![[davis photo big.jpg]] ** ** **A Short Biography of Frank Weston Davis** *Rocky Mount Civic and Business Leader 1862-1948 **                                 ** Frank Weston Davis was born in 1862,[^1] the year after the Civil War started and a year before the Emancipation Proclamation. Born in the midst of war, Davis reached adulthood during the Reconstruction era and before Disenfranchisement and forced segregation occurred in North Carolina. By the time he reached his 30’s, the record shows that he was becoming one of the foremost business, civic and spiritual leaders of Rocky Mount’s increasingly prosperous and successful African-American Community.       In 1907, Frank Davis and Israel D. Hargett became trustees for a group of local African American investors purchasing a five-and-one-half acre subdivision for Black suburban expansion, the first recorded “Little Raleigh” subdivision plat.[^2] And in 1909, a similar group of Black Rocky Mount entrepreneurs and investors incorporated the “Rocky Mount Manufacturing and Mercantile Company”. The President of the Board was Frank Davis.[^3] The Rocky Mount Manufacturing and Mercantile Company was located next to Tom and Lucinda Weston’s house on the corner of Holly Street and North Main. This silk and cotton mill factory was an adaptive reuse of the 1892 Logan tobacco prize house, “a four-story wooden building with a frontage of 40’ and a depth of 150’. On the first floor was the silk factory; the second and third, cotton; and on the fourth, the raw material cloth was transformed into the finished products, such as overalls, jackets, aprons, and the like.”[^4] As Booker T Washington pointed out during his visit to Rocky Mount in 1910, the Rocky Mount Manufacturing and Mercantile Company was “altogether owned and operated by Negroes - the only one of its kind in the country”.[^5] **Logan prize house (later the Rocky Mount Manufacturing and Mercantile Company )** ![[argonaunt leaf factory pic.jpg]]*Rocky Mount Argonaut Jun 4,1898* In 1915, the Rocky Mount Board of Aldermen confiscated all the unused burial lots the City had sold to African-Americans in the 1890’s,[^6] including those owned by Frank Davis.[^7] The City replaced the confiscated lots with new lots in the new “Colored” Cemetery,[^8] and it is there that Frank Davis buried his wife, Kizzie Jones, and his 15 year old daughter, Gertrude Mack.[^9] Both were victims of the 1918 flu epidemic. They are buried side by side with a handsome double granite headstone.[^10]  In 1919, during the epidemic, Davis gifted each of his living children a house in the Cross Town Community. This represented approximately one half of the rental properties he had acquired over the preceding 15 years.[^11] In 1935, Frank Davis, along with Ed Land and the [[Saint James Missionary Baptist Church]], purchased 22 additional burial lots from the city in the new “Colored” Cemetery. The City’s deed identified the exact location of the burial lots being sold by referencing the City’s 1915 cemetery plot map drawn by surveyor John J. Wells.[^12] As he got older, Frank Davis kept pace with the changing landscape of Rocky Mount and the New South Industrial Age. Prior to 1925 he established, owned and operated a trucking business in Rocky Mount, transitioning from a leading drayman utilizing horse and wagon transport to automotive trucking, and it proved to be another very profitable enterprise.[^13] **1925 Rocky Mount Auto Truck License**   ![[frank davis truck license.jpg]] In his seventies, Mr. Davis became an active member and supporter of the Rocky Mount Civic Forum. He served as treasurer of the organization from its inception in 1933 until his death.[^14] The Forum was instrumental in bringing a Community Center to Cross Town. The center, built in 1938 by the WPA, was situated next to the Holy Hope Episcopal Church.[^15] During his retirement, Mr. Davis remained a prominent figure in his community. After spending most of his adult life developing the built environment of the Community and striving to improve the economic, social, and spiritual conditions in his Cross Town neighborhood, Mr. Davis was able to relax and enjoy time with his many children and grandchildren. According to his granddaughter Josie Davis, who recalls sitting on “Papa's” lap as a young child, he loved to sing the contemporary Christian hymn, “I’ll Fly Away.”  It was his favorite.[^16]  He died on November 16, 1948. He was 86 years, 6 months and 14 days old. [^17]       Frank Weston Davis is buried in the southwest corner of the New “Colored” Cemetery portion of the Unity Cemetery Complex,[^18]located beside his wife and daughter in the 20’x20’ concrete curbed plot shown on the City’s 2022 SEPI survey map.[^19] The snip below of the SEPI Boundary Survey shows the approximate location of the 20’x20’ plot with concrete curb. <!-- Footnotes themselves at the bottom. --> ## Notes [^1]: Edgecombe County Registry of Deeds, Frank W Davis death certificate [^2]: Nash County Register of Deeds, Deed Book: [^3]: Edgecombe County Register of Deeds, Deed Book: The New York Age (New York, New York) Thu, Jun 16, 1910 Pg [^4]: The Advocate (Charleston, West Virginia) Thu, Nov 10, 1910 [^5]: The New York Age (New York, New York) Thu, Jun 16, 1910 Pg 1 [^6]: Minutes of the Board of Aldermen, December 2, 1915 [^7]: Board of Aldermen Resolution F(1) in back of 1916 Minutes Book (City was the owner and operator of the new cemetery and used it only as just compensation for confiscated lots. Lots were not available for public purchase.) [^8]: Minutes of the Board of Aldermen, April 6, 1916; and Board of Aldermen Resolution F(1) in back of 1916 Minutes Book [^9]: Hap Turner, A Brief History of African-American Cemeteries Owned by the City of Rocky Mount, Unity Cemetery Committee Report, Jan 23, 2022 [^10]: Rockymounttelegram.com eedition pg 1, Dec 14, 2020 [^11]: Edgecombe County Register of Deeds, Book 208 Pages 510, 511, 512, 513, 514, 515. [^12]: Edgecombe County Register of Deeds, Deed Book 342, Page 172. [^13]: C. Rudofph Knight, Rocky Mount African American Neighborhoods,unpublished; _Who’s Who Among North Carolina Negro Baptists, with a Brief History of Negro Baptist Organizations, _by M. S. Williams and George W. Watkins, 1940 Pg 245 [^14]: Rocky Mount Telegram (Rocky Mount, North Carolina) Wed, Nov 24, 1948 Pg. 9 [^15]: Ibid. Sat, Sep 9, 1939 Pg. 12 [^16]: Ibid. Sun, Mar 21, 2010 pg 17 [^17]: Edgecombe County Register of Deeds, Frank W Davis death certificate [^18]: SEPI 2022 Survey Report [^19]: SEPI 2922 Boundary Survey ## Additional Information ## May be related to [[Thomas Weston]]. ### Biographical entry from *Who’s Who among North Carolina Negro Baptists : With a Brief History of Negro Baptist Organizations* ![[Davis bio 248-x5-y7.png]] ![[davis bio 245.png]] *From* Williams, M.W., and George W. Watkins, _Who’s Who among North Carolina Negro Baptists : With a Brief History of Negro Baptist Organizations_, 1940.