Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 29, 1994 TAG: 9405290107
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LISA APPLEGATE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Davis had been with the Roanoke Times & World-News since 1961, when he began spending summers away from his professorial duties at Washington and Lee University to edit the book page.
In 1976 he focused much of his energy on writing columns for the editorial page. Addressing topics such as bad drivers and President Ronald Reagan, Davis provoked readers.
"By far, he received the most mail and generated the most heat from readers," Editorial Page Editor Alan Sorensen said Saturday.
But those readers who said they couldn't stand Davis' column faithfully read it week after week, Sorensen said.
"Whether one agrees with Paxie's views or not . . . his concepts are clearly and forcefully stated," Roanoke resident Ted Powers wrote in 1985.
Powers' letter to the editor went on to say "his columns have impelled me to re-examine some closely-held dogma and watch it disintegrate under the inexorable force of Paxton's twin-barreled weapon of logic and language."
Davis began his writing career as a reporter at the Winston-Salem Journal in 1949. He also reported for the Twin City Sentinel and the Richmond Times-Dispatch before he began teaching journalism at W&L.
Davis went on to become chairman of the journalism department from 1968 through 1974.
In 1956, he published his first novel, "Two Soldiers." Nine books followed, with the last book, "A Boy No More," published in 1992.
Some of his novels, such as "Three Days," explored various battles and characters from the Civil War. "Being a Boy," an autobiographical memoir of his youth in Winston-Salem, N.C., was published in 1988.
Although Davis grew up in North Carolina, he has a long line of ancestors from Virginia. His great-great grandfather was Rockbridge County native James Paxton, a major in the War of 1812 and commandant of the state arsenal at Lexington.
Davis began college at Virginia Military Institute in 1942. But a year later, he began a three-year tour of duty with the Army in China, Burma and India.
He completed his bachelor's degree in 1949 at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
Davis was on the board of the Virginia State Library from 1986 to 1990. He also was a visiting scholar at Cambridge University in 1973 and an honorary member of the Virginia Writer's Club.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Tuesday at the Fincastle Presbyterian Church.
by CNB