(RETURN TO THE TITLE PAGE) HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 375 OTHER PLACES OF ENTERTAINMENT. Robinson's opera house, corner of Ninth and Plum streets, built in 1872 by John Robinson, the veteran circus manager. Heuick's opera house, corner of Pine and Thirteenth streets; chiefly variety entertainments. Vine street opera house; variety. Coliseum, Vine street, between Twelfth and Thirteenth; variety. Lookout opera house, adjoining the Lookout house, at the head of the Main street incline; circus and dramatic performances. The other hill-top resorts—The Highland, at the head of the Mount Adams incline; the Bellevue house, at the head of the Mount Auburn incline, and that on Price's hill. The German, or Stadt theatre. Music hall, with its various forms of entertainment, has been sufficiently described in the chapter on Music. THE ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. At present there are but two zoological gardens in the United States, one at Philadelphia and the Cincinnati garden. The Zoological society of Cincinnati, to which alone the garden owes its existence, was organized in 1873 and is the direct outgrowth of the Acclimatization society. In the early part of 1873 Mr. Andrew Erkenbrecher, then president of the last named organization, directed the secretary of that body to correspond with the celebrated naturalists, Dr. A. E. Brehm, with a view of obtaining an estimate of the probable cost of a zoological garden established upon European models, requesting statistics in regard to those already established in Europe, and all other available information pertinent to the subject. The reply of the distinguished scientist, containing many valuable suggestions, and accompanied by the annual reports and statements of several European societies, was laid before a meeting of the Acclimatization society, held at the rooms of the Cincinnati board of trade, June 19, 1873. At this meeting, a resolution, offered by Mr. John Simpkinson, was adopted providing for a committee charged with the duty of digesting a plan of operations. The committee, consisting of Messrs. Andrew Erkenbrecher, John Simpkinson, and George H. Knight, subsequently called a meeting of citizens understood to be favorable to the proposed enterprise, for Monday, June 30, 1873, at which Dr. Lilienthal, Mr. Simpkinson, and others, delivered spirited addresses, a large sum of money was subscribed, and resolutions were adopted providing for the incorporation of a society whose capital stock should be three hundred throusand dollars. In conformity with this action, Messrs. Simpkinson, Erkenbrecher, C Oskamp, Knight and A. Tenner, subscribed articles of incorporation under the name of the Zoological Society of Cincinnati, which were duly filed and recorded according to law, on the eleventh day of July, 1873. The first meeting of the newly formed society was held at the board of trade rooms, on July 28th, and the following named gentlemen elected directors to manage its affairs, viz: Joseph Longworth, J. Simpkinson, A. Erkenbrecher, A. Pfirmann, John A. Mohlenhoff, Charles P. Taft, John Shillito, George K. Schoenberger, and Julius Dexter. The board of directors thus constituted immediately organized and elected the following named officers, viz: Joseph Longworth, president; John Simpkinson, vice-president; Clemens Oskamp, treasurer; Charles P. Taft, recording secretary, and Armin Tenner, corresponding secretary. From the constitution, as adopted at the first meeting of the stockholders, we quote the following extracts: SEC. I. The name of the society shall be "Zoological Society of Cincinnati." SEC. II. The capital stock of the society shall be three hundred thousand dollars, divided into six thousand shares, of fifty dollars each, transferable only on the books of the society upon the surrender of the certificate. SEC. III. The object of the society shall be the establishment and maintenance of a zoological garden at Cincinnati, and the study and dissemination of a knowledge of the nature and habits of the creatures of the animal kingdom. SEC. XVI. Stockholders shall be entitled to receive for each share of stock up to the number of five, twenty single tickets of admission each year, or one season ticket. All season tickets shall be issued in the name of a particular person, which shall be registered, and any season ticket presented by any other person than the one to whom it is issued shall be forfeited. The name on any season ticket may be changed at the option of the holder, upon surrender of the ticket, and a new season ticket will be issued in the substituted name, which shall be good for the the balance of the year. As will be seen from the foregoing summary of its history and organization, the Zoological society is a strictly private enterprise, not in any way dependent upon municipal aid for its existence or maintenance. At present the society consists of over four hundred members, representing a subscribed capital of about two hundred and thirty thousand dollars. The grounds upon which the garden has been established were secured from Messrs Winslow & Wilshire on perpetual lease, at the rate of seven thousand five hundred dollars per annum, with privilege of purchase at the rate of two thousand dollars per acre. Ground was first broken in October, 1874, but the work on the larger shelter-houses did not commence until May, 1875. On the eighteenth of September of the same year the garden was opened to the public, and since that the society has been constantly adding to the collection of animals, and expending large sums for improving and beautifying the grounds. It is but an act of justice that we should state that the success with which this enterprise has thus far been crowned, is chiefly due to the extraordinary labor of Mr. Andrew Erkenbrecher, who properly may be named the founder of the garden, who, however, was ably assisted in his efforts by such gentlemen as Messrs. John Simpkinson, Julius Dexter, Florence Marmet, George A. Smith, Clemens Oskamp and others. On December , 1880, the collection consisted of nine hundred and eighty-three specimens divided as follows: Mammals - 321 Birds - 608 Reptiles - 54 Total - 983 The present board of directors consists of Messrs. Florence Marmet, president; S. Lesher Taylor, vice-pres- 376 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. ident; C. M. Erkenbrecher, treasurer; J. M. Doherty, Otto Laist, George Hafer, George Fisher, B. Roth, A. Fischer. The post of secretary to the society and superintendent of the garden is filled by Frank J. Thompson, to whom we are indebted for this clear and succinct history of the garden. THE BURNET WOODS CONCERTS. These are given upon a munificent pecuniary foundation, provided April 7, 1875, by the Hon. W. S. Groesbeck, of East Walnut Hills, and conveyed in the following note: To the Board of Park Commissioners of Cincinnati: I understand that the council has indefinitely postponed a proposition to treat with the owners for a surrender of the lease of Burnet Woods Park; and, in accordance with a purpose heretofore declared, I hereby donate to the city of Cincinnati fifty thousand dollars, upon the single trust that the same shall be safely invested in bonds of the city or otherwise, and forever so kept, and that the interest thereon shall be applied yearly to furnish music for the people in the above named park. As this trust is to be perpetual, I do not think it best to embarrass it with any further limitations. Very respectfully, W. S. GROESBECK. Some concerts had already been given in the park by means of funds already in the hands of the Park commissioners, which were, however, nearly exhausted, and the gift was hailed by officials, press and people, as well-timed, in good taste, and a genuine public benefaction. The fund was invested in fifty water bonds of the city, of the denomination of one thousand dollars, bearing seven per cent. interest per annum, payable semi-annually, and thus yielding for its purpose three thousand five hundred dollars a year. Each of the bonds bears this endorsement: This bond belongs to the Groesbeck endowment fund, and is held subject to the trust of the endowment, and is not negotiable by order of the Park board. E. H. Pendleton, president; S. W. Hoffman, secretary. After careful examination of the park in all parts of it, the commissioners the same year decided to locate the music stand permanently in the area where the popular concerts had previously been given. It has been furnished with seats; while much of the tract is still left in greensward; a circular driveway encompasses it; and, on the pleasant afternoons of summer and early fall, twice a week, some of the most notable gatherings of citizens and visiting strangers that occur in the city are to be seen here. At first there was much competition among the bands of the city for the honor and emoluments attaching to their employment under the Groesbeck donation, and the music committee found no little difficulty in deciding between them. It was finally decided to employ, for the time being at least, the Cincinnati orchestra for the Burnet Woods concerts, and the Germania and Currier bands for the open-air summer entertainments in the down-town parks. Since then the concerts have been quite regularly given in the warm season. One hundred and eight concerts had been given at Burnet Woods, on the Groesbeck foundation, by the close of the season of 1880. CHAPTER XL. CEMETERIES. THE first and only public burying-ground in Cincinnati for many years was that upon the square bounded by Fourth and Fifth, Walnut and Main streets, given to the pe0ple by the original proprietors, in part for that purpose It was attached to the meeting-house of the First Presbyterian church, near the corner of Fourth and Main, and was used continuously for nearly a generation, or about twenty-seven years, when it became so crowded that another cemetery became necessary. In 1810 one of the four-acre out-lots was purchased by the Presbyterians, being the tract between Elm and Vine, Eleventh and Twelfth streets. The public generally were still permitted to make interments in the ground of the society at the new place. The Methodists have also an old burying-ground back of the Wesley chapel, on Fifth street, between Broadway and Sycamore, where some ancient graves are still to be seen. The Jews have another, long since abandoned, but still kept intact, at the corner of Chestnut street and Central avenue. It is altogether concealed from the public eye by buildings on one side and a lofty brick wall on another. The site of the former Catherine street burying-ground, on Court street, between Wesley avenue and Mound, is yet marked with an inside enclosure of iron fence, containing some graves. Many of the denominations maintain the old idea of interments in their own consecrated "God's acre." The Roman Catholics have their Calvary cemetery, of about twelve acres, on the Madison pike, at East Walnut Hills; St. Peter's, now full and disused, upon Lick run, on the Harrison turnpike, three miles from the city; St. Bernard's, on the Carthage pike, about three miles; St. Joseph's, near the city limits on the west, south of the Warsaw pike, in the twenty-first ward, in two separate tracts—one new, the other old, and both containing about one hundred acres; and the German Catholic, of about twelve acres, also on the Warsaw pike, in the twenty-first ward.' The German Evangelical Protestants have an old cemetery on the Baltimore pike, in the twenty-fourth ward, and another on the Carthage road, north of the zoological gardens; the German Protestants, also, two cemeteries, respectively at the corner of Park avenue and Chestnut street, Walnut Hills, and on the Reading turnpike, out of the city. The Methodist Pr0testants have theirs near the old Widow's Home, at the city limits, just south of Avondale. There is a Jewish cemetery in Clifton; the congregations K. K. Sherith and Judah Torah, the latter Reformed Jews, and the K. K. Adath Israel, Polish Jews, have each a cemetery on Lick run. The United Jewish cemetery, East Walnut Hills, corner of Montgomery and Duck Creek roads, comprises an old part, dating from 1849, and a new, laid out in 1860. The remaining space in the former is now reserved for the poor and members of the society who do not own lots; while the other is platted into lots, of which there is now room for about seven hundred. The colored people of the city have a Union Baptist cemetery HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 377 at Gazlay's corner, on the Warsaw turnpike, and a colored American or Afriean burying-ground at Avondale, on the Lebanon pike, adjoining the German Protestant cemetery. More famous than any other denominational cemetery about the city, in some 1espects, is THE WESLEYAN CEMETERY. This is situated upon a beautiful tract of twenty-five acres, in the northwestern part of the city, being the western part of Cumminsville, and on the east bank of the west fork of Mill creek and the Coleman pike, about five miles from Fountain square. By 1842 the old cemetery in the rear of Wesley chapel had become too small for the demands of the Methodist people in the city for burials, and, after casting about in the vicinity of the city for a suitable resting place for their dead, this area was purchased, laid out in burial lots, with winding walks and carriage ways, and formally dedicated to its sacred purposes. It was opened in 1843. In the centre, upon an elevation which commands a superb view, was placed the receiving vault, surrounded by a circular drive-way, from which roads diverged to every part of the grounds. A "preachers' lot," thirty-tw0 feet square, was set apart in a beautiful location, and was fitly enclosed and adorned. An acre of the ground near the entrance was leased for a nursery, from which might be supplied trees, shrubbery, and flowering plants for the uses 0f the cemetery. A two-story brick dwelling for the sexton was erected in a pleasing rural style, on the left of the main entrance; also a chapel on the high grounds of the cemetery, which was afterwards, about 1855, displaced by a new brick chapel on lower ground at the right of the nursery site, for services of the church whenever desired. Many of the early ministers and laymen of the Methodist Episcopal church in Cincinnati are buried here. About twenty-five thousand interments had been made in this cemetery up to 1879. PUBLIC CEMETERIES. Each of the principal outlying divisions of the city, formerly suburban villages, had its own cemetery for public use. The Columbia cemetery, containing some quite ancient graves, lies along the track of the Little. Miami railroad, a little beyond the station. Somewhat further out, east of the railway track, is the old Baptist enclosure, upon which formerly stood the oldest Protestant meeting-house in the N0rthwest Territory, and within which some of the earliest interments in the Miami country were made. The Walnut Hills cemetery is immediately south of the German Protestant, on the west border of Woodburn. THE "POTTER'S FIELD," or city cemetery, which, many years ago, occupied the tract now so beautifully improved as Lincoln Park, in the western district of the old city, is now in the valley of Lick run, three miles from Cincinnati, not far from the new branch of the city hospital, or pest house. By far the greatest and most noted of the local burying-grounds, however, is the SPRING GROVE CEMETERY. The people of the Queen City are truly fortunate in possessing, within easy reach of nearly all parts of the city, and upon a most eligible site, one of the finest, as it is undoubtedly the most extensive of cemeteries in the United States. Said the Hon. Lewis F. Allen, in his address at the dedication of Forest Lawn cemetery, Buffalo: Were I, of all cemeteries within my knowledge, to point you to one taking precedence as a model, it would be that of Spring Grove near Cincinnati. Their broad undulations of green turf, stately avenues, and tasteful monuments, intermingled with noble trees and shrubbery, meet the eye, conferring a grace and dignity