USA > Ohio > Women of Ohio; a record of their achievements in the history of the state, Volume III > Part 21
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Obviously, the key to the real character of the erstwhile Princess Alice is not to be obtained from news-print, despite space and headlines. A far better clew is provided by a book of reminiscences, "Crowded Hours," which consti- tuted, when it was published in 1933, the first voluntary public utterance of its long famous author.
It antedated by several years her voluntary entry into the field of journal- ism. This entry was inaugurated by a newspaper syndicate feature confined to terse and often quite frankly adverse comment on the administration of her cousin, Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Finally at long last, Alice Longworth broke silence, via the lecture platform, for her first series of public speeches.
"I have been on innumerable platforms, attended unnumbered flag raisings and cornerstone layings," said she, "but tonight I am making my first public speech."
The detachment of good taste and, fundamentally, good feeling which char- acterized even her most candid criticisms of a Rooseveltian era diametrically opposed to what, in the opinion of Theodore Roosevelt's daughter, is truly and democratically Rooseveltian, did not detract from the force and conviction of this maiden speech.
"I believe in America," she said. "We have a popular government based on democratic principles and republican institutions. I do not believe that we Americans have the remotest desire to substitute rulers for the individuals we have selected to administer the laws made by the reprsentatives of the people."
This is the public problem that most deeply interests the Alice Roosevelt Longworth of today. It is, as all must agree, despite widely diverging points of view, a serious matter. The matured and serious utterance of a matured, widely informed and highly intelligent woman-the real Alice Roosevelt Longworth.
Is it difficult to recognize in this portrait of today any likeness to the glamorous Princess Alice of yesterday ? The Alice whose youth and beauty and native wit and heritage of high spirits and of low resistance to the colorful and the venturesome, had the White House for background during one of the most interesting administrations in our history ?
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Not necessarily so. Not if it is borne in mind that virtually everything "Princess Alice" did or did not do, everything she said or did not say, was necessarily subject to those colorful journalistic processes which easily transform the most immaterial actions of a celebrity into good copy for page one.
On the other hand, there was plenty of basic truth in the public concept thus established; of a glorified hoyden who took a pet snake with her to brilliant house parties ; who hung a sign on the house of the already famous congress- man she was later to marry-"I live here, Nicholas Longworth;" who dove into a pool fully clad, daring her escort to follow her.
These and many more care-free incidents give zest to "Crowded Hours," largely because of the altogether impersonal manner in which the author deflates their exaggerated importance.
"I think people are apt to be amused by and interested in those who are themselves amused and interested," is her comment. "Probably this accounts for the degree of publicity I had. But my 'publicity value,' I fear, was a trial to my family."
Or, "When I hear criticism of the youth of this or any time a fellow-feeling comes over me. They may bore me, as I used to bore myself and undoubtedly did those around me, but no young creature could be more frivolous and inane, more scattered and yet more self-centered than I was"-And again-
"Looking over some old newspaper clipping books, kept by Nick's secretary while we were away, it is astonishing how much was made of our trip in the papers. Most of the accounts were kindly, some delightfully humorous. The vulgarity and inaccuracy of others would raise gooseflesh. Some of the foreign papers were worse, if possible, than our own yellow journals. But I suppose we were fair game for the press of the day. Anyway, it's all long ago and far away.''
There is, of course, no question but that Alice Roosevelt, while still in her teens, was a celebrity of the first order. Bright and particular star of the Philippine tour headed by the then secretary of war, William Howard Taft, she was the guest of the Dowager Empress of China, who loaded her with gifts- jade and gold brocade and a tiny Pekinese dog. At Honolulu she learned to dance the Hula Hula-and the song about this was sung around the world. She lunched with the Emperor of Japan-lacquer boxes, an embroidered screen, a photograph of the Empress were aftermath of this affair. The then Emperor and the Crown Prince of Korea did the honors of the Hermit Kingdom to Princess Alice. She was a witness to the vanishing glories of their imperial existence.
