USA > Ohio > Women of Ohio; a record of their achievements in the history of the state, Volume IV > Part 9
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Afloat at dusk,-the breathless tide By dying sunset glorified,- With silent sweep, the rhythmic oar Marring the mirror-deep no more, Phantoms far from earth we glide. Where the vast cloudland domes divide, Midway 'twixt height and depth we ride On unseen wings borne from the shore Afloat at dusk. Vanished is mirth, our song has died, Yet in a dream entranced we bide ; In Paradise our spirits soar,- Soul with my soul, whom I adore !- Through star-strewn silence side by side Afloat at dusk.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Women In Music, Art And Drama (Continued from Page 929)
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MRS. LEWIS H. CLEMENT
MRS. LEWIS H. CLEMENT has long been interested in the musical and cultural development of Toledo. She was born in Homer, Michigan, in 1864, a daughter of Henry S. Green and a granddaughter of Orator Green, who was a cousin of General Nathanael Greene of Rev- olutionary War fame. Being a man of practical thought and habits, the grandfather of Mrs. Clement dropped the final e from his name, saying that the spelling Green was sufficient. Henry S. Green, born in Michi- gan, engaged in the shoe business during the greater part of his life and died at the age of seventy-one years. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Mary E. Ketchum, was born in New York and died at the age of sixty-eight years.
In her girlhood days Mrs. Clement attended the grade and high schools of Homer, Michigan, and she also studied music under private tutors, her interest in the art continuing unabating during the passing years. While her chief interest has been her home, she belongs to the Educational, Sorosis and Toledo Woman's Clubs and for many years has been connected with the North Toledo Community House and established the musical department of that organization. During the World War she had charge of community singing for the Toledo Council of Defense. She and her husband were members of the Dis- ciples Church at Ann Arbor, Michigan, and since coming to Toledo have attended different churches.
It was in her native city that Miss Green became the wife of Lewis H. Clement, who was born in Colon, Michigan, in 1864, a son of Sylves- ter and Corinth (Legg) Clement. After several years employment in Chicago, as a young man, he moved, with his newly wedded wife to Ann Arbor, where he engaged in the manufacture of pianos and organs
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and later was connected with large piano firms, holding executive posi- tions in New York and Toledo. At the present time he is gathering data for a history of music in Toledo which he is writing. Mr. and Mrs. Clement have two daughters: Elsa, who lives with them and Eva Belle, the wife of Alfred James Franklin, of New York City, and the mother of one son, Alfred Lewis Franklin.
Mrs. Clement deserves much credit for what she has achieved in connection with club work and women's activities in Toledo and especially in her efficient co-operation with her husband in their efforts to establish in Toledo a permanent symphony orchestra. This orches- tra, of which Mr. Clement was the conductor during its six years of pioneering from 1920 to 1926, owed much of its success to Mrs. Clements' earnest efforts in promoting the sale of subscriptions and member- ships.
DOROTHY MAY FISHER
Since 1930 DOROTHY MAY CLELAND FISHER has been a resi- dent of Troy and throughout this period has engaged in teaching music, having now twenty private pupils. From early childhood she has been deeply interested in music and began her teaching when only sixteen years of age. She is a daughter of D. H. and Lillian (Sutton) Cleland, who are natives of Ohio and now make their home in St. Louis, Missouri, where they have been for the past twenty-six years, the father having had charge of music in the Roosevelt High School for more than twenty years, while for a long period the mother sang in Temple Israel in St. Louis, where both have been very prominent in music circles.
Mrs. Fisher began her education in the St. Louis public schools, completing the work of successive grades that brought her to her grad- uation from high school as a member of the class of 1926. Then owing
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to an injury she continued her music studies under the direction of her father and at the same time did considerable radio work and also as an accompanist. For some years she has taught music, having been in- structed by her father in teaching methods when but sixteen years of age. She was one of three sisters, all of whom took up the study of music at the age of four years, and Mrs. Fisher was anxious to begin teaching when in her teens, in fact began her work in that line when sixteen years of age and at the same time continued to act as an accom- panist. Her mother had been an outstanding music teacher and when young, Mrs. Fisher always accompanied her as she gave lessons and thus picked up much knowledge concerning teaching methods that has been of great value to her as the years have gone by.