which no cemetery in our country has yet equaled, thus blending the elegance of a park with the pensive beauty of a burial place." And Mr. Parton wrote of it, in his Atlantic Monthly article : "There is very little, if any, of that hideous ostentation, the mere expenditure of money, which renders Greenwood so melancholy a place, exciting far more compassion for the folly of the living than sorrow for the dead who have escaped their society." By 1844 the want of a finer and ampler cemetery than Cincinnati then possessed was seriously felt. Mt. Auburn, Laurel Hill, and Greenwood, had been established, and their fame had gone abroad in this and other lands. It was determined to found a Gottesaker as the Germans call it—a "field of God"—which should vie with any in the New World for beauty and convenience. The next few paragraphs, describing the early movements to this end we extract, almost verbatim in places, from the interesting account of the cemetery, published in 1862, in an octavo volume. On the thirteenth of April, 1844, a number of gentlemen met at the house of Robert Buchanan, to hold a consultation on the subject of establishing a rural cemetery in the neighborhood of Cincinnati, and for adopting measures for carrying their object into effect. Mr. Baird Loring was chairman of this meeting, and J. B. Russell secretary. It was decided, after due discussion, that this object was not only desirable, but feasible; and a committee was appointed to make the necessary examinations and recommend a suitable site. After all the necessary 1esearches and observations had been made, the Garrard farm, situated about four miles fr0m the city, containing one hundred and sixty-six and seventy-four hundredths acres, was selected, as combining more of the requisites sought for than any other, and the place being considered reasonable, its purchase was recommended by the committee which had been appointed at the meeting above mentioned. This committee consisted of the following gentlemen, well fitted for the duty assigned them, viz: William Neff, Melzer Flagg, T. H. Minor, David Loring, R. Buchanan, S. C. Parkhurst, and A. M. Ernst, and their recommendation was approved, and adopted. The purchase was effected the same year, from Mr. Josiah Lawrence, of whom further purchases were made in 1845 and 1847, to the amount of about twelve and a half acres. The original 48 378 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. purchase price was sixteen thousand d0llars, or something less than one hundred dollars per acre. A meeting was held on the fourth of May, and a committee was then appointed to prepare articles of association. It consisted of Timothy Walker, G. W. Neff, Nathan Guilford, Nathaniel Wright, D. B. Lawler, Miles Greenwood, and Judge James Hall, and on the eleventh they reported thirteen articles, which were ordered to be published in the newspapers for the consideration of the citizens generally. On the nineteenth of October, these articles were referred to a committee consisting of Timothy Walker, S. P. Chase, James Hall, N. Guilford, N. Wright, D. B. Lawler, and E. Woodruff, with instructions to prepare a charter in conformity with them, to be presented to the legislature for enactment. This was done, and Judges Burnet, Walker and Wright were, on the first of December, appointed to lay it before the legislature, and obtain its passage. It was passed, without objection or alteration, on the twenty-first of January, 1845. Much discussion took place in regard to a suitable name. Several were proposed, among them that of "Spring Grove," which, being preferred by a large majority, was accepted. It had especial appropriateness, from the flowing springs and ancient groves with which the place abounded. The approbation of the citizens in relation to the proceedings of the committee was general, and the exertions of Messrs. Peter Neff, James Pullan, and A. H. Ernst, in obtaining subscribers at one hundred dollars each, were so successful that, as soon as the lots were surveyed, enough were immediately taken up to establish the institution on a firm basis. The first meeting of the lot-holders, for the election of directors, in compliance with the requisitions of the charter, was held on the eighth of February, 1845, when the following gentlemen were elected, viz: R. Buchanan, William Neff, A. H. Ernst, R. G. Mitchell, D. Loring, N. Wright, J. C. Culbertson, Charles Stetson, and Griffin Taylor, and on the eleventh the board was organized by the appointment of R. Buchanan, president; S. C. Parkhurst, secretary, and G. Taylor, treasurer. The original plan of the grounds was made by John Notman, of Philadelphia, the designer of the famous Laurel Hill cemetery, in that city. It has sinee been materially improved, important alterations having been found necessary to adapt it to the surface of the ground. The cemetery was consecrated on the twenty-eight of August, 1845, with appropriate solemn ceremonies, including an address by the Hon. Judge McLean, a "Consecration Hymn" by Mr. William D. Gallagher, and an ode by Lewis J. Cist. Mr. Thomas Farnshaw was made chief engineer, and Mr. Howard Daniels, superintendent, assisted by his next successor, Dennis Delaney, all of whom did much for the embellishment of the grounds. The system of landscape gardening adopted in 1855, was mainly the work of Messrs. Adolph Strauch and Henry Earnshaw, the latter of whom was for years superintendent, and in 1856, to curtail expenses, the offices of superintendent and surveyor were united in his person. Mr. Strauch is now, and has been for a number of years, landscape gardener and superintendent of the cemetery. He has been identified with it from the beginning. By this time a large number of the cemetery lots had been sold, and a permanent fund had been accumulated of twelve thousand eight hundred dollars in stocks and bonds, besides six thousand dollars in unsold real estate, being part of a legacy left to the cemetery by Mr. Charles E. Williams. During the year 1856-7, the receipts exceeded the expenditures by about ten thousand eight hundred dollars. Beautiful improvements, including many fine monuments, had been made upon the gr0unds. In July, 1856, the price of l0ts was advanced from twenty to twenty-five cents per square foot —a price still below that then charged in most leading cemeteries of the land. Some of the lot-owners had contributed one thousand dollars toward making the lake, an improvement soon afterwards effected, and adding greatly to the beauty of the cemetery. The statue of Egeria at the Fountain, executed by the sculptor, Nathaniel Baker, formerly a Cincinnatian, was presented to the cemetery by Mr. Walter Gregory, and erected on the island in the lake. One of the most beautiful and appropriate places in the cemetery was appropriated as a burial-place for soldiers of the Union, and another for a pioneers' burial-ground. In 1857 an important addition was made by the purchase of sixty acres on the north line of the cemetery, running up to the Graytown road, from Mr. Platt Ewens, of whom forty acres had been bought ten years before. With these the area of the whole tract was two hundred and eighty acres. Subsequent purchases increased the amount to six hundred acres, and it is now the largest cemetery in the United States. Among the more important of these were the purchase of one hundred and thirty-two and a half acres in 1866 from the heirs of G. Hill, deceased, for one hundred and thirty thousand dollars; twenty-five acres the next year from the Marietta & Cincinnati railroad, for six thousand two hundred dollars; a like amount in 1873, from Israel Ludlow, for fourteen thousand four hundred and fifty-four dollars, and twenty-five and seven-tenths acres, the same year, from the widow and heirs of G. W. Crary, for seventeen thousand nine hundred and ninety-two dollars and eighty cents. The total sum expended in the purchase of real estate for the cemetery, from 1844 to 1874, was three hundred and fifty-two thousand one hundred and eleven dollars and ninety-seven cents. The price of lots is now from thirty to seventy-five cents per square foot, according to location, those fronting on the avenues generally being fifty cents, and those in the second tier forty. Between 1853 and 1867 the entrance buildings were erected at the principal gateway to the grounds, on the southern boundary, at Spring Grove avenue. They are from designs of Mr. James K. Wilson, in the Norman-Gothic style, one hundred and fifty feet long, and cost something over fifty thousand dollars. They include, besides apartments f0r the use of the directors and the superintendent, a large waiting-room for visitors. The commodious receiving vault, situated in the centre of HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 379 the grounds, was considerably enlarged in the year 1859. Among the notable monuments in the cemetery are the Dexter and Burnet mausoleums; the sepulchral chapel, containing the statue of George Selves, jr., executed by Daumas, in Paris; the Lytle monument, over the remains of General William H. Lytle, who fell at Chickamauga; the Shillito, Potter, Neff; Pendleton, Lawler, Gano, Resor, and many other memorials, some of them of great cost and beauty. The Gano shaft is of gray sandstone, and was originally erected in 1827, in the old Catharine Street burying-ground, in Cincinnati, by Mr. Daniel Gano, to the memory of his father, the brave pioneer and soldier, Major General John S. Gano. The Walker m0nument is a copy of the celebrated tomb of Scipio Africanus, in Rome. Another beautiful monument was erected to the memory of a teacher, Professor E. S. Brooks, by his pupils. Colonel Oliver Spencer, of the Continental army in the Revolution, who died here in 1811; Colonel Robert Elliott, who was barbarously murdered by the Indians near Colerain in 1794; the Rev. Dr. Joshua L. Wilson, for thirty-eight years pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, in Cincinnati; the Rev. J. T. Brooke, D.D., whose prayer lent interest to the consecration ceremonies of the cemetery in 1845; and many other local celebrities, repose here under fitting memorials in marble and granite. During or soon after the war, the city council voted a grant of ten thousand dollars as the nucleus of a fund for a soldiers' monument in the cemetery, which has not yet been built upon this foundation. In 1864, however, a soldiers' monument was erected by voluntary subscription at the junction of Lake Shore and Central avenues, in the park—a bronze statue of a Union soldier on guard, upon a pedestal of granite. It was cast by William Miller, of Munich, from a design by Rudolph Rogers. Close by this are the three lots in which are soldiers' graves—one of them given by the board of directors to the State, the other two purchased by the State, but now the property of the General Government. The graves occupy three consecutive knolls upon the lots. The pioneer lot is also an attractive place, but is yet without monument or any considerable number of interments. During the year ending September 30, 1880, Superintendent Strauch estimated in his annual report that the grounds were visited by more than a quarter of a million of people, exclusive of those with funerals. The system of laying out, adornment, and management of burial-places adopted by the board twenty-five years before bade fair to be applied, he said, by all the leading American and European cemeteries. A new mortuary chapel, with receiving tombs at the entrance, was rapidly approaching completion, and has since been finished. About thirty thousand dollars were expended on it in 1879-80. The introduction 0f many new varieties of trees and shrubs adapted to this latitude, together with the preservation of the trees native to the site, promised to make of the cemetery at no distant day an extensive and instructive. arboretum. The total number of interments to the date mentioned, inclusive, according to the report of Secretary Spear, was 34,498; number of single graves occupied, 5,862; soldiers' graves, 996; lot-holders, 7,133. The receipts of the financial year had been $74,903.80; expenditures, $75,119.12. The resources of the cemetery association, including cash, United States securities, and bills receivable, aggregated $148,573.68. The following-named gentlemen have filled the offices in the gift of the association: President—Robert Buchanan (until his death), Henry Probasco. Secretary—S. C. Parkhurst, James Pullan, H. Daniels, John Lea, E. J. Handy, D. G. A. Davenport, Cyrus Davenport, S. B. Spear. Treasurer—G. Taylor, D. H. Horne, John Shillito, William H. Harrison. Superintendent—Howard Daniels, Dennis Delaney, Henry Earnshaw, Adolph Strauch. Directors—J. C. Culbertson, N, Wright, D. C. Loring, R. G. Mitchell, C. Stetson, Griffin Taylor, William Neff, A. H. Ernst, R. Buchanan, S. C. Parkhurst, James Pullen, D. H. Home, William Resor, George K. Shoenberger, William Orange, K. Yardley, John P. Foote, W. B. Smith, Archibald Irwin, Peter Neff, Larz Anderson, T. H. Weasner, M. Werk, Henry Probasco, Robert Hosea, John Shillito, William H. Harrison, Andrew Erkenbrecher, Charles Thomas, Rufus King, George W. McAlpin, Augustus S. Winslow. CHAPTER XLI. THE CITY GOVERNMENT. MR. JAMES PARTON, in an essay contributed to the Atlantic Monthly in 1867, said: Cincinnati is governed by and for her own citizens, who take the same care of the public money as of their own private store. We looked into the council chamber of Cincinnati one morning, and we can testify that the entire furniture of the appartment, though it is substantial and sufficient, cost about as much as some single articles in the councilman's room of New York City hall—say the clock, the chandelier, or the chairman's throne. The whole of this commendation has not been deserved at all times in the history of Cincinnati. Yet many great and g0od men have been connected with the administration of her municipal affairs; and there are many clean pages in her public records. The government of the Queen City will compare favorably with that of any other large municipality in the land. THE CIVIL LIST. This place was not incorporated as a village until January 1, 1802, when it had but about eight hundred inhabitants. Before that it was governed under the township organization. By the tenth section of the charter, officers were appointed until the next general election was held on the first Monday of April, in the same year. They were: Major David Ziegler, president; David E. Wade, William Ramsey, Charles Avery, John Rieley, 380 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. William Stanley, Samuel Dick, and William Ruffin, trustees; Jacob Burnet, recorder; Joseph Prince, assessor; Abraham Carey, collector; James Smith, town marshal. Thenceforward these officers were elected by the people. The succession under this charter and the amendment of 1815 was as follows: PRESIDENTS. David Ziegler, 1802-3; Joseph Prince, 1804; James Findlay, 1805-6, 18i0-!1; Martin Baum, 1807, 1812; Daniel Symmes, 1808-9; William Stanley, 1813; Samuel W. Davies, 1814. The names of the following additional officers are also preserved: RECORDERS. Jacob Burnet, 1802, 1812; Charles Kilgour, 1803; Aaron Goforth, 1805-9; James Andrews, 1810-Ii; Samuel W. Davies, 1813; Griffin Yeatman, 1814; Oliver M. Spencer, 1815-16; Martin Baum, 1817-18; John- VV. Armstrong, 1818. CLERKS OF COUNCIL. John Reily, 1802; Matthew Nimrur, 1804; Griffin Yeatman, 1805-6; John Mahard, 1807; William McFarland and Daniel Drake, 1813; William Corry, 1814; William Ruffin, 1815; George P. Torrence, 1816; Jesse Embree, 1817-18. MARSHALS. James Smith, 1802; Andrew Brannan, 1813; James Chambers, 1814-18. TREASURERS. Jacob Williams, 1813; Davis Embree, 1814; David Kilgour, 1815-16; Jacob Wheeler, 1817-18. MAYORS. January 10, 1815, a new act of incorporation was granted by the legislature, under which a mayor instead of president was elected by the trustees from among their number. But one mayor was chosen in this way until the city government was formed: William M. Corry, 1815-19. By act 0f the general assembly of February 5, 1819, Cincinnati