Centennial history of Cincinnati and representative citizens, Vol. I, Pt. 2, Part 16

Author: Greve, Charles Theodore, b. 1863. cn
Publication date: 1904
Publisher: Chicago : Biographical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1048

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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF CINCINNATI

Pearl Street House. Nathan Guilford presided and was assisted by Griffin Yeatman, Maj. Dan- iel Gano and Gen: Robert T. Lytle as vice- presidents. There were 13 regular toasts in- cluding : The day we celebrate, the country, the West, the State, the pioneer fathers, the pioneer mothers, the city, the orator of the day, Ken- tucky, the schools, the manufacturers and me- chanics, the railroads and the military. In re- sponding to the toast to the orator of the day, Dr. Drake after a few remarks contrasting the city of that time with the town in 1800 offered the toast of the people of Cincinnati. The conclu- sion of the regular toasts, however, was but the beginning of the festivities. The volunteer toasts must have been fifty in number and many let- ters were read and reminiscences recited. Among those especially toasted were the .Shawanee chief, Logan; Capt. John Bartle who 92 years of age sat at the right hand of the

presiding officer and who is mentioned as the second merchant of the town; General Harrison, the memory of General Lytle, Colonel McFar- land, Simon Kenton, Judge Burnet, Judge Symmes, Miss Ross the first Cincinnati belle, Dr. Allison, William Goforth, William McMil- lan, William Wells, Gen. Josiah Harmar, Col. Israel Ludlow, Gen. John S. Gano, John Filson, Benjamin Van Cleve, Joel Williams, Benjamin Stites, Colonel Kingsbury the heroic defender of Colerain, Col. John S. Wallace, Col. David Strong and Capt. Ephraim Kibby. The hilari- ties of the occasion were heightened by several songs and by fine music by the Buckeye Band and it is not strange that the company which sat down in the afternoon dispersed at an early hour as stated by the report signed by Griffin Yeatman as chairman and P. S. Symmes and William M. Corry, secretaries of the general committee.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

THE CITY TO THE SEMI-CENTENNIAL-VI.

THE EDUCATIONAL AND RELIGIOUS INFLUENCES.

CINCINNATI COLLEGE-MEDICAL COLLEGE OF OHIO -- CINCINNATI LAW SCHOOL -THE HIGH SCHOOLS, OLD WOODWARD AND HUGHES-PRIVATE SCHOOLS-THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS-LANE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY-THE CATHOLIC SCHOOL-THE CHURCHES.

CINCINNATI COLLEGE-MEDICAL COLLEGE OF OHIO CINCINNATI LAW SCHOOL.

In no department of the city's life was greater progress made during the two decades conclud- ing the first half century than in that of educa- tion. At the outset of this period as has al- ready been stated charters were obtained for the Cincinnati College and for the Medical College of Ohio. Large amounts were subscribed by Gen. William Lytle, Oliver M. Spencer, John H. Piatt, Ethan Stone, William Corry, Gen. James Findlay, David E. Wade and Andrew Mack as well as many others whose avowed purpose was to elevate Lancaster Seminary into a respectable college. The edifice itself called by one writer "the building that most deserved the attention of strangers" has been described several times.

The high hopes of the public are shown by the notices in the first directory in which we are told that the officers are to consist of president, vice-president, professor of languages and tu- tors who were to be appointed by the approach- ing winter season. Dr. Elijah Slack had al- ready been elected president. The government of the college was vested in the hands of 20 trustees to be chosen annually from among the stockholders. For the first year the trustees elected were Jacob Burnet, Joshna 1 .. Wilson,

Oliver M. Spencer, William Corry, Levi James, Daniel Drake, Samuel W. Davies, Samuel John- ston, Martin Baum, William Lytle, William Steele, David E. Wade, Jesse Hunt, John Thomp- son, Zaccheus Biggs, Francis Dunlevy, Joseph H. Crane, William II. Harrison, John Galloway, Jr., and Samuel McCord, surely a most impos- ing list. The college was to have two sessions, those of the winter and the summer, and the annual commencement was to be held on the last Wednesday in September. The months of April and October were the vacation months al- lotted to students in those days. The require- ments for admission to the freshman class in- cluded the knowledge of at least two books of the "Æneid," prosody and the introductory authors usually read; the Greek grammar and one or two of the evangelists, the accurate con- struction of Latin and arithmetic through the "rule of three." For entrance to the sophomore class was required a knowledge of Virgil, Hor- ace's "Odes," Lucian, the first book of Xenophon and arithemetic through fractions. The junior class studied geometry, algebra, surveying, navi- gation, conic sections, spherics, natural philoso- phy, composition and occasionally the languages, while the senior class devoted itself to natural philosophy, astronomy, belles lettres, moral phil-

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osophy, logic, chemistry, composition,. spcaking and the languages.

