 
 pause and think over the reasons for the marvellous 
 progress we have made, and measure without partiality 
 the men who have led us in our matchless march from 
 poverty to prosperity, and it is especially fortunate 
 that, while heretofore in Atlanta we have erected mon- 
 uments to those whose splendid services, cis a soldier, 
 statesman and journalist, have been appreciated by a 
 
 L52] 
 
IN MEMORUM 
 SAMUEL SI'ENCEK 
 
 grateful people, we can to-day unveil another monu- 
 ment which is to be a fitting tribute to a plain business 
 man who ever had the interests of this section at heart, 
 and, through his influence with his associates in the 
 North, did perhaps more than any other man in com- 
 mercially rebuilding this section. 
 
 ** It is well that this and future generations should 
 know that a man by honest endeavor can operate a 
 commercial enterprise to the credit of himself and for 
 the benefit of his fellow-men. This should be an en- 
 couragement at a time when the press of the country 
 and the people generally are too apt to think and say 
 unjust things of all men engaged in the large commer- 
 cial enterprises. 
 
 "Atlanta is known as the ' Gate City of the South,* 
 and is proud of the twelve lines of railroad radiating 
 from here to every point of the compass, and I take this 
 occasion to say that the construction and operation of 
 the railroads entering Atlanta have done much to make 
 this City what it is to-day, and we wish for each and 
 every one of them, success. 
 
 "We are especially grateful that the 30,000 friends 
 of Mr. Spencer among the employees of the South- 
 ern Railway, selected Atlanta as the point where this 
 splendid monument will stand. 
 
 " Now, Mr. Chairman, as Mayor of this City, and 
 speaking for all of our citizens, I accept this monu- 
 
 [63] 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 SAMUEL SPENCER 
 
 ment to the late Samuel Spencer, and assure the 
 donors, each and all, that Atlanta will always be proud 
 of it, and we hope that the city will prove ever worthy 
 of their choice. Its location in the heart of the South, 
 in the Capital City of the State in which he was born, 
 facing the splendid terminal station which he build- 
 ed, is ideal. 
 
 " I trust it will sit upon this beautiful plaza for in- 
 definite years to inspire every young Georgian who 
 sees it to achieve something for himself and his fellow- 
 men. I sincerely hope that this city, this section, and 
 the road which Mr. Spencer served so well, may con- 
 tinue to grow in influence and in strength, to the glory 
 of God and the nation." 
 
 Rev. John E. White, D. D., Pastor of the Second 
 Baptist Church of Atlanta, pronounced the following 
 benediction : 
 
 ''Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, in whom 
 we move and have our being, from whose hand we 
 receive all life and opportunity, we seek Thy gracious 
 benediction upon this occasion. We thank Thee for 
 the great Southerner and good man whose large work 
 for his people and whose noble qualities we have hon- 
 ored to-day. May his career be an inspiration to those 
 who are left to carry forward the progress he dreamed 
 and planned for our people. Bless, we entreat Thee, 
 the thousands of employees who have so lovingly con- 
 
 [54] 
 
IN MKMOKIAM 
 SAMtKL SPENCER 
 
 tributed to this worthy memorial. Grant grace, mercy 
 and peace to the family and children's children who 
 witness to-day the testimonial of honor we have ded- 
 icated to their beloved dead. Send us forth from this 
 place in Thy favor and guard us from all evil into the 
 paths of righteousness and peace. And this we ask 
 through Jesus Christ, our Lord, Amen." 
 
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