USA > Ohio > Hamilton County > Cincinnati > Cincinnati in 1841 : its early annals and future prospects > Part 20
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Reverses of Fortunes.
Few people are aware of the ups and downs of society, be- yond the present moment. We see one man rise by some fortunate conjuncture of events, to honor, power, or fortune, whose descendants, perhaps whose children, may be steeped in poverty or infamy to the very lips. But the same generation, in this case, rarely witnesses the ascent and descent of the
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ladder; it is only by inquiry or recorded history, that we are called to contrast the affluence or the dignity of the past, with the destitutions or insignificance of the present.
In the course of my census travels, I found an old lady- the widow of a distinguished professor in one of our eastern cities-in such abject poverty, that a broad board stretched across an old barrel was all the table she possessed; the chairs were in keeping with the table, being sawed billets of wood. I discovered a man who had been proprietor in a large foundery, on the river Carron, in Scotland, reduced to the condition of a day laborer at iron works here. I found a de- scendant of a distinguished governor of one of the eastern states, and a cousin of a late governor of New Jersey, ma- king their subsistence at washing by the day. What impres- sive rebukes to pride may be found in such lessons. In all these cases the individuals appeared to bear their reverses of fortune, with a suitable and becoming spirit, and some of them with such dignity and philosophy as commanded not only my sympathy but my respect.
But I found deeper grades of wretchedness that these. " The spirit of a man shall sustain his infirmity," but degra- dation and infamy who can bear ? Yes,-some are so far sunk as to glory in their shame, or to become callous under disgrace. The daughter of a respectable clergyman in Philadelphia, and a niece of a member of congress from New York, is a public prostitute in this city, whom no remonstrances can rouse, nor recollection shame. The grandson of a general officer of the revolution, a distinguished son of Pennsylvania, is a vagabond in our city ; now, and not for the first time, on the chain gang, apparently one of the most hopeless of the lost. I assisted to lift out of the gutter, in which he lay drunk, a man whom I knew years before in Pittsburg, worth, even in those days when man's wealth was counted by only tens of thousands, as much in real estate and warehouse as fifty thousand dollars. I found in another case, a man of my own age-I had left him in Philadelphia twenty-five years ago, a youth of the highest
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promise, the pride and joy of his parents, and the delight and favorite of female society ; he was so disfigured by intem- perance, that not a vestige by which I could recall him to memory remained, and nothing but certain tones of his once musical voice and the narration of early events, which a stran- ger could not have known, did at last induce me to believe him any thing else than an impostor. He was so completely ru- ined, that it was impossible to render him any service. He has since gone down the river to Texas,-
" Texas, the needy outcast's general home." .
Such is human life.
Publications.
This is a department of industry and enterprise of great extent. Books to a value exceeding two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, issued from the Cincinnati press the last year. More than one half of these in value, and almost one million volumes in number-primers, &c. not included-were school books. These, besides supplying our own wants, have superceded the rival publications of the east at various places abroad,-Detroit for example, where they are introduced into the public schools. Western Pennsylvania, western Virginia and Texas are also supplied from this market.
These books may be classified as follows :
1. Reprints for western use, of standard works. Among these are family bibles, in quarto, Josephus' Works, Rollin's Ancient History, Gibbon with Guizot's Notes, Digby's Ages of Faith, the Calvinistic and Family Libraries, large octavos.
Many of the current English publications, principally of light literature, and duodecimo size, are reprinted here like- wise. The great staples for the religious community of books of doctrine and discipline, hymn books, tracts, &c., are also supplied to the great west.
2. Original publications, periodicals in magazine form and pamphlets. The Ladies' Repository and Gatherings of the West, seven thousand copies ; the Family Magazine, five thou- sand copies, and the Western Pilot,-all large octavos: Cin-
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cinnati in 1841, four thousand copies, and Western Poetical Lit- erature, duodecimos, will serve as specimens of these.
3. Elementary works for schools. These are of every va- riety, both of series and single publications, and embrace pri- mers, exercises in spelling and reading, arithmetics, grammars, geographies, dictionaries, historical narratives, music books and new testaments, with various publications of the sort, partly for schools, and partly for general reading.