Then came the Roosevelt-Longworth wedding and new space records for virtually all newspapers. Then the wedding trip to Cuba and, not long after, Princess Alice and her husband's European tour. Lavish gifts-not as lavish as the glittering newspaper accounts but certainly gifts to surprise and delight
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any princess that ever lived, marked the wedding, especially the presents sent by kings and queens and foreign countries. So it was polite as well as pleasant to pay respects in person.
Nicholas Longworth and his bride were guests of King Edward VII of England, of the Kaiser Wilhelm, and the Bellamy Storers-this last, a strained occasion, because this was at the very time that Mrs. Storer, Nick's aunt, was exchanging all too candid letters with President Roosevelt, Nick's wife's father, about the red hat promised by "Dear Maria" to Archbishop Ireland.
Nicholas Longworth, fourth generation in descent from the Nicholas Long- worth who did so much to make Cincinnati, Ohio, the city it has become, had accompanied the Taft party to the Philippines. So had plenty of reporters. It probably did not strain their lynx eyes to detect the emergence, from a throng of eligibles-and ineligibles-of a favored suitor.
The culmination of the romance was heralded far and wide, the wedding was a social function long to be remembered.
Alice and Nick-neither his wife, his family nor his friends seem ever to have called him Nicholas-were as near to the ideal of a basically congenial and happily married couple as fate is likely to permit. They were the natural nucleus of a very festive and very brilliant social circle. The Medill McCormicks -Ruth Hanna McCormick, now Ruth Hanna McCormick Simms, was since their girlhood and still is, Alice Longworth's closest friend-the Ned McLeans, the Cornelius Vanderbilts, the Goelets, Neil Primrose, younger son of Lord Rose- berry, Cecil Spring Rice, British Ambassador and his family, Gussie Gardner, Bourke Cochran-and others kept festivities from lagging and the sands of gay time from running down.
Parties, week-ends, balls, receptions, trips, teas, tours and poker parties maintained the social tempo at a well accelerated pace.
Except for the interval during which he was not returned to Congress, Nick and Alice spent comparatively little time at Rookwood, the Cincinnati home and, for many years past, the center of leisurely and pleasant living for several generations of the Longworth family.
It is said that the first Nicholas who came to Cincinnati, then little more than a village, and who helped to build the Cincinnati that it became, left a fortune of between $10,000,000 and $15,000,000, a vast sum for those days. He made it, largely, in real estate. It was this first Cincinnati Longworth who planted vineyards on the hillsides and encouraged the coming of thrifty Germans for their cultivation. He was of decided character, very philanthropic, in his own way. He gave freely to the "Devils poor." To such down and outs, that is, as were unworthy rather than worthy and unedifying rather than exemplary. He said he liked them better.
The financial backlog provided by the first Cincinnati Longworth furnished quite a luxurious warmth for his descendants. It was dwindling, however,
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when the Princess Alice entered the family. Her charm, intelligence, innate good nature built a substantial foundation for her mutual liking beneath new relationship.
For one thing, a bride whose father was President Theodore Roosevelt, whose own family rated high mark in any social register, and who was, moreover, the "Princess Alice," was worth cultivating, to say the least.
On the other hand, the Longworth social standing had long been what is known as "enviable." It needed no adventitious aid. As for titles, they had real titles-and very nice ones-of their own. Clara Longworth, Nick's sister, had married Count Adelbert de Chambrun, a direct descendant of Lafayette. Another de Chambrun-a marquis-was also married into the family.
So honors were easy and life at Rookwood continued to be the gracious and spacious affair it had always been-until the death of Mrs. Nicholas Longworth, Sr., Nick's mother. Then evaluation of what remained of former fortunes became necessary and much of the beautifully wooded acreage was sold to a subdivision.
Mrs. Alice Longworth still spends part of the year at Rookwood. But now, as in the past, she likes her life at Washington a good deal better.
It could not-and should not-be otherwise. For it was Washington that made-developed-the real Alice Roosevelt Longworth; the person behind the public personality ; the woman that the public hardly knows.
A thoroughly delightful woman, thoroughly informed, whose tact and innate kindliness have preserved strong friendships with men and women to whose political opinions both she and her forceful father were diametrically opposed.
That her father was source of virtually all her own convictions, that his design for political living was-and is-her own design, becomes quite clear to the reader of Alice Longworth's memoirs.