The funds of the institution at that time al- rcady amounted to $50,000 and. students were entitled to the use of the Cincinnati Library con- taining more than 2,000 volumes and the cabinet of the Western Museum Socicty both of which had been placed in the College Building.

The college was organized in 1820 with Dr. Slack as president and with a professor in every department of science. It seems to have been moderately successful for a time and in 1821 held its first commencement on September 26th, at which time the honorary degree of Master of Arts was conferred upon William Henry Har- rison, Rev. Joshua L. Wilson and Rev. James Kemper. In 1825 we are told that the insti- tution, exclusive of the Lancasterian department in which 400 pupils were regularly taught, "was conducted by three professors and one tutor, four officers in the whole and the income of the house defrayed the expenses of the establishment." The average number of pupils was 60. The in- stitution was improving and bade fair to be- come a permanent and useful seminary in which would be taught all the branches prosecuted in the Eastern colleges. Proper instruments were owned for experiments in mathematics, natural philosophy, chemistry, astronomy and mineralogy of which nearly 5,000 were performed in a year. There was a collection of minerals, a philosophi- cal apparatus and a library. In addition to nat- ural science and mathematics, languages, moral philosophy and such studies were particularly attended to. The fourth commencement had just been held. The college had contributed to the education of more than 100 pupils since the ob- taining of the charter and "of this number not a profligate was to be found." Two literary societies had been founded by the students,- Philomath and Erophoebic. A grammar school was connceted with the college in which pupils were prepared for the collegiate department. (Directory of 1825, p. 122.)

Unfortunately the funds of the college were finally exhausted and instruction was supended during the next year. The rooms of the col- lege were leased and from the proceeds the in- terest on the debts was paid. All the rooms of the edifice were occupied by schools except the one permanently appropriated to the Lan- casterian department, whose exercises though re- cently suspended it was thought would soon be reopened under the superintendency of a com- petent teacher. (Cincinnati in 1826, p. 41.)

We are told that during the operation of the college several young ladies were included in the graduating classes. Their presence however does not seem to have affected the manners of the students as much as might be desired, for a visitor to the college in 1823 predicted that it would not be well. attended until better regu- lations were cstablished. He attended a lecture and was much shocked at the want of decorum exhibited by the students who sat down in their plaids and coats and were constantly spitting to- bacco juice about the room.

Among the trustecs of the year 1824 were some new names of prominence,-Rev. William Burkc, G. P. Torrence, D. K. Este, J. S. Lytle, P. S. Symmes, Daniel Gano, William Greene, Joseph Benham, T. Graham, Charles Hammond, Nathan Guilford, E. S. Haines and A. Mack. At the fourth commencement held this year ora- tions were delivered by H. E. Spencer, T. H. Burrows, George W. Burnet, J. W. Piatt, E. Woodruff and John Scott Harrison. The hon- orary degree of Master of Arts was conferred on John H. James, Frederick A. Kemper and William H. Harrison, Jr.

After the closing of the collegiate department, the charter was kept alive by a primary school. In the Cincinnati Mirror of June 7, 1832, a call was issued by Morgan Neville, president of the board of trustees, and Peyton S. Symmes, secretary, soliciting public interest in behalf of the college and expressing the hope that the Mechanics' Institute, the Lyceum and the Public Library would be induced to con- nect their institutions with the college. Dr. William H. McGuffey became president in 1833 and in the following year Ormsby M. Mitchel began a course of popular lectures in the College Building on astronomy, which re- sulted in his appointment, upon the attempted reorganization of the college in 1836, to the pro- fessorship of mathematics and astronomy. To understand this it is necessary to go back a bit.

