History of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio; their past and present, Part 9

Author: Nelson, S.B., Cincinnati
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Cincinnati : S. B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1592

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DEVELOPMENT OF COMMERCE.

Before manufacturing can fairly begin in a new country, commerce and exchange must provide for the wants of a community in many directions. Local trade sets in as soon as there is anything to buy or sell, be it only a fish hooked from the water, or venison shot in the forest. When Demand calls "Hello!" Supply answers "Here I am." The Cincinnati pioneers in 1789 wanted seed-corn, and corn for hominy and bread, and immediately corn-meal came from Lexington, down the Licking, in canoes. The hungry garrison at Fort Washington craved meat, and forthwith Jacob Fowler and his brother Matthew agreed to deliver, at the barracks, a regular supply of the flesh of buffalo and bear, taken in the Miami woods. Com- merce, on a small scale, was thus carried on. Lexington was older than Cincinnati, and for many years kept the lead as a source of supply. Cincinnati merchants obtained their goods from Lexington.

HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

A frame building belonging to Israel Ludlow was used as a general store in 1791. This was the first store in the settlement, and was located on the site of what was afterward the "Cincinnati Hotel" on Sycamore street. It was kept by John Barth, who sold flour at ten dollars a barrel, and salt at eight dollars.

In 1792, Wayne's victory having opened the doors of traffic, the town was over- stocked with stores. Nevertheless, there was in July, of that year, a scarcity of corn and flour. Shoes sold well; and there was an enormous demand for strong drink, which demand was met by ample shipments of Monongahela whisky and peach brandy. The military gentry of the barracks required New England rum and plenty of imported wine. It was the urgent call for spirituous liquor that induced an early beginning of the distillery business, one of the first of Cincinnati's manufacturing enterprises. In 1793 Matthew Hueston, merchant, realized large profits on leather goods. In 1796 gunpowder sold at from $1 to $1.50 per pound; wheat, seventy-five cents to one dollar per bushel; pork, fifty to seventy-five cents per 100 pounds. The English traveler, Bailey, describes Cincinnati, in 1796, as a noted depot for stores for supplying other western points, and a place of great business.

The sightseer of to-day, looking for curious landmarks of Old Cincinnati, will notice, at the corner of Pearl and Broadway, a quaint brown market-house, for- merly called "Fly Market, " on the end of which is inscribed the words, " Erected in 1816." This seems to the modern eye a rather ancient piece of architecture, but Dr. Drake has left, in one of his graphic sketches, a description of the only market- house of the city as it appeared in 1800, when the Doctor first came to Cincinnati. He says, "In front of the mouth of Sycamore street, near the hotel, there was a small wooden market-house, built over a cove [Yeatman's Cove] into which pirogues and other craft, when the river was high, were paddled to be tied to the rude col- umns."

By the close of the eighteenth century the commerce of the young city had assumed considerable magnitude. From February to May, 1802, there were exported from Cincinnati 4,457 barrels of flour. Martin Baum (builder of the Sin- ton residence on Pike street) had recently organized the "Miami Exporting Com- pany." The day of small things was drawing to a close. The Ohio river was to add to her proud title, the Beautiful, the mercantile epithet, Useful. The mer- chants began to call the town an "Emporium, " and some spoke of it as a new Tyre. The Ohio Gazette, of Marietta, was not so sanguine in regard to the growth of com- merce and the importance of river navigation. Herman Blennerhassett wrote for its columns in 1804: "It will forever remain impracticable for shipping to perform a return voyage against the current of our great rivers." But the steamboat was soon to be invented, and to that invention our city owes the rapid development of her commerce before the time of railroads. Mr. Carnegie has estimated that, in 1884, the annual trade of the Ohio river alone amounted to eight hundred million dollars! The river brings annually to Cincinnati two million five hundred thousand tons of coal.

The routes and modes of transportation to and from Cincinnati, at first, were few and primitive. Bridle-paths, wagon-roads, and rivers furnished the lines of travel. Pack horses were much used. One of the few early roads was that marked out by Filson from Lexington to the mouth of the Licking. In 1799, Capt. Kibby cut a road to Vincennes, Ind. Good roads were slow enough in coming, and, in fact, there is yet much room for improvement in the roads of Hamilton county. One of the most useful exhibits at the Columbian Fair, of 1893, was that showing the latest approved methods of road-making.

