Stewart Davis

Stewart Davis Stewart Davis, 67, former newspaperman and a communicator, died January 26, 2005, of lung cancer after a seven-month illness. Stewart Davis was in the communications industry for 40 years as a newspaperman and a communications and public affairs director at a state agency. He was chief writer and editor at the Texas Department of Protective and Regulatory Services. Before that, he was for 12 years media director at the Texas Department of Human Services, where award-winning communications products were created. His expertise there included writing and editing brochures, annual reports, and virtually every other kind of printed paper product. On the video side, award-winning work told clients and the general public about the programs and services of an agency that touches the lives of one out of every seven Texans. Prior to public service, Davis was in the newspaper industry for 21 years, including 14 years for The Dallas Morning News Austin Bureau in the State Capitol at Austin and seven years for the Houston Chronicle, including three years at the Capitol Bureau. At the Dallas Morning News, he rose to be chief of the Austin Bureau based on experience of covering Texas state government. His news clips ranged from remote points on the Texas political campaign trail to the tumultuous climaxes of legislative sessions. He covered the executive, legislative and judicial branches, including the Texas Supreme Court and myriad state agencies. Not content with government news only, his reporting extended to newsworthy events in Austin's cultural life and to science and human behavior stories from the University of Texas at Austin campus where he was educated from 1956 to 1960. After attending the university, he became a reporter for the Houston Chronicle in 1960. He covered virtually every "beat" in the metropolitan area, including city hall, federal courthouse, police, and general assignments. Promotion to the capitol bureau gave him a first taste of politics and government, as well as the realities of the civil rights movement and other social tides of the 1960s. This experience served him later when the Capitol became the focus of anti-war sentiments over Vietnam. For 21 years, Davis reported on the political process statewide, including candidates running for congressional, legislative and statewide races. He covered the aftermath of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the administration of Texas Gov. John Connally, who was wounded in the assassination, as well as the subsequent election of Lyndon B. Johnson. Johnson's Texas White House was a familiar story for Davis, who prepared stories and photo cutlines on visits by international leaders to ranch-style socials at the LBJ Ranch. Davis covered the administrations of Governors Connally, Preston Smith, Dolph Briscoe, and William P. Clements Jr., as well as the senatorial leadership of Lieutenant Governors John Ben Ramsey, Preston Smith, Ben Barnes, and William P. Hobby, who held what most political observers believe is the most powerful office in the state. He was a friend, despite frequent adversarial relations, with dozens of powerful and legendary legislators, including State Senators A. M. Aikin Jr. of Paris, Dorsey B. Hardeman of San Angelo, William T. Moore of Bryan, and George Parkhouse of Dallas, and State Representatives William Heatley of Paducah and "Jumbo" Ben Atwell of Dallas. Davis covered the events, including exclusive stories, that led to the political demise of House Speaker Gus Mutscher due to the so-called "Sharpstown" scandal, and he thrived on the antics of then-Comptroller Bob Bullock, who later became lieutenant governor. Davis also covered the so-called "Dirty 30" reform session of the Texas House in 1970 following the Sharpstown scandal, and he reported on the "Killer Bees," senators who paralyzed the Texas Senate by hiding out and denying the legislative body of a quorum to do business. Davis covered the Civil Rights Movement from the early 1960s when blacks integrated movie theaters in Houston through the massive marches on the State Capitol leading to the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and subsequent legislation designed to guarantee equality in American society. He also observed and reported on marches by thousands of Texans protesting United States involvement in the Vietnam war. During his newspaper years, Davis won a number of awards and honors, including recognition by his peers who selected him as president of the Austin Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists in a year that the chapter won national acclaim as the best organization of its size in the nation. He was in on the inception of the Stuart Long Memorial Scholarship Fund and the DeWitt C. Reddick Memorial First Amendment Fund, both financed in part by the popular annual Gridiron Show which he helped launch. He won Associated Press and United Press International managing editors awards, as well as the prestigious Headliners Award, for coverage in the late 1970s of the so-called "rent-a-bank" scandal that was a forerunner of the collapse of the banking and savings and loan industries in the 1980s. News stories prompted congressional hearings in Texas and Washington, and some of the perpetrators went to prison. At least one target of the newspaper probe escaped federal prosecution for 10 years before he finally went behind bars. Davis also won an American Trucking Association award for a series on highway safety and the coveted Dallas Press Club "Addy" award for his coverage of the Memorial Day Flood that swept through downtown Austin in 1981. Davis credited his mentors for much of his success in communications. They included Bo Byers, former Austin Bureau Chief of the Houston Chronicle and William S. "Bill" Woods, former city editor of the Austin American-Statesman and information officer for the Texas Department of Human Services. Ralph Stewart Davis Jr. was born October 13, 1937, in Bay City, Texas. He was the son of Ralph Stewart Davis and Annie Stella Lipinski Davis. He is predeceased by his father. Stewart Davis is survived by his wife, Deloris Peck Hastings, Austin; children, Darrell Scott Davis and his wife, Lily Chien-Davis, Berkeley, California; Matthew Stewart Davis, Galveston; Diane Sheryl Davis Flowers and her husband, James Flowers, Denton; and Kathleen Sharon Davis, New Orleans; Deloris’ children Mela Deane Rhodes, Austin; Robert Ware Hastings and his wife, Catherine Hastings, Kempner; Loxy Lorraine Passmore and her husband, Bill Passmore, Austin; mother, Annie Stella Lipinski Davis, Bay City; brother, Charles Stanley Davis, Rockfield, Kentucky; and grandchildren Lorelei Davis Trammell and Xen Sebastian Davis, Berkeley, California; Coleen Sofia Flowers and Hannah Elizabeth Flowers, Denton; William Colgin IV, Houston; Tinaya White, Navasota; William, James, Robert Louis and Christopher Hastings, Kempner. In lieu of flowers, please make a memorial contribution to the Salvation Army, which has been Stewart’s personal choice of charity, or to your choice. Graveside services and burial will be at 11:00 a.m. on January 28, 2005, Live Oak Cemetery, Manchaca, Texas. Arrangements by Wilke-Clay-Fish Funeral Home, 2620 S. Congress, Austin, Texas (512) 442-1446. Memorials and guestbook online at wcfish.com