Exactly 100 years after the day James J. Davis joined the Moose fraternity--starting its resurrection toward the founding of Mooseheart-- Jewel Davis Cornell visited the site of her father’s proudest achievement, and was wowed by what she found.
‘He Would Be So Proud’
By KURT WEHRMEISTER
Jewel Davis Cornell visiting Mooseheart third-graders last Oct. 27, the 100th anniversary of the day her father joined the Moose fraternity.
> When Jewel Davis Cornell was born in 1926, her father, James J. Davis, was already 53 years old and five years into his service as U.S. Secretary of Labor under President Warren Harding, then Calvin Coolidge. Davis would continue to serve briefly in the Cabinet of Herbert Hoover as well, before winning a U.S. Senate seat in Pennsylvania in 1930, when his youngest daughter was just four. He would serve in the Senate until she was in college.
So, as Jewel grew up, mostly around Washington, DC, with her father preoccupied with national issues and traveling extensively, the topic of Mooseheart was occasionally discussed, but generally as something her father had been involved in a long time before.
She recalls having visited the campus once in the late ’40s as a very young woman (she doesn’t remember the date or exact occasion)--then not until 1995, for a few ceremonial hours on Graduation Day, at the invitation of then-Director General Frank Sarnecki, for a re-dedication of the Campanile building in her father’s honor.
The House of God was full--with students, staff, local government and business leaders, and the news media--to its 700-plus capacity for the 40-minute multimedia presentation on the life and legacy of James J. Davis.
Mrs. Cornell reacts to the loud and prolonged standing ovation she received from Mooseheart students, teachers, staff and visitors as she went to the lectern to climax the Founder’s Day Centennial presentation in the House of God.
In fall 2006, more than 11 years later, Director General Bill Airey extended a third invitation, this time, for her to be the guest of honor on Oct. 27, 2006--the 100th anniversary of the date in 1906 on which her father had joined the Moose as a 33-year-old dynamo--with the vision to create a City of Children that would become a reality less than seven short years later.
And this time--as you see from the pictures on these pages--there was plenty of time for Jewel Davis Cornell to see the full flowering of the idea that her father began conceiving, 20 years before she was born.
“Oct. 27 was always a very special day when I was growing up, because it was my father’s birthday,” she said at the lectern in the Mooseheart House of God in what was the emotional climax to a 40-minute multimedia presentation, narrated by students, on the life and legacy of her father.
“My father always had a hand out to help those in need--whether it was to help them find a job, or find a meal, or just to show kindness to another person. He did so much for so many,” she said.
“I’ve had the opportunity to talk with past Mooseheart graduates so grateful for what Mooseheart had done for them, and for the opportunity it gave them to start a better life in the adult world.
“Of all my father’s accomplishments that you’ve heard about today, I know that he was most proud of what he set in motion here at Mooseheart.
“And today, I can assure you that he would be so proud of what Mooseheart has become.”
Mrs. Cornell visited the music classroom of Mooseheart Band Director Steven Schmidt, who explained the Commercial Music curriculum and methodology with Mooseheart High Schoool junior Marco Namowicz.
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Please click on any photograph below to view a larger image.
Jewel Davis on her father’s knee, circa 1928
(From top), Student narrators of the Oct. 27 Mooseheart Founder’s Day Centennial presentation in the House of God included Katherine Morones, Adrianna Tezanos-Pinto, Nic Grasty, Michael Tovar, Melissa Quitoriano and Christopher Morones.
Supt. of Education Gary Urwiler emceed as students from eighth grade down to first grade read their essays on the question, “What I Would Want to Say to James J. Davis”.
Later, at a buffet luncheon in the Mooseheart Fieldhouse, Mrs. Cornell listened as Grand Chancellor Janet Fregulia explained how a $4 Women of the Moose per-capita dues amount provides the bulk of the funding for the annual operation of Mooseheart’s school.
After the House of God presentation and lunch, Jewel Davis Cornell spent the afternoon on a tour of Mooseheart campus and school. In the cosmetology laboratory, she enjoyed receiving a paraffin hand-moisturizing treatment from students Susan Crow and Renee James.
She conversed with fourth grader Megan Price about a class project.
She visited the basement recreation room of the renovated James J. Davis Home with Mooseheart Executive Director Scott Hart and Family Teacher Lily Blanco.
Mrs. Cornell enjoyed visiting the third-grade classroom of teacher Sylvia Jonsson, where she sat down to observe the classwork in progress.
Later, she beamed as Executive Director Hart showed her a display of more posted essays written by elementary school students about her father’s legacy.
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