The Medical College of Ohio had received its charter at about the time of the organization of the Cincinnati College. Principally instrumental in its organization as in the case of the college was Dr. Daniel Drake. There was some delay about the organization of the Medical College, due it was thoughit to the jealousy of several leading medical men, but the college was organ- ized in January, 1820, with a faculty consisting of Dr. Drake, Dr. Jesse Smith and Dr. Benjamin Bohrer. The original organization had contem- plated as members of the faculty Dr. Samuel

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Brown and Dr. Coleman Rogers, the latter of whom had been a partner of Dr. Drake; but the jealousies of the profession had cstranged these two from Dr. Drakc and neither of them served. To take their places the two professors, Bohrer and Smith, werc imported from the Atlantic States, "a process," says Mansfield, "which though sometimes successful is oftener attended with disappointment." In the first announcement of the college, President Elijah Slack of the Cin- cinnati College and Robert Best, curator of the Western. Museum, werc assigned to the charge of chemistry. Drake was the president of the faculty and professor of the theory and practice of medicine.

The government of the institution, by a great defect in the charter, made the professors also the trustces so that in fact the majority of the faculty could turn out the others and elect whom they pleased. Bohrer was charged with being an intriguer who immediately began a cabal to supplant Dr. Drake. He soon left of his own accord, after alienating the other professors from their president, which resulted in a very solemn and ludicrous ceremony.

"At eight o'clock we met," says Dr. Drake, "according to a previous adjournment, and trans- acted some financial business. A profound si- lenec ensned; our dim taper shed a faint light over the faces of the plotters; and everything seemed ominous of an approaching revolution. On trying occasions, Dr. Smith is said to be subject to a discasc not unlike St. Vitus' dance ; and on this he did not wholly escape. Wan and trembling, he raised himself, with the cx- ception of his cycs, and in lugubrious accents said: 'Mr. President, in the resolution I am about to offer, I am influenced by no private feelings, but solely by a reference to the public good.' He then read as follows: 'Voted, that Daniel Drake, M. D., be dismissed from the Medical College of Ohio.' The portentous still- ness recurred, and was not interrupted until I reminded the gentlemen of their designs. Mr. Slack, who is blessed with stronger nerves, then rose, and adjusting himself to a firmer balance, put on a proper sanctimony, and ejaculated: 'T second the motion.' The crisis had now mani- festly come; and learning that the gentlenich were ready to meet it, I put the question, which carried, in the classical language of Dr. Smith, 'Nemo contradicente.' I could not do more than tender them a vote of thanks, nor less than withdraw ; and performing both, the Doctor po-

litely lit me down stairs." (Mansfield's Memo- rics, p. 170.)

Therc scems to be no question that this action was `a great shock to the public mind as well it might have been and this particularly brought about the end of the institution for a timc.' There had been in attendance 30 pupils during the first year and during the following ycar, when Dr. Jesse Smith and another colleague attempted to carry on a course of lectures there was but a handful of pupils. The Legislature at the session of 1822-23 thereupon amended the charter and appointed a new board of trustees with General Harrison at its head, and to this board was given the power of electing and dismissing members of the faculty. The college was revived the next year with an attendance of 15, which increased the following year to 30, and then to 80, and a few years later was as large as 131, making 1,019 pupils in the 16 years from 1819 to 1834. The medical war, however, filled the town and divided it into parties and the bit- terness on this subject lasted for many years. An attempt to found a "Medical Department of Miami University" was made in 1831 by Dr. Drake and others, but the old school took in four of the professors, including Drake, and thus broke up the scheme.

In 1834-35 there was sent to the Legislature a petition for a reform of the institution; this was signed by a number of prominent physicians of Cincinnati and the neighborhood. A new board was provided for by the Legislature and- this board sent out a circular asking physicians their views as to the inefficiency of the college. The replies caused the report to be made by the board that the depressed condition of the insti- tution was due to "the dissensions of individuals composing the faculty at different times and the want of scientific reputation in the teachers." Thereupon an attempt was made to reorganize the faculty and Dr. Drake and several of his friends were offered chairs, but as several of the old professors were to be kept, and these were the ones against whom was the greatest com- plaint, this scheme fell through. As a result of this attempt came about the revival of the Cin- cinnati College. In May, 1835, a resolution, offered by Dr. Joshua Martin, was passed by the board of trustees of that institution, reciting the unsuccessful attempt to improve the condition of the Medical College of Ohio and resolving to establish a medical department of the Cincin- nati College. As a result of this a faculty in- cluding Drs. J: W. MeDowell, Samuel D. Gross,

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Horatio G. Jameson, Landon C. Rives, James B. Rogers, John P. Harrison, Daniel Drake and John L. Riddell was selected. As Dr. Jameson did not take his place, the chair, that of surgery, was filled by Dr. Willard Parker. The pro- jectors of this movement were Drs. Drake, Rives, McDowell and Gross.

