Information
Sheet
R Torrey, Jay Linn, 1852-1920.
218 Scrapbook, 1893-1920.
One volume.
MICROFILM
This is a scrapbook of Jay L. Torrey of Howell County, Missouri. Torrey was a rancher, politician, veteran of
the Spanish-American War, and promoter of southern Missouri.
The scrapbook includes material on the Missouri Immigration Society,
the State Fruit Experiment Station, the “Good Roads” movement, relocation of
the state capitol, Fruitville Farm and the proposed village of Torreytown,
and the campaign for the U.S. Senate in 1918.
Jay Linn Torrey was born on 16 October
1852 at Pittsfield, Illinois.
He grew up in Louisiana, Missouri, and St. Louis,
where he graduated from Washington
University in 1876. He set up a practice in commercial law in St. Louis, specializing
in bankruptcy cases. Years of work in
the field led him to formulate a new code which was ultimately adopted by the
U.S. Congress. Known as the Torrey
Bankruptcy Act, it remained in effect for many years. Torrey was also involved in a plan for
establishing the appellate court system in Missouri.
He was prominent in St. Louis
civil, fraternal, and Republican Party circles, and was president of the St.
Louis Mercantile Club.
At the invitation of his older brother, a
retired Army captain, Torrey moved to Thermopolis, Wyoming, to manage a large cattle and
cavalry horse ranch. His work there led
to U.S.
patents on improvements in branding irons and saddle blankets in 1890. He was elected to the Wyoming legislature on the Republican ticket
and served as speaker of the lower house.
He attracted nationwide attention at the beginning of the
Spanish-American War with a proposal to enlist western cowboys and stockmen
for cavalry service. His concept for
“Rough Riders” was accepted by the War Department, and Torrey was commissioned
Colonel of the 2nd Regiment U.S. Cavalry Volunteers. The regiment organized and trained at Fort D.
A. Russell, Wyoming, but never reached Cuba. En route to Florida,
the troop train derailed at Tupelo,
Mississippi, killing and
injuring several Rough Riders and crushing both of Col. Torrey's feet. As a veteran and Rough Rider, Torrey was
prominently mentioned as a running mate to William McKinley on the Republican
ticket in 1900. He was passed by when
Theodore Roosevelt accepted the nomination.
Torrey amassed considerable wealth in Wyoming, and in 1905 he returned to Missouri.
He acquired the “White Farm” southeast of West Plains in Howell County,
adding to it to create a 10,000-acre tract which he named Fruitville Farm. He became known in Howell
County as a slightly eccentric
philanthropist and civil organizer, and a tireless booster of southern Missouri and the Ozarks,
particularly concerning the possibilities of fruit-culture. He was very involved in progressive
campaigns for civic improvements in Howell
County and West Plains,
and was a director of the statewide “Good Roads” campaign in 1912-1913. Through his Republican Party connections, he
was appointed to several state posts.
Gov. Herbert S. Hadley named him to the Board of Visitors of the University of Missouri and the Missouri School of
Mines and Metallurgy at Rolla. He was
also appointed a trustee of the Missouri State Fruit Experiment Station at Mountain Grove, Missouri,
and was elected president of the Missouri Immigration Society in 1912.
Torrey’s most ambitious project was the
“ideal” village
of Torreytown, which he
hoped to establish at Fruitville Farm.
Designed after the European model, residents were to be urban farmers,
living in a central town surrounded by outlying farmsteads. Progressive and patriotic themes were
included in plans for Torreytown, whose ritual was to include programs of
patriotic ethics and flag-raising on specified days. With generous purchase plans and statewide
advertising, Torrey expected to attract “desirable,” industrious individuals
to inhabit his proposed village. Although
there were a few tenant farmers at Fruitville, the ideal village never caught
on and development never got underway.
Torreytown was central in a
well-publicized feud between Col. Torrey and Gov. Hadley in 1910 after the
state capitol in Jefferson City
burned. As discussion went on concerning
funding its reconstruction, Torrey offered a thousand acres and a million
dollars for the capitol to be relocated near Fruitville Farm. The debate grew acrimonious when Torrey
alleged fraud on the part of Jefferson
City’s backers and the bond issue they proposed. Gov. Hadley countered that Torrey was more
concerned with promoting his real estate development at Torreytown. The highly public controversy was settled
when Missouri’s voters approved the bond issue
in favor of Jefferson City. Torrey and Hadley staged a widely-reported
reconciliation at the Ozark Land Congress at Springfield in 1911.
Col. Torrey entertained lavishly at
Fruitville and other locations in the state, befitting his various
capacities. Politicians, educators,
Rough Riders, and suffragettes were guests at his table, and a Wyoming equestrienne made headlines in 1913 as she made
her circuit of Missouri
riding on a mule loaned from Fruitville Farm.
An active member of the United Spanish War Veterans, Torrey hosted
statewide encampments at Fruitville in 1913 and 1918. Torrey’s most elaborate affair was the celebration
of Memorial Day in 1918. Thousands came
from all over southern Missouri and northern Arkansas to attend the public events, which included a
display of torpedoes by the U.S. Navy, a flyover by a U.S. Army aviator, the
filming of an historical motion picture of Howell
County, and music by W. L. Handy and
band from Memphis.
Later in 1918, Torrey launched a
whirlwind campaign in the Republican primary for U.S. Senator. He ran well in southern Missouri despite a late start and little
backing from the party, but he was defeated by Selden P. Spencer. The campaign was the last great public
enterprise of his career. He visited
his land holdings in Wyoming and traveled to
Central America, and was no longer the central figure in southern Missouri that he once
had been.
A longtime bachelor, Torrey married Mrs.
Frances Reiley, businesswoman and widow of a physician in West Plains, in
October 1920. He lived only six weeks
afterward, succumbing to Bright’s disease at West Plains on 4 December
1920. After ceremonies at West Plains, Louisiana,
and St. Louis, his remains were interred in his
hometown of Pittsfield, Illinois.
His estate, estimated at one hundred thousand dollars, was divided
between his widow and his old friend, Rough Rider, and manager of Fruitville,
Wallace B. Hodge. The newspapers of West
Plains eulogized Torrey as a man of visionary ideals whose motives were
altruistic, not mercenary. Although
many of his plans were never put into effect, Torrey was clearly one of the
most energetic spokesmen ever to represent southern Missouri.
Torrey’s scrapbook consists largely of
newspaper clippings and miscellaneous printed material from 1910 to
1920. Most of the clippings were
extracted from newspapers in Missouri, although
a few earlier items from Wyoming
are included. There is a large
collection of Torrey’s personal papers at the University
of Wyoming’s American Heritage
Center.
The materials in the scrapbook touch on
most aspects of Torrey’s career, with the greatest coverage of his work with
the Missouri Immigration Society, the Good Roads movement, the fight over
restoration of the capitol at Jefferson City, and the development of Fruitville
Farm. There is also a considerable
amount of coverage of agricultural advancements suitable for the Ozarks, Torrey’s
career with the Rough Riders and involvement with the United Spanish War
Veterans, civic developments in Howell
County, and Torrey’s
futile senatorial campaign in 1918. His
attempt to create the ideal village is covered only lightly, but the scrapbook
does include a proposed plat of the village, and examples of several
promotional brochures describing the plan for Torreytown. A guide to the materials in the scrapbook is
available.
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