The early commerce of Cincinnati depended mainly upon water transportation. The first regular ferry between Cincinnati and Newport was established in 1792. The first regular line of keelboats plied between our city and Marietta in 1794. Of

HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

course Pittsburgh, Gallipolis, Wheeling and Maysville were sources of supply to the young markets of the Miami settlements. In due time, navigation extended not only along the main water courses-the Ohio, the Mississippi, the Missouri-but also up the larger tributaries of these streams. The exporting association of Cin- cinnati established commercial relations with Europe, by way of New Orleans, a city which long held preeminence over all other cities in the Mississippi Valley, in population and trade. Many ships were built and rigged in yards along the Ohio, and the marine commerce came to be closely associated with the river business.

With the increase of population and the multiplication of farm products and manufactures, more and better facilities for travel, transportation and trade neces- sarily were constructed. "Dirt-roads" and turn-pikes stretched from the "Tyre of the West" to the tributary towns. The wheels and hoofs, that bore burdens over the land, like the keels and oars that furrowed the streams, were as so many flying shuttles weaving the web of an ever lengthening and widening commerce.

The application of steam to the propulsion of water-craft, followed soon by the adoption of the same tremendous force to drive locomotives over land, wrought changes that revolutionized the commerce of the world. Cincinnati was among the first cities of the continent to avail herself of the power of steam. The first steam- boat that plowed the Ohio made its first trip in 1812. The steamboat interest rap- idly rose to commanding importance. The western rivers swarmed with magnificent vessels, hundreds of which, and thousands, were built in the docks of this city and were owned by resident capitalists. In 1840 there were launched, at Cincinnati, thirty-three boats, costing six hundred thousand dollars.

The first train of cars that carried passengers and goods out of Cincinnati sped along its new-laid, strap-iron track, up the lovely valley of the Little Miami, in the year 1845. The writer of this sketch, then a lad, saw with wide-opened eyes of wonder the steaming prodigy, as it roared past the station of Corwin, now East Waynesville. Compare, or rather contrast the Little Miami road of that period, with the state binding lines of the vast Pan Handle system of to-day. There are now twenty-four railroads entering the city, uniting her with all the chief sections of the continent. One of these, the Cincinnati Southern railway, is peculiarly a Cincin- nati enterprise. It was built by the city, at a cost of twenty-five million dollars, the right of way having been bought through Kentucky and Tennessee, a length of 340 miles, by our people, the first instance, it is claimed, in the world's history, of a city making a railroad for her own special convenience, and the benefit of local commerce.

Before steamboats and steam-cars had come into much use, the active promoters. of internal improvement gave great energy to the furtherance of the canal interest. Turnpikes and canals were regarded as the ne plus ultra of transportation, when Clinton, Clay and Corwin were making speeches and laws for America. The Na- tional road and the Erie canal were considered as the climax of human achievement, and, indeed, they were and are great works. The Queen City was smitten in her youth with the canal mania. The Miami canal was dug, its picturesque locks were placed, the water was let in, and the slender, slow boats were roped along the watery way by horse and mule, tugging tandem, over the narrow tow-path. An inspiring sight it was to the crowd of enthusiastic Cincinnatians, who, on a grim day in November, 1826, gathered by the canal to see the first two boats start on a trial trip to Middletown. The old Miami canal was put to a novel use during the Expo- sition of 1888, when a fleet of real Venetian gondolas carried innumerable pleasure- parties over its waters which shone and sparkled under electric lights. Now it is thought by many that the old canal has outlived its usefulness, and that it should be abandoned, and its place occupied by a boulevard. Others think it should be widened and deepened into a ship canal, and made a connecting aqueduct between Lake Erie and the Ohio river. Such a piece of engineering would not seem over-

Wester .E. -

M. H. Venable

HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

difficult, compared with the Chicago enterprise of uniting Lake Michigan with the Mississippi, by the extension of the Chicago river.