Indeed, she admits this frankly-with pride. "As soon as father declared where he stood, I followed him, as I always did," she says. This is why Mrs. Longworth's political activities, while unofficial, have proven many times highly effective. To be really efficient, one must feel that one's best efforts are fully justified.
In not one of the gargantuan struggles that so joyously engaged the fight- ing spirit of Theodore Roosevelt did his daughter, once she had reached the age of understanding and had become his trusted confidant, fail to give all aid and comfort that in her lay. The same is true as regards her husband. Only Nick's political career was rather free from trouble and he did not share, to anything like a Rooseveltian, degree, the habit of looking for it.
Except once. This was the time of the famous "Bull Moose" campaign, in which Longworth's political loyalties were, by force of fate and circumstances, exactly on the opposite side of the political fence from his father-in-law, candi- date of the Progressive Party. It was, writes Alice, one of the hardest political
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experiences of her life. Caught between two hostile camps, with hostages in each, she could do exactly nothing.
But she more than evened the score with fate, both before and after. Her memoirs deal very feelingly with the refusal of President Woodrow Wilson to permit Theodore Roosevelt to recruit and lead a division in the World War.
This did not at all improve the already highly critical attitude of Ex- President Roosevelt-and his daughter-toward President Wilson's adminis- tration.
"Our morale had been lowered by the vacillating policy- or lack of policy- that Wilson pursued toward Mexico," wrote Mrs. Longworth in, her memoirs- and "He just wrote notes-and then more notes. He called it 'watchful waiting.' Father called it a 'policy of poltroonery.' It was not long after the World War started that Wilson directed his note writing to the European belligerents also."
So the systematized, untiring, relentless fight in which-this was after her father's death-Alice Longworth devoted herself, the calling together of all political resources as against the League of Nations, was undoubtedly a matter of personal feeling as well as a matter of principal.
She tells in "Crowded Hours" of an impromptu midnight supper at her home, following the Senate session at which President Wilson's followers in the Senate "persisted in their refusal-in Mr. Wilson's refusal-to vote for the Versailles Treaty with the Lodge reservations and so the Wilson Democrats and the irreconcilables saved the country from the League of Nations."
There is irony as well as triumph in the statement, for it was Wilson himself, Mrs. Longworth believes, who by his absolute determination to permit no reservation in Article X his "particular pride," contributed to his own catastrophic defeat. But that the "irreconcilables"; i. e. Brandegee, Jim Reed, James Wadsworth, Medill McCormick, George Moses, et al-had decisive part in this defeat, their first aid-"colonel" of the "Battalion of Death"-makes just as clear.
Mrs. Warren G. Harding it seems scrambled the eggs at the midnight supper. But that as between herself and both the Hardings there was never any loss of love, Alice Longworth also brings out quite candidly and definitely, "The fact was that though they came to our house I never happened to go to theirs."
Virtually all of Mrs. Longworth's references to Warren Gamaliel Harding show recurrence of the impudent humor which so added to the gaiety of nations in the writer's girlhood.
Paulina, only child of the late Nicholas and Mrs. Longworth, was born nearly twenty years after their marriage. She is said to "take after" both parents, inheriting many pleasing qualities of each. But one thing, her mother is determined she shall not inherit-the spot-light. Mrs. Longworth insists that her little daughter shall have a normal childhood, that she shall not be deluged with printer's ink. So far she has been moderately successful, although Paulina has by no means come off scot free.
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Paulina was named, by her mother, after Paul the Apostle. Few, if any women, have read the Bible more regularly than Alice Longworth. In her childhood her parents required that she do so. Later it became a habit. Not a religious habit. A habit based on genuine interest, deep appreciation and strong and very human appeal. Of all the books of Holy Writ with which she is long since almost letter perfect, Mrs. Longworth likes best the gospel according to St. Paul. So she named her child in honor of its author.
Concerning the death of her husband at the ascending point of his career, in 1932, Alice Longworth makes no mention in her memoirs. Nor of her father's death, nor that of her dearly loved young brother, Quentin, killed in the World War in which the three other sons of Theodore Roosevelt also enlisted and gave overseas service.