was incorporated as a city. The legislative power was vested in a president, recorder, and nine trustees. The usual powers granted to city corporations at that time were conceded in this case, including the power "to fix the assize of bread," "to prevent every description of animals from running at large," and "to levy taxes on hogs and dogs, and on all property subject to taxation for county purposes." Taxes on real property, however, could not exceed one per cent, on its valuation, unless a larger levy was authorized by vote of the people. A city court, consisting of a mayor and three aldermen, was appointed by the city council from the citizens at large, with sessions once in two months, and original jurisdiction over all crimes and misdemeanors committed in the city, when the punishment did not amount to confinement in the penitentiary. It had appellate jurisdiction from the decision of the mayor (who was ex officio justice of the peace), in all' cases, and concurrent jurisdiction with the court of common pleas in all cases where the defendant resided within the city, and where the title to real estate was not in issue. The mayo1 determined, in the first instance, all cases arising under the corporate laws and ordinances. Under this rule of appointment but one mayor was appointed, but he by successive reappointments for twelve years: Isaac G. Burnet, 1819-27. After that, the mayor by a new charter, taking effect March 1, 1827, was elected by.popular suffrage; under which the following-named gentlemen served: Isaac G. Burnet, 1827-31; Elisha Hotchkiss, 1831-33; Samuel W. Davis, 1833-43; Henry E. Spencer, 1843-5 1. The following-named were in service under the provisions of the constitution of 1852: Mark P. Taylor, 1851-3; David T. Snelbaker, 1853-5; James J. Faran, 1855-7; N. W. Thomas, 1857-9; Richard M. Bishop, 1859-61; George Hatch, 1861-3; Len. A. Harris, 1863-7; Charles F. Wilstach, 1867-9; John F. Torrence, 1869-71; S. S. Davis, 1871-3; G. W. C. Johnson, 1873-7; Robert M. Moore, 1877-9; Charles Jacob, jr., 1879-81. PRESIDENTS OF COUNCIL. These were identical with president or mayor until the city organization: Jesse Hunt, 1819; William Oliver, 1821; Samuel Perry, 1822-3; Calvin Fletcher, 1824-5; Lewis Howell, 1826.8; Daniel Stone, 1829-30; E. S. Haines, 1831 and 1834-5; N. G. Pendleton, 1832-3; George W. Neff, 1836-8; Edward Woodruff, 1839-41; Samuel Freer, 1842; William Stephenson, 1843; Septimius Hazen, 1844; D. E. Strong, 1845; J. G. Rust, 1846; N. W. Thomas, 1847; William P. Statton, 1848; Daniel F. Meader, 1849; J. B. Warren, 1850 and 1856-9; William B. Cassily, 185 r ; A. Griffin, 182; James C0oper, 1853; Charles F. Wilstach, 1854-5; John F. Torrence, 1860-r; Christian Von Seggern, 1862; Theodore Marsh, 1863; Thomas H. Weasner, 1864-6; Samuel L. Hayden, 1867-8; Josiah L. Keck, 1869. The city legislature was now divided into two chambers, each with its own presiding officer. PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF COUNCILMEN. A. T. Goshorn, 1870-2; 1. J. Miller, 1873-4; James W. Fitzgerald, 1875-6; Benjamin Eggleston, 1877-9; Lewis L. Sadler, i880-l. PRESIDENTS OF THE BOARD OF ALDERMEN. George T. Davis, 1870; S. F. Covington, 1871; Josiah L. Keck, 1872; W. T. Bishop, 1873-4; Julius Reis, 1875, 1878-9; W. W. Sutton, 1876; Charles Winkler, 1877; Gabriel Dirr, i880—r. CLERKS OF COUNCIL John Tuttle and R. L. Coleman, 1819; William Disney, 1820; William Ruffin, 182!; Thomas Tucker, 1822-3; Daniel Rue, 1824; John Gibson, 1825-8; John T. Jones, 1829-3!; Charles Satterly, 1832-49; William G. Williams, 1850-3; Stephen B. Hulse, 1854-7; Samuel L. Corwin, 1858-61; George M. Casey, 1862-3; H. G. Armstrong, 1864-6; Julius F. Blackburn, 186772; R. C. Rohner, 1874-9; Edwin Henderson,.1880-81. RECORDERS. William Oliver, 1819-20; James Perry, 182!; Thomas Henderson, 1822-3; Charles Tatem, 1824; Oliver Lov- HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 381 ell, 1825-7, 1830-3, 1839-40; Samuel R. Miller, 1828-9; Ebenezer Hinman, 1834-8; Jonah Martin, 1841; William Stephenson, 1842; D. E. A. Strong, 1843; L. E. Brewster, 1844; Joseph G. Rust, 1845; N. W. Thomas, 1846; Daniel F. Meader, 1847; Caleb Brudsall, 1848; Benjamin Dennis, 1849; Thomas Bodley, 1850; Charles F. Wilstach, 1851. The office was then abolished. TREASURERS. Jacob Wheeler, 1819; Richard L. Coleman, 1820-30; Stephen McFarland, 1831-2; James Conly, 1833-4; Samuel Scott, 1835-41; William Disney, 1843-50; James Johnston, 1851-9; E. B. Townsend, 1860-1; J. M. Noble, 1862-3; Adolph Carnes, 1864-6; Ezekiel De Camp, 1867-8; Robert Moore, 1869-74; August Ligowski, 1875-6; Henry Knorr, 1877-80. AUDITORS. Cyrus Davenport, 1853-5; S. S. McGibbons, 1856-8; Emanuel Wassenich, 1859-61; George Stackhouse, 1862-3; Charles S. Betts, 1864-5; Harry H. Them, 1866-8; Charles H. Titus, 1869-71; William B. Folger, 1871-2; S. W. Huffman, 1873-9. COMPTROLLER. E. C. Eshelby, 1880-1. MARSHALS. William Ruffin, 1819-20; Samuel R. Miller, 1821; John C. Avery, 1822-4; William C. Anderson, 1825-6; Zebulon Byington, 1827-8; William Doty, 1828-32; Jesse Justice, 1833-4; James Laffin, 1835-46; Ebenezer Hulse, 1847-8; Charles L. Ruffin, 1849-54; William Craven, 1855-7; Benjamin Robinson, 1858; John S. Gano, 1859. The office was then merged in that of chief (afterwards superintendent) of police. CHIEFS OF POLICE. Jacob Kiefer, 1853; David T. Hoke, 1854-5; James L. Ruffin, 1857-9, 1864-6, 1869-70; Lewis Wilson, 18601; John W. Dudley, 1862-3; Robert McGrew, 1867-8; David M. Bleaks, 1870-1; (superintendents of police), Jeremiah Kiersted, 1872 and 1874; Eugene Daylor, 1873-4; Th0mas E. Snellbaker, 1874-5; Ira Wood, 1875-7; George W. Zeigler; 1877-8; Charles Wappenstein, 1878-80; Enoch T. Carson, 1880-1. PROSECUTING ATTORNEYS. Nathaniel G. Pendleton, 1819; Bellamy Storer, 1825; W. M. Dickson, 1853; Thomas A. Logan, 1854-5; H. Brown, 1856-9; E. M. Johnson, 1860-1; F. C. Jones, 1861-3; Walter F. Straub, 1863-7; C. H. Blackburn, 1867-8; Isaac J. Neall, 1868-9; Moses F. Wilson, 186970; Thomas C. Campbell, 1871-5; Charles E. Callahan, 1875-7; John P. Murphy, 1877-81. CITY SOLICITORS. E. A. Ferguson,' 1852-3; Patrick McGroarty, 1854-5; Samuel Hart, 1856-8; Rutherford B. Hayes, 1859-60; Thomas C. Ware, 1861-3; Thomas J. Gallagher, 1864-5; Edward F. N0yes, 1866; Henry A. Morrill, 1867-8; J. Bryant Walker, 1869-70; Fred W. Moore, 1871-2; John W. Warrington, 1873-4; Robert 0. Strong, 1875; Hiram D. Peck, 1876; Clement S. Bates, 1877-8; Philip H. Kumler, 1879-80. POLICE JUDGES. William L. Spooner, 1853-5; Andrew J. Pruden, 18569; D. P. Lowe, 1860-1; James Laffin, 1861-3; John B. Warren, 1863-7; Walter F. Straub, 1867-73; Nathan Marchant, 1873-5; George Lindeman, 1875-7; Moses F. Wilson, 1877-81. COMMERCIAL COURT. 1849-52.—Thomas M. Key, judge; Edward P. Cranch, clerk. CRIMINAL COURT. 1851-2.—Jacob Flynn, judge; Daniel Gano, clerk. OLD SUPERIOR COURT. Judges—David K. Este, 1838-45; Charles D. Coffin, 1845-6; William Johnston, 1847-50; Charles P. James, 1850-I; George Hoadly, 1851-3. NEW SUPERIOR COURT. Judges—Oliver M. Spencer, 1854-61; William Y. Gholson, 1854-9; Bellamy Storer, 1854-71; George Hoadly, 1860-5; Charles D. Coffin, 1862-3; Stanley Matthews, 1864; Charles Fox, 1865-8; Alphonso Taft, 1866-71; M. B. Hagans, 1869-73; J. L. Miner, J. Bryant Walker, 1872; Alfred Gaple, 1873-8; T. A. O'Connor, 1873-7; M. H. Tilden, 1874-8; Manning F. Force, 1878; Judson Harmon, 1879; J. B. Foraker, 1879. Clerks—James M. McMaster, 1854; Thomas H. Spooner, 1855-7; Richard H. Stone, 1858-61; Charles E. Cist, 1862-5; Benjamin T. Horton, 1866; T. B. Disney, 1867-70; Henry H. Tinker, 1871-3; William M. Trevor, 1874-7; Louis G. Barnard, 1878; Samuel W. Ramp, 1879. CITY SURVEYORS. Joseph Gest, 1834-41; Erasmus Gest, 1844-6; William G. Halpin, 1851; Thomas J. Peter, 1857; Joseph Earnshaw, 1858-9. CIVIL ENGINEERS. A. W. Gilbert, 1851-5; S. W. Irwin, 1856-7; Thomas J. Peter, 1858-9, 1862-3; A. W. Gilbert, 1859-6, 1864-6; Jacob Writh, 1868; R. C. Phillips, 1869-70; A. Hickenlooper, 1871-2; A. E. Tripp, 1872-4; W. G. Halpin, 1875; A. L. Anderson, 1876-8; C. N. Dannenhower, 1879; H. J. Stanley, 1880-1. CHIEF ENGINEERS FIRE DEPARTMENT. Miles Greenwood, 1853-6; F. Clements, 1857; E. G. Megrue, 1858-77; Joseph Bunker (fire-marshal), 1878-81. PROMOTIONS. Said Mayor Moore, in his annual message of April, 1879 : Connected with our city government in some capacity, at various times, have been two presidents of the United States, General W. H. Harrison and R. B. Hayes; one chief justice of the United States, S. P. Chase; five United States Senators, Jacob Burnet, S. P. Chase, George E. Pugh, Stanley Matthews, George E. Pendleton; one secretary of treasury, S. P. Chase; secretary of war and attorney general, Alphonso Taft; five governors of Ohio, Noyes, Young, Chase, Hayes, Bishop; a governor to Arizona, John A. Gurley; the following representatives to Congress: W. H. Harrison, John W. Gazlay, N. G. Pendleton, Alexander Long, W. S. Groesbeck, R. B. Hayes, Ozro J. Dodds, Milton Sayler, T. C. Day. ORGANIZATION. The city is divided into twenty-five wards. Its successive subdivisions into wards, from the original form of the 382 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. early day, may be learned from an observation of the census table, affixed to our chapter of annals of the Ninth Decade. These are further subdivided into fifty-five voting districts, with as many polling-places. This subdivision was made by Mayor Johnson, with a small force of assistants, in 1877, at a cost of less than two hundred dollars. It would be a bootless and most elaborate task to follow the city government through all its statutory changes since the charter of 1827 was granted; especially through the manifold "reorganizations" of recent years. At present the great municipality is governed and adjudged by a mayor, board of councilmen, board of aldermen, superior court, police court, solicitor, prosecuting attorney, city clerk, treasurer, comptroller, superintendents of police, of markets, of street cleaning, and of sanitary police, fire marshal, health officer, chief engineer, a wharf master and wharf register, a weigher, a sealer of weights and measures, and a milk and sundry other inspectors. There are also boards of education, union board of high schools, of public works, of fire commissioners, of examiners of insecure buildings, of revision, and a special board of equalization, a sinking fund commission, boards of managers of the public library, trustees of the Cincinnati Southern railway, and of directors of the university of Cincinnati, of trustees of the city hospital, of the house of refuge and of the work-house, directors of the infirmary and overseers of the out-door poor department. The hoard of public works includes the water-works department and the engineer's department, with its bureaus of sewers and highways, the latter with its several divisions of streets, sidewalks, and bridges, each with its full equipment of officers. Some of these boards deserve a brief special notice. SINKING FUND COMMISSION. This board was created by act of the legislature in May, 1877, and has plenary powers ove1 all moneys, or other property, which, under the law, is to be used exclusively for the liquidation of the public debt. They provide for the undue indebtedness of the city, certifying to the city council the amounts necessary to provide for the payment of the bonded indebtedness of the city and the interest upon it. The council must place these in the tax ordinance, in preference to any other items, if necessary. They also receive the earnings of the Southern railroad and all rents due the city. The original appointees, chosen from among the oldest, wealthiest, and most reputable citizens of Cincinnati, were Messrs. Joseph Longworth, president; James H. Laws, Lewis Seasongood, W. F. Thorne, and Aaron F. Perry. The members of the board are appointed by the judges of the superior court, to serve five years, and receive no compensation, but furnish bonds of one hundred thousand dollars each, for the faithful performance of their duties. Their duties, in view of the large debt now upon the city, are justly considered of the highest importance. Within two years after its creation, a sinking fund of one million six hundred thousand dollars was raised, and two hundred thousand dollars of the maturing bonds also purchased. In 1880 general bonds were redeemed to the amount of two hundred and twelve thousand dollars, interest charges paid to amount of one million, six hundred and forty-six thousand four hundred and sixty-eight dollars and twenty-five cents; and one hundred and fourteen thousand seven hundred and eighty-three dollars and nineteen cents bought by the commission as an investment. Last year the board, of which Mr. Julius Dexter had become a member, in place of Mr. Lewis Seasongood, engaged very rapidly in the prosecution of the late city auditor, Mr. S. W. Hoffman, for alleged malfeasance in office. It has regular monthly meetings on the second business day of each month, and annual meetings on the third Monday of April. BOARD OF REVISION. This body—a small one in point of numbers, but important, was created by act of assembly in 1869. It consisted of the mayor, the president of the city council, and the city solicitor, and was not fully organized until April, 1873, under the administration of Mayor Johnston. The president of the board of aldermen was added to the original number. The revision board has in charge, as its name partly implies, the legal supervision and revision of mistakes, errors, or misdemeanors, in any department of the city government. In its first few months of full organization, it received and considered a large number of administrative and legal questions ; but, having no secretary with power to inspect the books of city officers and report results, its efficiency was much impaired. The council declined to appropriate enough fo1 clerical work, and the meetings of the board, for nearly ten years, were few and of little importance. The board did not exhibit much activity until March 8, 1878, when the requisite authority having been secured, it convened and appointed S. W. Ramp—afterwards J. M. W. Neff, and finally, upon the declination of both these gentlemen, Mr. George B. Johnston, its secretary. He soon set about the minute inspection of the books and accounts in the several city offices—first in the city auditor's, and then in the office of the fire departments. His reports have been made to the board, and have been the basis of various important steps taken by it. It has met of late years on the first Monday of every month, and by its industry and the value of its work, has done much to atone for the quiescence of the first few years of its existence. The board now consists of the mayor, the presidents, respectively,-of the boards of councilmen and aldermen, and the city solicitor. THE PLATTING COMMISSION. An act of the State legislature, dated March 13, 187, authorizes the appointment of platting commissioners, prescribing the manner of their appointment, regulating their organization, and defining their powers and duties. Under this statute the common council of Cincinnati, August 3, 1871, elected a platting commission for the city, as follows: A. P. C. Bonte, Kenner Garrard, J. H. Rhodes, A. Moor, and A. S. Winslow. It afterwards, by HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 383 resolution, designated the territory to be platted, and by an ordinance provided necessary for the purposes of the commission. Its members at once set about obtaining actual surveys, the exact information necessary to full and correct platting, by determining the boundaries of property and the location of existing roads and streets. So effective and energetic was its subsequent work that at the close of 1815 little more than four years after the creation of the commission, Mayor Johnston was able to make, in his annual message, the following reference to its work : The city is now mainly platted. This is a work of great value to the people, and will be appreciated not only by this, but by all coming generations. "It will settle amicably, hereafter, a very large number of expensive litigations in regard to the area of landed property, and quiet many titles that would otherwise be disputed. The labors of the commission have now ceased. THE TAX-PAYERS' LEAGUE is not a branch of the city government, but rather an influence upon it from without. Ex-governor Jacob D. Cox is president of the league. Mr. Julius Dexter, of the sinking fund commission, is secretary. Its last regular meeting was held December , 1880, in College hall, when reports of the condition of the city's finances were made and discussed. TAXES. The following comparative statement of taxation in the city for a number of years in the middle section of its history, is not without interest and value. It was made for his Cincinnati Miseellany by the late Mr. Charles J, Cist: 1826, $4,735.08; 1827, $5,538.45; 1828, $5,607-19; 1829, $22,257.46; 1830, $22,526.31; 1831, $25,334.26; 1832, $37,630.50; 1833, $41,167.42; 1834, $51, 654. 