\JR(;iXIA BIOGRAPHY
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l)uildings have been equipped. Mr. Stevens
takes not only the view of the humanitarian
in regard to Young Men's Christian Asso-
ciation work among railroad men, but also
that of the practical business man. He in-
sists that a comfortable room where rail-
read employees can gather under proper
influence, to read and enjoy social inter-
course, will promote not only their interests
Init the interests of the railways by which
they are employed. This is another view
of the same doctrine of "community of in-
terest," that he believes should exist be-
tween railway and shipper. The Railroad
Young Men's Christian Association build-
ing at Richmond, erected at an expense of
$100,000. is one of the results of President
Stevens' help and interest in the welfare of
the railroad employee. Plis principle of
co-operation between carrier and shipper,
employer and employee, is based upon the
soundest business principles, and their ap-
plication has resulted most happily for the
corporations over which President Stevens
has authority. In a not less degree, have
shippers and employees benefitted ; which
fact leads to the hope that the gospel he
preaches and exemplifies may spread until
strikes and lockouts with all their attending
misery may fore\er disappear from our fair
land.
President Stevens is a member of the Westmoreland. Commonwealth and Coun- try clubs of Richmond and the Railroad Club, of New York, and everywhere known he is popular, honored and respected. Able and untiring in business, genial and kindly- hearted, he is the ideal leader of men. and \vhile he stands at the head of his particular branch of activity, his career is not finished. but the biographer of the future will chron- icle many more years of this useful life.
Mr. Stevens married, December ly , 1881, Virginia, daughter of James S. Wilson, of Logansport, Indiana. Children : Helen, James Paul, Cecil Wade, George Wilson. The family home is at Richmond, Virginia. Mrs Stevens died on August 28, 1904.
Rev. Landon Randolph Mason. "(Jun- ston Hall," on the bank of the Potomac, the ancestral home of this branch of the Masons of Virginia, was built by George Mason, the statesman whom Thomas Jefferson declared "a man of expansive mind, profound judg- ment, urgent in argument, learned in the
lore of our former constitution, and earnest
for the republican change on democratic
principles." Cieorge Mason, the statesman,
was the great-grandfather of Rev. Landon
R. Mason, who through him descends from
Colonel (icorge Mason, a member of the
English Parliament in the reign of Charles
I. and an officer in the army of Charles II.,
who, after the defeat at Worcester in 1617
escaped to Virginia in disguise, losing his
estate in England. Erom Colonel George
Mason sprang George Mason, the states-
man, born in Doeg's, afterwards Mason's
Neck, in Stafford (now Eairfax) county,
X'irginia, in 1726.
After the marriage of Cieorge Mason, the statesman, to Ann, daughter of Colonel William Eilbeck, of Maryland, he built "(lUnston Hall" on the bank of the Potomac river, where he took up his permanent resi- dence. "Gunston Hall" continued in the Mason ownership until after the war, 1861- 1S65. and there ( ieorge Mason lived on terms of intimacy with his friend as well as neigh- bor, (icorge Washington, Truro parish in- cluding both Mount V^ernon and Gunston Hall. It was Mason's pen that drew up the non-importation resolutions which were presented by Washington and unanimously adopted by the Virginia legislature in 1769, one of them pledging the planters to buy no slaves imported after November i of that } ear. Against the assertion of the British Parliament of the right to tax the colonies, Mason wrote a tract entitled "Extracts from the Virginia Charters, with some Remarks upon Them." At a meeting of the people of Eairfax county, Virginia, July 17, 1774, he presented a series of twenty-four reso- lutions which reviewed the whole ground of controversy, advised a congress of the colo- nies, and urged the policy of non-intercourse with the Mother Country. The Virginia convetition sanctioned these resolutions and (in October 20, 1774, they were substantially adojited by the Eirst Continental Congress. In 1775 George Mason was a member of the \"irginia Convention, but he declined an election to Congress for family reasons and urged Erancis Lightfoot Lee to take his place. He, however, served as a mem- ber of the \"irginia committee of safety and supported open rupture with England. He was the author of the famous "Declaration of Rights" and the plan of government unanimously accepted by the Virginia con-