The whole of what is thus stated refers to the business in this line of the last twelve months. Many of these books are copy-rights ; and of the original publications, three duodeci- mos have gone to press within the last thirty days.
As regards raw materials, it can easily be seen, that the consumption must be immense. One establishment at Wheel- ing, alone, supplies this market with paper to the value of forty-five thousand dollars. Stereotyping enters largely into our publications. There are plates in three or four publishing houses alone, which are worth sixty thousand dollars.
Value of Property.
For the last twenty years, interrupted occasionally by checks for the moment, property in Cincinnati has been steadily on the advance, and even at the severest periods of panic and pressure, never declined in price. As the value of property is one of those subjects on which there is great dif- ference of opinion every where, and different standards are applied in different places, I shall take the rents as my meas- ure of value, and specify no price of rent, but what the same or a greater amount, could be got for the tenement if vacated at this moment.
In 1802, Ethan Stone paid Joel Williams for lots No. 89, 90, and 91, extending one hundred and fifty feet on Vine, by two hundred feet on Fourth street, two hundred and twenty dollars. Some years afterwards Mr. Stone removed to the country and sold out this property. In the progress of the canal improvements in 1839, he felt his farm so much injured that he decided to abandon it and reside in the city. With
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this design he repurchased a portion of his original property in Cincinnati, sixty feet front on Vine street, by two hundred feet in depth. It should be observed, that as the Vine street front is much less valuable than that on Fourth street, and excludes the corner property, that the best part of the lot was left out in the repurchase. For this, he paid one hundred and fifty dollars per foot front, or nine thousand dollars for the lot, being at the rate of forty-five thousand dollars for the original lots, estimating the corner lot at the same price, although worth much more.
Samuel Stitt, who came here in 1796, and like most others of the early settlers, considered farming land of more value than city lots, invested his first resources in the purchase of property outside of the city. But in 1800, he purchased of colonel John Riddle-now of Mill creek township-the lot sixty feet front, on which the Exchange Hotel facing the pub- lic landing is built, for twelve hundred dollars. After deriving considerable revenue for years from the rents, he sold the property in 1833, on perpetual lease, for the same sum per annum as constituted his purchase money. Had he deferred the transaction till this date-eight years more-there can be no doubt that he could have obtained three thousand dollars per annum as a permanent ground rent, or more than one hundred and fifty per cent. advance within that short period, on the property.
In 1836, John H. Groesbeck, of this city, bought the Cin- cinnati Hotel property, at the corner of Broadway and Front street, at public sale, for the sum of fifty-two thousand dollars. On examining it more leisurely after it came into his posses- sion, and ascertaining that it would cost a large sum to put it in the order he had contemplated at first, he disposed of the property, on a lease for ten years, to Joseph Darr, for four thousand dollars per annum. Mr. Darr made some petty al- terations, principally in the fronts, and partitions into store rooms for clothing shops, and rented it out at seven thousand six hundred dollars a year, being the interest, at six per cent.
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on one hundred and twenty-six thousand six hundred and sixty-seven dollars, or about one hundred and fifty per cent. advance upon the purchase money, made within the short space of a few months.
The original lot No. 77, corner of Main and Front streets, cost in 1789 'two dollars, being in size one hundred feet on Front and two hundred feet on Main street. Major Bush of Kentucky told me, that it had been offered him by colonel Gib- son, who then owned it, in 1793, for one hundred dollars. The present rent of the stores and offices, may be thus stated : Main street property :-
Five stores rented at $5,600
Four stores occupied by owners, which would . fetch, if for rent, . 4,700
Front street property :-
Four stores and two offices, 3,950
- $14,250
being six per cent. interest on two hundred and thirty-seven thousand five hundred dollars, a sum which must therefore be the present value of the lot.
The property on the east side of Sycamore, extending on Front street towards Broadway, and being about one-sixth part of lot No. 27, which, like the other I have stated, cost two dollars, rents for two thousand eight hundred and sixty dollars, the interest at six per cent. of forty-seven thousand six hun- dred and sixty-seven dollars, or at the rate of two hundred and eighty-six thousand dollars, for the original premises. This is the lot on which Mr. Yeatman kept tavern for many years.