39 ; 1835, $69, 721. go; 1836, $69,599.52; 1837, $70,056.90; 1838, $80,771.88; 1839, $98,352.05; 1841, $98,352.05; 1842, $148,453.04; 1843, $146,201.50; 1844, $149,323.54; 1845, $155,300.68. Official statements bring the statistics down to the present day: 1846, $286,388.06; 1847, $362,747.93; 1848, $394,363.64; 1849, $547,936.18; 1850, $728,666.37; 1851, $665,742.35; 1852, $910,307.70; 1853, $1,236,561.87; 1854, $1,496,090.70; 1855, $1,262,897.02; 1856, $1,366,625.09; 1857, $1,296,676.36; 1858, $1,590,118.23; 1859, $1,525,841.20; 1860, $1,721,811.39; 1861, $1,920,865.32; 1862, $1,709,889.88; 1863, $1,878,847-45; 1864, $2,783,609.44; 1865, $3,050,000.00; 1866, $3,383,970.45; 1867, $4,304,677.92; 1868, $3,723,056.62; 1869, $4,119,413.79; 1870, $4,362,197.17; 1871, $4,661, 658.86 ; 1872, $3,589, 855.39; 1873, $4,348,625.72; 1874, $4,346,263.30; 1875, $4,670,186.67; 1876, $5,113,737.31; 1877, $5,419,613.29; 1878, $4,933,825.90. The tax levy for 1880 was three and one-tenth pe1 cent., upon a grand duplicate of about one hundred and sixty-seven million dollars. That of 1879 was two and eight hundred and eight-thousandths upon a valuation of one hundred and sixty-nine million three hundred and five thousand six hundred and thirty-nine dollars. In 1809 the tax levy in the village of Cincinnati was one-half of one per cent.; in 1810, two-fifths of one per cent.; Ind in 1811, thirty-five cents on the hundred dollars. THE RECEIPTS AND EXPENDITURES of the last year of the city government (1880), were, receipts four million eight hundred and eighty-seven thou->and seven hundred dollars and sixty-six cents, including ;even hundred and sixty thousand five hundred and thirty dollars and eight cents balance on hand at the beginning of the year, and disbursements, four million eight hundred and seventy-seven thousand seven hundred dollars and sixty-six cents, including one hundred and six thousand two hundred and forty-five dollars and eighty-one cents. Of disbursements by far the largest particular, more than twice the amount of any other, was for interest on the city debt, one million six hundred and sixteen thousand seven dollars and twenty-four cents. PUBLIC 1NDEBTEDNESS. About half a century ago (1830), the city owed eighty-two thousand two hundred and thirty-nine dollars and thirty-two cents, and had owing to it eight thousand seven hundred and eighty-six dollars and ninety-six cents. The legislature had just authorized the corporation to borrow one hundred thousand dollars. In April, 1869, its bonded indebtedness was four million five hundred and seven thousand dollars, and the value of its public property was eleven million three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. January 1, 1880, of twenty-six million one hundred and six thousand dollars bonded indebtedness issued, two million two hundred and two thousand five hundred dollars had been redeemed, and twenty-three million nine hundred and three thousand five hundred dollars were still outstanding. This indebtedness has been chiefly -to the amount of eight million dollars-incurred by the construction of the Southern railroad. THE CITY BUILDINGS, in the square bounded by Eighth, Ninth, and Plum streets, and Central avenue, were built in 1853. In 1860 about thirty thousand dollars were expended in improving and making additions to them. The city's charitable institutions have been noticed in our chapter on public charities. Its penal institutions will form the subject of the next chapter, and other branches of the city government will receive attention in chapters that follow. CHAPTER XLII. THE FIRE DEPARTMENT. WE follow the foregoing account of the city government with some brief chapters recording memoranda of history concerning the chief departments of the public service controlled by the city. Just as the last century was going out, in December, 1800, the good people of Cincinnati began to be much troubled with incendiary fires. Their arrangements for the quenching of fire were as yet, in a town of less than eight hundred inhabitants, and far in the wilderness west, of the most primitive character; and when, a year thereafter, several other conflagrations occurred, the purchase of a fire engine began to be seriously mooted. A meeting was held to consider the matter; but nothing came of the discussion, as there were yet no village authorities 384 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. to give the movement municipal authority. But when, the next year, Cincinnati received its first village charter, a meeting of citizens was held July 14th, in the new court-house, at the southeast corner of Walnut and Fifth streets, to pass upon the expenditure of forty-six dollars by the select council, of which twelve dollars were to be appropriated for six fire-ladders, and a like sum for as many fire-hooks. With these public equipments the villagers had to be contented until 1808, when the council bought THE FIRST FIRE ENGINE. Another account, which we have embodied in the annals of the Second Decade, says that the engines were purchased by the council on the third of September, 1807—one to be used on the bottom, the other on the hill; but the former statement is the more probable. The engine procured was a very poor one, and must have been wholly inefficient by 1810, since it receives no mention in the recollections of that year by Mr. S. S. L'Hommedieu, as given in his Pioneer Address. He says that then, whenever a fire oceurred, "every one able to labor was required to be on hand with his long leather fire-bucket, and form in line to the river, to pass buckets with water to the fire. Every householder was 1equired to keep one of these hung up, marked, and ready for instant use." In the address from which this extract is made, Mr. L'Hommedieu expressed the opinion that in 1870 Cincinnati, in her steam fire-engines and well ordered fire department, excelled any other city. The Union Fire company, comprising nearly all the men and well grown boys in the village, was organized the same year the engine was bought. Its organization proved to be about as ineffieient as that of its engine. For two years before 1815, says the Picture of Cincinnati that year, it had held no meeting. A second company was formed about 1815. A second engine had been provided for by public taxation imposed by the select council two years ago, but it had not yet been purchased. The village ordinances, now required, as in the days of which Mr. L'Hommedieu speaks, that each house should be furnished with a fire-bucket, and that all male citizens of fifteen to fifty years should attend upon an alarm of fire, and that upon the occurrence of each conflagration every drayman in town should provide at least two barrels of water. Bonfires and -all other burnings on the streets or in-lots were "expressly but not successfully forbidden," says Dr. Drake, who also notes that the first, at least, of the foregoing provisions was disregarded by the majority of the inhabitants. A WEAK DEPARTMENT. The Directory of the year 1819, the year when the city proper had its birth, contains the following not over-flattering notice of the department of that day: There are two engines owned by the corporation, but, strange as it may appear, neither of them are kept in proper repair. A most unpardonable apathy on this subject pervades our citizens generally. Almost destitute of ladders, fire-hooks, buckets (or even water in most parts of the city), should the fiery element assail us in a dry and windy season, the denouement of the awful tragedy would be a general devastation of our now flourishing city. The most practicable means ought immediately to be taken for creating a supply of water, the number of engines increased and put in working condition, and every other apparatus procured which can be of service in restricting the 1avages of this powerful destroyer. Otherwise the "good easy man," who 1etires to his couch meditating on the competency of his fortune, may stalk forth a beggar in the morning. AN IMPROVEMENT. The Directory of 1825 gives a little better account the department. It now "consists of four engine companies, one hose company, one hook and ladder company, a protection company and a protection society." Thomas Tucker was chief engineer and Jeremiah Kiersted assistant. "There are one hundred and fifty-five firemen and sixteen fire wardens. . The utensils of the fire department are in first rate repair, and the companies well organized and ready on the first notice to do their duty." This was something like a department. Each of the engine companies numbered about twenty-five, whose foreman was then called captain. The hose company also numbered twenty-five, and had in charge eighteen hundred feet of hose; the ho0k and ladder company, thirty, with a pretty good equipment for that day. The bucket company was specially charged with the preservation of the fire-buckets. The protection company numbered about fifty, and included many of the leading men in the place. The firemen were said by the authors of Cincinnati in 1826 to "keep the engines in excellent order, and in cases of fire are prompt, active, and persevering. The city council had just seconded their efforts nobly by constructing five substantial brick cisterns in different parts of the city, holding five thousand gallons each, and kept constantly filled through the pipes from the primitive water-works of the period. There was already a popular call, however, for an increase to thrice the number. In 1829 nine organized companies ccmposed the fire department of Cincinnati—Fire Warden Company, No. ; John L. Avery, president; Moses Brooks, secretary; twenty members. Fire Engine Company, No. r; Hugh Gilbreath, foreman; S. R. Teal, assistant ; thirty-five members. Fire Engine Company, No. 2 ; A. G. Dodd, foreman; J. S. Ross, assistant; thirty-five members. Fire Engine Company, No. 3; William Brown, foreman; thirty-five members. Fire Engine Company, No. 4; Thomas Baruise, foreman; John Morris, assistant; thirty-five members. Hook and Ladder Company, No. 1; E. D. Williams, foreman; S. Carrington, assistant; thirty-five members. Hose Company, No. r; thirty-five members. Protection society, for the protection of exposed property during an alarm of fire ; Joseph Gest, president; William Mills, vice-president; David Churchill, secretary; Stephen Burrows, treasurer; seven directors; fifty members, with privilege of one hundred; composed principally of respectable, substantial householders. Fire Bucket company, A. M. Ferguson, foreman; Nathaniel Reeder, assistant. Seven brick cisterns had been constructed in eligible situations, each to contain five thousand gallons of water. They were connected with the pipes of the water-works, and so were easily replenished when empty. Two of these—at the intersection of Main and Eighth, and the junction of Fourth and Syca- HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 385 more streets, had been made only theyear before. Zebulon Byington was chief engineer, Moses Coffin, assistant. A STRONG DEPARTMENT. In 1831 the city had ten public cisterns, and ten more were projected. The Water company had put in fifty fire-plugs, and kept them in repair and furnished with water. The department consisted of eight companies, the same as in 1829, except the hose company, in place of which the Cincinnati Independent Fire Engine and Hose company had been organized, under a charter granted February 22, 1830. The city council, the insurance companies, and the citizens generally had subscribed liberally in aid of the company, and it had apparatus valued at four thousand dollars—an eight-inch double-chamber engine of thirty-four men-power, discharging four and five-fifths gallons per stroke, in two streams; a suction engine, with double seven-inch chambers, of thirty men-power, discharging four gallons at each stroke. Both engines were finished in the best style of the time. The company also had one thousand five hundred feet of the best eight and one-half-inch hose, carried, on a double hose-reel. A-new engine-house had been contracted for, to go up on Fourth street, near Broadway. George W. Neff was president of the company; Joseph Pierce, vice-president; Charles D. Dana, secretary; Kirk-bride Yardley, treasurer. THE FIRE BRIGADES. In 1836 the department was organized into eight brigades, each brigade consisting of tw0 engines and a hose company, together manned by one hundred and fifty firemen. A chief or director was appointed for each brigade with one or more assistants, a secretary and treasurer. The brigades were designated, respectively, as Washington Fire Engine Company No. , manning the Pat Lyon and Ohio engines and the Ranger hose carriage; Relief Fire Engine No. 2, with the Relief and Cincinnati engines and Reliance hose carriage; Independence Fire Company No. 3, Constitution and Liberty engines and veteran hose; Franklin Fire Company No. 4, Neptune and Atlantic Engines and Nymph hose; Brigade Fire Company No. 5, Fame engine and Canal hose; Cincinnati Independence Fire Company No. 1, Waterwitch and Pilot engines and Red Rover hose; Cincinnati Independent Fire Company No. 2, Cataract and Deluge engines and Pioneer hose; Independent No. 3, Buckeye, with Buckeye and Niagara engines and Diligent hose. There were also the Fire Warden C0mpany No. , composed of six members from each ward; the Cincinnati Fire Guards No. 1, Protection Society No. 1, whose object is defined above; and Hook and Ladder Company No. 1; besides the Cincinnati Fire association, composed of persons from the different fire companies, for the mutual benefit of the department. The fire cisterns now numbered twenty-seven, all supplied from the water-works, as also fifty-five cast-iron plugs. In 1834 it was noted by the Directory that "much attention has been bestowed by the city council upon this important department. There are belonging to it fifteen engines and ten thousand one hundred and fifty feet of hose. It is divided into brigades, each of which has two engines, a hose company, and one hundred and fifty members in it. There are belonging to this department fifteen engines, seven hose-reels, one hundred and eighty-six buckets, and seven brigades, besides one engine belonging to the boys." The last-named feature, with which we have not met before in these inquiries, was the Vigilant Fire Engine and Bucket company, of seventy-five members, mostly youths. Benjamin Brice was president; Henry Pierce, vice-president; James Gilbreath, secretary; William Coppin, treasurer; Samuel James, foreman and engineer; Miller Ayres, fore- man of the bucket company. William Headly was chief engineer of the department in special charge of the cisterns and fire-plugs. An eminently respectable feature was the Cincinnati Fire Engine and Hose Company No. 2, of which Belamy Storer was president, and several leading citizens in other offices. The company had been incorporated by act of legislature January 15, 1833. FORTY YEARS AGO. In 1840–1 the department consisted of eleven companies. They were: Washington No. r, with two engines and one hundred and four members, including the hose company; Relief, ninety-six