In connection with the medical department, Dr. Drake and his associates contemplated an entire reorganization of the college in which should be included a law department and a fac- ulty of arts. The Cincinnati Law School had been founded in 1833 by John C. Wright, Tim- othy Walker and Edward King, . a most able body of instructors. King and Walker were then partners. Both had been educated in the East, the latter at the Harvard Law School. The first term of this, the first law school west of the Alleghanies, began October 8, 1833, with 17 students, one of whom was the son of Dr. Drake, -Charles D. Drake, afterwards Senator from Missouri, chief justice of the Court of Claims and author of "Drake on Attachment." General King had subsequently died and upon the revival of the college, this school was made a department of that institution as the Law School of the Cin- cinnati College. The faculty were John C. Wright, Joseph S. Benham and Timothy Walker. This institution is the only department of the old college that has survived and to-day, as a result of the union of May, 1897, it forms a department of the present University of Cincinnati.

The literary department of the college survived but a few years. The faculty as finally consti- tuted was composed of a most interesting and able set of instructors. At its head as president and professor of moral and intellectual philoso- phy was Rev. William H. McGuffey, a man of experience as an educator and of great energy and zeal in the cause of education. Orinsby M. Mitchel became professor of mathematics and astronomy. His reputation as an educator, as- tronomer and soldier has become national. Asa Drury was professor of ancient languages, a man of great tact as a teacher, who subsequently became a professor of. the Baptist Theological Seminary in Covington and later the head of a private school in that city. Charles L. Telford was professor of rhetoric and belles lettres. He was "in no way a common person ; he had tin1- common talents, both of nature and self culture. Tall, erect, with dark hair and clear dark eyes his carriage was manly, dignified and commanding. In this respect he was one of a few whom na- ture has formed not to be reduced to the ordin-

ary level by the want of gravity and dignity. *

* * He was a fine writer and with a clear voice and good address he was also a graceful orator. *

* He was a pure character ; lic was upright ; he was conscientious. In all these respects he was without fear and without re- proach. He was entirely reliable; and in integ- rity and fidelity, was a model in these days of laxity and irreligion." ( Mansfield's Drake, p. 291.)

Telford was subsequently, in 1847, appointed one of the professors of the Cincinnati Law School. He died, while yet young, of consump- tion. He seems to have been one of those young men who make a most marked impression upon their contemporaries both for ability and charac- ter and whose early death make all who know them feel that great opportunities for usefulness have been cut off. Telford's name is always mentioned by writers of his times with the great- est respect, admiration and affection.

Edward D. Mansfield, the journalist and his- torian, was the professor of constitutional his- tory. Lyman Harding was principal of the pre- paratory department and Joseph Herron of the primary department. With such a faculty Mans- field thought, as Dr. Gross did of the medical department, that they should have succeeded. For a time they did and the college contained at one time as many as 160 pupils, but being with- out endowment of any kind and without revenue except such as had been received from tuition the institution was unable to carry the burden. "After lingering a few years its light went out; the professors separated; and the college name attached to its walls only attests that such an in- stitution once existed."

The lease from the First Presbyterian Churchi had stipulated for certain gratuitous annual in- struction and as the institution had been unable to give this instruction for some years, the church trustees attempted to obtain a surrender of the lease. This resulted in litigation which was compromised in 1840. By the terms of the compromise the college released to the church the southern part of the lot. It received a deed for its nortli 140 feet,-the lot on which stood for so many years the College Building now replaced by the new Emery sky-scraper. The old build- ing was destroyed by fire January 19, 1845, and all that survives through many years of the insti- tution is the Cincinnati Law School, now incor- porated with the Law Department of the Uuiver- sity of Cincinnati.

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THE IIIGII SCHOOLS,-OLD WOODWARD AND

HUGHES.

A most important part of the educational sys- tem of Cincinnati is contributed by the high schools, Woodward and Hughes, named for their founders, and that child of recent birth the Wal- nut Hills High School.