It was on the 18th of January, 1930, that Dorothy May Cleland was married to J. Lynn Fisher, a native of Ansonia, Ohio, where he pursued his grade and high school education and then entered the Cincinnati College of Embalming. After his graduation he began business with his father in Ansonia, where he remained until his marriage and then re- moved to Troy with his bride. Here they have since resided and Mr. Fisher established his funeral home, which he has since conducted, while his wife has given much of her time to her music classes, being a most capable instructor of piano music, having the ability to win and hold the attention of her pupils. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher have one son. J. Lynn, Jr., and they also lost two sons in infancy.
Mrs. Fisher belongs to the Presbyterian Church and has member- ship in the Troy Music Club, the Music Study Club and the Altrurian Club. She has served on the program committee of the Altrurian Club and has held various offices in the music clubs with which she is identi- fied. Her artistic nature finds expression in her music and other loves have been enriched and broadened by her art.
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HELEN MOORE FRANTZ
HELEN MOORE FRANTZ, of Bellefontaine, O., for the past ten years a member of the board of directors of the Ohio Public Health Asso- ciation and for the past two years of the Ohio Legislative Committee on Public Health, was born in Logan County, O., one of a family of nine children.
Among highly cherished papers now filed away in the library of the Daughters of the Revolution at Washington, D. C., are letters written by the great-great grandfather of Mrs. Frantz, when he was a captain in the Revolutionary Army fighting for American inde- pendence. This gift to the DAR is only one of the series of valuable documents turned over by the Moore family, on special request, to the DAR archives.
The Moore collection included 2000 personal letters. Many of these were written during the War of 1812 and still more during the Civil War. There was also a file of 241 issues of the "Fayette Gazette" published from 1780 to 1792, considered one of the best of old news- papers covering this period in the entire country. One of the letters regarded as most valuable dates back to 1749 but even this yields in value and veneration gem of the family treasures, a collection of the works of Sir Thomas Moore, distinguished forbear, in manu- script form, written by the hand of the world famous poet.
Traditions such as these help to explain the fact that six of the seven Moore children now living are university graduates and that all of them have won distinction in their varied fields of service.
Helen Moore was graduated from the music department of the College for Women at Oxford-her mother was a gifted church or- ganist-then attended Miami University and later Northwestern Uni- versity, at Evanston, Ill., where she worked for her degree by teach- ing public school music.
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For more than 15 years Helen Moore devoted her natural musical gifts and fine training to her profession. Following public school serv- ice as music supervisor she became head of the department of music in several normal schools.
After her marriage, in 1929, her interest in social service, espe- cially in the field of public health, also became a major challenge to her energy and public spirit.
For the past five years Mrs. Frantz has been a member of the Women's Joint Committee of Ohio for Public Welfare. She is one of the six members of the Bellefontaine Board of Health, is secretary of the Logan County Visiting Board, served for nine years as execu- tive secretary of the Logan County Public Health League, was former- ly president of the Women's Auxiliary Ohio Optometric Association, is a member of the State Probation Association, is in charge of the organ- ization of cancer boards for 15 counties under the Women's Field Army for Control of Cancer, and has given unstinted time and ability of the first order to many other related projects.
In her professional field of music Mrs. Frantz has achieved widely recognized distinction. She has directed many programs sponsored by the Ohio Federation of Music Clubs, of which she has long been an enthusiastic member, and has definitely furthered the progress of the Euterpean Music Club. Program making, an art for which she is said to have special aptitude, has been one of her most successful activities. "Music, Mind and Health," a book published by Mrs. Frantz 11 years ago, challenged the interest of music lovers through- out the state, so much so that Mrs. Frantz is now getting out an autobiography, dealing with her experiences in the field of community and social service as well as that of music. In addition to these mani- fold activities she has been able to work as actively with the DAR, the Kings Daughters, the Bellefontaine Woman's Club, the Economic Club, the Red Cross and other outstanding organizations.
