USA > Ohio > Hamilton County > Cincinnati > Cincinnati, the Queen City, 1788-1912, Volume II > Part 35
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ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE WORK DONE.
The first boy ever received into the institution has since been well known as Col. John H. Carroll of St. Louis. He was an orphan ten years old and had been earning his living in the streets of Cincinnati as a newsboy making his home in a heap of empty dry goods boxes at the rear of the John Shillito store. Under the fostering care of the Children's Home he grew to manhood and has since been a distinguished attorney, man of means, and a very helpful friend to the chil- dren of the poor. As a memorial to Mr. Shipley, Mr. Carroll wrote the fol- lowing :
"I never think of Murray Shipley without being filled with gratitude. He it was who found me sitting in a box in Baker alley tying up my frozen feet. He stopped long enough to inquire about my troubles, and when I told him my story, he asked me to go with him and he put me in the Children's Home. I had been wandering in the streets for a long time and had tried to tell my story to a great many men. But for some reason that I never knew, he was the first man in two years that I saw on the streets in Cincinnati, who waited long enough to hear my story. And when I had finished, he took me in his arms and carried me away to the Children's Home."
A GRATEFUL GIRL.
Another example was of a little girl friendless and forlorn. The Children's Home took her and placed her in a good adoptive home. There she received
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an education and in time became the wife of a judge of a United States court and a splendid woman every way. From her home of wealth and high social rank she wrote:
"I am the girl Julia so kindly taken by the Children's Home and so happily placed in the hearts and home of my foster parents. Those two best people in all the world, who will ever hold in my heart of hearts the place of real parents. Their people are my people, their home my home., their God is my God. And this all is true notwithstanding my very happy marriage. I write this letter to express and record my profoundest thanks to the Children's Home which has been instrumental in bringing all this happiness to me."
A BEAUTIFUL STORY.
John Koch was a little orphan received by the Children's Home and placed in a foster family near Bellefontaine with a Quaker minister who supported himself by farming. John grew up and when he became a man went west and worked hard for ten years, saving his money. Meantime, the old foster father devoting much labor to the ministry, had fallen behind in worldly prosperity, and became unable to meet his financial obligations. As a result the old people were to be turned out from their home and the farm to be sold at sheriff's sale to satisfy judgment. On the day of the auction, among the bidders was John Koch, who had come back from Nebraska for the purpose. He purchased the farm and kept his foster parents there in their old age, as they had kept him when a little homeless lad.
PROTESTANT HOME OF THE FRIENDLESS AND FOUNDLINGS.
Up to the year 1855 there was no institution in Cincinnati that offered shelter to the poor and unfortunate women. Prior to that time Mrs. Mary J. Taylor and Mrs. R. M. Bishop were the pioneer workers among women whom misfortune had thrown upon the cold charity of the world. No attempt at organization was made until January, 1855, when a meeting was called at the residence of R. M. Bishop, a leading citizen and philanthropist. Here the society was created and its future work emphasized. The name was then "The Home for the Friendless and Female Guardian Society;" its object, to assist as far as possible the home- less, the distressed and those whom confiding nature and adverse circumstances had driven to absolute want and despair. The first location was on John street where one room was rented, serving as an office where applicants could call and arrangements could be perfected to procure situations or returned to their homes. The field for doing good grew apace and soon this little office was found inad- equate and on January 10th, 1860, the society known as The Protestant Home for the Friendless and Foundlings was inaugurated. One year later a house on Court street was acquired by purchase, serving its purpose until 1864, when the adjoining property was bought and the present building of the society was erected. In 1891 a large addition was built in the rear consisting of nursery, dormitory and laundry, so that at this time the house has forty-four rooms and can comfortably accommodate fifty women and twenty-five children. The in-
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HOME OF THE FRIENDLESS, WEST COURT STREET
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stitution has assumed proportions never dreamed of by its founders; is par- ticularly fortunate in securing an efficient board of managers and an excellent board of trustees, men of the highest integrity and business qualifications have taken charge of its finances and bequests have been judiciously and profitably invested and the income from these and subscriptions from friends enable the lady managers to carry out successfully the object of the home which is today the great department charity of Cincinnati.