members; Independence, eighty-eight; Franklin, seventy-four; Fame, seventy-four; Fulton; Independent, one hundred and twenty-nine; Fire Engine and Hose and Independent No. 2, eighty-one; Cincinnati Fire Guards, sixty-six; and the Hook and Ladner company, forty-two. The Protection society numbered four hundred and seventy-one, and the company of Fire Wardens No. r had thirty-two members. Each of the engine companies had two engines and a hose cart in charge. The public cisterns numbered thirty-four, with thirty-five fire plugs. The Cincinnati Fire association was organized in the latter year, of seven men from each company and five fire wardens. Its objects were to regulate the department, settle disputes arising between the companies, and provide benefits for sick and disabled members. Josiah J. Stratton was president, Teuton Lawson, treasurer, and John D. Lovell, secretary. A TRANSITION PERIOD. The volunteer department in Cincinnati, as in other cities, was subject t0 many abuses, which need n0t be detailed here, as they are well known to all wh0 have given any thought or inquiry to the subject. The time at length arrived when a change seemed absolutely necessary to the peace and safety of the city at times of fire, or even of fire alarm. A few leading citizens, prominent among them Messrs. Miles Greenwo0d and James H. Walker, then a councilman from the Fifth ward, early in the seventh decade of the city, began to move for a reform in the department. Most fortunately for their purposes, about this time came in the era of THE STEAM FIRE ENGINE. ne of the earliest of these engines built in this country, and the first that was practicable for ready use, was constructed in Cincinnati. It has been somewhat described on page 328 of this volume, in our chapter on manufacturing. An engraving issued by way of frontis- 49 386 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. piece to the First Annual Report of the chief engineer of the department, April , 1854, represents this primitive steam fire engine, the Uncle Joe Ross, the first in use in Cincinnati, and, except one for a short, time in New York, anywhere in America. It was of the construction of Messrs. Shawk & Latta, of this city, and had then been in the service of the department for more than sixteen months, stationed on the north side of Eighth street, between Plum and Central avenue: It appears rude and clumsy in comparison with the elegant machines of the present day, and was heavy and difficult to move; but was strong and serviceable, doing its work well. The chief engineer reported this year: "If any doubt remained of the practicability of this invention for protecting property from destruction by fire, it must now be removed. The triumphant success of this invention has so completely satisfied every one that has seen it in operation, not only as a means of greater security to property, but in point of economy far beyond anything now in use." So much confidence had the new device inspired, that a sum had been raised by the citizens and insurance companies, sufficient to pay for another steamer, which was then almost 1eady for service. The contract for still another had been authorized by the council, but it was thought best not to orde1 it until the new one had been tested, so that the next steamer might be built with such improvements as the performance of the other suggested. He thought that when the engine nearly wady was placed in service, four or five of the existing hand engine companies in the heart of the city might be safely dispensed with, as was presently done. In 1880 a present citizen of Iowa, an old-time visitor to Cincinnati, recalled some memories of this engine in reply to an inquiry, which, with some abatement for errors not necessary to indicate, well justifies its reproduction here. "Yes, sir," was the response, "I drove the team that hauled the first steam Are engine ever built to the first fire on which streams were played by steam power. I'll tell you how it was: My brother worked in Miles Greenwood's foundry in Cincinnati—and I lived at Island Pond, Vermont—and in May, 1852, I believe, I went to Cincinnati to see him, arriving there Saturday evening. We were on our way to church Sun day morning, when the fire bells struck, and my brother said : ' Now we'll see what they will do with the steam machine, and we started for Miles Greenwood's shop, where the steam fire engine was. It was built by Greenwood--the first ever on wheels. There the engine stood, steam up, four large gray horses hitched to it, a crowd looking at it, and Greenwood mad as the devil because he couldn't get a man to drive the horses. You see all the firemen were opposed to this new invention because they believed it would spoil their fun, and nobody wanted to be stoned by them, and then the horses were kicking about so that everybody was afraid on that account. My brother says : 'Larry, you can drive those horses, I know I' And Greenwood said : 'If you can, I wish you pay you for it !' My business was teaming, you see. And just as I was, with my Sunday clothes on, I jumped 'on the back of a wheel horse, seized the rein, spoke to the horses, and out we went kiting. Miles Greenwood went ahead, telling the people to get out of the way—the streets were full of people. The horses went on a fast run nearly the whole way, and when we got to the fire we took suction from the canal, and played two streams on the building, a large frame house, and put the fire out. That was the biggest crowd I ever saw in my life, and the people yelled and shouted while some of the firemen who stood around the piano machines (hand fire engines) jeered and groaned. After the fire was out Greenwood put on two more streams, and four were played. Then the city hired me to drive the four horse team with the steamer, paying me seventy-five dollars a month. It was a great long, wide affair, with a tall heavy boiler— it was bigger than this room—and run on three wheels, two behind and one in front to guide it by. After a few weeks a fellow offered to do my work for fifty dollars a month, and they turned me off and hired him. The second fire he drove to he was run over and killed." In the same report cited Chief Greenwood recommended the purchase of the lot, then vacant, on the south side of Sixth street, between Vine and Race, for the use of the department, arguing its convenience to the lookout and alarm bell about to be placed upon the adjoining Mechanics' Institute building, and other important eonsiderations. The same thing had been under advisement by the authorities, and, before the chief engineer's report appeared in print, the purchase had been authorized by the city council. The handsome and convenient building subsequently erected upon it is the one now occupied as the headquarters of the department, and also by gift, steam engine company, No. 3, Phoenix hook and ladder company, No. , and the fire alarm telegraph. The cost of the department for the year reported (1853-4) was seventy-eight thousand four hundred and forty-four dollars and four cents, of which twelve thousand two hundred and seventy-three dollars and sixty-three cents was attributable to the change from the volunteer to the paid system.' Besides the steam fire-engine, fourteen hand-engine companies were still in service, two hook and ladder companies, and one hose company. The salary list of officers and men for the year was fifty-three thousand six hundred and thirty-nine dollars and one cent. The fires of the year numbered one hundred and sixty, with an estimated loss of six hundred and eighty thousand nine hundred and six dollars, of which three hundred and thirty thousand and eighty-nine dollars was covered by insurance. It was a notable period of transition in the organization of one of the finest fire departments in the world. MILES GREENWOOD. Mr. Greenwood had accepted service under the ordinance passed March 9, 1853, reorganizing the department and providing, in a limited way, for a paid department. Each member of a company employed by the city (none to be under twenty-one years of age) was to receive the munificent sum of sixty dollars per annum; each lieutenant, one hundred dollars; captains, one hundred and fifty dollars ; pipemen and drivers, three hundred and sixty-five dollars ; assistant engineers (four), three hundred dollars, and the chief engineer one thousand dollars a year. Mr. Greenwood, however, was practically serving without pay, while employing another person at a good salary to attend to his regular business. A writer in the Biographical Cyclopaedia and Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Men thus refers to his eminent service in this difficult work : Mr. Greenwood became connected with the fire department in 1829, when there was but one hose company in the city, and was president of the association several times. In 1853 the first steam fire engine was brought out to a fire by a number of picked men under the command of Mr. Greenwood. It was well understood that the buildings had been fired by the members of the volunteer company, who were bitterly opposed to the introduction of steam engines, for the purpose of hav- HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 387 ing an opportunity to smash it. Mr. Greenwood was soon surrounded by three hundred of these men, who were loud in their threats of vengeance. But his cool courage and resolute will daunted the rioters, so that everything dwindled into a threat that he would never get an office after that. Two other fires occurred the same night. It will be remembered that the city council took little or no interest in the great change in the fire department which the exigency of the times called for; and being determined to accomplish the work he had undertaken, he furnished fifteen thousand dollars of his own money, and obtained fifteen thousand dollars more from private citizens and insurance companies, who had confidence in the final success of the change. It was not until the change had been made that the council sanctioned it by paying the expenses attending it. Mr. Greenwood, however, had fully informed himself in regard to the will of the better class of citizens, and was determined to succeed with the moral support which they rendered him. He removed his family from the city to Avondale, previous to the struggle, and for the first eighteen months only slept at home six flights; and from his house on the corner of Race and Ninth streets answered every tap of the alarm bell. The council paid him one thousand dollars to attend to their business, and he paid one thousand five hundred dollars for a person to take his place in his own business; and to show that he was not actuated by mercenary motives, donated the one thousand dollars to the Mechanics' Institute. After the steam fire engine became a fixed fact in the Cincinnati fire department, a deputation from the city of Baltimore came on to examine its workings and compare the paid and volunteer systems. On being questioned as to the points of difference, Mr. Greenwood's answer was characteristic, and as follows: " 1st, it never gets drunk; end, it never throws brickbats, and the only drawback connected with it is, that it can't vote." As evidence that even the council were ultimately made sensible of the benefit accruing to the city from the services of Mr. Greenwood in this direction, we insert the following resolution: "Resolved, That the thanks of the citizens of Cincinnati are due to Miles Greenwood, chief engineer of the fire department, for the able and efficient manner in which he has discharged the duties of said office, bringing order out of confusion and saving property and life by systematized and well defined rules and regulations, and a personal supervision highly honorable to him, and immensely valuable to this city." A beautiful souvenir was presented to Mr. Greenwood, the inscription on which was as follows: " Presented to Miles Greenwood by the officers of the pay fire department, upon his retirement from the position of chief engineer of the department, as a tribute of their respect and esteem for his efficient services as a fireman, his hearing as an officer, and exemplary character as a citizen, for many years an active fireman, and the last two in organizing the present department,' the best the world can boast of." Mr. Greenwood had been prominent in the affairs of the department from the beginning of his connection with it, and was several times elected president of the firemen's association. The story of his battle with the volunteer companies and their sympathizers is retold by the writer of his biography in Cincinnati, Past and Present, from which we extract the following paragraphs: To Mr. Greenwood the Cincinnati fire department is mainly indebted for its efficient organization. The pay fire department, now in general use, is really his creation. From being a leading spirit in the old volunteer department, he saw the inevitably demoralizing tendencies of it upon the youth of cities, and conceiving the idea of adopting steam as a motive power in the extinguishing of fires, he next determined to have a paid, rather than a volunteer department. In this he met with a weight of opposition, both in the city council and the volunteer firemen that would have completely discouraged a man of less determination of character and persistence. For three months after the organization of the paid fire department of the city, the city council refused to recognize the change, or appropriate the money to pay the men; and during this time Mr. Greenwood advanced for this purpose fifteen thousand dollars to keep the men together by paying them regularly. Night and day he was constantly engaged fighting the opposition to the organization. He had no time to attend to his own business, but paid a man one thousand five hundred dollars to attend to it for him. Eventually he triumphed over every difficulty, and to-day such a thing as a volunteer fire department is unknown in any city of the first class in Europe or America. THE PAID DEPARTMENT. Thus the great reform was finally effected, while Baltimore, Philadelphia, and other cities were still afflicted with the rivalries and rowdyism of the old system. Mr. Greenwood personally settled all claims and difficulties between the city authorities and the old companies. The efficiency with which he took hold of abuses and promoted the reform of the department, is apparent in his first annual report. After the lapse of but six months from the institution of the new order of things, "the change for good was so manifest that even the opposition of the most clamorous advocates of the old system were hushed to silence," an at the end of a year he was enabled to say, in addition: In the semi-annual report that I had the privilege to present to your honorable body, I could not refrain from congratulating the city council upon the triumphant success which had crowned their efforts in the reform of the fire department, which the peace and good order of society so imperatively demanded ; the result of which, although scarcely six months had passed, the change for good was so manifest that soon the opposition of the most clamorous advocates of the old system were hushed into silence ; nor is the effect of the change now, after the first twelve months have elapsed, less manifest or worthy your confidence. Under the present control the engine houses are no longer nurseries where the youth of the city are trained up in vice, vulgarity and debauchery, and where licentiousness holds her nightly revels. The Sabbath day is no longer desecrated by the yells and fierce conflicts of rival fire companies, who sought the occasion afforded by false alarms, often gotten up for the purpose of making brutal assaults upon each other ; our citizens, male and female, pass our engine houses without being insulted by the coarse vulgarities of the persons collected around them. The safety and security of our citizens are no longer trampled under foot by men claiming a higher law, under the license of the name of firemen, to commit all manner of