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LINA C. KEITH
There is perhaps no one in Toledo who has done more to stimulate and foster the love of music there than LINA C. KEITH, one of the city's leading music teachers and for many years a leader in music circles. Miss Keith's teaching methods are peculiarly her own-she not only teaches the technique of her art but also appeals to the hearts and minds of her pupils. Her great and sincere love of music has made it possible for her to teach others to feel its beauty, its pathos, idealism and inspirational qualities. There are hundreds of Toledoans whose lives have been enriched through her instruction and development of their own talents.
Miss Keith is a native of Clayton, Michigan. Her parents were Har- land and Phoebe (Aldrich) Keith, her father a native of New York State, her mother of Michigan. Her father taught school in Michigan for some years, then moved to Toledo to become associated with the Lake Shore Railroad, with which he remained until he retired. Mr. Keith passed away in 1932, a year after his wife's death.
Miss Keith attended grade schools of Adrian, Michigan and also attended high school there for three years. She began her music studies when she was twelve and so great was her desire to teach music, even at this early age, that when other little girls her age were "playing house" with their dolls, she was giving hers "piano" lessons, using a window sill as a piano. Her childhood ambition to become a music teacher later became a reality, and today Miss Keith is considered one of the outstanding music teachers of Ohio.
Of her early ambitions Miss Keith once said: "Very early I became imbued with the idea that if we were to have good music for the many music lovers in the world, we must have good teachers-teachers who
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could explain the psychology of music as well as the art. I wanted to satisfy the universal desire for real music, and as soon as I could I went to Cornell University to learn how I could become that kind of teacher."
From those with whom she studied at Cornell Miss Keith learned what they before her had learned from great musicians and teachers- that the first requisite is a thorough knowledge of the theory of music. She began her teaching career after studying this subject, first teaching adults, later forming classes for those who wished to become teachers themselves.
Miss Keith first established a school of music in 1905 and in 1911 reorganized it as the Lina C. Keith School of Music. The school has turned out many outstanding students and graduates, all of whom will testify that under Miss Keith's direction they learned not only how to play, but learned the lives of composers, and about the construction of instruments, as well as many other facts designed to round out their musical education.
Miss Keith always has maintained a staff of exceptionally talented teachers, many of whom have studied abroad. She herself is a graduate of the Adrian (Michigan) College of Music, and studied for several summers with William H. Sherwood at Chautauqua Lake, New York. She also was a pupil of Emil Leibling in Chicago, later studied with Leopold Godowsky in the same city, and in 1933 went to Paris on a scholarship to study with Cortot. It was there that she first heard the young pianist, Ruth Slenczynski, another Cortot pupil.
Miss Keith also had a scholarship at the Mendelssohn Conservatory in Leipsic, Germany, and took both class and private lessons of Robert Teichmuller at the Royal Conservatory in the same city. In Weimar, Germany, she alone of a group was privileged to play the piano once owned by Franz Liszt. Miss Keith recalls, too, that in Bayreuth she once occupied a box seat at a concert only a few feet away from the royal box where sat Adolf Hitler, Madame Walmer and the former crown prince of Germany.
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In addition to her studies abroad, Miss Keith had a summer of study with Ernest Kroeger and Hollis E. Dann at Cornell University.
In 1907, Miss Keith was treasurer of the Ohio Music Teachers Asso- ciation and one of the original members of the high school music credits committee of that organization, a committee which first made it possible for students to study music and receive credits for such study.
Miss Keith is a charter member of the Zonta Club of Toledo, an affiliate of Zonta International, each chapter of which has but one member representing one profession. She also is a member of the P. E. O. Sisterhood, women's study organization, and for thirty years has been a member of Ashland Avenue Baptist Church.
One of Miss Keith's pleasantest memories is of the work she did some twenty-odd years ago with the Toledo Museum of Art when that institution pioneered in combining music with art in its work with young boys and girls. At that time a Toledo newspaper said of her: "Lina Keith is one of Toledo's worthy ones who is doing her best-and her best means much-to make everyone around her happier. She gives her pupils in the music school a deeper knowledge of her beloved art than they had ever dreamed. She gives the members of her church an example of daily Christian living and thinking that is inspiring. She fits into the place perfectly into which her lines are cast."
