PERSONAL RECORD. l6l 
The Man of Affairs 
Mr. McNary: Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: I esteem it a high honor and a 
great pleasure to be invited to participate with you in doing honor to the name of Frank 
Springer. 
A quarter of a century ago through the instrumentality of Mr. Springer, president of the 
Board of Regents, and Mr. E. L. Hewett, president of the faculty of the Normal University 
of Las Vegas, the fates directed my youthful footsteps to New Mexico, for which I have 
always had reason to be deeply grateful. 
From the day, just 24 years ago, when I first met Mr. Springer, I have held it a high honor 
to call him my friend, and who does not love tO' pay tribute to a friend of such illustrious 
achievements that moderation ceases to be a virtue ? 
It would be impossible to overestimate the value of scientific knowledge. Each stray bit 
of such truth from the farther shore of human thought and inc[uiry, has its value in applying 
the phenomena of the physical world to the needs of our complex social life. 
Of Mr. Springer’s unusual fund of scientific knowledge and of his generous use of it, 
you have heard and are to hear from others better qualified than I to speak, but I wish to tres- 
pass on their ground long enough to read a few lines dedicated to Mr. Springer and handed 
me by a mutual friend. Emerson said: “ Next to the man whO' originates a beautiful thought 
is the man who quotes it.” 
“ In solitude he played his flute and thought. 
Till Anally this miracle was wrought. 
The ordered working of his cultured brain, 
Gave power to his gaze and through the train 
Of aeons of dead years his piercing eye 
Sought out Earth’s secrets where they underlie 
The cold faced rocks. Then slowly page by page. 
He read through Nature’s book and age by age 
He found a story there. Today the world 
Is deeply in his debt, for he revealed 
To man the mystery the Earth concealed.” 
I am, however, delegated to speak especially of Mr. Springer’s services as a builder of 
the state. How, I beg of you, can I do justice to this theme in ten short minutes ? 
When Mr. Springer first came to New Mexico, over a half century ago, her population 
was a scant one hundred thousand, her developed resources scarcely amounted to the value 
of the property now within the limits of this city. Great resources of coal lay hidden in her 
mountains, which required money and brains to develop and railroads to haul to the consumer. 
Her streams carried a wealth of water for the thirsty land, which it required the hand 
of man to conserve, impound and distribute. 
Mr. Springer arrived in New Mexico in the year 1873, and engaged in the practice of law 
at Cimarron. 
One of his first public services was the founding of a newspaper and though I have never 
seen a copy, I can judge of the high spirit which must have animated its pages. 
Early in his legal career Mr. Springer became identified with the interests of the Maxwell 
Land Grant Company, and in due time became its president, which position he still occupies. 
He exerted an important influence on the industrial life of the state, as he was one of 
Ahe first to recognize the importance of coal resources of New Mexico, and took a prominent 
part in the organization of the St. Louis, Rocky Mountain and Pacific company, the most im- 
portant fuel producing company in the west, is today one of its directors and has always 
exerted an important influence in its affairs. 
The greatest enterprise ever undertaken in the state of New Mexico by private capital, 
the building of the so-called Eagle Nest Dam in the Cimarron Canyon, was carried through by 
Mr. Springer and his brother Charles. 
