1000 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS to get into practical life by the age of twenty-three. Few of them can have any valid basis for specialization beforehand. Another ten years and we shall see larger numbers of young engineers coming back to college, some for full time, some for half time, some in the late afternoon or evening, some in correspondence divisions, some for higher work in science, some for advanced technique, some for business courses and some for broader cultural training. This is as it should be. Once sure that these opportunities will exist in an adequate degree, we could broaden the scientific and humanitarian bases of our undergraduate course, cut down specialization, relieve overcrowding, and show the world the best balanced and best integrated of all undergraduate disciplines." The services of Case School to the city have been invaluable. Along with formal instruction, in its own courses and those of Cleveland College, it is continually engaged in research work along many lines and in practical engineering in cooperation with local industries. Little is known, except by those directly concerned, regarding the many important industrial products and processes worked out by Case faculty members and students in the college laboratories. Many of them are necessarily scientific and industrial secrets for the time being. All of them illustrate the admirable way in which such an institution combines theory and practice and repays, many-fold, the support given it by the community. A good illustration is the experimental work conducted recently by Dr. W. R. Veazey of the chemical department, with regard to the production and utilization of magnesium, one of the two lightest metals available for modern industrial use, a new rival of aluminum, capable of entering into many alloys for special purposes. In 1932 the faculty numbered 73 and the students 800. This, as President Wickenden explained, was the capacity of the school. It is the deliberate policy to hold down the number of students and maintain a large faculty of experts, in order to maintain the greatest diversity of work and the highest quality of instruction. THE CITY'S LIFE - 1001 Admirably supplementing the full-time, daylight work of this college has been the technical contribution of the Young Men's Christian Association. Simultaneously with the opening of Case School in 1881, this Association started evening classes in mechanical dravving, practical electricity and shop mathematics, with about twenty-five students. The purpose was not to keep the boys out of mischief so much as to give them useful training. The classes flourished. But as time passed, the students came to feel that short-time courses to acquire merely a little skill were not enough; they needed longer study and more funda-mental training. So in 1918 there were added evening engineering courses for high school graduates covering three to four years. Five years later the day cooperative College of Engineering was started, with a five-year course leading to the degree of Bachelor of Science. In 1930 technical work was offered in various unrelated units, or in a Junior College course covering three years, or in a comprehensive five-year course. So popular was this work that in 1929 there were 1,487 students enrolled in the technical courses out of a total of 3,500 in all the educational departments, and there were ninety business firms cooperating in such instruction. All of the Y. M. C. A.'s college work has recently been organized under one department called Fenn College, in honor of S. P. Fenn, a prominent benefactor. Another promising technical school is the John Huntington Polytechnic Institute. It was established in 1918 by the man for whom it is named, in accordance with a trust created in his will. The idea, like the donor, was English. The wealth that made it possible was won in Cleveland. The John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust not only helped to finance the Cleveland Museum of Art, but provided for "a free evening polytechnic school for the promotion of scientific education for the benefit of deserving persons of said city." In addition to courses offered for many years in architecture and applied arts, it established in 1929 a Department of Technology, with courses in sheet metal stamping, engineering salesmanship, patent precedure, contract law, modern build- 1002 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS ing construction, production planning, mechanism of machine tools and similar subjects. This department is expected to broaden year by year. The Institute has had in recent years far more applicants than it could accommodate. ROMAN CATHOLIC SCHOOLS In the year 1850 three Ursuline sisters arrived in Cleveland to open the first little school under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Church. The French bishop, Louis Amadeus Rappe, and the mothers of French descent in his diocese, had decided that the time was come when education could be given their daughters in what they considered the good old-fashioned French manner. This meant that the little girls would be taught their Catechism of Christian Doctrine, their Bible History, their needlework and music, along with their reading, writing and arithmetic. They would be taught to stand erect, to speak the truth, to be gentle-mannered on all occasions and never to forget that he who controlleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city. There never was a time, the writer ventures to comment, when these were not satisfactory educational ideals. Eighty years have passed. There are now one hundred and seven elementary schools, six one-year high schools, sixteen two-year high schools, twenty-five four-year high schools, and five colleges under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Church in the Diocese of Cleveland. Twenty different religious orders are represented, and twenty-eight communities among the teaching sisters, not to mention the orders of teaching brothers. Methods of teaching have changed vastly and the curricula have expanded