The property on Commercial Row, belonging to George W. Jones, a block of eight buildings, and with a front of one hundred feet on Main, by, sixty feet on Front and Water streets, rents for six thousand five hundred dollars per an- num, amounting at an interest of six per cent. to one hundred and eight thousand one hundred and sixty-seven dollars, for X
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about one fourth of the original lot, or at the rate of three hun- dred and sixty thousand five hundred and fifty-five dollars, for that which cost two dollars, fifty years ago.
Lot No. 51, at the intersection of the west side of Syca- more and Front streets, with its improvements, rents for ten thousand two hundred dollars, the interest at six per cent. of one hundred and seventy thousand dollars. This, like the last, cost two dollars originally.
The property, lot No. 135, was willed by William M'Mil- lan, in 1804, to the Nova Cæsarea Lodge of this city. Of so little value was it considered at that comparatively late period, that the Lodge suffered it to be sold for taxes, and left it unre- deemed for the same reason, a considerable period of time. It now rents for twenty-four hundred dollars, the interest at six per cent. of forty thousand dollars ; on this principle of compu- tation, its present value. I will close this article with perhaps the most remarkable case of all. Lot No. 110, at the north- west corner of Third and Main streets, after being repeatedly rejected by the original settlers, in the selection of choice lots, was taken up by Patrick Moore, who, coming rather later than the rest, was obliged to take this lot, for the regular price of two dollars, or pay four dollars higher up on the second table of the city, and, of course, farther from the landing. Why this region was undervalued has been already stated. Moore, after holding on until 1804, sold it to James M'Ginnis for eight hundred dollars, and M'Ginnis, later in the same year, sold out at the same price, to Robert Merrie and Peter M'Nicoll, two of our old and valuable citizens, the latter still living, and the other surviving until within four or five years. In the division of the property, Merrie received the south half, off which he sold in 1814 to J. and N. Longworth, twenty feet by one hundred, on the corner of Third and Main streets, for twenty-five hundred dollars ; and a lot of the same size, just north of it, to J. W. Browne, for twenty-four hundred dol- lars. William T. Crissey purchased the corner lot in 1817, for four thousand dollars, and sold it in 1819 to Joseph Jonas,
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for six thousand dollars. Mr. Jonas sold the property in 1828, but subsequently repurchased it during the same year, at fifteen thousand dollars, and in 1839 leased the corner, re- duced to twenty by twenty-six feet, to N. Lougee, the present occupant, for the term of ten years, for two thousand dollars per annum, Mr. L. putting up the building which now stands on the premises, and holding the privilege of occupying it five years longer, on the termination of the present lease, at the rate of twenty-five hundred dollars per annum. A tenant of a small office partitioned off from this space by Mr. Lougee, rents from him for nine hundred dollars, and the cellar, occupied by a fruiterer, brings him four hundred dollars more.
Let us now put these operations into another shape, and connect with them the residue of the building-which has but one front-on Third street, so as to ascertain the rental of this very productive property.
Mr. Jonas receives two thousand dollars for the Main street building, and twenty-five hundred and ninety-two dollars for that on Third street. He thus obtains forty-five hundred and ninety-two dollars in rent, per annum, a sum, at six per cent., equal to the interest on seventy-six thousand five hundred and thirty-three dollars, thirty-three cents ; and in the same pro- portion, making the entire lot worth seven hundred and sixty- five thousand, three hundred and thirty-three dollars ; his pro- perty being just one tenth of the original lot, and that lot, like others I have cited, costing two dollars in the first instance.
The whole world may be challenged to furnish cases as re- markable of rise of property within an equal space of time,- fifty years. Indeed, the value conferred in most instances, upon the property alluded to in these sketches, by the growth of Cincinnati, and the extent to which this cause alone has enriched individuals-the great Nong tong paw of this city among the number-defies any parallel, except what may be found in the legend of Aladdin and his wonderful lamp.
