USA > Ohio > Women of Ohio; a record of their achievements in the history of the state, Volume III > Part 23
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President Mckinley did. He made Bellamy Storer minister to Belgium. And so was begun the world famous Storer saga. "It involved popes, presi- dents, cardinals and statesmen" says Mrs. Foraker in her autobiography. "It ran through two administrations, provoked vast rages and many laughs, was a seven days wonder in London, Paris, Rome, Berlin. It was talked to tatters in Washington-and it ended most unhappily."
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In 1899, President Mckinley transferred the Storers from the U. S. Lega- tion at Brussels to the legation at Madrid, Spain.
This seems to have been at the request of Mrs. Storer-certainly it was in line with the president's desire to please. Again according to Mrs. For- aker-
"Madrid, it seemed, was not the pleasantest place of residence for an American minister just after the Spanish American War. Distracted as was President McKinley in 1901, he was pressed to do something, and at once, to brighten life for the Storers in Spain. If Madrid, now, were an embassy-
"Secretary Hay was, I know, instructed to suggest this change to the Spanish minister, Burnetti, Duke of Arcos. Spain must, of course, send us an ambassador first. Unamiable, she did not so honor us until 12 years later- But Madrid didn't matter. The Storer's orientation was toward an im- portant embassy, Paris, preferably."
All of this, in Mrs. Foraker's "opinion," was memorable only for the fiercer, grander aim enmeshed in it. That aim was the cardinalate for Arch- bishop John Ireland. Mrs. Bellamy Storer swept into history on the arm of the archbishop. Beside her desire to see him wear the red hat, her de- sire to see her husband ambassador to France fades to a trifle.
"One can understand" writes the shrewd and possibly, at times, a bit shrewdish Julia Foraker, "one can understand poor badgered Mckinley prom- ising anything to the Storers. But fate grimly stayed his loyal intentions. So up on President Roosevelt devolved the difficulties of finding a way out of the labyrinth.
"Only we in the inner circle knew how deeply Roosevelt was involved. (Mrs. Storer was a friend of the Roosevelts, also.) At this very time, as later was shown, Mr. Roosevelt's letters to 'Dear Maria' were full of sooth- ing injunctions to patience, of friendliness and promises.
"But one could not blame the president. The affair got to be too much for him. King Solomon, under similar stress, would have fled to Ophir for an indefinite stay.
"The Storers' storming of the administration citadel came as near to rocking it as anything could. The very White House cat was christened Maria.
"Diplomatically, Viennia, Austria, was the nearest to Heaven that the Storers ever got. Still, Mrs. Storer was the wife of an important ambassador, the Austria-Hungary capital was an excellent place-dreams now promised to turn into exciting reality.
"Then, presto, something happened that was to bring the roof of the ambassador's handsome Viennese palace about his head.
Archbishop Farley, of New York, called one day on President Roosevelt. He had heard, he said, that Archbishop Ireland had the president's backing
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for the cardinalate. Archbishop Farley merely wished to know where he stood-was he not also under the presidential aegis ?
"Instantly-the president let it be known that he would be pleased to see Archbishop Farley a cardinal as well. Well, no American was honored by the red hat in 1905.
"President Roosevelt raged for a minute-then he acted. An he wrote the ambassador and Mrs. Storer at Vienna a letter. It must have been a letter in all ways remarkable, for it was never answered. And then-in spite of the Storers' lavish devotion to the Roosevelts, in the early days -- he (President Roosevelt) recalled Ambassador Storer in a peremptory tele- gram.
"The tide of sympathy now raced to the Storers. They had intrigued daringly, perhaps. But they had been cruelly and ruinously rebuked.
"His ( (Roosevelt's) letters to 'Dear Maria' and the archbishop's letters to Mrs. Storer, as their subsequent publication was to show, had been full of the president's desire to have Archbishop Ireland made a cardinal.
"Archbishop Ireland never wore the red hat. And that Maria Longworth Storer never graced, with her undeniable distinction, the American Embassy at the French capitol was an unravelment fantastic and sad."
So much for the Storer Saga. But Maria Longworth Storer was not one to forget what, temporarily, might seem a minor responsibility while in pursuit of a major interest.