to admit the new subjects of the changing world. But instruction is still given in the truths of religion, and the ideals underlying education remain. Of the elementary and high schools not much need be said, because they differ so little from the public schools and other private schools. The late Reverend William MacMahon, at one time editor of the Catholic Universe, used to say that it THE CITY'S LIFE - 1003 was the pride of Catholic education that it moved slowly in any new direction, waiting a bit to see what would happen in the case of educational novelties, whether they worked out wisely, before jumping into them. Then when the Catholic schools did adopt a new thing, they took it not because it was new but because it was good. They move, therefore, a little more slowly, but the more dependably for this very slowness. The teaching is very thorough and conscientious. Of the colleges, one is the theological seminary, "Our Lady of the Lake" at 1227 Ansel Road. One is the Sisters' College, at 1027 Superior Avenue, where the teaching. sisters go for advanced study and preparation for teaching. There are two colleges for young women, one conducted by the Sisters of Notre Dame on College Road in South Euclid. These sisters long. maintained an excellent private school of elementary and high school grades. In the last few years they have supplied a demand for higher education under church auspices by adding a college to their other schools. The Ursulines were given a collegiate charter by the State of Ohio in 1871, with power to confer degrees. The demand for teaching sisters for parochial school work grew so rapidly as the population multiplied, that for some years all work of a collegiate character was given up, in order that teachers might be released for the lower schools. But in 1922 it was possible to resume the higher studies, and the Ursulines gladly did so. Their college is located at 2234 Overlook Road, They have also several secondary schools and a boarding school. In John Carroll University we meet the Jesuits—that famous old order of scholars, teachers and soldiers of Jesus Christ. Inigo Lopez de Recalde, Spanish noble and soldier afterwards canonized as St. Ignatius de Loyola, who founded the order in 1539, had a real idea. He thought it was all right for monastic orders to renounce the world, laying their talents, as well as their worldly goods, on the altar, but that the world and the church needed also an order of a different kind. He proposed, quite in the manner of modern thought, 1004 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS not to bury talent, but to use it for the glory of God and the betterment of mankind. Being himself a soldier, he favored military rather than monastic discipline. He believed, for instance, in rigorous self-restraint which strength-ened the body for its noble purpose, but not in those extreme forms of penance which regarded the body as of no importance. The regard of Ignatius was for the uses of the intellect, and his desire was for the establishment of a religious order which would develop the mental powers and use them for service. To this end, the body must be treated neither as master nor as slave, but as a sustaining partner. Having had one good idea, Ignatius found himself possessed of another one. He had seen some of the difficulties attendant upon having religious orders controlled in detail by authority too far off to grasp the needs and circumstances. So he planned an order more flexible in its control. It was not to be a religious order after the fashion of the older ones, but a society of volunteers who could be sent hither and yon as the needs of education called them, without having to ask permission of central church authorities. These two ideas have made the Jesuits what they are—a remarkable band of teachers, scholars, scientists. As mem-bers of the Roman Catholic Church, they are under their local bishop as other members are. But as a society, they are free to make their own decisions. Their schools are entirely under their own control. If they wish to experiment with the curricula of their colleges, they may go ahead without waiting for ponderous ecclesiastical machinery to catch up with them. Their schools, therefore, have the same advantages that other private schools have. The public schools must move as a unit, in accordance with public opinion. The parochial schools, also large and united, mostly do likewise. The individualistic teaching known as "progressive education," for example, had to be developed first in more freely moving and flexible private schools. Some of its discoveries have been applied, in these late days, by public and parochial schools. The St. Augustine's Academy on Lake Avenue in Lakewood, a private school, is doing some delightful work THE CITY'S LIFE - 1005 with small children along the lines of progressive education. The Jesuits have used this freedom in America to develop a scientific and astronomical research which has made them famous. Cleveland knows this best through its loved and respected Father Odenbach, whose seismological and meteorological data are among the things to which all the citizens of Cleveland point with pride. A handful of members of the Society of Jesus came to Cleveland from Germany in 1880 at the request of Bishop Richard Gilmour, to give instruction to the children of a large body of Germans who had settled on the West Side. They used first a temporary frame structure, but in 1888 were able to move into a five-story brick building., which has housed their school from then till now. When the growth of the school allowed courses of collegiate grade, they were given, and the school was called St. Ignatius College. This name was changed to that of John Carroll University in 1923. John Carroll was the name of the first bishop of Baltimore, a member of the famous family of the Carrolls of Carrollton, which had in Charles Carroll a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Needless to say, the school lost its German character and began to serve students of all the nationalities which make up Cleveland years