During each year more than five hundred admissions are recorded. Some- times something like a proportion of two hundred remain but one night. Some of these are seeking friends, some are too late to find the situations promised, all are without means. Most of them are guided to the home by the city's police force, who thus save many innocent girls, who under different circumstances might fall an easy prey to the human beasts that infest the streets and by-ways. A couple of hundred situations a year are secured for inmates, showing that an excellent intelligence office is part of the home. A number of infants are found homes each year. This part of the work is accomplished in conjunction with the Children's Home; that institution housing and caring for no child under a year old, persons desirous of adopting a young baby are referred to the Home of the Friendless and Foundlings.
The soup house connected with the institution has proved a godsend to many a hungry wayfarer. More than twelve hundred meals are furnished each year, to men, women and children irrespective of color or creed, besides large numbers of lunches prepared for them that proposed going elsewhere. The home is the veritable clearing house for the hospitals ; women, old and young, who have been treated in the free wards of these dispensaries, go the home during convalescence and make efforts to recuperate sufficient strength to go forth and renew the struggle for existence.
Many hospital cases are received each year, some of them young mothers with infants in their arms varying from two to three weeks old. Many women are helped to rejoin their friends, some of them married women with little chil- dred, whose husbands are out of employment and whose friends, while able to assist them, refuse them transportation. The home is also a way station for the pitiable subjects for the county infirmary. These go direct from the mayor's or magistrate's office and are accorded kind treatment, food and shelter until the conveyance makes its weekly call. The ages of the inmates vary from young girls of fourteen to old ladies of seventy. To none is admittance denied and while it is only a temporary home and cannot be classed with reformatory in- stitutions, the kindness and good advice received during their limited sojourn makes them happy for a brief period and in many instances the turnstile of their lives.
There is a summer home at Glendale, under the same management, where a delightful retreat is afforded as many of the women and sick children as room can be found for.
CINCINNATI RELIEF UNION.
Cincinnati Relief Union was a society for the relief of the worthy poor and was founded in 1848. It was sustained by interest on bequests and by voluntary
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contributions. Its operation was almost entirely in the winter time, and the work was done through ward managers. Those in charge were business men, and the greatest care was observed that none but the deserving come within its benefits. This has now been merged in the associated charities.
THE HOME FOR INCURABLES.
The Home for Incurables, a strictly non-sectarian charity, was an outgrowth of the need felt for a place in which to shelter persons of both sexes and all ages afflicted with non-contagious incurable diseases, who have no other place in which to be properly cared for. It was organized by a little band of ten women and five gentlemen, the latter acting as trustees, and in 1890 opened its doors to the public in a rented room on Mt. Auburn.
The struggle for success was a hard one, and discouragements were many ; but the institution managed to exist, and in 1893 was removed to Kemper Lane, Walnut Hills ; here new interest was awakened, and not only encouragement given to the managers, but much sympathy shown to the inmates. The present home is on Beechwood avenue, Walnut Hills. Many of the patients are such as suffer with paralysis, chronic rheumatism, diseases of the nerves, locomotor ataxia, blindness, tumors, chronic stomach troubles, and in fact all cases in which medical and surgical advice can be of no further benefit.
One boy, taken from the Children's Hospital, had been paralyzed from infancy, but sat patiently in his chair all day long, never complaining and always wear- ing a smile. As can be easily imagined he was a great favorite with every one. If space permitted many instances could be given of cheerful endurance under suffering which could scarcely be credited.
The home, however, is what its name implies, and although caring for the comfort and happiness of its inmates is not conducted as a hospital, nor is it designed to care for that class of patients who as a rule enter an infirmary, but its prime object is to make a home for those who have been accustomed to better surroundings in former years, to whom the atmosphere and tender care of a home are all that can solace their afflicted lives, which appeal to the sympathy of the public at large without regard to sectarian opinions of any kind.