In 1891 she had presented the pottery and all its patents to Mr. Taylor, continuing, however, to devote herself to designing until her husband's appointment as U. S. Minister to Belgium in 1897. While they were in Brus- sels Mrs. Storer sent to Cincinnati for a Japanese artist, Asano and estab- lished a studio for working in bronze. Two years later, when they went to Spain, the studio was removed to Madrid and here work in metal mountings for pottery and also in bronze vases and plaques was continued.
Bellamy Storer died in 1922. His gifted, and tenacious if somewhat tempestuous wife lived to the ripe old age of 83 years. She died April 30, 1932, in Paris at the home of her daughter Margaret, who had married the Marquis Pierre de Chambrun. She was survived also by three grandchildren, Jean and Gilbert de Chambrun and Nonna M. Ruspoli, of Rome, Italy.
HARRIET BROWN STUART
HARRIET BROWN STUART, of Bucyrus, began her career of public service as a teacher for nine years in the Bucyrus and Mansfield schools.
She was a member of the Bucyrus Library Board and soon became well known as a book-reviewer.
MRS. HARRIET B. STUART
former executive, office of Ohio State Treasurer
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Mrs. Stuart was managing editor of The Buckeye, official publication of the Ohio Federation of Women's Clubs, in 1937-38 and is a member of Han- nah Crawford Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, Bucyrus.
Mrs. Stuart organized the Democratic Women of Crawford County and was president of the group four years. She was elected democratic state committee-woman in 1934 without opposition and in 1930 was appointed by Governor George White to a position in the state department of education, which she served as a lecturer on law observance in the Ohio Public Schools and before civic clubs throughout the state.
During the last general election she was selected executive secretary in national Democratic headquarters.
MRS. ROBERT A. TAFT
In this chapter on Ohio Women in public life and public service, it is with the latter classification that the writer, as would many other privileged to know MRS. ROBERT A. TAFT, definitely identifies her.
It is true that the wife of the junior senator from Ohio, elected in 1938, the daughter of a former solicitor of the United States and the daughter-in- law of a former president, Martha Taft certainly is a woman in public life.
But to any really accurate summary of the characteristics the attain- ments and the achievements of this adopted daughter of Ohio, one word is indispensable and that word is "service."
All her life Martha Bowers Taft has been doing something for some- one other than herself. Some of these services were for the benefit of virtu- ally every person of every country of the globe-for instance, the lost cause of the World Court, whereby, perhaps, had her efforts and those innumerable other clear visioned Americans been successful, many of the dangers threaten- ing world progress today might have been averted.
Some of Mrs. Taft's services, perhaps her most efficient and successful- have been for the unfortunate or underprivileged of Cincinnati, her home city. Five years ago-for instance, she was made leader of a "crusade" conducted by the Community Chest of the city and county. It was not the first time she was called on for arduous and unremitting effort in behalf of the vital and constructive social agencies federated under the Community Chest.
For the past 15 years, in fact, leaders of movements fundamental to the welfare of Cincinnati have been giving jobs like this to Martha Taft. She is given such jobs for two reasons-first-because she is deeply concerned with human welfare, second-because she is a woman that gets things done.
She cannot bear not to. "She's the sort of woman" said a newspaper interview published several years ago "that cannot bear to start home until she has crossed off all the items on her shopping list."
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Time after time Mrs. Taft has been made vice-chairman-the only woman thus appointed-of the Community Chest campaign. Time after time she has stayed with her job until every many woman and child of Hamilton County knew-and could not escape knowing-why the community must club together to preserve health, prevent delinquency, care for babies, for the handicapped and for the aged. The work she headed was acclaimed as the most effective program of its type throughout the country.
But approval of Mrs. Taft's convictions and activities was not always so unanimous or so widespread, especially when she first came to Cincin- nati as a bride. In fact, former anti-suffragists had the shock of their lives when, the year after women were enfranchised, young Mrs. Taft was made president of the then newly organized League of Women Voters. It was the more surprising because sympathies of the older branches of the Taft family had been frankly on the "anti" side.