before the name was changed. A tract of sixty acres has been purchased on Shaker Heights, its frontage forming one side of a triangle, the other two sides of which belong to University School and Hathaway Brown. Its new buildings, beautifully designed in collegiate Gothic, are up, but because of the depression, still unfinished. Father Odenbach moved some of his instruments to the new location because of its superior value for observation purposes, and he camps for weeks at a time in a cold and empty building to further the cause of science. It is the hope that another year may see the new college finished and occupied. The schools of the Roman Catholics have been taken in some detail because they are so large and there are so many of them. But the Lutheran Church also maintains parochial schools, some of them so excellent that they have a waiting 1006 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS list of children of other faiths whose parents would like to have them obtain the benefits of the Lutheran teaching methods. The Jews have Hebrew Schools attached to their syna-gogues, but these are not parochial schools in the usual sense. The children attend public or private schools, and go to the Hebrew schools for religious instruction as the Gentile children do to Sunday schools. The denominations which support parochial schools tax themselves doubly for education, and find it often a severe burden. They pay, as all good citizens do, the regular taxes, from which is drawn support of the public schools. Then they have to begin all over again to support their own church schools. Why do they do this? Because they regard religious education so highly that the sacrifice seems necessary to them. The problem looks to some outsiders like a simple one, especially in these days of departmental education. Why cannot teachers from various churches go to public schools, and why do not children have a period of religious instruction as they do of arithmetic? Episcopalians Room 3 at the first hour, Methodists Room 5 at the second and third, and so on? But the matter is not so simple when the attempt is made to work it out in this or some other apparently obvious way. It seems to be one of the difficulties inherent in democracy, and remains in its present status one of the problems in social justice still waiting to be satisfactorily solved. PRIVATE SCHOOLS No matter how good the public schools may be, there is sure to be a demand for private schools, to train boys and girls in special ways that the public schools with their mass production cannot manage so well. The first schools in the city were necessarily private schools. Famous among those of the last century were the old Cleveland Academy, opened in 1822, in which Harvey Rice, later known as the Father of Ohio Public Schools, was principal for a short time. Another was the "female seminary" conducted for many years, beginning in 1848, by Miss L. T. Guilford in an old hotel at the THE CITY'S LIFE - 1007 secluded corner of Prospect Avenue and Ontario Street and, after the Civil war, in the Brick Academy on Huron Road near Euclid Avenue. Still another was Brooks School for Boys, established by prominent citizens in 1875 on Sibley Street (Carnegie) near East Thirty-sixth Street, and contin-ued until 1891. Then there was Miss Mittleberger's, better remembered than any of these, conducted by Miss Augusta Mittleberger on the southeast corner of Case Avenue (East Fortieth) and Prospect, in a large brick dwelling moved bod-ily to that site by John D. Rockefeller when he bought his home on the corner of Case and Euclid. Her school closed in 1908. There were many other private schools from first to last which need not be mentioned here. Our present concern is with schools now existing. University School was established in 1890 by a group of citizens who felt the need of a good local preparatory school for boys. It was owned by a stock company and controlled by a board of trustees. Its first officers and executive committee were Judge Samuel Williamson, president; Samuel Mather, vice president; W. E. Cushing, secretary; D. Z. Norton, treasurer; J. H. McBride, H. S. Sherman, C. W. Bingham, E. P. Williams and F. P. Whitman. It soon had a very complete plant on Hough Avenue, consisting of an attractive main building, an elementary school, a dormitory, and an ample athletic field, with swimming pool, gymnasium, manual training shops and everything else needed to keep the boys wholesomely busy. It succeeded admirably in its academic, physical and manual training, and among its graduates are a great many present-day leaders of Cleveland life. In 1925 it moved to more complete and pretentious quarters in Shaker Heights, from which section it draws most of its present students. Hathaway Brown school was started in 1876 as a girls' branch of the Brooks Academy. It was given its present name ten years later, when Miss Anne Hathaway Brown obtained control and made it an independent institution. Miss Brown soon retired, but the name was retained. After occupying buildings on Euclid Avenue, Prospect, and again on 1008 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS Euclid, it outgrew its quarters and in 1907 moved to a commodious stone structure on East Ninety-Seventh Street. Continuing for twenty years on that site, in 1927 it followed the example of University School and went to the Heights, where with its modern buildings and eighteen acres of ground on North Park Boulevard, it has ample room, in a lovely environment, for all its activities. Laurel School, also for girls, was started in 1896 by Miss Jenny Warren Prentiss in her home on East One Hundredth Street. It grew rapidly, took over another house in the neighborhood and called itself the Wade Park Home School for Girls. In 1899 it was incorporated as Laurel Institute. A little later a stock company was formed, a fine property was acquired on East Ninety-Seventh Street near Euclid, in the vicinity of the Hathaway Brown school, and other buildings were added. The name Laurel School was given it by Mrs. Arthur E. Lyman, who had been connected