Every modern city is indebted to railroads, and the means of rapid transit fur- nished by steam and electricity; and many cities have the advantage that navigable waters afford. Cincinnati is well supplied with railroads, and has also the benefit of river and canal navigation. Five bridges, costing about twelve million dollars, span the Ohio at this point, and give transportation ready access to the South. The valleys of the two Miamis are the natural base of roadbeds to the North. And such is the surface of the United States that all the great trunk lines running across the continent, east and west, must of necessity pass through Ohio, and it is con- venient for them to make Cincinnati a central point. The city is not far from the present center of population for the Union. These facts and conditions give assur- ance that, with proper enterprise and city pride, Cincinnati, though outnumbered in population by rival cities, and though, in some respects, necessarily less prosperous than other cities, may continue to wear the crown and bear the name of the Queen City. Her commerce is increasing with her manufactures. In the words of another: " Her exports go to all parts of the habitable world. Only a few years ago one of her booksellers sold a large invoice of their law publications to the Japanese govern- ment. Wood working machinery made here has penetrated to the frozen regions of Siberia and the burning zone of Africa, has gone to Spain, to Italy, to Greece, to Palestine, to India, to China, to Japan, and to the islands of the Pacific. Invoices of Cincinnati saddles have been sent from here to Jerusalem, and Cincinnati-made carriages may be found in South Africa, in Egypt, and in every other part of the globe where vehicles are used. It has been said that the sun never sets on the Eng- lish drum-beat, and, with closer fidelity to the fact, it may be said that outside the frozen zones the rising sun never ceases to shine on the products of Cincinnati."

MANUFACTURING IN CINCINNATI.

The situation and environment of Cincinnati destined it to become a manufact- uring city. Every condition favors mechanical industry, and the practice of the liberal arts. The resources of the country around invited to discovery and provoked to invention. The forest yielded best timber for building; the near quarry offered limestone; the clay was good material for brick; the mine produced coal and iron .. Raw material from the farm demanded to be metamorphosed into food and clothing.

One of the first experiments of Robinson Crusoe, on his solitary island, was the. attempt to make vessels of clay. The potter's wheel began to turn in Cincinnati as early, at least, as the year 1799, when William McFarland started the manufacture of earthenware, thus inaugurating an industry which has since made our city dis- tinguished over the world. Brick making was not undertaken until 1805.

Guns were necessary to the backwoodsman. The first gunsmith of Cincinnati was Andrew Danseth, who set up his shop in 1800.

Cotton and woolen fabrics were woven by Cincinnati looms before the year 1809 ..

Mr. John Melish, an English traveler who visited Cincinnati in 1811, mentions that there were, at that time, in the place, cabinetmakers, coopers, turners, machine- makers, wheelwrights, smiths, coppersmiths, tinners, silversmiths, tanners, saddlers, boot and shoe makers, glovers, tailors, spinners, weavers, dyers, printers, book- binders, rope-makers, and bricklayers, certainly a respectable array of guilds.

The manufacturing of malt liquors, now conducted here on a prodigious scale, seems to have originated in the first decade of the century. The first Cincinnati brewery, the property of John Embree, was located on the river bank at the foot of Race street. The annual product of the establishment, in 1811, was five thousand barrels of beer and porter. A Cincinnati brewery in the World's Fair exhibit at Chicago, in 1893, displayed, as an advertisement, a booth with fixtures and decora- 5

HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

tions costing ten thousand dollars! Cincinnati's annual product of beer is nearly twenty-five million gallons.

The business of pork-packing, which gave the city the disagreeable title of "Porkopolis," but which also, like the equally unpoetical whisky business, did much to lay the foundations of her prosperity and to enrich individuals, was carried on in Cincinnati as early as 1812, by Richard Fosdick, and by others. In the pork trade Cincinnati held the preeminence above all other cities of the world, until the dis- tinction was captured some years ago by a younger western city.

The carriage trade in which Cincinnati now forges far ahead of most rival cities, and for which she has a world-wide reputation, began to assume importance in the city just after the war of 1812-15. George C. Miller's plow-works were started in 1812. There stood on the river's bank, about the year 1812, a steam-mill with a seventy-horse power engine. The mill is referred to in an old city directory, as "a noble and sublime piece of architecture."

The town contained, in 1815, a factory of red and white lead, a sugar refinery, and a place for manufacturing mineral waters. At that date there had been in operation for several years, manufactories of glassware, tobacco and snuff, soap and candles, furniture and clothes. Cincinnati hats and Cincinnati beer were exported to New Orleans.