CHRIST'S HOSPITAL.
This retreat for the sick is located in a quiet part of the city on Mount Auburn, an elevation of more than four hundred feet above the level of the Ohio river. It has ninety beds for patients, and all its appointments are first-class. Those in charge of this hospital aim to furnish the conditions most favorable to the sick and do the best work possible, in short operate an up-to-date hospital in every respect. They cheerfully refer to the several thou- sands of patients that have been treated therein as to its superior merits.
The medical staff is an exceptionally able one. The nurses are all members of the Deaconess Sisterhood of the Methodist Episcopal church who are not only conscience governed but carefully trained by the medical staff and the best head nurse that could be secured.
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All these advantages are given to the suffering, irrespective of their ability or inability to pay for such care, treating all within their means, yet requiring all to pay up to the measure of their ability.
The purpose of the managers of this institution is to provide for the worthy sick poor, that is the self respecting, industrious and sober, yet unfortunate peo- ple, but not to pauperize any one or offer a premium on pauperism.
This institution is growing in favor with the medical profession as well as the public .. It is often crowded and pay patients are declined repeatedly. Each year it treats more than five hundred patients. In one year, out of 561 patients, 218 were in the pay department, 93 paid in part and 250 were free patients.
THE WIDOWS' HOME.
This institution for aged and indigent women is an asylum and was estab- lished more than sixty years ago. It has a splendid location in the beautiful suburb of Walnut Hills, at McMillan and Ashland avenues. The idea of such a home was first suggested by Mrs. Elizabeth Mansfield, who with it donated the sum of $300. Of the first official board Mrs. Lyman Beecher was first director, Mrs. Yorke, second director, Mrs. David B. Lawler, treasurer, and Mrs. Rufus King, secretary. A house on Everett street, city, of nine rooms and a kitchen was the first home. The Mt. Auburn home was built in 1851, and was partially destroyed by fire in 1869. Helpful sympathy readily rebuilt the house, but ap- plications for admission so rapidly outgrew the accommodations that plan's were considered for new and larger quarters on Walnut Hills. One half of the grounds occupied by the Old Men's Home on McMillan street was offered at cost with twenty years in which to pay for it. The purchase was made and the corner stone was laid July 2, 1879. A fair was held in Music Hall in March, 1880, which realized the munificent sum of $29,751. Financial stresses have several times been met and overcome, and the annual festivals and holidays abundantly prove that the public does not forget the home. No person under sixty years is ad- mitted, except in rare instances of premature helplessness. The charge for ad- mission of those from sixty to sixty-five is $250; from sixty-five to seventy, $200; over seventy, $150. This is for the purpose of sustaining a furnished room.
THE OLD MEN'S HOME.
The Old Men's Home is delightfully located next that just treated. The great building is occupied conjointly by the Widows' Home, and both are under one management. It is here that the aged who have passed from the time of labor to the time of rest may pass the evening of their days in every real comfort with the best of the city's noble women to look after their welfare.
Applicants for admission to the home must be persons of respectability in reduced circumstances and not under sixty years of age. The charge for those from sixty to sixty-five is $300; from sixty-five to seventy is $250; over seventy, $150. This is for the purpose of sustaining a furnished room. The rules, regu- lations and by-laws are the same as those of the Widows' Home. The health of the old people is simply marvellous considering the advanced age at which they can be admitted. It would not be surprising if all were invalids; and yet on the contrary illness is the exception and comfortable health the rule. No one can
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visit this home without a feeling of thankfulness for the protection that is there afforded. The turmoil and strife of the busy world find no lodgment within its walls. Those who have homes here have arranged their affairs and when they entered left their cares outside.
Music is a special feature in the home, and is in charge of a competent lady who lias given her loving service for many years. Church services are held every Sunday afternoon by the chaplain, and there the old people from both wings assemble, thus testifying their reverence for Him and appreciation of His services.