with the Hathaway Brown school, when she acquired control of the institution and reorganized it in 1904. After a highly successful career in this locality, the school "followed the birds and flowers," as Mrs. Lyman has said, and like its sister schools, found a new and more adequate home on the Heights. The Western Reserve Academy at Hudson, which uses the original buildings and campus of Western Reserve College, may be regarded as virtually a Cleveland institution. With its modern equipment, some fine new buildings, its big farm and athletic facilities, and its high scholastic standards, it is regarded as one of the best preparatory schools in this part of the country. It has been handsomely endowed by James W. Ellsworth. Its head master is Joel B. Hayden. Harlan N. Wood is dean. It draws most of its students from this city. Hawken School, founded by James Hawken, is now in a fine location on Clubside Road, South Euclid. It is an excellent private school for boys, of the progressive type, conducted by Carl Holmes. It has recently abandoned complete college preparatory work, taking its students only through the tenth grade. THE CITY'S LIFE - 1009 PUBLIC LIBRARY Strangely enough, Cuyahoga County's first public library was not in Cleveland, but in Olmsted. The story of its coming, a romantic episode of the early Western Reserve, goes back to Aaron Olmsted, a promoter of the Connecticut Land Company, that owned the land now comprising Olmsted Township and the village of North Olmsted. His son, Charles H. Olmsted of New Haven, Connecticut, agreed in 1829 to give the village, then called Lenox, a library on condition that its name be changed to Olmsted. An ox cart containing 500 books thus became the price for the change of name. Despite the fact that before the cart left New Haven, heavy blue paper covers were made to guard the volumes against the weather, they were badly soaked by the rains in transit. These covers and water stains still appear on the hundred or more volumes that survive. The collection was the property of the Olmsted Library Company, a membership in which cost, generally, the munificent sum of twelve and one-half cents per annum—in the era of high prices following the Civil war, twenty-five cents. The books were "boarded 'round" from house to house, much like country school teachers. One family would take the library for a while until it became a nuisance, and then pass it on to another. The neighbors would come and help themselves, often, we fear, failing to return the books. The record book goes down to 1868; eventually the memory of the library faded until 1926, when an exhibit of antiques at North Olmsted elicited from the village attics some fifty volumes of the original collection. Others had been stored in the home of the late Arthur A. Stearns, well-known Cleve-land attorney and president of the Cleveland Library Board, who turned them over as a special collection to the North Olmsted branch of the Cuyahoga County Library. The list affords an excellent idea of the literature of the time, of which the surviving volumes hardly give a correct impression. These (naturally the least interesting) are chiefly works on natural and moral philosophy, though we 1010 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS still find a volume of the New England Farmer, a popular magazine of the day. Other volumes may yet lurk in attics, not only of Olmsted, but of the towns with which its population intermingled : Berea, Middleburgh Heights and Brecksville. Many years elapsed before a public library came to Cleveland. Beginning with 1853, the law permitted the purchase of books for school libraries. The 1,500 volumes thus authorized were brought together in the Central High School in 1857, and could be borrowed by the public from two to four o'clock on Saturday afternoons. This meagre lot was supplemented by a collection of German books bought from the proceeds of the Humboldt Festival held in 1867. In that same year a new law authorized the Board of Education to levy a tax of one-tenth mill for library purposes. Two years later comes the real beginning of the Cleveland Public Library. On February 18, 1869, the Public School Library, intended, despite its name, for the free use of all citizens, was opened on the second floor of the Northrup and Harrington Block, 238 Superior Street. The collection numbered 5,800 volumes. Out of this humble beginning, well within the memory of many living, grew the great institution that we know today. Various minor legal vicissitudes, chiefly changes of control, need not be chronicled. The really important events are the authorization, on April 1, 1879, of a one-fourth mill levy for library support; and the substitution, on April 18, 1883, of the more accurate term, Public Library, for the misleading designation, Public School Library, previously in use. There were also several removals, viz., in 1875, first to Clark's Block, farther west on Superior Street, and a few months later in the same year, to the old City Hall at Superior and Wood (now East Third). To this site, incidentally, the library gravitated intermittently throughout its history; three separate times has it moved to its present location. The first stay here lasted only till April 1, 1879, when the institution was installed on the second and third floors of the Board of Education Building near the southwest corner of THE CITY'S LIFE - 1013 Euclid and Erie (now East Ninth) . This building had been the former Central High School and on its site now stands the Citizens Building. In 1901 came the second removal to a temporary brick building at the corner of Wood and Rockwell streets, adjacent on the north to the old City Hall and in 1913 a transfer to the upper floors of the Kinney-Levan Building at Euclid and East Fourteenth Street. These changes of address are chiefly of geographical interest. Far more important is one outstanding date, September 1, 1884, when William Howard Brett was appointed librarian. He was the third to hold this position, following L. M. Oviatt (librarian from 1869 to September 1, 1875) and