MARIAN BESS KRIMENDAHL
MARIAN BESS KRIMENDAHL of Celina, a harpist of much more than local renown, who has been associated with the development of music culture in Ohio for a number of years, is the wife of H. F. Krimen- dahl and the daughter of Forrest D. and Florence Evelyn (Hardman) Christian, both of whom are natives of Ohio and now residents of Sidney, where the father was engaged in the drug business for several years. The mother was a musician who possessed a contralto voice of unusual
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charm and beauty and because of her intense interest in the art did much to shape the musical career of her daughter.
Mrs. Krimendahl, an only child, completed the work of the grades in the Sidney schools and was graduated from the high school there with the class of 1916. She afterward spent a year as a student in Ohio Wesleyan University and then attended the Cincinnati College of Music until 1920, when she entered the Conservatory there and took up the study of the harp, continuing until 1923, when she went to Charlotte, North Carolina, where she was assistant in the music department of Queen's College, a school for girls. While in the south she sang the title role in the opera Martha which was directed and presented by the head of the department in which she was assistant. In Charlotte she also was the accompanist in the music department and while a student in the Conservatory she did some outside work. The harp is her instru- ment and she has given various lecture recitals before clubs and the chapters of the Daughters of the American Revolution and she has also done some choral work since coming to Celina and also prior to that time.
With her return to Ohio from Charlotte, North Carolina, she was married in Sidney, on the 10th of December, 1925, to H. F. Krimendahl of Celina, where he has charge of the business of Crampton-Camerys, Inc., of which he is the president. They have two sons, David and Fred- erick. Mrs. Krimendahl is now state chairman of the Ohio Federation of Music and the Ohio Society of Music and belongs to the Daughters of the American Revolution. While Mrs. J. D. Johnson was district president of the Ohio Federation, the Altruian Club had a recital in her honor. Of the Altruian Club, Mrs. Krimendahl is now the president. Her interest has always centered in music and, cultivating the talents with which nature endowed her, she has been able to give much pleasure to others in that field of art.
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FLORENCE SNEIDER MORLEY
FLORENCE SNEIDER MORLEY, who has been prominently con- nected with the Garden Clubs of the Toledo area and is now president of the Garden Clubs Forum, is also well known in musical and church circles of Toledo. She is the wife of Dr. Frank W. Morley and a daugh- ter of George H. and Minnie Belle (Byrkit) Sneider, the former a native of the state of New York and the latter of Indiana. Her father, who was engaged in the linseed oil business in Toledo for a number of years, died about 1926, while his wife passed away in 1918. There were but two children in their family, the sister of Mrs. Morley being Helen Bel, who was Mrs. Norman Bel Geddes and died May 28, 1938, leaving two daughters, Joan Geddes and Barbara Geddes.
Mrs. Morley, who was born in Toledo, attended the public schools here until graduated from high school, after which she concentrated her attention upon the study of music, specializing on the pipe organ. She served as assistant organist of Trinity Episcopal Church at Toledo and later became organist of the First Unitarian Church, where she continued for six years. She is now director of the choir of St. Paul's Episcopal Church at Maumee, Ohio, and has been organist of the church school for several years.
It was on the 27th of May, 1919, that Florence Sneider became the wife of Dr. Francis Wayland Morley and they now have four sons: Francis Wayland, III, who is a pre-law student at the University of Michigan; Buel, who is a graduate of the Toledo High School and is planning to enter the University of Michigan; George William, and Robert Byrkit.
In addition to her activity in musical circles, Mrs. Morley has co- operated in many interests of public worth and benefit. She has been
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home service director of the American Red Cross, was president of the Harvard Parent-Teachers Association for two years and is a past presi- dent of the River Road Garden Club. For two years she was treasurer of the Garden Center and is now president of the Garden Club Forum, which is composed of twenty-three clubs in this district. In 1938 she was chairman of the convention of the Garden Clubs, which met at the Commodore Perry Hotel in Toledo, and she is treasurer of the A. G. Chapter of the P. E. O. She is a member of the Toledo Woman's Club, the Samagama Club and the Upper River Book Club.
