- Grading the Road Over Davis Hill
Among the many admirable characters of historic Oysterville, one of my favorites is Fernando C. (always known as “F. C.”) Davis. The hill just west of the Oysterville Store is named after him; presumably he owned Davis Hill in its entirety at one time. At the foot of his hill, located about where the store is now, Davis operated a tannery. Native son Charles Nelson once recalled that some of the first leather tanned on the Pacific Coast came from the F. C. Davis Tannery.
On July 9, 1890, Davis sold the top portion of his hill to the Oysterville Cemetery Association for $100. The town’s burial ground had been located there since 1860, but more than thirty years passed before the legal transfer took place. The delay of formalities probably hadn’t bothered Mr. Davis in the slightest. He was a God-fearing and community-spirited man who did more than his share for Oysterville, Pacific County, and Washington Territory.
Davis was a Seventh Day Baptist and did not work on Saturdays, though he worked any other time and overtime, as well. One of his many jobs was to take his team and wagon out on the tide flats when the oyster schooners came in and pick up their freight for delivery to the local stores. However, he was adamant in his refusal to off-load barrels of whiskey. He felt that hauling such base cargo would disgrace his hard-working team of red oxen, Moses and Aaron, whom he considered too noble for such a use.
The oxen were his proudest possessions. According to an article in the first issue of Pacific County Historical Society’s Sou’wester magazine, the great beasts were “as gentle as kittens and broke to ride.” In his capacity as United States Deputy Customs Officer, Davis often rode one or the other out to the schooner beds to transact necessary government business. One ship’s captain remarked, “I have been in ports all over the world, and the customs officers have come out in whale boats, canoes, and catamarans. But this man came out on a beef – and tied him to the anchor chain!”
Davis served a number of terms as Pacific County Treasurer during the years 1878 to 1889. He maintained orderly accounts by keeping county funds in different colored socks – black for incoming funds and red for outgoing payments. In those days, the very best recommendation a man could have was to declare him “as honest as F. C. Davis.”
Aside from his community service and his work as a tanner, there is little information about Davis. He was a native of New York, arrived in Oysterville in 1860 at age 36 with his 26-year-old wife, Sarah; their son, Lincoln, was born in 1861. Davis died in 1901 and is buried in the pioneer section of the Oysterville Cemetery on the land he had once owned.
The detail about keeping the money is different colored socks had be laughing as did the mental picture of Mr. Davis conducting official business on an oxen! The picture is great. I just love old pictures. Wouldn’t you love to know what drew this man all the way from NY to Oysterville?