I. L. Beardsley, occupying the interim. Almost all that the library is, and has been, is due to the genius or example of William Howard Brett. Born in Braceville, Ohio, July 1, 1846, he became a salesman in Cleveland's leading book store, Cobb and Andrews, from which inconspicuous post he was called, at the age of 38, to work of revolutionary importance. True, the foundation had already been laid. Insignificant as the early library seems, it stood well among its sister institutions. Of thirty-three leading free libraries in 1879, Cleveland ranked eighth in circulation, and fourteenth in number of volumes. Yet so radical were the changes made by the Brett administration that the Library soon seemed like a new world. It is not too much to say that the American public library might never have been what it is today without the initiative and example of William Howard Brett. His great achievement was to make Cleveland in 1890 the first large library in America to have an open-shelf system. Previously readers had been barred from access to the books, and could get titles only by consulting the catalogue and filling out application blanks. If the book thus obtained proved unsatisfactory, there was nothing to do but repeat the process ad infinitum until the desired volume were secured or (what was more likely) the reader gave up in disgust. Throwing open the shelves to unrestricted browsing was a new departure indeed. "All your books will be stolen," cried the conservatives. But Mr. Brett stuck to his guns, main- 1014 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS taining that the educational benefit outweighed all possible losses. Before long every progressive library had followed suit. Special rooms for children's books, with librarians def-initely trained along this line, was another idea which he brought to Cleveland. Work with children bulks very large in American libraries—another of the many points in which Cleveland was a pioneer. School libraries also had a great development, covering senior and junior schools and some elementary schools, and making an invaluable contribution to the city's educational system. All Mr. Brett's policies had the same motive; increasing usefulness of books. Thus the foreign-born received special attention, with large collections of books in the chief tongues spoken by our immigrants. Deposit stations were installed in factories, department stores, fire-engine houses. Branches were opened, till now there are thirty-two housed in buildings of their own and aiming to cover every section of town. Many of these branch buildings were erected through the generosity of Andrew Carnegie. On April 4, 1903, came $250,000 for branches, followed in the next few years by $351,800 more. Less spectacular than new buildings, but quite as important in its way, was the reorganization, in 1913, of the main library along divisional lines. This meant the division of the book collection into units like Fine Arts, Technology and History, each administered by a staff trained in that subject. Expert service for the reader, and systematic strengthening. of the book collection, thus result. All libraries admire the scheme, and nearly all would copy, did money but permit. All these accomplishments would hardly have been possible without the aid of two other persons, one on the library staff and one a public-spirited citizen. Linda Anne Eastman, vice-librarian for many years and finally Mr. Brett's successor, not only took much detail off his hands, but worked so closely with him that often it is impossible to assign to either the credit for a particular idea. Few pioneering executives have had their work so adequately carried on. John THE CITY'S LIFE - 1015 Griswold White, eminent lawyer and life-long friend of the Library, was in 1884 president of the board of trustees that appointed Mr. Brett. Though he retired from this position soon afterward and did not return to the board till 1910, he continued to give the Library the benefit of his legal learning, and in 1899 began a series of book donations almost without parallel in American history. Soon they became so numerous as to justify the creation of a special John G. White Collection of Folklore and Orientalia, before long the largest of its kind in the land. To this was added, at Mr. White's death in 1928, his unequalled private library on chess and checkers. His entire estate, too, except for some minor donations, was left to the Library to assure that these great collections (some 75,000 volumes in 1932) should not fall off in quality with the passage of the years. To bring the Library's other book collections up to somewhere near the standard set by Mr. White became one of the tasks of Miss Eastman, elected librarian on December 19, 1918, after Mr. Brett's tragic death through the carelessness of a drunken automobile driver. No effort was spared to acquire important reference sets. The History Division has become truly notable, particularly in its English and Italian historical collections. Deserving of mention, also, are the McMichael collection of pictures of Cleveland and the Standiford gift of portraits of notable Clevelanders. The Technology Division owns abundant files of patent reports and has benefitted from the deposit of the library of the Cleveland Engineering Society. Though Mr. White's generosity has not had as many imitators as could be desired, there have been the Schweinfurth bequest of architectural volumes, the Ambler legacy for books on dental hygiene, and the Gottdiener and Klein memorials for Jewish books. Equally important was the erection of a main library building, which Mr. Brett had helped to plan, but did not live to see. For this purpose $250,000 in bonds had been voted in 1896, and $2,000,000 in 1912. Unforeseen obstacles prevented the utilization of these sums at the time. In 1921 another issue of $2,000,000 was voted, and construction at 1016 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS last was begun. At the laying of the cornerstone October 23, 1923, the principal speaker was David Lloyd-George, England's famous war-time premier. The new