Generous remembrances always make Thanksgiving and Christmas days red letter days indeed; the gifts of good things comprising every delicacy and lux- ury that the market affords.
There is always an annual festival for the various enterprises of love and duty throughout the city of which the home receives a prorated portion.
CONVENT OF THE GOOD SHEPHERD.
The Order of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, of which Cincinnati has three branches, and Newport, Kentucky, one, has a record of more than two hundred and fifty years of usefulness. At present there is an aggregate through- out all parts of the world of nearly three hundred houses, four thousand, five hundred Sisters of the Good Shepherd, one thousand, two hundred Magdalens, twenty-five thousand penitent young women and nearly thirty thousand home- less female children. There are over forty of these houses in the United States.
On February 26th, 1857, a branch of this order was established in Cincinnati. The annual average of inmates cared for by the sisters in the four houses, in and around Cincinnati, for the past fifteen years, numbers between seven and eight hundred. The Bank street house sometimes has upwards of one hundred penitent young women; the Baum street house in the various departments has two hundred inmates ; the Newport, Kentucky, home has over one hundred and fifty inmates, and the home at Carthage, which is the provincial motherhouse for four states, has three hundred and twenty-five inmates and one hundred and fifty sisters.
The purpose and aim of the work of the Good Shepherd Sisterhood is two- fold: First to bring back to the pathways of virtue the unfortunate young wo- men who have strayed therefrom; and second, to shelter from peril young girls, both white and colored, as yet innocent perhaps of sin, but sorely exposed to it by untoward social environments.
The Sisterhood of the Good Shepherd is one of the many sisterhoods of the Catholic church; its members are Catholic in faith, inspired by the influences of the Catholic church; but its work being a work of charity, of charity for God and for God's children, is coextensive with the realms of charity itself; knowing neither Jew nor Samaritan; limited neither by creed nor by color; embracing all children of God, who are willing to come under its tender touch. In many cases the sisters have to begin the work of training which is proper to childhood. Very many young women and grown up girls have never been surrounded by the care and guardianship which society associates with developed character. Added to
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this, many of the poor creatures have been so badly born as to place them beyond the reach of any hope save from those whose faith forbids them ever to despair ; this delicate and difficult work calls for real true, lifelong consecration.
The Good Shepherd Sisters of Carthage have built a large public laundry, which cost in the neighborhood of twenty-five thousand dollars. Its purpose is to give work to penitent young women, and to earn an income for the support and extension of the various departments. There are two departments in the reformatory. The first comprises the Sisterhood of the Magdalens; those among the penitents chiefly who elect to remain for life with the Good Shepherd Sisters as the surest way to persevere in virtue. They must undergo a probation of five years. If, after probation, they still persevere in their resolution to remain, they are permitted to enter the Magdalen Sisterhood for life. Their lives are spent in peaceful retirement and fervent penance; their time is divided between prayer, intellectual work and finest needle and art work. These Magdalens execute the fancy needlework so much admired by the cultivated ladies of the world. The second department of the reformatory comprises girls and women of blemished character. In this department the sisters must show great love, patience and tact in order to compel vice. to make room for virtue and moral regeneration. Complete isolation from previous associations is necessary. Idle- ness must likewise be prevented, and the reform pupils must become accustomed to labor, and to labor well that they may be safe from peril in the future.
The sisters have been favored by many city firms and by members of private families with orders for custom work and various kinds of sewing. This variety of work together with patronage of tlie laundry keeps this department con- stantly busy. The next important charges of the sisters comprise two industrial departments for white and colored children; each department being conducted in separate buildings. These children are mostly taken from impoverished homes, or are entirely homeless; they receive a common school education and are instructed in needlework and useful home industries. The most capable among them are trained in higher education, music, etc. Each department is managed by a local superior. Some of these children upon reaching maturity, elect to remain with the sisters and are given special charges, management of work, etc .; others are placed with good, reliable people and others still are taken by friends, or find honorable positions in which they prove the fact of their convent training. Over all the various departments the Sisters of the Good Shepherd preside. These sisters, in order to become eligible to member- ship in the order, must have honorable lineage, and a continuous record of social standing, education and refinement.
