National Park to Davis

To readers of educational advertisements in the flyleaves of solid U. S. periodicals, two young women gazing placidly into a mirror ball have represented for many years National Park Seminary of Forest Glen, Md. National Park's well publicized mirror ball and reputation as a stronghold of Southern culture were the creations of a remarkable Illinois educator named James E. Ament, who bought a part interest in the school in 1916 and managed it with distinction for 20 years. When Dr. Ament died last year, National Park had a glamorous list of alumnae including Cinemactress Margaret Lindsay, Soprano Marion Claire, Irene Castle McLaughlin, the daughters of Walter P. Chrysler and Milton Snavely Hershey. Last fortnight his widow, Mrs. Teresa Catherine Ament, put National Park into the hands of an equally remarkable midwestern educator, Dr. Roy Tasco Davis, who simultaneously resigned as public relations director of Missouri's Stephens College.

Alert, adaptable Roy Davis has had two separate and successful careers. He got his political start as a page to U. S. Speaker Joseph Gurney ("Uncle Joe") Cannon, continued it after taking a Ph.B. degree at Brown in 1910 as secretary to the commission in charge of building the Missouri capitol. He married a Missouri girl named Loyce Enloe, and branched out as an educator in 1914 by joining the administrative staff of Stephens, which young President James Madison ("Daddy") Wood was just beginning to develop into a horsey mid-western finishing school (TIME, June 7). Seven years later Roy Davis' Republican friends made him U. S. Minister to Guatemala, an event he celebrated by adopting spats, cane and black-ribboned pince-nez. High point of Roy Davis' diplomatic career was the revolution that overtook him as U. S. Minister to Panama in 1931. Because no U. S. soldiers were called from the Canal Zone during the fracas, Minister Davis was hailed by Panamanians of every stripe, including even profane and eccentric Editor Nelson Rounsevell of the Panama American. They named a lake in his honor. When Republican diplomats began trooping back home in 1933, Roy Tasco Davis, minus spats and cane, returned to Stephens.

Although President Davis will head a new operating company formed to run the school, Widow Ament will retain control of National Park Seminary Co. which owns its "physical properties." These comprise a woodsy 200-acre campus with 44 buildings, including eight resident clubhouses built in the style of various nations. The English has a drawbridge, the Chinese resembles a pagoda. Other National Park wonders are a ballroom with 24 balconies, acres of antique furniture purchased by Dr. Ament during his travels, a Negro kitchen staff which appears on a balcony over the dining room to sing spirituals during meals. National Park's 120 students, aged from 14 to 21, pay from $850 to $1,200 a year.

Roy Davis will not alter National Park's four-year preparatory curriculum, but plans to expand its junior college course, advertise it more extensively than ever. He favors plenty of bowling, swimming, gymnastics for his girls, regular parties for neighboring collegians, frequent excursions to Washington nine miles away. Says he: "I look on this school as a magnificent laboratory."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.