[This clipping came from a packet of material passed down through two generations, and the dates and names of the papers are included where they exist, but on many of them there is no date and no newspaper. They were mostly published in Highland County, Ohio.]

In Memory of Mary Davis
Published in Highland County, OH, 1911

On the morning of November 4, 1911, Mary Davis arrived at her long awaited home. She began the pilgrimage nearly a century ago on the banks of the little stream that flowed by the humble home of Ruth and Benjamin Barrett, January 17, 1813. There was not a phase of pioneer life with which she was unfamiliar. She walked in the fresh trail of the Indian, and beheld the smoke of their campfires. She heard the howl of the wolf, and gazed at the fleet-footed deer. The flavor of the corn pone on the hearth-stone appealed to her childish hunger. The clothes she wore and under which she slept were spun, woven, and made by the honest toil of her mother's hands. Being the oldest of 13 children, she had the blessings of a double portion of unselfish service, for to the younger children she became both sister and mother. "Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of these, my brethren, even these last, ye did it unto me."

In the far away days of her youth, she mingled in social life with the same buoyancy and gladness as the youth of today, and with the same fond hopes and dreams, but her lot was to abide in the old home until she became Aunt Mary, and in a measure, the mother again of sons and daughters , of her younger brothers and sisters. Could any nephew or niece be so ungrateful as to forget how often his or her childish hunger has been satisfied by the good things given him by his patient and dutiful aunt.

With the exception of the two brief years of her married life with Joseph Davis, from 1864 to 1866, she ceased not to bear a daughter's portion of the paternal burdens of the old home. Even in her teens she helped them bear the heavy stroke of the loss of two sisters and two brothers in one month. She was reared in the language and customs of the Friends and her sympathies always clung to the faith of her Quaker fathers. When her parents approached the sunset of life, when their steps grew short, and their shoulders became bowed by the toil of years, she had the same pity for them which they had for her when she was a helpless child upon their knees, and as far as was in her power, she brought them down to their graves in peace. Who ever knew her that will not say that the whole tone of her life was that of a meek and quiet Christian spirit, breathing always in her measure the life of him who said, "I came not to be ministered unto, but to minister." Even to the last she desired to minister to those who were ministering to her. The undying union of her soul to her parents was evidenced to the last. One morning she said, "I have seen and talked with mother." She then expressed a longing desire for the time to come when she could go and make her home with them.

Unto that home we believe she has entered to go out no more forever.