Martha Bowers, the daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Bowers, was educated at Rosemary Hall School, Greenwich, Conn., and later at the Paris Sarbonne. Her wedding took place at Washington, D. C. in 1914. It was the sort of wedding of which debutantes dream. Cincinnati society was all agog when the young Mr. and Mrs. Taft settled down in their midst. But presently society discovered that young Mrs. Taft's main interest was not in social functions -- it was in education of the woman voter, in art, in music, in the law business and the political career of her husband-and very defi- nitely in the plight and problems of the "have nots."
Later these interests had to make room for four children-William How- ard, Robert, Lloyd Bowers and Horace.
Mrs. Taft, however, managed to find time for important work she was more and more urged to undertake-for girl scouts, for public welfare, in the Cincinnati Peace League-Then came a new call for service-again not for herself but, this time, for some one very near and dear. It was decided that Mrs. Taft should assist in her husband's campaign for the U. S. Senate. First, she wanted, naturally, to help. Second-a campaign committee oblivious of the virtually universal admiration for and approval of Martha Taft, would have been blind and deaf as well as dumb. This was not that sort of a com- mittee.
At the height of the campaign, the Robert Tafts totalled 30 speeches in a single night. Robert did 20 of them, Martha did 10.
Cincinnatians are delighted with the fact that Mrs. Taft is now a sena- tor's wife. They think she can do a lot of good in Washington. They think she can still do a lot of good in Cincinnati, when she returns during ad- journments of Congress, to the Robert Taft home "Skylands on Indian Hill." Doubtless plenty of jobs are waiting for her.
"Martha Taft"-the word will again go round-"She can do it if any woman can."
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MRS. WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT
To those wearied with repeated characterization which assumes woman as a mysterious entity composed of complex impulses, prone to drift hither and thither on a psychological sea of conflicting interests and emotions, we candidly commend the story of MRS. WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT, of Cin- cinnati, wife of the twenty-seventh president of the United States.
At the time her husband was elected to the highest office in the gift of his countrymen-for in 1908 women did not have the vote-an intimate friend of Mrs. Taft selected "fixity of purpose" as the basic characteristic of "Nellie" Herron Taft.
"She never drifts," declared this astute student of personality. "She seems to give everything careful consideration." With her natural ability she was bound to have won distinction. She chose to find it through the abilities of her husband. This is possibly to some extent due to the fact that she is quite without the personal conceit of the characteristic careerist.
"She is co-operative rather than self-assertive. But she is as thorough in her making out any project as if all responsibility rested on her alone."
This gift for thorough thinking manifested itself unmistakably in the childhood and girlhood of Helen Herron who was born in Cincinnati, the daughter of the late Judge Herron.
It is said that "Nellie" kept from her early teens, a diary which was more than once subject to the raillery of her witty family. But Nellie still kept her diary with undaunted regularity.
When, as a young girl, she was advised by her instructor in music to make the most of her native talent, and to study abroad preparatory to a music career, she was not unduly excited. On the contrary, she consid- ered the matter gravely in all its aspects. Then she recorded her opinions and those of her advisors in her diary. "I would not wish to make the mistake of attempting to found an artistic career on insufficient talent or inclination" wrote this seventeen-year-old girl. The inscription was discov- ered and read aloud to an appreciative audience of young Herrons, while "Nellie" joined heartily in the general fun at her expense.
As a matter of fact, the family into which Nellie got herself born is excellent testimony to her good judgment. It would have been hard to find better ancestry. The American branch of the Herron family dates back to early New England settlements of this country. Men have all been of an admirable type, few of them rich but all finely educated. The women have been clear headed, efficient, straightforward.
Judge Herron was a lifelong friend of President Hayes and the former mistress of the White House visited it, the first time as a guest of the Hayes family. She was sixteen years old at the time and entered upon the pleasures and festivities of a several months visit, with all the enjoyment that sixteen
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can experience. When, after a "perfectly lovely" time, Nellie Herron came home, she made a remark, the apparent humor of which was fully appreciated by her fun-loving family. "I think I would like to marry a man who will be president," she said. Then it was quite funny. Now-was it a prohpecy ?