excesses with impunity. The temptation for the youths of our city to follow fire companies and attach themselves to them, is entirely done away. For all these good results let me congratulate the city council, and all who have so manfully and disinterestedly labored for the reform. LATER DEVELOPMENT. In 1858 the steam engines manned by the department already numbered seven. Two years thereafter the number was eleven with one hundred and fifty-one members in the department, including officers, and two hook and ladder companies. All the hand-engines had been retired, except one in the Seventeenth ward, which was still kept for local protection. The mayor this year characterized the department as "the most efficient in Ameriea," and Chief Megrue said: At no period since the organization of the fire department, has it reached so near perfection as now. As an achievement of human skill we point to it with pride, and in practical workings we have the attestation of an admiring world. The self-propelling steam fire engines were introduced about this time, or soon after; and in 1864 a splendid new machine of this kind, called the "John F. Torrence," was purchased for seven thousand dollars. Four years afterwards the "A. B. Latta" was added, named from the builder of the first steam fire engine in Cincinnati. The cost of the department in the latte1 year (1868-9) was two hundred and forty thousand five hundred and eighty-four dollars and thirteen cents. There were one hundred and eighty-three alarms and ninety fires, with a loss of four hundred and forty-seven thousand three hundred and eighty-two dollars, against which was a total insurance of two hundred and seventy-one thousand and 388 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. sixteen dollars. Some new and yet more powerful machines were being added. The department was now accounted the best in the world, and was famous throughout the country for its promptness and success in conquering the fire-fiend. In the annual 1eport of Chief Engineer Megrue for 1871, he said : The wonderful increase of Cincinnati, in territory, wealth, and population, cannot be better shown than by looking at the progress of the fire department. Fourteen years ago, when I was appointed chief engineer, there were only seven steam engines, and a few hand-engines, the task of which was to guard the small valley of twelve wards composing the city; while we now, have eighteen steamers in operation, or soon to be placed in service, placed at proper distances through the twenty-four wards of the city, which has a river front of some twelve miles with an average depth of about one half that distance. At the Chicago fire of October, in the next year, a part of the Cincinnati department was present, and rendered effective aid. That year three new steamers and two hook and ladder companies were added to its forces. The next year (1873) its organization was changed by an act of the general assembly. It was removed from the immediate care of the city council, and placed in charge of a board of fire commissioners appointed by the mayor and eonfirmed by the council. The first board was composed of the following citizens: P. W. Strader, president; George C. Sargent, George Weber, Henry Hanna, and Charles Kahn, jr. The board organized on the twenty-fifth of August, abolished the offices of foreman and outside pipeman of the companies, and employed a force of men on full time and pay.' Five Babc0ck chemical engines were contracted for, which have since rendered signal service. The department was taken from the board by legislative act March 17, 1877, but restored by the same authority February 14, 1878, when the judge of the police court appointed to the board Messrs. Weber and Sargent, together with John L. Thompson and William Dunn. A marked instance of the promptness and efficiency of the department was presented at the fire in Glendale May 14, 1880, when it was summoned by telegraph, and in forty-five minutes from the time when the dispatch was filed at the Glendale office, had an engine playing on the fire, in personal charge of Chief Engineer Bunker. Chief Megrue noted in 1875 that the losses by fire the year before were two hundred and forty thousand dollars less than in 1854, though the city had meanwhile doubled in population. Cincinnati, it may be here remarked, has never been visited by any of the great conflagrations of our history. It is protected, not only by its superb fire department, but by the environment of hills which breaks the force of prevailing winds; and the rates of insurance are therefore less than in any other large city in the United States. THE FIRE ALARM TELEGRAPH. After repeated appeals for this additional protective agency, through the annual messages of the mayor, reports of the chief engineer and otherwise, it was at last ordered by the city. A law of 1865 enabled the city council to raise a fund for it, and it was erected the next year by Messrs. J. F. Kennard & Co., of Boston. It was used also for police purposes, and at once amply jus tified the cause of its working, which was twenty-five thousand dollars the first year, and twenty thousand eight hundred dollars the second. It was extended in 1868 to Mount Adams, the Walnut Hills, the workhouse, and the west side of Mill creek. In 1873 still more extensive additions were made, in consequence of the annexations, and twenty-seven new signal boxes were also put up. THE CHIEF ENGINEERS. Besides those already noted—Thomas Tucker in 1825, and before and after, with Jeremiah Kiersted as assistant; Zebulon Byington about 1826, with Moses Coffin assistant; and William Hedley in 1833-4—we have the names of Miles Greenwood, 1852--6; Enoch G. Megrue, for twenty-one years, 1856--77; and since the latter date captain Joseph Bunker, formerly assistant engineer, and who has been connected with the department since 1854. RECENT STATISTICS. The expenses of the department for 188c were one hundred and eighty-nine thousand thirty-two dollars and forty-seven cents, against receipts of two hundred and two thousand one hundred dollars and seventy-six eents, yielding a balance of thirteen thousand sixty eight dollars and twenty-nine cents, of which five thousand dollars was reserved for a new engine, and seven thousand one hundred and sixty-seven dollars for an engine-house on Lick run. The alarms of the year were two hundred and seventy-eight, of which one hundred and fifty-four were still alarms. Losses by fire in the city aggregated four hundred and twenty-six thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight dollars and seventy-seven cents, with insurance three hundred and thirty-four thousand five hundred and forty-nine dollars and fifty-seven cents. During the year sixteen new alarm boxes were placed in position, and the entire alarm system has been renovated by removing the wires from houset0ps and placing them on poles. CHAPTER XLIII. THE WATER-WORKS. THERE was never any lack of water in Cincinnati, or scarcely anywhere else in the Miami country, one of the best watered tracts in all the world. THE FIRST WELL upon the site of the Queen City was excavated in 1791, inside the embattled precincts of Fort Washington, by a professional well-digger named Robert Shaw, otherwise "the water-witch," a queer characte1 of the early day, whose life, written and rudely illustrated by himself, may be seen in a very rare volume at the Cincinnati public library. THE WATER-CARTS. Two years afterwards, during the year in which Mr. David McCash, a stout Scotchman, immigrated hither HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 389 from Mason county, Kentucky, his eldest son made a contrivance of two stout poles, the front halves of 'which were used as shafts for the single horse employed to drag the affair, while a cross-piece about midway of the poles, a barrel, and two pegs to keep it in place, completed the singular outfit. With this the enterprising young William furnished the primitive Cincinnatians with their first water supply, away from their own premises. Jesse Reeder and others, long afterwards enlarged profitably upon the McCash idea, as will be seen in the extracts below. DR. DRAKE, IN EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND FIFTEEN, notes a few indifferent springs on the borders of the village, and others on the hillsides, but none with a sufficiency of water for distribution through the town. A number of wells, however, had been sunk—those east of Broadway to the depth of thirty to fifty feet; some of those on the northwest parts of the hill only twenty to forty feet, while, strange to say, those on the bottom had to be sunk forty to sixty feet. At points between Third and Sixth streets, west of Broadway, a depth of seventy to one hundred was necessary, in order to reach water. The find contained the usual salts, and in some wells was slightly impregnated with iron. (Sixty-two years afterwards, in 1877, the artesian well at Moerlein's brewery, on Elm street, near McMicken avenue, developed a vein of mineral water, flowing nearly a hundred barrels per hour, draughts from which are said to have cured a number of confirmed invalids). Cisterns were common in 1815, "and from the absence of coal in our fires," says Dr. Drake, happy man! "afford good water." A large share of all the water used, however, was hauled in barrels from the river. It was often impure, and took time to settle, but was preferred to well water for most domestic purposes. The proprietors of the great steam mill were contemplating the application of their surplus power in the distribution of the river wate1 over the whole town, which, thought the doctor, was "a plan so interesting that its execution will constitute an important era in our public improvements." A COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY. Mr. Cist, in his Cincinnati in 1851, gives the following instructive sketch of .the early history of the water supply of the city : The first settlers of Cincinnati drank from the springs in the hillside, along and below the present line of Third street, and did their washing in the Ohio river. As the population increased individuals for their greater private convenience sank wells. Still a large portion of the inhabitants obtained thei1 supply from the river, and there are many still living who associate toting water by hoop and bucket with their reminiscences of a washing day. The summer of 1802 was very dry, and most of the springs failed. Among the rest the one which supplied Deacon Wade's tan-yard. Without water the business could not go no—not a dray in the settlement—what was to be done? An inventive genius, James McMahan, came to their relief; with an axe and auger repaired to the adjoining fields, cut a couple of saplings, pinned cross-pieces, and upon them secured a cask. To this dray by aid of a yoke, or wooden collar, he geared his bull, and with this "fixin' " the water was furnished, and the business of the yard kept in operation. In 1806, when the citizens numbered seventeen hundred, the first move for supplying them with water was made by William, better known as "Bill" Gibson, rigging a cask upon wheels, and undertaking the furnishing of water as a part of his business. The facility this water-cart afforded was as great a desideratum and as marked an epoch in the history of the progress of the comforts of the town as any subsequent improvement for furnishing the city with water. In 1817 Jesse Reeder built a tank on the bank of the river, near Ludlow street. By means of elevators worked by horse power he lifted the water into this tank and thence sold it to the water carts. In 1816 the town council of Cincinnati granted the Cincinnati Woollen Manufacturing company the exclusive privilege of laying pipe through the streets, lanes and alleys of the town, for the purpose of supplying the citizens thereof with water, conditioned "That ̊et or before the fourth day of July, 1819, the pipe should be laid and water conveyed to that part of the town lying south of Third street, commonly called the 'Bottom,' and to that part of the the town called the ' Hill,' so that it may be delivered three feet above the first floor of James Furgeson's kitchen, in said town, on or before the second day of July, 1823." In 1818 the Woollen Manufacturing company, with the assent of the town council, transferred all their right, interest and privilege of supplying the inhabitants of the town of Cincinnati with water, to S. W. Davies, and the legislature granted said Davies and his associates an act of incorporation by the name of the Cincinnati Water company, with the privilege of creating a capital not exceeding seventy-five thousand dollars. Mr. Davies purchased the property now occupied by the engine house and reservoir, and commenced preparing for furnishing the city with water. A reservoir forty by thirty and six feet deep, bottom and sides planked, was excavated on the hillside, a little south and west of the present site. Two frame buildings were erected on the bank, one on the north and the other on the south side of Front street. A lifting pump, placed in the building south of Front street, lifted the water from the river into a tank in the building on the north side of Front street. From this tank the water was forced up the hill into the reservoir. The pipes, pumps and machinery were of wood, and worked by horse power. In 1820, there being at the time no improvements between Broadway and the reservoir, the wooden pipes leading into the town were laid along the hillside, through Martin Baum's orchard, down to Deer creek; on the west side of the creek, through what at the time was Baum's fields, now Longwood's garden, and other lots to Broadway; thence along Fifth' street to Sycamore, and down Sycamore to Lower Market. Here the first fire-plug—a wooden pent stock—was placed, and from it the first water lifted by machinery, from the Ohio river, and passed through pipes for the use of the citizens, flowed on the third day of July, 1821. In 1824, Mr. Davis purchased the engine and boiler of the steamboat Vesta; and Mr. Joseph Dickinson, after having repaired and fitted the engine up in the frame building south of Front street, attached by means of crank and lever two lifting pumps, of six-inch cylinder, and two force pumps of seven-inch cylinder and four-foot stroke. With' these the water was lifted from the river into a tank in the same building, and forced from this tank, up the hill, four hundred feet through five-inch iron pipe, and three hundred and fifty feet of gum-wood pipe, into the reservoir. The trees for these pipes were cut in Deacon Wade's woods, near the corner of Western Row and Everett streets. In 1827, Mr. Davies sold his interest in the water-works to Messrs. Ware, Foote, Greene and others when, in accordance with the act of incorporation, a company organization took place. At this time there were about seventeen thousand feet of wooden pipe, five hundred and thirty hydrants, and less than five thousand dollars income. In 1828, the engine was repaired, and the entire pumping apparatus remodeled by Anthony Harkness. After this the water was thrown through a twelve-inch iron pipe into a new stone reservoir, one hundred feet by fifty, and twelve feet deep. This reservoir was enlarged from time to time, until its dimensions equalled three hundred and fifty feet in length by fifty feet in width, and twelve feet deep, containing one million, two hundred thousand gallons of water. This reservoir, having served its day, has now to give way to make room for a new one, enlarged to meet the present demand. In 1833, Mr. Harkness made and put up a new engine and pumping apparatus, which is now in use. The grant of 1816 (some say 1817) by ordinance to the manufacturing company, gave the company the exclusive privilege, for ninety-nine years, of supplying the city, for an annual payment of one hundred dollars and unlimited free water at fires. The company was also ob- 390 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. ligated to place a fire plug at each block into which water was introduced, to fill all corporation cisterns