The demands of the work are continually increasing, and for want of accom- modations many have to be refused admission who are sorely in need of it.
THE CITY INFIRMARY.
Previous to 1852, the dependent poor of Cincinnati were cared for, under a law of 1821, at the old Commercial Hospital and by an expensive system of our-door relief. During the fiscal year 1849-50, the cost of medical attendance, medicines and provisions furnished the needy was $10,197. The firewood pro- vided cost $11,124. The total for these supplies was $21,322. In 1851-52, be-
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fore the directors took charge under the new plan, the cost for items as above was $21,601.
The infirmary was built in 1851-52, and was opened for inmates in 1852. During the first year of its existence, the cost of provisions was $3,920, of medi- cine and medical attendance, $2,815; and of fuel, $6.735. For the years 1849- 50 and 1851-52, the expenses of the Commercial Hospital, including provisions, medicines, wines, liquors, dry goods, fuel, groceries, oil, and not counting ex- pense of pest house, orphan asylum, interments, salaries and other wages, were $24.4JI and $20,432. For the following year, the expense of the City Infirmary, including amounts paid the Commercial Hospital, cost of conveyance to the infirmary, fitting it with stoves, bedsteads, bell, etc. ($4,766 for these items), was only $13,271.
Under the old arrangement there had been obtained by taxation and duties upon auctioneers, these sums for relief of the poor of Cincinnati: In 1844-45, $29,965 ; 1845-46, $30,609; 1846-47, $33,422; 1847-48, $39,174; 1848-49, $61,- 988; 1849-50, $61,074 ; 1850-51, $65,570. In 1852-53, under the new order in full operation, the whole cost of in-door and out-door relief, at hospital and infirmary, not counting expenses of permanent improvements, was $25,892.
Although the Cincinnati Orphan Asylum had for several years received con- siderable sums from the poor fund, the directors of the infirmary declined to allow this claim, because of lack of legal authority.
The general assembly passed an act March 23, 1850, entitled, "An act to authorize the city of Cincinnati to erect a poorhouse, and for other purposes." Under this act, the board of directors of the infirmary came into office. The law of March 11, 1853, announced that their further duties were "to provide for the organization of cities and incorporated villages." In such corporations, the offices of township clerks and township trustees were dispensed with.
The city council on January 14, 1857, passed an ordinance "to regulate the management of the City Infirmary, Commercial Hospital, pesthouse, City Burying Ground, and the granting of outdoor relief to the poor. The council ordered that directors of the infirmary should be elected according to the acts mentioned, give bonds of five thousand dollars each, guaranteeing faithfulness to their duties, have the care of charities indicated in title of the ordinance, and that they should appoint the officers of these institutions and other necessary officials, subject to approval of council."
On April 15, 1864, council passed a like ordinance limiting authority of the directors to charge of the infirmary, of the City Burying Ground, and providing outdoor relief to the needy.
By the rules of 1852-53, each city ward was to provide food for the poor, and a contract was made with a grocer in each ward, from whom supplies were to be bought, at prices charged his regular cash customers. Six medical dis- tricts were arranged for, in each of which two or more physicians were appointed to look after the sick. One physician in each district should be a German. Medical visits were to be paid for at twenty-five cents each. One of the infirm- ary directors, of whom there were three, was to look after two medical districts. Each of the medical districts was to have an undertaker, for care of deceased poor, and identical sums in all districts were to be paid for such services.
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In 1864, the city was divided into seven districts. In each there was one overseer of the poor, whose whole time was given to this work. Each district was to have a physician, preferably one who could speak both English and German. In any district where a majority of the people used German, the physi- cian must know both languages. One druggist was appointed for each district, if one could be found willing to provide medicines at the rates fixed upon for the outdoor poor.
Three directors' districts were formed from the seven districts. In each, when practicable, an undertaker was appointed to care for the deceased poor.
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