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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 21, 1948)
Hall BearslNamelof UO Benefactor Editor’s note: This is the first in a series of articles on Ihe lives j of the men and women for whom j University of Oregon buildings j are named. The series is designed 1 to honor the memories of people j who have aided the University j financially and through their ed ucational ability. By JOE MEIER Henry Hilgaard Villard, whose spirit is perpetuated by the school ;uilding bearing his name, is prob ibly the most renowned University >f Oregon benefactor. His charac :er was dynamic, his career colos sal, his reputation mythical. . A man of many accomplishments —journalist, editor, teacher, bank ;r, and railroad financier—Villard vill always be remembered for his ■ole in the historical development >f Oregon. It was Villard, who, in the latter lalf of the nineteenth century, cut i network of rail transportation :hrough the Oregon wilderness, initing the state and speeding its growth. It was Villard who, as resident of the Northern Pacific aiiroad, fostered construction of ;he first transcontinental railroad ,o Oregon, increasing with a rush he settlement of this state. Swung Sledge-Hammer All school children remember iom their history books the wild ■elebration during which a golden ipike was driven at Gold Springs, Montana, completing construction if the 2,000 mile railway. Most of .hem do not remember that Henry Dillard was the man who swung he sledge-hammer that clay. Villard fell in love with Oregon’s fcenic beauty at first sight and rate friends enthusiastically about t- His dream was to see this re fion grow into a great economic mpire, and no man did more to ward this end. Through an exten ive advertising campaign, he at racted thousands of immigrant J ettlers and made Oregon the most 'U’olicized of all the United States, j , Considering this record, Villard ! might be expected to be an Amer-1 ican-born pioneer, steeped in this country’s traditions—but he was not. He was born in Bavaria in 1 1335, the son of. a Munich suprem< court judge. At the age of 17, he came to America with the express intention of making a name and a fortune for himself. He dropped his family name, Hil gaard, and borrowed “Villard" from a French schoolmate. Laving on the Illinois farm of relatives Villard attended law school at Car lyle university and concurrently wrote for the German-American press. Later, he abandoned law and tried his hand at editing a country paper. As a war correspondent during the Civil War, Villard gained con siderable fame and at the close of the war was sent to France as a foreign correspondent. In 1868, on his return from Europe, he was elected secretary of the American social science association, in which capacity he worked tirelessly for civil service reform. Railroad Man Eventually he learned of Oregon railroad conditions through friends who held stock in the rustic Oregon & California Railroad company. He was interested, came to Oregon, ; stayed. In a few years he was pres J ident of Northern Pacific Railroad company and owner of most of Oregon's transportation system. For a time, due to his gigantic op erations, Villard was considered the leading figure in Amovican rail roads. Villard’s attention was drawn to | Oregon in 1881 when news of tire impending sale of the University’s only building, Deady hall, appeared in Portland newspapers. Always a man of keen intellectual interests, lie believed in developing the edu cational as well as economic re sources of the Northwest. Consequently he assumed the j threatening $7,000 debt. Besides I making numerous other contribu tions, he presented the University with $50,000 in Northern Pacific bonds from which a $3,000 annual income was derived. With this en dowment the University’s days of financial insecurity were ended. Villard’s generosity attracted wide attention, since his donations were the first of any importance to public higher education in Ore gon. The Louis Prima’s "With a Hey and a Hi and a Ho Ho Ho" (RCA Victo/) The man who plays pretty for the people, Louis Prima, has a groovy new record! A trumpet player of long experience, Louis knows when lie’s hit the right note in smoking pleasure too. He’s a dyed-in-the-wool Camel fan. “Camels are the ‘choice of experience’ with me,” says Prima. Try Camels! Let your own experience tell i you why, with smokers who have tried and compared, Camels are the * “choice of experience.” And ano’her SrCat 1 record-” i k m >&£1 1 _ R. J. Reynolds Tob. Co. Winston-Salem. N. C. ^ CAMEL, IS MY \ ^ BRAND / !! i i >• jM •• J - <:: P O'