or reservoirs free of expense, and allow water from them to be used only in case Of fire. When the company transferred to Mr. Davies all their rights in the premises, he repaid to them all the preliminary cost they had put upon the works. By the first of July, 1820, water was supplied on both the upper and lower plains as required by the ordinance. Notwithstanding the energy of Mr. Davies, however, and the success with which he pushed his operations, the citizens took little interest in them, and the disgusted proprietor finally offered the whole of his works to the city at less than cost. A vote was taken upon the proposal; but it was adverse to acceptance, and by and by operations were enlarged by the incorporation of the Cincinnati Water company, as above noted, although an authority places the date in the winter of 1825-6, several years later than the time named by Mr. Cist. The few members of the company took stock enough to enable the building of water-works by which the supply was raised by a steam engine of forty-horse power to a reservoir on the adjacent hillside, about thirty feet above the village "Hill" in extreme hight, being one hundred and fifty-eight feet above low water mark in the river. Thence two wooden pipes, by the route before described, conducted the water to the city, and distributed it along the principal streets through about forty thousand feet of smaller pipe. In 1826 about five hundred families and many manufactories were thus supplied. A neat enlarged reservoir, to hold three hundred thousand gallons, was just building, and iron pipes, of eight and six inches diameter, were to be laid the next summer from the engine house just above Deer creek bridge to the reservoir and through the town. The traveller Burnet, here in 1817, observes the "pumps placed for general accommodation" in the streets of the village, and has a foot-note to the following effect: The pump water, though commonly used, is not good in hot weather, neither is the water of the Ohio. At a considerable expense they might be supplied with good water. I should think this important subject will meet the early attention of the enlightened inhabitants. Mr. John P. Foote's biography of his brother, the late Samuel E. Foote, makes the following contribution to the history of Cincinnati water-works: At an early period in the history of Cincinnati, when its future growth and prosperity appeared to be fully established, the need of a regular supply of water was seen to be necessary, not only for family purposes, but for supplying the wants of manufacturing establishments, which were beginning to be requisite for the supply (especially) of those heavy fabrics, the transportation of which from the seaboard imposed taxes too heavy to be borne by the early emigrants to our western towns and farms. This want, a most energetic and accomplished man of business, Colonel Samuel W. Davies, undertook to supply. He raised a substantial building of stone and brick, at low-water mark of the river, for the accommodation of the lifting and forcing pumps, necessary to convey the water of the river to a reservoir, on a hill immediately north of the building. This reservoir was about three hundred feet above low-water mark, and was near the eastern boundary of the city, and higher than its highest levels. He laid wooden pipes for carrying the water through the principal streets of the city, but its rapid increase soon showed that such pipes were insufficient to supply even a small portion of its requirements. The growth and extension of the city being chiefly to the westward, iron pipes, and those of larger calibre than would have been necessary, had the growth of the city been upwards'on the river, as had ever been the course of our river towns, were needed. Colonel Davies, when he had devoted all his means--his capital and credit—to the work, found that he had but made a commencement, and there was a necessity for a much larger amount of capital than any individual in the west, at that time, could furnish. He, therefore, proposed to put the works into the hands of a joint stock company, and obtained a charter for the formation of such a company, which he endeavored, with his characteristicenergy, to organize. He found, however, the vis inertia of the citizens in regard to public improvements, proportionate to their efforts for the increase of their individual fortunes. As in the case of the canal stock, there was found a sufficient number of citizens who considered it a public duty of others to carry out Colonel Davies' undertaking, which was the extent of their public spirit in this case. The prevalence of this opinion, however, did not produce the desired practical result, and the plan was on the point of being abandoned for the want of funds. ,Under these circumstances the following named gentlemen undertook to unite with Colonel Davies, and carry on the works; these were David B. Lawler, William Greene, Samuel E. and J. P. Foote, and N. A. Ware, who, however, soon sold his share in the establishment to George Graham and William S. Johnston. These gentlemen constituted the "Cincinnati Water Company." Samuel E- Foote was appointed its secretary, and served in that office during its existence, without compensation. In this office he brought into exercise that knowledge and capacity for business by which he was always distinguished. All his accounts and plans are models of correctness and adaptation to the interest of the institution. The company made extensive improvements, substituting iron for wooden pipes, in those streets that required the largest mains, establishing improved pumps, enlarging the reservoirs, and generally adapting the progress of the works to that of the city. They, however, became weary of well-doing in the cause of the public, for which their returns in money were not enough, and in reproaches and abuse for demanding payment rents, too much, for the comfort of their lives. They, therefore, made an offer of the establishment to the city, for a sum which—judging from the cost of subsequent improvements—was less than half what it would have cost to begin and carry forward the works to the state in which they were. The offer was submitted to a vote of the citizens, and accepted, though similar, and, perhaps, more favorable offers had been previously I ejected. The water rents have been increased fifty to one hundred per cent. since the sale, but they are, perhaps, not- now too high, though as long as they were much lower, and collected by a private company, they were intolerably oppressive. The vote here mentioned was the second taken by the electors of the city, and long after the first. In June, 1839, the company owning the water-works had fallen into such financial straits as to make it necessary to part with the property. If not bought by the city, it seemed likely to pass into the hands of strangers, without other interest in the place. A popular vote was taken upon the question of purchase by the city, and the council was thereby instructed to procure whatever legislation might be necessary to authorize the purchase. This was secured without difficulty, and, in the month above designated, the city became the purchaser of the water-works, and all its franchise and privileges, for the sum of three hundred thousand dollars, which became a bonded debt, due January 15, 1865, when it was promptly redeemed. It may be here mentioned that bonds became frequently necessary during the years 1847-53, for improvements and extensions, and long-time issues, becoming due in 1895 and 1900, were made as follows : For improvements, $56,000, March , 1847; $50,000, April , 1847; $94,000, May 15, 1847; $00,000, April 15, 1849. For extension of the works, July , 1851, $100,000; June 15, 1853, $25,000; July 5, 5853, $50,000; making a total, with the original issue, of $875,000 water-works indebtedness. September 8, 1868, $150,000 HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 391 in seven-thirty bonds were issued for the construction of additional works and the purchase of grounds therefor. Bonded issues since have been: For the Eden Park reservoir, 1869, $'150,000; for extension and improvement of the works, $150,000; for "water-works purposes," $300,- 000; and $300,000, August 2, 1875, to complete the new reservoirs, and for laying water-pipes and purchasing new engine. The total water-works bonded indebtedness of the city in 1880 was $ When the purchase of the works was made by the city, in 1839, the facilities for water distribution consisted of twenty thousand four hundred and twenty-three feet of iron pipe, chiefly three and four itch pipe, and one hundred and seventeen thousand eight hundred and forty-three feet of wooden pipe—mere logs with -a two-and-ahalf inch bore. The city received from the works during the first year of its ownership but thirty-nine thousand four hundred dollars, and for thirteen years the revenue from this source was insufficient to meet the expenses of the department. Meanwhile, however, many of the old and useless log pipes had been removed, the water service had been greatly extended, and additional pumping power had been introduced. But little of this improvement was made down to June, i846, when the management of the works was placed under the control of three trustees. A contract was now made with Messrs. Yeatman & Shield, of the city, for building the combination engine, which displaced the old and now much dilapidated machinery. The revenue for water rents was as yet but forty-four thousand two hundred and fifty dollars. In 1850 greater pumping power became necessary, and Messrs. Harkness & Company contracted to build a condensing engine to meet the deficiency. Two years afterwards, the superintendent and engineer of the works made an earnest appeal to the board of trustees for a reserve engine, to fall back upon in case of the sudden disability of either or both of the other engines, and a contract was accordingly made with Messrs. Powell & Company for another condensing engine, which was presently added to the facilities possessed by the works. Very large additions were made in 1854-5 to the distributing pipes and the hydrants—sixty-three miles of the former and nine thousand of the latter being in use when the water-works board reported at the beginning of 1856. The works were, no great while after, estimated by the board to be worth two millions of dollars, and, in 1860, Superintendent Phillips increased this estimate by a quarter of a million. From that time to and including 1866, there were expended for main and supply pipe, $453,889.35; for the new engine, $208,239.16; new building, $143,970; stand-pipe and improvement at reservoir, $21,871.42; and the new Eden Park reservoir, $60,094.70; total, $888,064.63. A net gain was shown as having accrued to the city since the purchase of the works, deducting eight hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars of appropriations by the council, of two million two hundred and sixty-three thousand and sixty-four dollars and sixty-three cents, which had been derived from lower water-rates than the general average charged in other cities supplied by engine-pumping power. So long ago as 1854, the water-works board urged upon the council the importance of securing enough ground for additional reservoir capacity, at an increased elevation over that in use, and the building of two Cornish engines. The recommendation resulted in no definite action until 1860, when, upon the report of Mr. Shield, now engineer of the works, submitting plans, drawings, and estimate of cost (eighty-seven thousand, seven hundred and seventy-nine dollars and fifty-five cents), he was instructed to proceed with the work of building a single monster engine on the Cornish plan. It was nearly five years in building, and, as we have seen above, cost a great deal more than the original estimate. The castings for it were the largest in dimensions and weight that had been brought for any purpose into the city, and the largest, indeed, then ever cast in the country. During the excavation made for the building which was to contain it, two old log roads were found, which had been used in hauling the stone quarried for the old water-works building. In 1861 the average daily supply of water from the works was four million eight hundred and fifty-five thousand, five hundred and eight gallons, which was forty-six thousand four hundred and seventy-eight gallons more than the average daily supply of the two previous years combined. A considerable length of twenty-inch mains had been put down this year. The next year the total supply was two billion, sixty-two million, sixteen thousand, nine hundred and ten gallons, or two hundred and eighty-nine millunton, seven hundred and fifty-six thousand, two hundred and sixty-six more than in 1861. A new aqueduct had been extended to the river channel, supposed to be out of the reach of impurities,_ and a stand-pipe and main had been constructed at the reservoir. The former fact brings to mind AN INTERESTING QUESTION. In 1852, the board of trustees of the water works employed Dr. John Locke, sr., an eminent professor of chemistry and a very c0mpetent man for the purpose, to make analyses of samples of water taken from the Ohio river at various points between Cincinnati and the mouth of the Big Sandy, above the city, also from sundry places on the Great and Little Miamis, from the Whitewater and Mad rivers, and from a spring on Sycamore street hill, near the city. Careful tests, calculations, and comparisons with each other, and with the Croton water of New York city, were made; and it was satisfactorily proved that the Ohio river water was superior to any of the other, and that it contained but seventy-six thousandths of a grain more solid matter in a gallon than the. Croton water. The use of the water from that stream was therefore approved and continued. In 1864, however, it was deemed advisable by the city council to appoint "Water Supply Commission," consisting of Mayor Harris, Colonel Gilbert, the city civil engineer, with the trustees of the water-works and Messrs. Weasner, Moore, Wiltsee, and Davis, of the council, to report further in regard to the attainment of a supply of pure water for the city. They secured the services of Mr. James P. Kirkwood, of New 392 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. York, one of the most eminent hydraulic engineers in the country, who made a thorough inspection of the country surrounding Cincinnati, including an examination of its rivers, creeks, and springs, and the character of its rocks and soil with a view to the supply of the city by surface drainage. After all his searches and wanderings, he finally returned to the water of the amber stream, la belle riviere, as the best available for the purp0se, and reported emphatically in its favor. He also submitted a plan for new water-works, the water to be taken from the Ohio at Pendleton, and for greater reservoir capacity. This did not receive the favor of the majority of the commissioners; but a minority report from them, favoring the Ohio river water, and discharging it with the existing pumps into a new reservoir, or the old one, at an additional elevation, was almost unanimously adopted by the city council, and instructions given to negotiate with Mr. Joseph Longworth, heir of the late Nicholas Long-worth, for the purchase of the property known as the "Garden of Eden" (now part of Eden Park), for the proposed extension. It was a specially favorable locality for a reservoir, being a natural basin, two hundred and thirty-eight feet above low-water in the Ohio and sixty-eight above the overflow pipe of the old reservoir. Stone of excellent quality for all purposes of building the structure was found upon the site, much of which would be necessarily quarried in making the excavation for a reservoir of the desired capacity—one hundred millions of gallons. The negotiations with Mr. Longworth were successful, the necessary papers being executed January 9, 1866, and the great work was begun as soon as the requisite legal authority could be