One senses loss too deep for even her detached and impersonal attitude. Her memoirs are not at all in a pensive key. How could they be, when inevitably they center about herself ?
It is safe to assume that Alice Longworth's Bible reading has included, many times, the ten commandments. It is more than indicated that to these she has added an eleventh commandment of her own :
"Thou shalt not take thyself nor what is said of thee, in praise or dispraise, too seriously."
AMY GRACE MAHER
AMY GRACE MAHER, research worker with Social Security Board at Washington, D. C., and former president of the Consumers League of Toledo, is widely known as an authority on labor and employment. Her services, pro- fessional and voluntary, have benefitted numerous groups and organizations and her efforts have done much to improve the position of women especially in the economic world.
Miss Maher was born in Toledo, the daughter of William H. and Annie Maher, attended Ferry Hall Seminary and took her A.B. at Smith College. Since 1933 she has been a member of the Toledo Metropolitan Housing Author- ity and the previous year she was a member of the Ohio Unemployment In- surance Commission. She is on the advisory board of the American Association for Labor Legislation, is an active member of the National Women's Trade Union League, the National League of Women Voters, the American Economic Society, the American Statistical Society and is a fellow of the Royal Eco- nomic Society. Many of her articles on wages and earnings have been featured by leading magazines. Her home is at 2418 Robinwood Ave., Toledo, Ohio.
MARY EDNA McCHRISTIE
When MARY EDNA McCHRISTIE, referee of the Hamilton County Court of Domestic Relations, was a little girl it was thought that some day she
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might become quite a musician. She is. But it's not her profession. Later on people said that Edna McChristie would be a fine writer. She is. But that's not her profession. Her profession is social service and there are liter- ally thousands of girls and women who have reason to be thankful for her choice of her special part in the world's work. Not only authorities but also the rank and file of citizens have also come to know about Edna McChristie. The prevailing opinion seems to be that it would certainly be bad luck to have to even try to get along without her.
Born at Camden, Ohio, Edna McChristie was graduated from Western College at Oxford, then from Miami University. She studied music at the Cincinnati Conservatory, became a skilled pianist. Then she discovered that it was not life's harmonies which challenged her interest most, it was life's discords.
The song of youth was out of tune. Its cry was clamorous, defiant, reckless or sullen or terrified or disgusted or discouraged-something had to be done about helping-if possible; about keeping girls in particular out of the troubles that are by product of the underprivileged or inadequate or dislocated home.
For a time, Miss McChristie worked with the Associated Charities of Cincinnati and then at the Chicago School of Social Administration.
In 1915 she became identified with the Hamilton County Juvenile Court under its famous head, Judge Charles W. Hoffman. In 1916 she was made referee of girls in this court and she has devoted herself to this service ever since.
Because of her success in dealing with the maladjusted young lives that come into her hands, Edna McChristie was sent in 1928 to St. Louis, Mo. to organize a girls protective association there. Bettered understanding of the problems that make for delinquency in girls has been extended also by a Courts Committee which she helped to organize in Cincinnati and Hamilton County. She is an active officer of the Ohio Probation Association, a charter member of the Cincinnati Business and Professional Women's Club; an en- thusiastic worker in the Woman's City Club; a member of the Women's Press Club and is closely identified with numerous social service and welfare groups.
Despite the pressure of her numerous responsibilities, Edna McChristie has managed also to find time to write the stories of young lives as her work has revealed them to her, in a fashion so convincing as well as so highly skilled that they have found their way into leading magazines.
MRS. WILLIAM MCKINLEY MRS. WARREN HARDING
Probably no two women ever afforded greater contrast in personality than MRS. WILLIAM McKINLEY (Ida Saxton Mckinley), of Canton, Ohio, wife of the 25th president of the U. S. and MRS. WARREN HARDING
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(Florence Kling Harding), of Marion, Ohio, wife of the 29th president.
Similarities in their public positions and in various general experiences suggest this linking of their life stories. But similarity in situation or cir- cumstance is by no means indicative of similarity of reaction to such cir- cumstances or situations.
In their differing reactions to the challenge of their high position, Ida McKinley and Florence Harding registered basic differences in personality which provide an interesting insight to even the superficial student of human character.