The whole of the property to which I have referred, is im- proved with tenements, some of which are spacious and lofty,
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and with the exception of the last instance, are all valuable and expensive. It will readily occur to some persons, that this is probably one great cause of the prodigious advances in value of property I have alluded to, sufficient, in most cases, if not in all, to account for the difference in value, between the past and the present. This, though plausible at a dis- tance, every man here familiar with property and its value, knows to bè not the fact ; and that in most of the cases I have stated, the ground alone is worth more than it is with the buildings added to it.
This paradox is easily understood, when we reflect that the increase of value in such instances, refers principally to the mere lots, and only to the improvement in cases where its construction admits of access to the upper stories for offices, and of its subdivision on the first floor, into more store-rooms than already exist; that most of the warehouses, erected ten or fifteen years since, and now occupied on their third or fourth stories with old barrels or boxes, having been put up for other purposes, do not afford the means of making such changes to advantage, and, in general, that it is only under an entire re- building, that property owners can adequately meet the in- creased demand for tenements and offices in the crowded bu- siness regions of the city.
Improvements in prospect or in progress.
Early as is the season, our building operations have already opened with a vigor, which promises extensive results ; and the probability is, that there will not be less than five hundred warehouses and private dwellings put up in the current year. This will be rather more than the regular increase in buildings from 1840. Of these a larger proportion than usual, will be of warehouses. One block on Second, between Main and Syc- amore, one on Fifth, west of Walnut, one at the intersection of Sycamore and Lower-market, with a number of single buildings in various parts of the city-all intended for stores- are, at this time,-March 1st,-in various stages of pro-
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gress. Several dwelling-houses,-a block at the corner of Harrison street and Broadway among the rest,-are also com- menced. It is hardly necessary to add to what has been stat- ed elsewhere in these pages, in reference to our buildings, whether for family use, or business stations, that while they are increasing in number, from year to year, they are at the same time improving in value, beauty, and adaptation to their respective purposes. S
Among the public buildings which are contemplated to be in course of building this year is,
The Catholic Cathedral.
That large lot, one half of the block originally bounded by Plum and Western-row, and Seventh and Eighth streets, has been recently purchased by Bishop Purcell, with the design of erecting a cathedral on the premises for the use of the Roman Catholic society. The lot fronts three hundred and eighty- three feet on Eighth, by one hundred and ninety-two feet on Plum and Western-row. The plan of this building has not yet been fully determined on; but from the various designs which have been submitted to the Bishop for his sanction, and among which, I understand, his selection will finally be made, there can be no doubt that the edifice which will be construct- ed for that purpose, will prove an ornament to Cincinnati.
I believe that the Bishop proposes to place the front of the cathedral on Plum street, and erect contiguous to it, on Eighth street, an Orphan House, with such other buildings as may be needed for the future benevolent operations of that society,- an hospital among the rest. This last department of charita- ble effort, will withdraw a large portion of patients from the Commercial Hospital of the city, already in too crowded a state, as the township trustees have assured me, and will, of course, enhance the comfort and conveniences, alike of those who remain, and those who remove.
The cathedral will be commenced, I understand, this sea- son, although from its massive character and extent, it may take two or three years to complete the edifice.
x 2
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The building of a new church for the German part of the same religious community, will also be commenced this spring, on Main street beyond the canal, which, being in the heart of that population, will, no doubt, be constructed on a scale suf- ficiently large for all necessary purposes, and diminish the throng which has for some time been attending the present edifice on Fifth street, a building found entirely insufficient to accommodate a congregation so large and constantly in- creasing in numbers. At least three-fourths of the German community here are Roman Catholics.
Another public improvement of no ordinary beauty, and of an imposing appearance, from its design, commanding posi- tion, and number of buildings, of which an idea may be form- ed from the annexed plate, is
The Western Baptist Theological Institute-at Covington, Kentucky.
This institution was originated by the Western Baptist Ed- ucation Society, and formed November 10th, 1834, by dele- gates to a general convention of the Baptist denomination throughout the western states of Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Tennessee, Mississipi, Arkansas, Louisiana, Michigan, western Pennsylvania, and western Virginia.