The Cincinnati Bell, Brass and Iron Foundry was established about 1814, by William Greene & Co. The church bells cast in the Queen City are famed for sweet- ness of tone. Dom Pedro, the emperor of Brazil, when visiting the city asked especially to be taken to one of the celebrated bell foundries. In 1819 the Phoenix Foundry was in operation.

The Cincinnati Directory for 1825 contains the following

STATISTICAL VIEW OF CINCINNATI IN 1825.

" The inhabitants of this city are principally emigrants from the different States and from every kingdom in Europe. And it may be said, to the credit of the citi- zens in general, that the greatest harmony exists between the people of different nations and tongues, all viewing each other as brothers drawn together by the natural consequence of emigration.

"Such is the security and safety of the citizens that a night-watch is thought unnecessary by the city council.

" The trade and manufactures exceed those of any other town in the western States. The healthfulness and pleasantness of the city are such as to induce strang- ers from many parts to make it their residence during the warmer season. Almost all articles of importation are sold here nearly as cheap as in the eastern cities. The facilities for conveying articles to and from this place have become so improved, that the expense is small compared to what it once was.

" The number of arrivals and departures of steamboats in five months, beginning the 1st day of April, 1824, and ending the 31st day of August following, was 480. Of the number of keel and flat boats no account was kept, though the greater pro- portion of the exports was carried in them.

"During the past year, eight steamboats have been built in and near this place. The manufactories in general are fast improving, some of them have been doubled and tripled within the past five years. The type foundry of this city is the only one west of the Alleghany Mountains; it furnishes type for the principal part of the Western States. There are upward of fifty mechanical trades carried on here, many of which furnish a large surplus for exportation. The city is regularly improving from year to year, ninety-nine houses, sixty-eight of which are brick, have been erected during the past year. The public improvements of 1824 are such as might be expected from an efficient and enterprising city council. The new

HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

'wharf alone bears honorable testimony of their ability to plan, and energy to execute their design.

"The markets in general are well supplied, and at a cheap rate. It may be said, with great propriety, that there is one advantage to the citizen here over most other places, viz .: that all articles of provision, of clothing, in short, almost everything, whether of necessaries, convenience, or luxury, may be procured in greater plenty, greater variety, and at a cheaper rate, than in any other part of the Western States."

THEN AND NOW.

The foregoing records sufficiently show that Cincinnati took on the character of a manufacturing place, near the commencement of her career. Her increasing commerce stimulated manufacture, and was, in return, quickened and enlarged by the necessity of handling a constantly growing out-put of manufactured goods. Both manufacture and commerce were sustained and accelerated by agriculture, stockgrowing, by the lumberman and the miner. As, by degrees, competing cities encroached on the agricultural area of supply and subsistence which had at first been monopolized by the Queen City of the West, that city was obliged to rely more and more upon her internal and local resources, and so her people turned their attention more decidedly to manufacture, the arts, and to mercantile pursuits.

The total product of the manufactures of the city, in 1826, was valued at one million eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It is now estimated at more than two hundred million dollars annually. Col. Sidney D. Maxwell, late superintendent of the Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce, in an address on "The Manufactures of Cincinnati," said: "We all recognize the fact that a diversity of production secures a more sure and steady prosperity. Here again is found an element of strength at Cincinnati. Our manufactures extend to a great variety of articles, many of them entirely distinct from each other. They embrace productions from wood, metal, stone, animals, earth, paper, leather, grain, vegetable fibre, tobacco, drugs, and other articles differing widely in their nature and in the wants and local- ities they are called upon to supply. The number of different kinds of goods made here is beyond the estimate of many of the best informed. If anything of a sur- prising nature were revealed by our industrial displays, it was the scope of our pro- duction. The statistician finds it difficult to pursue the vocations. Men are work- ing in their own houses. They are in obscure places. They are doing their busi- ness in a small way, but are swelling production. The kinds of manufactures are steadily increasing in number. You will hear of producers, in unlooked-for locali- ties, commencing the manufacture of new articles, doing it in an unpretending man- ner, but laying the foundation of great future usefulness to the city."