Both Mrs. Harding and Mrs. McKinley were Ohio born. Each became mistress of the White House, each through marriage to a member of the same party and a representative, more or less, of that still cherished Ameri- can tradition, the self made man.
It is doubtful if either man-or either president-was in reality self made. Who is?
The record shows that both Mrs. McKinley and Mrs. Harding gave highly helpful first aid to their husbands at the outset of their careers.
The story of Florence Harding's unstinted contribution to the success of the Ohio paper edited by her husband is as valid as it is impressive. She ran the business department, no task of which was too small or too large to command her utmost effort and energy. She did all that in her lay, in behalf of her husband's success, from the very beginning.
So, especially, at the outset of his career, did Mrs. McKinley for her able and energetic young husband. Ida Saxton is said to have fallen in love "at first sight" with the handsome and gallant Major McKinley, whose fine war record was well known, when she was assisting her father as cashier of the Saxton Bank at Canton. She is said to have been a beautiful girl, well educated and with a good mind for business. After their marriage the fine old Saxton residence at Canton-where later Mckinley was to conduct his front porch campaign for the presidency-became their home.
Mckinley was elected to congress in 1877, again in 1885 and in 1892 was chosen governor of Ohio. He held this office until 1896, when he was nomi- nated to the presidency of the United States. He was elected and although during his first term-it is said to have been much against his will-had to go through with the Spanish-American War, he was triumphantly re-elected in 1900.
Mrs. McKinley gloried in the success of her adored and adoring hus- band. She gloried in his high position-but at the same time she grudged the time and energy demanded by his all important duties and obligations.
No, not all-important, never, it is said, was there a husband so devoted to a wife condemned to a life of invalidism. Nothing, perhaps, could have endeared him more to the entire country than this devotion. His chivalry, his protective tenderness meant constant sacrifice of rest and sleep to soothe and
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solace her over-sensitized affections, now concentrated, in the loss of their beloved babies, on one human being-and one alone.
To be candid, Ida Mckinley had probably become a badly spoiled and quite unconscientiously, a very self-centered and exacting woman, even though she had also become by the very circumstances of her pathetic in- validism, a highly cherished American ideal of wifehood. In her honest opin- ion, William McKinley, her husband, was the hero of all times. Even a hero however, could doubtless appreciate from time to time, a little common sense co-operation on the part of the hero's helpmate.
But though she remained a deeply adoring wife until the tragic end of her husband's life, helpmate Ida Mckinley had, alas, longsince ceased to be.
It is only fair to say that after her husband's death by the bullet of a crazed assassin Mrs. McKinley rallied her forces wonderfully. No one be- lieved that she could long survive her beloved. But from the depths of her fundamentally fine character she drew self control, strength and courage sufficient to live bravely through the lonely years.
Right here at the end, is one of the strange contrasts between Mrs. McKinley and Mrs. Warren G. Harding who, although she lived a little longer, did not really survive the shock of her husband's sudden death in 1923.
Yet if ever there was a self-contained, self-controlled and resourceful woman, it was Florence Kling Harding.
Born in 1860, at Marion, Ohio, the daughter of Amos II. Kling, pros- perous hardware merchant who came from Pennsylvania, Florence Kling was first married to Henry De Wolfe. The union was not a happy one and several years after its termination, Florence was married, in 1891, to Warren Gama- liel Harding. He was then a rising young newspaper man, already regarded as an authority in the local councils of his party.
So the two began their working partnership-with the wife doing her full share of spade work-at the outset of the husband's career.
Harding was defeated when he was candidate for governor of Ohio in 1910, but in 1914 he was elected U. S. Senator for the term of 1915-1921.
Before this term ended he had resigned to take office as president of the United States. He was nominated at the Republican convention of 1920 on the 10th ballot. He had entered as the "dark horse" of the convention.
But he was never, from the beginning of the convention, a dark horse to Mrs. Harding. Others besides the writer-who as reporter helped to "cover" this convention-will probably long remember the figure of a tall well dressed woman-she wore a dark blue hat and slippers to match the first day-as she welcomed visitors to the Harding headquarters all day and every day.
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