Shortly after the formation of this society, its executive committee, in accordance with a provision in the constitution, purchased a tract of land in Covington, Kentucky, for the site of a theological institution. In the centre of this tract, they have located the " theological square," which contains about twelve acres, enclosed with a handsome and permanent paling fence. This square is beautifully situated on elevated ground, overlooking the cities of Cincinnati and Covington, and the town of Newport.
The plan of the building, exhibited in the engraving, as seen from the north-western corner of the square, is as follows, viz : the centre building presents the chapel, and on either side, at the distance of fifty feet, are the east and west wings of the theological building, each of which is one hundred and twenty
Drawn by C huster
Eing & ty Tico hatte Comsu won
WESTERN BAPTIST THEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE.
A'L COTINGTON KY,
OPPOSITE CINCINNATI, OHIO.
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feet in length by forty-six in depth, and, as will be seen by the plate, are four stories high besides the basement; at the extreme east and west ends of the east and west wings, are double two story dwellings, designed to be occupied by the four professors of the Institute. All these buildings are situa- ted in a horizontal line running from east to west, overlook- ing the Ohio river and the city of Cincinnati.
In the foreground of the whole, facing the west, stands the mansion-house, a building of singular beauty and proportion, designed as the residence of the president of the institution. This building was erected in the spring and summer of 1839. The grounds around this part of the square, are highly im- proved and embellished with groves of forest and fruit trees and ornamental shrubbery, and the whole intersected with handsome gravel walks, exhibiting to the eye a landscape of quiet beauty, rarely surpassed.
The east wing of the theological building, is an elegant and commanding structure, erected during the summer and autumn of 1840, and will accommodate about one hundred students. The remaining buildings will be erected in conformity with the plan exhibited in the annexed plate, as they may be re- quired, and as the means of the board will justify.
It is intended to bring this institution into operation in the course of the ensuing year ; and it is the determination of the board of trustees, in conformity to the wishes of the whole Baptist community in the western states, as expressed through their delegates in convention, that it shall, at its commence- ment, assume a character of piety and learning in no respect inferior to similar institutions in the eastern states. The ex- ecutive committee having thus located the institution and ap- pointed its first trustees, in conformity with the provisions of the constitution of the Western Baptist Education Society, ap- plied for, and obtained a charter from the state of Kentucky, in the winter of 1839-'40.
Its present trustees are :- Cave Johnson, S. W. Lynd, E. Robins, J. Stevens, P. S. Bush, R. W. Lee, S. Trevor.
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Fuel.
The fuel consumed in this city has heretofore been prin- cipally wood; but the consumption of coal during late years has been large, and is constantly increasing, and will, in a few years, probably constitute the entire fuel-except for cook- ing purposes-in the place. Of this none will doubt who concur in opinion with me, that it is a material for fires supe- rior to wood in every respect but in cleanliness. The ad- vantages of coal are
1st. It is more portable and convenient both to receive and stow away, and to put into use in a city ; a great difference in its favor over wood, which requires sawing and splitting, and takes up so much room as to put it out of the power of most housekeepers, to lay up a stock for the whole season, and exposes them constantly to that rise in the article which winter always creates.
2d. It is much cheaper : coal at 12} cents per bushel, be- ing about equal to wood at $1,75 cents per cord ; which is only one half of the price which wood averages throughout the year.
.3d. It is a safer fire than that of wood, both in burning by day and keeping alive by night. Every one is familiar with this fact.
4th. It requires less care and attention to keep it in proper order, and to preserve one uniform heat, and less labor to feed it than wood.
5th. and lastly. The facility it affords in rekindling instan- taneously in the morning, after being covered up over night, is a convenience and comfort so great, as to form, in this re- spect alone, if there were no other ground of preference, a sufficient reason to supercede the employment of wood for fires.
It will be obvious, under these circumstances, that a very large quantity of coal must be consumed in this city. The sales from coal yards during the last year were nine hundred and thirty thousand bushels, and the probability is, that the
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