From the time she made her debut, the young woman showed herself to be decidedly adapted to social life in that she was unusually intelligent, accomplished and quite willing to exert herself, if need be, to be entertaining. One of Mrs. Taft's friends tells of an incident which occurred shortly after her marriage. Two Eastern men, friends of Mr. Taft, were to be guests for a short time at the Taft home. The young hostess took pains to in- quire concerning their special tastes and interests, and jotted down a memo- randum. "X-art; Y -literary." Both gentlemen were charmed beyond measure with the entertaining manner in which their hostess conversed with them in their favorite subjects. The day after their departure Mrs. Taft was quite as much amused at receiving two beautifully bound volumes, one Hamerton on Art, from "art," and the other "Shelley's Poems," from "literary."
The first training school for nurses in Cincinnati was the direct outcome of the love of the school girl, Nellie Herron, for physiology. As a scholar she was thoroughness itself, and never let any branch of a subject go until she had mastered it. Not satisfied with the course in physiology received at the private school she had attended, Miss Herron later persuaded several of her friends to form a special class in the subject, which was instructed by a professor from the Cincinnati University. A year or two afterward the same young women formed themselves into a permanent organization for the establishment of a training school. Prominent Cincinnati women were interested and the work finally established.
Nellie Herron was for several years herself a teacher. During the three years that she was a faculty member of a boys school on Walnut Hills, she demonstrated beyond a doubt her ability to make a success of this profession.
Marriage changed what might have been an educational career as suc- cessful as that of her daughter now Mrs. Helen Taft Manning, dean of Bryn Mawr College. In 1886 Helen Herron was married to William Howard Taft then just an able young Cincinnati attorney but destined to become president of the United States. From various judgeships and the position of U. S. Solicitor General, he rose to the civil government of the Philippines, then to the position of Secretary of War, then to the presidency, and afterward to the Supreme Court of the U. S. of which William Howard Taft was chief justice until a month before his death in 1930.
Mrs. Taft has since divided her time between her home in Washington, D. C. and those of her daughter and two sons, Robert A. Taft, now U. S. Senator, and Charles P. Taft 2nd, of Cincinnati.
MRS. WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT (taken at time of President Taft's inauguration)
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Capitol historians said that attendance of Mrs. William Howard Taft at the ceremonies attending the seating of Robert A. Taft in the Senate, Jan. 3, 1939, marked the first time in 136 years that the wife of a former president had seen her son thus honored.
One outstanding interest and activity of Mrs. William Howard Taft de- serves final and special emphasis. Herself in her youth, an excellent musician, she has given every aid within her power to the development and appreciation of good music, especially to that of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.
She was the first president of the Orchestra Association Company, fore- runner of the present Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra Association, and served in this capacity from 1895 to 1900, when Mr. Taft was appointed to the Philippines. Her interest in this great cultural cause is as alive and alert today as it was fifty years ago. In recognition of this fine assistance and endeavor, Mrs. William Howard Taft was several years ago named permanent honorary president of the organization.
A woman whose ability, intelligence and good will combined with whole- some energy to meet well every opportunity with which life afforded her contact-here we have, perhaps, more than a glimpse of the fundamental terms on which the world is willing to permit us happiness and success.
ELEANOR ROWLAND WEMBRIDGE
ELEANOR ROWLAND WEMBRIDGE (Mrs. Henry A. Wembridge), ref- eree of the girls division of the Cleveland Juvenile Court, received her A.B., M.A. and Ph.D. from Radcliffe College, specialized in clinical psychology and is recognized throughout the country as one of the leaders in her profession.
She was formerly professor of psychology at Mt. Holyoke College, held the same position at Reed College and for a period was supervisor of mili- tary aides at Washington, D. C. She is an outstanding member of the Na- tional Association of Social Workers and author of books and short stories that have challenged public attention, notably "Other People's Daughters and Life Among the Lowbrows." Her magazine articles and plays have also won general recognition. She edited a "Modern American Prose" anthology and has been awarded several prizes for modern drama.