FAYE STROTHER MOUSER
Since the formation of the Federation of Music Clubs of Ohio FAYE STROTHER MOUSER has been a member of its board-which fact is indicative of her high position in the musical circles of the state. She has also been state radio chairman of the federation and has done much to further and develop the interests of music and musicians in Ohio.
A native of Paulding, Ohio, she is a daughter of Clarence B. and Effie (Grummond) Strother, whose family numbered but two children, Faye and Dale Grummond Strother. The father engaged in the mer- cantile business and also carried on a real estate agency. The daughter began her education in the grade schools of Latty, Paulding County, and after completing the high school course there, continued her studies in Beaver College for a year, before matriculating at Oberlin College, where she remained for two years, majoring in music. She also went abroad, studying for a time in France.
The recognition of her ability and her interest in musical progress in the state came in her election to the board of the Federation of Music
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Clubs on its organization and she has continuously served in that ca- pacity. She has also been its state radio chairman, has been on the Bureau of Club Artists much of the time and is at present first vice president and has been state chairman of music for the Federation of Women's Club for four years. She is also a past president of the Ohio State Music Teachers Association and now one of its directors. Mrs. Mouser was one of the original committee of three that organized the Music Club, a lecture-recital club, and she was also one of the original organizers of the American Legion Auxiliary, the Hospital Board, Marion Garden Club and the Women's Symphony Board and served as president of the Marion County Federation of Women's Clubs during 1930-1932. She is at present serving as a member of the citizens com- mittee of the Ohio Library Association.
Faye Strother was married to Dr. Harold Karl Mouser, formerly of La Rue, Ohio, who was graduated in medicine from Purdue Univer- sity and began the general practice of his profession in Oakwood, Ohio, in 1910, there remaining until November, 1912, when he removed to Marion, where he still practices and where both he and Mrs. Mouser are both widely and prominently known.
CORINNE RIDER-REED (Rider-Kelsey)
CORINNE RIDER-REED (Rider-Kelsey), for many years known as "America's foremost concert and oratorio soprano," was born in a little red farmhouse near LeRoy, New York, the daughter of Ebenezer and Fannie (Hovey) Rider. Her father died when she was only three years of age, leaving her mother with a family of seven children, of whom she was the youngest. At the age of eight she moved with her mother and her family to Rockford, Illinois. From the time she was
CORINNE RIDER-REED
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six years old she was chosen to take leading singing parts in school and church festivals, but it was not until she was sixteen that serious thought was given to her talent and sufficient funds found for her to study what seemed to be preordained-the art of singing. Her first year of study was spent in Oberlin, Ohio, where she studied voice production under Mrs. Helen M. Rice, to whom Madame Rider-Reed gives great credit for foundational work upon which her career was built. Funds being exhausted, she returned to her home town and began singing in church choirs, hoping thereby to replenish the ever-necessary purse for further study. It is with pride that she points to the fact that from this time onward she was able to make her own way unaided by outside financial backing.
During the three following years spent in Rockford, she studied with L. A. Torrens, a famous voice builder from Chicago. This, too, proved to be an excellent choice and her voice began to attract attention. In 1900 she married George Kelsey, son of the professor of botany in Oberlin College, and went with him to live in Toledo, Ohio. During her three years stay in Toledo, her singing was much in demand in church choirs as well as for concert work, but there was always the hidden longing for further study and more knowledge of how to sing better. Musical friends constantly urged that she go to New York for study and eventually this came about. Securing a leave of absence from her church choir she went to New York for three months of intensive study under Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Toedt, both concert, church and oratorio singers of the first magnitude. She took six lessons every week during this period and for the fun of knowing how she would rank in a contest, sang an audition for a much sought after position in a church choir in Brook- lyn. To her great surprise she was chosen out of ninety-one contestants and soon thereafter accepted the position and moved to New York to live.
Having won the first encounter, she was now eager for the next opportunity which presented itself in the form of a choice of impresario. Being ambitious she decided to try for the biggest and best of them all-none other than the one and only Henry Wolfsohn. After two at- tempts she won him over and received a five year's contract. This con-
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