The number of manufacturing establishments in Cincinnati, according to the sta- tistics of 1892, was 8,667; the number of hands employed 115,944; the capital invested was $106,599,000; and the total value of the products $250,000,000. Selecting the eight items of the highest commercial importance we find the values of these several products as follows: Iron, $30,422,000; liquors, $29,580,000; clothing, $28,631,000; food, $26,092,000; wooden goods, $22,195,000; leather, $15,000,000; carriages, $13,000,000; soap, candles, etc., $11,000,000. The value of commodities received in the city last year was $346,400,000, and the value of shipments from the city $346,383,000. The amount of business transacted may be indicated by the amount of exchanges at the clearing house, which, for the year, was over seven hundred and twenty-one million dollars.

Whoever visited the great industrial display made by Cincinnati firms at the Centennial Exposition of 1888, must have been impressed by its vastness, variety and beauty; and the hundreds of thousands who saw the majestic palace of the Liberal Arts, in the World's Exposition of 1893, could not fail to observe that many of the finest exhibits there admired were from the city of Cincinnati.

HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

A RICH CITY.

Cincinnati is a rich city. The tax duplicate, for the year 1892, indicates returns of property valued at nearly one hundred and eighty-nine million dollars, and this probably does not represent half the actual wealth of the city. The revenue from taxation is over five million dollars. The total banking capital, employed. by the seventeen banks, is $9,918,000, and, if we include the banks of Covington. and Newport, the total capital is $12,918,000. The Cincinnati Clearing House returns for 1892 show the actual exchanges for the year represented $720,980,450. Though the city taxes at present are high, the rate being 2.740 cents, and. though the municipal debt now amounts to over twenty-four million dollars, the people have received the value of the levy, and, in a proper reckoning of the prop- erty holdings of the city, including the Southern railroad, there is no indebtedness not more than balanced by assets. The tax rolls show a long list of the names of millionaires, and not a few names of persons who own several millions. The source of this wealth is not far to seek. Cincinnati became rich, not by speculation, but by the industrial development of her own resources. She did not so much borrow capi- tal as produce property. The land, the teeming soil, the primary source of all wealth, was at hand to begin with. It cost the original proprietors almost nothing; but, occupied and improved, it became a means of prosperity, a bank of supply richer than Fortunatus' purse. The corner, on which the Chamber of Commerce now stands, was offered to a Swiss hat-maker, in 1810, for twelve straw hats, but the hat-maker preferred six dollars in cash.

We have described the original state of the Miami Purchase, and the marvellous. natural advantages of the area of subsistence spreading away for hundreds of miles in every direction from Cincinnati. The town opposite the Licking's mouth was like a stripling tree set in deep soil containing all elements to feed and stimulate growth and vigor. From what has been said in the preceding topics on the agricul- tural and commercial activities of the city and surroundings, and the rapidly devel- oping manufacturing industries, it follows that wealth must needs accrue in somebody's hands. And it is safe to say that the wealth of Cincinnati is as equitably distributed as the social and economic systems of our day will allow. Comparatively, the people are well off. Poverty is not abolished, misery not expelled; neither is want widely prevalent, nor labor habitually discontented.

The men who developed the resources of the central States, and who built up the business establishments of Cincinnati, were men of steady perseverance. Some, like our first millionaire, Nicholas Longworth, had the sagacity to buy land cheap and wait until it became dear. But the waiting required self-denial and entailed hardship. Mr. Longworth used to say it kept him poor to pay his $30,000 taxes on land. The reproach has been brought against some of the early property owners of the city that they were too conservative, too plodding, and gave all their atten- tion to material interests and none to the things of higher import. They were prudent, they were saving, they built up a secure property of their own, and held on to it. Their fortunes were what they appeared to be, and not fictitious. Their credit was good as gold. They built their own ample houses and each lived in his independent home. This characteristic economy and self-dependence was trans- mitted from generation to generation. Our rich men are men of affairs-they attend punctually to their business concerns. On this point Col. Maxwell, who, as superintendent of the Chamber of Commerce for many years, had a good chance to observe, says: "It is a noticeable feature of Cincinnati, that they who are manag- ing our industrial establishments are generally men who are thoroughly acquainted with the practical features of their business. They are mechanics themselves who did not commence to build at the top of the structure, but at the bottom, when they had small means. These oaks, whose great spreading branches now shelter so

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History of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio; their past and present, Part 9

Author: Nelson, S.B., Cincinnati Publication date: 1894 Publisher: Cincinnati : S. B. Nelson Number of Pages: 1592

Author: Nelson, S.B., Cincinnati
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Cincinnati : S. B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1592