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CHAPTER 7
Achievements Close to Home
 UTH
STILL MARVELS that FJD
could devote so much time to his thriving legal and notarial practice,
his extensive real estate investments and his active civic ventures and still have plenty of energy and love to
devote to his family. Both she and FJD's first grandchild, Carol, fondly recall the wholesome and nurturing family
life that FJD and Julia created for their children and grandchildren.
One of Carol's descriptions tells a great deal about the special relationship
FJD enjoyed with his oldest grandchild. The two had intimate routines that they could joke about and share:
"As a child enjoys the same story over and over, I went through the same dramas to get the expected response
from my grandfather. I knew that he never drank water, though I hardly believed it. However, I'd ask: 'Grandpa,
can I get you a glass of water?' He'd always respond, 'You know I don't drink water.' Everyday he read the newspaper.
He'd sit in the solarium... the newspaper open in front of him. Or he would take the paper upstairs to his bedroom,
sit in bed concentrating on the pages. Grandpa told me that he read every word in the newspaper. I'd ask, 'Do you
read everything, all the ads, the sports, every word? Are you sure you don't skip anything?' 'Every word.' he'd
answer."
In 1919, FJD was selected speaker at the Newcomb graduation banquet of
his daughter, Caroline, and he chose to discuss Tulane University's greatest pioneers, Paul Tulane and Randell
Lee Gibson. In calling upon the memory of these mentors, FJD exclaimed, "What better opportunity could be
presented than that offered by the one whose wealth was to be dedicated to the most beneficial purpose and by the
other in devoting the influence of mind and of thought, to direct the dedication to the cause of education."
FJD's recapitulation of the educational goals of the university formed the real heart of his remarks. This synopsis
coincided with the end of World War I, but indicated that FJD's Progressive spirit remained resilient, even though
he must have realized that the Progressive movement itself was on the wane. He spoke with great fervor, as he stressed,
"The philosophy of education evoked here is not that of the German
which conceives the creation of a superman--an ego who sees in the mental development a right to control, to rule
by might and not by reason, but there arises, rather from the association of Tulane, the Frenchman, and Gibson,
the American, the spirit of Rousseau and of Jefferson,--the ideals of the Rights of Man and of Democracy, promoting
and fostering the principles of equality, liberty and fraternity."
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