building, a model of its kind, was thrown open on May 5, 1925. A third achievement was the establishment, in 1924, of service to that part of the county outside the three principal cities, through the County Library Department. Constant improvements were made within the walls. A Business Information Bureau got together multifarious serv-ices which hitherto had been widely separated. A Reader's Adviser was appointed to help those desiring self-improvement through reading under guidance. More adequate salaries were striven for and, to some extent, attained. An eminent English librarian attests the results of these and other advances: "Nothing in the whole of my visit to the United States two years ago impressed me with such a sense of strength and efficiency as your library,—not only its arrangement and its general organization, but also its staff and the general spirit of the work." The triumph of Miss Eastman's administration is seen in such figures as 1,469,250 volumes owned and a circulation of 8,665,656 in 1931, or over eight books per capita a year. The Library has come far from its modest beginnings. More than that, it has become a civic factor, bulking. large in the community life and, nationally famous for years, has now won itself international reputation. Summing up, if one were asked to characterize the Library in a phrase, one might style it a vital service grown great through years of intelligent devotion. EDITOR'S NOTE: This account of Cleveland's Public Library system has been written by Mr. Gordon Woods Thayer who omits to mention his own services in building up the White Collection of Orientalia and Folklore, of which he is Curator, or of his assistance to Miss Eastman. He also omits the very great service rendered by his wife, Margaret Wright Thayer, for many years head of the County Department. No book about Cleveland could be written without the invaluable assistance of the Library and "This Cleveland of Ours" is deeply indebted to the County Department in general, to Mrs. Thayer, and to Miss Katherine Wilder of the Rocky River branch in particular. THE CITY'S LIFE - 1017 WESTERN RESERVE HISTORICAL SOCIETY The Western Reserve Historical Society is one of Cleveland's small but most valuable educational institutions. It is now located on the corner of Euclid Avenue and East One Hundred and Seventh Street, in a building of its own, which is far too small to house its rich and varied collection of historical material, much less permit easy access to it, or that beautiful and orderly display which Wallace Cathcart and his assistants would so much like to maintain. The Historical Society is as old as the Cleveland Public Library, and was planned in the beginning as a department of the Cleveland Library Association, which developed not into the Public Library, but into the later Case Library. The organization of the Historical Society was first suggested in 1866 by Charles C. Baldwin, then vice president of the Cleveland Library Association. In April, 1867, a meeting was held in the rooms of the Library Association, at which were present Charles Whittlesey, Joseph Perkins, John Barr, H. A. Smith, Charles C. Baldwin and Alfred T. Goodman. The record runs: "The object of the meeting thus assembled was to take steps toward the formation of a historical society in the City of Cleveland. The meeting was not organized in a formal way, but Colonel Whittlesey acted as chairman. A discussion was held as to the name the association should take, the following being finally adopted, viz.: The Reserve Historical Department of the Cleveland Library Association." By May, the society was organized under its present name, its avowed object being "to discover, procure and preserve whatever relates to the history, biography, genealogy, antiquities and statistics connected with the City of Cleveland and the Western Reserve, and generally what relates to the history of Ohio and the Great West." The Library Association approved its new department, and authorized it to engage the third story of the old Society for Savings Building on the Public Square for the storage and display of its materials. Whittlesey and Baldwin were the prime movers in the 1018 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS development of the society, and through them was secured the generous cooperation of Leonard Case and other benefactors. In time it came to occupy the whole of the bank building, and in 1897 it was able to move to its present fireproof building in the university group. In the last thirty-five years this building has been seri-ously outgrown. There is vacant land immediately to the eastward, and it is the earnest hope of many of those who use and enjoy the rich resources of the society that before the able curator, Mr. Cathcart, and his friendly assistants find themselves entirely crowded out and camping on the front steps, some means may be found to build a large central building of which the present one may be one wing, with room for another wing to be added when it is needed. Manuscripts, field books of the surveyors, files of the Early Settlers Association, economic and geological pamphlets left by Colonel Whittlesey, files of newspapers and magazines, old china and other objects of antique interest, pictures and reproductions elbow each other in the present building in the most approved sardinian manner. The society's historical resources are enormous and of inestimable value to the city. Women's Centennial Commission Among the curious treasures held by the Western Reserve Historical Society are the boxes packed by the Women's Cen, tennial Commission, which has a history unique, it is believed, among civic organizations. In 1896, when Cleveland celebrated its one hundred birthday, men and women were not accustomed to working together so freely and easily as they do today. Therefore, instead of appointing a few women members on the Centennial Commission in charge of the celebration, a separate "Women's Department" was appointed, with a central executive board. Mrs. W. A. Ingham was elected president, with five active vice presidents : Mrs. Mary Scranton Bradford, Mrs. Sarah E. Bierce, Mrs. Charles F. Olney, Mrs. George Presley, Jr., and Mrs. Evan Hopkins. THE CITY'S LIFE - 1019 Mrs. Ella Sturtevant Webb was elected recording secretary, which position she still holds. Mrs. W. B. Neff was made financial secretary, and Mrs. J. C. Covert corresponding secretary, Miss Elizabeth Blair treasurer, Miss Elizabeth Stanton assistant treasurer and Mrs. Charles W. Chase auditor. The other members of the executive committee were Mrs. Elroy M. Avery, Mrs. F. A. Kendall, Mrs. F. W. Penton, Mrs. N. B. Prentice, Mrs. A. J. Williams, Mrs M. B. Schwab, Mrs. L. A. Russell, Mrs. T. K. Dissette, Miss Elizabeth Clifford Neff, Mrs. O. J. Hodge, Mrs. H. A. Griffin, Mrs. Carrie Younglove Abbott. This central committee enlarged itself by adding a hundred "councilors." The women worked hard and cheerfully, and "Women's Day" of the Centennial Week was a great success. If this were all, no place could here be given it. But this was only the beginning. The women, seeking history of the achievements of women since the city's founding, discovered that histories were written about men. There was no women's history. This committee undertook to write it. The labor was a long one. The committee reached out into every city, town and hamlet of the reserve and gathered documents of remarkable human interest, now published in two sets of books, "Pioneer Families of the Western Reserve" and "Pioneer Women of the Western Reserve," edited by Gertrude V. R. Wickham. For the purpose of gathering and publishing such historical matter, the women of this executive committee organized themselves into a self-perpetuating society, each member to appoint her successor, a lineal descendant if possible. In 1927 "The Executive Committee of the Women's Department of the Cleveland Centennial Commission" changed its name to "The Women's Centennial Commission." The members pack boxes of historical materials every quarter-century to be opened by their successors in 1996. These boxes — metal chests packed to the brim and sealed—are left in the custody of the Western Reserve Historical Society. The women of 1996 will suffer from no lack of knowledge of Cleveland's past. 1020 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS The women had a little money left, too, in 1896. They placed one hundred dollars in the Society for Savings, to be left at compound interest until 1996, when it will amount to over $7,000, to be used as a starter for the work of the Bicentennial celebration. The officers of the Women's Centennial Commission in 1932 were: Mrs. W. B. Neff, president; Mrs. Charles H. Smith, and Mrs. Frank B. Meade, vice presidents; Mrs. Ella Sturtevant Webb, recording secretary; Mrs. Charles W. Chase, corresponding secretary ; Mrs. H. A. Griffin, treasurer. Members are : Mrs. Edward L. Harris, Mrs. William Handy, Mrs. Belle Bierce Stair, Mrs. Mier Keith Wilson, Mrs. Charles W. Brainerd, Mrs. A. P. Churchill, Mrs. Howard Ingham, Mrs. W. F. Rothenberger of Indianapolis, Ind., Miss Marie Edna Shedd of Columbus, Ohio, Mrs. Charles R. Miller, Mrs. Robb D. Bartholomew, Mrs. May C. Whitaker, Mrs. Wilson Chisholm, Mrs. Ruth Hayden Hitchings, Mrs. Daniel Huebsch, Mrs. Hermon A. Kelley, Mrs. George M. Kelley, Mrs. Edward W. Dissette, Mrs. William (Horner) Park, Mrs. Charles Wendell Mills, Mrs. Frederick H. Goff, Mrs. Wilfred Henry Alburn, Miss Katherine Wickham, Mrs. Samuel Wal-ter Kelley, Mrs. Adin T. Hills, Mrs. J. J. Tracy, Sr., Miss Ruth Williamson, Mrs. William Ambler, Mrs. B. L. Millikin. Every member has a successor appointed, who has a vote in the absence of the member An annual luncheon meeting is held, for the sake of keeping the members acquainted and interested. It is a strange group, this one of competent Cleveland women of all ages, banded together solely to preserve the history of their city. It is a nucleus of women used to cooper-ation, ready to function at any time. NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM One of the latest and finest accessions to the city's educational system is the Museum of Natural History. This institution, almost as much as the Museum of Art, and more than the Historical Society, teaches painlessly by visual appeal, while maintaining ample libraries for those willing to make use of them. THE CITY'S LIFE - 1021 The museum was incorporated in 1920. Its first treasures were a collection of shells and books given by Dr. John C. and Miss M. Claire Darby. The next year it acquired, as a temporary home, the old Hanna residence at 2717 Euclid Avenue, and moved in. Immediately it established a library and department of education, aided by the Cleveland Museum of Art and the National Museum. In 1922 it opened its exhibits to the public, started Sunday afternoon lectures, began cooperation with the public schools, established a department of geology, published a "Museum Bulletin" and a "Pocket Natural History," created a permanent book fund, opened a museum print shop, bought its first exhibition and storage cases, equipped a photographic laboratory and undertook a systematic collection of Ohio birds and mammals. It was evident that the museum meant business. Gifts poured in—a collection of butterflies and moths, native and foreign birds, minerals and fossils, African mammal heads, a fine herbarium and library, publications of many kinds, in a shower ever growing and varying. The big event of 1923 was the sailing of the Blossom expedition, fitted out by Mr. and Mrs. Dudley S. Blossom, to the South Atlantic, where it cruised about for three years, returning. freighted with many thousands of birds, animals, fishes, plants and other specimens. A department of ornithology was established. Experts began collecting and mounting the Cleveland shale fishes, of which the museum now has an impressive collection. Next came a department of entomology, then mammal groups. A mastodon skeleton was obtained from Johnstown, Pa. A collection of 5,000 Brazilian birds was acquired. The museum branched out into radio talks. The Harvey Brown property at 2727 Euclid Avenue was obtained for offices and laboratories. The Fuller-Bole expedition was sent to Wyoming. A site for a permanent building was purchased on East Boulevard, in Wade Park, near the Museum of Art. Meanwhile the old barn on the temporary site was remodeled to provide an auditorium and classrooms. The museum began sponsoring nature trails in the Metropolitan Park Reservation. Exhibits poured in from all points of the compass. 