KATHRYN ENGLISH WETZEL
KATHRYN ENGLISH WETZEL, founder of the Studio of Expression and Public Speaking in Hamilton, has devoted much of her life to educational activity and is well known as a lecturer, having spoken many times from the public platform in twenty-two different states of the Union. Born on a farm near Cambridge, in Grundy County, Ohio, she attended a country school and after her high school course became a student in Kent College, taking special work in the school of expression. When nineteen years of age she
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began teaching and later was an instructor in the Teachers' Normal College. She took up lecturing in connection with the Red Cross Lyceum, appearing in twenty-two different states and always her labors have been directed along lines for the benefit of the individual or the public at large.
In 1916 Kathryn English was married to the Rev. Carl N. Anneshansley of Akron and there, following their marriage she conducted a studio, teaching expression and public speaking, for which work her previous studies had well qualified her. Later they removed to Hamilton where she opened the Studio of Expression and Public Speaking, which she has since carried on, making it one of the excellent schools of this character in the state. In 1927 the Rev. Anneshansley died, leaving a daughter by this marriage, who is now attending college. In 1932 Mrs. Anneshansley became the wife of Dr. R. H. Wetezl of Hamilton. She has continued her educational work here and at the same time, for a number of years has been a national campaign speaker, a member of the National Speakers Bureau. In 1936 she spoke for the Republican party in six states and she has for ten years been on the speakers bureau of that party, keeping at all times thoroughly in touch with the vital questions and issues of the day. her arguments being based upon a logical understanding of the points under discussion. She spoke through- out Ohio in the campaign which brought Governor Campbell to the position of chief executive of the state and her utterances are authoritative because of her broad knowledge.
Not only has Mrs. Wetzel been prominent in educational work and in political circles, but after the death of her first husband she filled the pulpit of the First Reform church of Hamilton for a year. She is a member of the Women's Bible Class in the Sunday school and is actively interested in other branches of the church work. She has membership in the Business and Pro- fessional Woman's Club and formerly was chairman of the Woman's City Club. Her interests have centered in those projects which promote the great- est good for the greatest number and which, through intellectual stimulus, put human happiness on a higher plane.
FRANCES R. WHITNEY
FRANCES R. WHITNEY, assistant director of the Ohio State Employ- ment Service, has lived in the state since 1926, seven years of that time in Cincinnati and the balance in Columbus. She came to Cincinnati in Sep- tember 1926 as executive secretary of the Consumers League of Cincinnati. During her seven years as secretary of this organization, the League pub- lished four studies on conditions as they affect employed women and children.
The first of these studies dealt with the problem of injuries to children employed in Cincinnati, some of whom were working without work certifi- cates or at occupations prohibited by the Child Labor Law.
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In 1928, the Consumers League published a more comprehensive study entitled "Employment Agencies in Cincinnati" an investigation of the ac- tivities of private fee-charging agencies, of the public employment service and of other types of agencies finding jobs for workers. Some of the recom- mendations made in this study were used in the drafting of a new city ordi- nance regulating private employment agencies which was passed immediately after the issuance of the study.
It was as a result of this study of employment agencies that Miss Whit- ney was asked by the Ohio Mission on Unemployment Insurance to make a study of the public employment service in Ohio to determine whether or not that service was ready to function in co-operation with a system of un- employment insurance when and if such a system were set up in the state.
The third of Miss Whitney's studies made during her connection with the Consumers League was a study of the earnings and budget of one hundred employed women published with the title "What Girls Live On and How." This investigation revealed the inadequacy of the income of a considerable proportion of the sample group in terms of allowance for health, recreation, savings and even such necessities as clothing, food and housing.
During the latter part of Frances Whitney's connection with the Con- sumers League of Cincinnati, the League campaigned actively for an unem- ployment insurance law. She got out a regular monthly bulletin through which were supplied members of the League and others interested with argu- ments indicating the reasons why Ohio should have such a law.
Frances was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1886 and was graduated from Mt. Holyoke College in 1908. She taught for three years in a private school in Connecticut, was Assistant Dean of Women at Bates College in Lewiston, Mass., for a year. She then went to Walnut Hill School in Natick, Mass., where she was secretary to the principals for five years. Miss Whitney left school work in the fall of 1918 to take a position in the Information Service in the United States Department of Labor in Washington. After a year there, she spent the next seven years at the Babson's Organization in Wellesley Hill, Mass., as Assistant to the Head of the Labor Department of that or- ganization.
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