Among the earliest of the pioneers who came to Cincinnati were Levi and William Woodward, two sons of Elias Woodward of Connecticut and of a mother Lydia Cliff, a sister of the mother of Lorenzo Dow. Levi's name is among the list of those who purchased land here in 1789 and 1790; William came here in the fall of 1791. He took part in one of the expeditions against the In- dians. In the year 1792 he purchased from his brother a farm in the northeastern part of the city which extended from where is now Hunt street to Liberty and from Main to Broadway. He built here on Webster street between Main and Sycamore the house which stood as a land- mark for more than half a century, using in its construction the timber from old flat-boats and wooden pins in lieu of nails. During this same year he married Jane McGowan, who died with- in the twelvemonth. Some six years later he took a trip to his old home in Connecticut, a peril- ous and laborious journey in those days.

Among the early victims of the marauding In- dians was James Cutter, who was killed while at work on his farm near the present site of the Cincinnati Hospital. In 1801 William Woodward became the guardian for Cutter's daughter Abi- gail, a young girl of about 15 years, who was quite an heiress for those times. She owned land on the north side of Fifth street between Main and Walnut, also the southeast corner of Fifth and Main streets and a number of out-lots north- west of the city and other strips on Sycamore street. She also had $2,000 in money and at a later time more money came to her from her father's people in the East. Mr. Woodward took excellent charge of Miss Cutter's estate and also of his ward, and two years later, in 1803, he made her his wife. Abigail street took its name from this young woman, as Cutter street did from her father. The old house was not con- sidered pretentious enough for people of such consequence and in 1816 a commodious brick house, one of the handsomest houses of that time, was built which is still standing in part at the northeast corner of Main and Webster streets. Several children were born to them but all died young. With the property already acquired by

Mr. Woodward and that brought by his wife as a foundation he succeeded in accumulating a large fortune. He engaged in farming and also carried on the occupation of tanning on the north- ern outskirts of the town on the south side of Liberty street east of Sycamore. He engaged in trading ventures down the Ohio and made many investments in real estate. He was a large con- tributor to public enterprises and especially to the First Presbyterian Church of which he was a member and to the Lane Seminary fund. At the time of his death in his 66th year, his real estate was valued at $230,000 and his per- sonalty at more than $28,000. As early as the year 1819 Woodward gave some attention to the matter of schools for poor children, but it was not until 1826 that he made any actual move in this direction. In this as in all other matters he consulted his friend Samuel Lewis and as a re- sult in that year he transferred to two trustees, Samuel Lewis and his nephew Osmond Cogs- well, some seven acres of land on Sycamore street north of the present site of Hunt street. A lit- tle later he gave more than an acre in addition for a school house and on this land was erected the old Woodward College building and its suc- cessor, the present Woodward High School building. By the terms of the gift its purpose was to maintain a free school for the education of the poor children of the city of Cincinnati in reading, writing, arithmetic and English gram- mar. This apparent discrimination in favor of the poor for a time seemed a drawback but the terms of the gift were afterwards altered in this particular. On January 24, 1827, an act was passed by the Legislature providing that Samuel Lewis, Osmond Cogswell and Jonathan Pancoast be trustees of the land under the name of the "Trustees of the Woodward Free Grammar School." They and their successors were au- thorized to hold and use other property which might be granted to them for similar purposes. The act provided for the admission of children between the age of five and sixteen years who had no parents able to provide for their instruc- tion or whose parents or relatives refused to do so. Other children, however, could be admitted upon payment of reasonable compensation. On March 24, 1828, Lewis and Cogswell as trustees accepted the deed of confirmation from Wood- ward carrying into effect the previous deed and the last mentioned act. In May, 1828, Lewis Howell was formally elected by the City Council . as trustee to act with Lewis and Cogswell. Two years later, May 25, 1830, Woodward modified

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the trust so as to allow the trustees to establish a high school and on December 16th of the same year he conveyed the land for the building, add- ing to the three trustees already mentioned Oliver Lovell and J. P. Foote. To Lewis and Cogswell, the life trustees,'was given the privilege of each educating two pupils in the high school free of expense.

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Centennial history of Cincinnati and representative citizens, Vol. I, Pt. 2, Part 16

Author: Greve, Charles Theodore, b. 1863. cn Publication date: 1904 Publisher: Chicago : Biographical Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1048

Author: Greve, Charles Theodore, b. 1863. cn
Publication date: 1904
Publisher: Chicago : Biographical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1048