1022 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS In 1929 the architect began preliminary studies for a new building. Field work was in progress in Florida and several western states. Windsor T. and W. Holden White donated a big collection of African mammals and ethnological objects. In 1930 came the White-Fuller African expedition, the Bramley-Pallister expedition to Yucatan, an extension of ornithological field work in the United States, the opening of a gem room and aquarium room, the receipt of a bird col-lection from Mexico, with other accessions too numerous to record—and 100 acres of land near Kirtland, twenty-five miles east of Cleveland, given by Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin P. Bole for an arboretum in memory of Elizabeth Davis Holden. The museum continues to expand its work and multiply its possessions with bewildering rapidity. In one decade it has become a big., vital Cleveland institution. Through its exhibits, lectures, books, publications, radio talks and bulletins, its rooms provided for meetings, its collaboration with the public schools and with organizations of many kinds, it makes itself more and more a vital part of the city's life. "A natural history museum," its officers believe, "is as much a necessary part of a great city as are churches, libraries, an art museum, a historical museum or a public school system. With these it comprises a cultural index of the intellectual standards of the people." The president of the museum is Lewis Blair Williams, who has borne a leading part in the development of this insti-tution from its inception. Other officers in 1932 were George W. Crile, Warren Bicknell and Francis H. Herrick, vice presidents, Alwin C. Ernst, treasurer, and Harold T. Clark, secre-tary. Harold Madison was curator. CHAPTER IV THE PRESS The fair measure of decency in Cleveland's conduct, in-cluding its political government, must be credited in large part to so-called "sensational" journalism. That the safety of cities, as well as their civic decency, largely depends on it is a truth which has been learned only in the present generation, after hundreds of years of professional experimenting had failed to reveal the proper function of a newspaper. With enlightenment, there passed the "great editors"—the Danas, Greeleys, Wattersons, Cowleses, and the rest of the elder notables, whose like is not seen today and probably never will be again. Nor has their passing injured the cause of journalism. It is time that a true picture of the modern newspaper be drawn. This chapter can make but a small effort at the picture of one city's press. Today's newspaper is more read than the Bible, and more believed, literally. More Clevelanders can name one great daily than can name their mayor. The newspaper is a better advertised product than any soap, bread or automobile. Yet it is the least understood. It is the least discussed—comprehendingly. "You can't believe anything you read in the newspapers" is a common saying. Yet as a matter of fact, people believe everything they read in the newspapers, to the extent of staking their fortunes upon the accuracy of a market quotation or publication of a war rumor. If all the newspapers in Cleveland should suspend publication today, civic activity would be paralyzed. If they should stray from righteousness, chaos would result. Whence, then, this disparagement, this expression of distrust, this doubt of sincerity? Lay the blame gently but firmly upon the broad brows of the "great editors" of the - 1023 - 1024 - THIS CLEVELAND OF OURS past, absolving them at the same time from conscious guilt. Webster says that a newspaper is "a publication issued for general circulation at frequent intervals, a public print that circulates news," and that news is "fresh information concerning something that has recently taken place. Anything new or strange." A reader starting with that definition in mind may follow the development of Cleveland newspapers from the first, down to the present day, and come to the conclusion that the "great editors" failed clearly to perceive the foundation purpose of their business, and for that reason fell short of realizing the power they might have wielded for the common good. An observer can go back to the pyramids of Egypt, if he likes, and there begin a train of observations on this subject, but he need not start so early. The 31st of July, 1818, will do as well; for then, in Cleaveland, the Cleaveland Gazette and Commercial Register made its appearance, with Andrew Logan as editor. Logan went to prodigious exertions to publish this paper, for he had to bring his press and type all the way from Beaver, Pennsylvania, by wagon, and at great expense. The type was badly worn and some of the impressions were nearly illegible. The paper was announced as a weekly, but sometimes ten days or two weeks elapsed between issues. It was discontinued after the advent of the second newspaper, the Cleaveland Herald, which was issued on October 19, 1819. When the Gazette first appeared, the population of Cleaveland was less than one hundred and fifty. There was no rural population to speak of, certainly none valuable for purposes of newspaper circulation, for there were no adequate shipping. facilities. If Logan could have gained one subscription from every family in Cleaveland he would have had just fifty subscribers. What would cause a man to launch such an impossible financial enterprise? Love of the job—desire for self-expression. Could anyone conceive of a man so fired with zeal for blacksmithing, for example, that he would lug a heavy anvil and a wagon-load of tools all the way from Beaver, Pennsylvania, to Cleaveland, knowing all the while that there were