Charles Lewis Cocke, Founder of Hollins CollegeSmith, William Robert Lee
History
Charles Lewis Cocke, Founder of Hollins College
Smith, William Robert Lee
Cocke, Charles Lewis, 1820-1901; Hollins College
"Imperious sometimes? Yes. I recall once, certainly. That new invention,
the telephone, had been installed at Hollins. It was wonderful,
enabling one to talk to the depot agent at Cloverdale, _three_ miles
away. For the first few days of the new 'fixture,' Miss Matty had
attended to all the preliminaries, so Mr. Cocke had not realized just
what these preliminaries were, or that any were necessary. I saw him
walk up to the transmitter and speak into it, without ringing the bell,
asking a question of the agent. No response, of course. He spoke again.
The same dead silence. Then he right royally tapped the transmitter as
with a rod of office and commanded, 'Here, _answer_ me!' Although I knew
that the ringing of the bell was essential, I had the feeling that some
response _must_ come when Mr. Cocke spoke like that.
"By means of credit and otherwise, he helped me and helped other girls
from my section of Virginia who had less ready money than craving for an
education. The work of one of these, as Foreign Missionary, has been so
good and so big that I love to think that in her, Hollins may have its
reward for what it did for the rest of us. But so utterly did Mr. Cocke
ignore all such benefits conferred by himself that I used to think he
surely must not know about these things, that they must have all been
transacted in the privacy of Mr. Charley's business office. The
President looked so far above any money considerations; and still he
must have been a wonderful financier. Who else could have found the
means of building and maintaining that great Institution without aid of
church or state or millionaire? I never know what to say when asked by
school men how Hollins was financed in the old days. The means must have
been brought down by prayer from Heaven somehow.
"We talk much of the prudence that keeps at a safe distance from the
plague of influenza. That is right, often. But when LaGrippe came from
Russia in 1889 and invaded Hollins, I saw how the suffering was, to some
of the girls, far outweighed by the honor and joy of having Mr. Cocke
himself make the rounds to visit them as if he cared. Cared? I have
looked out into the semi-darkness of the campus and seen that stately
figure, with bowed head, walking up and down beneath the window of the
infirmary, where some girl lay extremely ill, moving to and fro, far
into the night, in a vigil, which, let me say it with reverence, has
made it easier to believe that close to all earth's pains,
"Standeth One within the shadow,
Keeping watch above His own."
E. P. C.
Such was the inner life of Hollins. It was and is the loving fellowship
and co-operative industry of a big family, consecrated to true culture,
good citizenship and human progress. It was the life-work of the Good
President, to cheer and help his girls onward to the realization of
these noble ideals.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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