22 PROCEEDINGS OP THE WASHINGTON MEETING 



MEMORIAL OF JOSEPH AUSTIN HOLMES 1 

 BY JOSEPH HYDE PRATT 



The life of Dr. Joseph Austin Holmes was devoted to the development 

 and welfare of his country, and in his death the people of the United 

 States have lost one of their most efficient and valuable public servants. 

 He was a man who put duty first, and in carrying out this ideal he gave 

 his life in an endeavor to improve the condition and safety of the miners. 

 He did not know the word "failure ;" and, where other men would have 

 failed, he has been able to accomplish the results desired. It is granted 

 to but few men to be able in the few years of their life's activity to do 

 that which will leave a permanent influence and impress on an industry; 

 but to Doctor Holmes, whose life we are now commemorating, this dis- 

 tinct ion was allotted. 



Due almost entirely to his energy and efforts, there has been created 

 throughout this country an organized movement looking to the preserva- 

 tion of human life; and, although his first work'Avas directed toward the 

 prevention of mine accidents and safety and welfare of the hundreds of 

 thousands of men who daily risk their lives in the production of fuel, so 

 necessary to the nation's industry and commerce, it developed the "safety 

 first'' idea that has spread to nearly every industry and into all walks of 

 life. These words are almost synonymous with the word "Holmes," and 

 wherever we see "safety first" we are reminded of the wonderful achieve- 

 ments of this man. He has not only left his impress on an industry, but 

 has also created an organization which will live as long as our govern- 

 ment exists, and is a monument to the tireless energy, public-spiritedness, 

 and unselfishness of the man who is responsible for its creation. I refer 

 to the Bureau of Mines, whose foundation he laid by many feats of exact- 

 ing labor and fruitful work, and who, by masterful generalship and argu- 

 ments, as he only could use, carried the bill to establish the Bureau of 

 Mines successfully through an unsympathetic Congress. 



To Dr. Charles D. Walcott, former Director of the United States Geo- 

 logical Survey and now Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, must 

 be given the credit of recognizing those qualities of character and ability 

 in Mr. Holmes which he realized were necessary in a man who could not- 

 only lay the foundation and build up an organization that would lead to 

 a Bureau of Mines, but who would also be able to direct it after its crea- 

 tion. In a recent communication from Doctor Walcott, he wrote : 



x Read at the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America, Washington, D. C, 

 December 2S, 1915. 