obtained. In the latter part of February the survey of the ground was eommenced and early in May plans were submitted for building the main on southward, and for sewers for draining the ground. The work was pushed briskly, and by the last day of the year sixty-nine thousand and ninety-four d0llars and seventy cents had been expended upon the improvement. The question of purity of the water was still naturally much agitated by the people of the city—an agitation materially increased by an amusing but mortifying incident occuring in the autumn of 1866, which demonstrated a fact long in dispute that the filthy waters of Deer creek, detained for a time near its mouth by a movement of the current of the Ohio that came to be ealled the "Deer Creek eddy," were brought within the area of waters entering the aqeduct of the water-works, and were pumped into the 1eservoir for the supply of the city's drinking water. By the burning of a distillery somewhere along the course of the creek, a quantity of whisky was lost and mingled with its waters. The same aleohol element being shorty afterwards detected in the water from the reservoir, the close relation of Deer creek and the city water supply was shown beyond a cavil; and steps were promptly taken by the water board to break the connection by constructing a wall into the river from the upper bank of the creek, so as to prevent the eddy. About eighteen months afterwards, Mayor Wilstach expressed the opinion, in which Mr. Joseph P. Mayer, superintendent of the water-works, concurred that the city would "never be supplied with a really pure article of water until the works are located at some point above the mouth of the Little Miami river," on account of the increasing population on both sides of the Ohio below that point adding to the drainage and consequent impurity 0f the water supply. This view received further confirmation the next year, in the report of the board of health, that the waters of the Little Miami were also a source of c0ntamination, since, as Professor Locke reported: "By the analyses the waters of either of the Miamis is shown to be too highly charged with mineral matter t0 answer well for d0mestic use." This feeling ultimately led to the purchase by the corporation of the Markley farm above the city, on the river, about ten miles above the present pumping-house, for the purposes 0f inproved water-works. It cost not far from one hundred thousand dollars, and has not yet been utilized for the ends of its purchase. THE NEW ENGINE at the works was not ready for testing until the fifteenth of November, 1865, when the piston-head burst, and there was further delay. Many troubles with the great machine followed, and it was not of much service until 1867, when, with the final insertion of new pump-valves, the engine worked satisfactorily, and has been since continued in use. It may be remarked that in 1847 the combined engines at the works were first put in operation. About 1851 the engine of Harkness & Sons was started, and in 1854 the Powell & Sons' engine. There was no increase in p0wer then until in 1860, when the new engine on the Cornish plan was ordered. The ultimate cost of this improvement, three hundred and two thousand seven hundred and sixty-six dollars and seventy-six cents, excited a great deal of hostility among the citizens, although the extension of mains to the amount of one hundred and seventy-eight thousand dollars, between 1854 and 1860, and two hundred and four thousand dollars from 1860 to 1864, created no general murmur from the people. In 1868-9 works for the supply of Mount Auburn, Walnut Hills, and other elevated localities, were constructed, and in 1879-80 similar works for the supply of the heights in the western part of the city. Here the great tank, holding two million seven hundred thousand gallons, on the "Considine place," a tract of three acres, on Glenway avenue, a spot so elevated as to afford a supply for the loftiest building on the hills, and to give a pressure that will throw a jet above the tallest edifice in the city below. The flow-line of the tank is five hundred and eleven feet above low water in the river. OTHER RESERVOIRS. Two boiler iron tanks previously constructed for the supply of the hills are in a favorable locality at the intersection of Auburn avenue and Vine street, on Mount Auburn. The pumping-works which supply these are in the valley below, at the corner of Hunt and Effluentpipe streets, which draw on the great reservoirs in Eden park. HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 393 They supply the Tyler Davidson fountain, also a line of fire-plugs by a ten inch pipe down Vine street to Fourth, upon which is a pressure of two hundred pounds to the square inch. The old Third street reservoir is in the so-called Waterworks park, at the foot of Mount Adams, and is constructed of solid masonry. It is very much smaller than the immense basins in Eden park, but by constant pumping into it is made sufficient for the supply of the district south of Third street and a part of the west end. The two reservoirs around the hills above, in Eden park, will together hold about one hundred million gallons. The natural hollows of that region favored their construction, and a building of a huge wall of strong and solid masonry across the mouth of one of these ravines was sufficient to create the great artificial lakes or reservoirs. The ground was first broken for these reservoirs, which are in effect one, on the ninth of April, 1866, and the work was continued with little interruption, except from an injunction obtained in April, 1875, which stopped the work for four and a half months. It was prosecuted, however, at great cost, the total expense for them reaching about four and a half millions. In 1874 the northwest division, containing fifty-eight million sixty-one thousand six hundred and twenty-six gallons, was completed, and water was pumped into it October 9th of that year. The entire work, as finished, alone provides a supply for the city for about six days, which time could be prolonged by economy of consumption, in case of any sudden and dangerous contingency. It is a work of gigantic proportions, whose construction involved important new problems in hydraulic engineering, all of which are believed to have been successfully solved. It supplies the extensive and densely populated districts between Third street and the hills. THE LATEST STATISTICS. The daily average consumption of water by the city of Cincinnati in 1880 was 19,476,732 gallons, against 17,322,412 in 1879, being an increase of 12.44 per cent. The largest consumption for one day was on the seventeenth of July, being 27,951,395 gallons. The total consumption of the year was 7,128,484,020 gallons, or 805,803,468 more than the year next before. The number of miles of main pipe in use was 188.7, of which 4.64, or 24,505 feet, were laid in 1880, of which 3,319 were 46-inch pump mains, and 12,689 in small lines for petitioners. Pipe was relaid to the amount of 3,350 feet. The total disbursements of the department for the year were $521,311.79, and receipts $523,087.09, of which $504,490.16 were from water rents, and $300 from rents of the Markley farm, etc. There was a net increase of receipts for the year, as against 1879, of $57,253.89, and decrease of expenditures $23,000.83, making a net increase of profit and loss for 1880 of $80,254.72—the largest since the water-works were created, and larger than any other three years together, excluding 1864. The ratio of expense to receipts, exclusive of the interest account, was but 37 per cent., against 47 in 1879, when the rents were reduced 5 per cent., and 41 the previous year. CHAPTER XLIV. PENAL INSTITUTIONS. A SMALL prison was erected fo1 municipal purposes quite early in the history of Cincinnati; but at what date or under what circumstances or auspices we have been unable to learn.* It was not only small and inconvenient, but in time became exceedingly noisome and unhealthful, and in March, 1818, the condition of the prison used by the town was so bad as to call out an emphatic protest from an association of Christian women, embracing some of the first ladies in the place. A communication to the mayor and town council, signed by Mrs. Riske, formerly wife of Colonel Ludlow, as corresponding secretary of the society, contained the following: Amidst proofs of public munificence that distinguish Cincinnati and give it a dignified position among the cities of the United States, the neglected condition of its prison will, to the eye of any philanthropic traveller, impart counterbalancing degradation. The prison is at present in a state of decay, and its dilapidated walls, which bear many marks of the ingenuity and perseverance of men driven to despair, are inadequate to withstand attempts at escape; so that the only alternative is the additional cruelty of loading culprits with irons. When the ladies of this association last visited it, one room of about twenty feet square contained twenty-two prisoners. Debtors, house-breakers, malefactors, male and female, were crowded promiscuously together, like animals in a pen for slaughter! This state of things was measurably relieved in due course of time, and the prison accommodations of the place were enlarged with the growth of the city and of its crime record; but in 1859 the report made of an official investigation into the condition and management of the city prison, then on Ninth street, again excited much compassion and indignation. As one result of the stir made, the female prisoners were removed for confinement in a school-house on East Front street, which was put in charge of Mother Mary Stanislaus Cusack, a religieuse of the Catholic order of the Good Shepherd, who for several years administered its affairs admirably as matron. The Ninth Street prison, however, again became insufferably crowded, about forty men and three women being incarcerated therein daily. At length abundant relief was found in the superseding of the old den on Ninth street by the present superb CITY WORKHOUSE. On the twenty-first of July, 1865, Councilman William P. Wiltsee, of the committee of council on police, city prison, and workhouse, offered the following measure: Resolved, That the committee on police, city prison and workhouse are hereby authorized to select a site and have plans and estimates made for the erection of a city prison and workhouse, and report the same to council as soon as practicable, with all necessary action required, on the part of the legislature of the State, for carrying out the objects of this resolution, viz: The erection of a city prison and workhouse. The resolution was adopted, and the latter part of it took ultimate effect in the passage by the legislature, at its next session, March 9, 1866, of an act supplementary to the act of May 3, 1852, to provide for the organization of cities and incorporated villages, by which the city * In 1826 the county jail was the only place in the city for the confinement of prisoners. 50 394 - HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO. was empowered to erect and maintain a workhouse; to issue bonds to the amount of one hundred thousand dollars, bearing interest at not more than six per cent. per annum, for such institution, and to levy a tax not exceeding one-half of one mill on the dollar for its maintenance. Its direction and control were vested in a b0ard of five directors, serving without compensation. Originally these were to be appointed for the term of four years—one by the judges of the superior court, one by the judges of the court of common pleas, two by the city council, and the mayor was to be the fifth, and ex officio chairman of the board. By a later act all are appointed by the mayor, with the consent of the council, and hold for term of five years. On the ninth of March, 4866, Councilman Joseph Kirkup, from the same committee as before, offered the following: WHEREAS, The committee on police, city prison and workhouse, acting under the instructions of the city council, have selected a site on which to erect a city prison and workhouse, and, WHEREAS, The general assembly of the State of Ohio has authorized the city of Cincinnati to issue bonds, and levy a tax, for the purpose of erecting a city prison and workhouse, Therefore, be it Resolved, That the committee on police, city prison and workhouse, in connection with the city auditor and city solicitor, be, and they are hereby empowered to purchase the lot of land lying adjacent to, and adjoining the house of refuge, said lot containing twenty-six acres, more or less, for the sum of fifty thousand dollars, payable in city bonds. Adopted. Resolved, That the finance committee be requested to prepare an ordinance, authorizing the issue of bonds, for the purpose herein set forth. The preamble and resolutions were adopted, and subsequently, April 20, 1866, the following submitted by Councilman Robert Allison, of the same committee: Resolved, That the committee on police, city prison and workhouse be and are hereby authorized to procure plans and specifications for a workhouse, to be erected on the property purchased for the purpose of erecting a city prison and workhouse, Also, That the committee on police, city prison and workhouse be, and they are hereby instructed to take immediate measures for erection of a temporary house for a prison, on the property purchased for the purpose of erecting a permanent workhouse. The property purchased was a tract on the old Camp Washington, used for the rendezvous of Ohio troops during the Mexican war, in the Mill Creek valley, one-third of a mile east of the stream, and near the base of Clifton Heights. It is on the Colerain avenue or turnpike, three and one-half miles from Fountain square, and now within the limits of the city. Ground was presently broken, under the direction of Mr. Allison, who was made chairman of the building committee, and the immense building n0w occupied put up the next year, after plans prepared by Messrs. Adams and Hanna-ford, architects. The following description of it is comprised in the annual reports of the institution: The buildings present a beautiful and imposing structure, with a frontage on the west of five hundred and ten feet in length, and consists of a main building fifty-four feet in width, and fifty-four feet in depth, and five stories in height. In this building are contained the offices, reception and ante-rooms, superintendents' and officers dormitories. In connection, and extending north and south of the main building, are two wings, each wing being two hundred and twenty-eight feet long by sixty feet deep. The wings are one story of sixty feet in height, exclusive of the turrets at the extreme ends of the wings. In the south, or main wings of the structure, are contained three hundred and fifty-six cells for male prisoners; all are built in one single block of six tiers, with a hall or passage-way around the same, two hundred and twenty-four feet long and sixteen feet wide. The north wing (female department) contains two hundred and forty cells, built in one solid block, and a hall or passage-way extending around the same, one hundred and sixty-two feet in length and sixteen feet in width. At the extreme end of this wing are the female workrooms, five in number, sixty feet in length and twenty-five feet in width. The rooms are occupied during the day by females exclusively, employed in the manufacture of clothing, etc.; here also wearing apparel, both male and female, for prison use, is manufactured and repaired; in connection with this suite of rooms is the female hospital, sixty by twenty-five feet. Immediately in rear and centre of main structure are the domestic departments; first, the prisoners' kitchen, where food for all prisoners is prepared, and at the proper hours passed by means of endless belts to the prisoners on their entrance to the prisons, the food having been already divided into proper rations; the labor in this department being performed by female prisoners under the supervision of a lady guard. Connected with the domestic apartments, in the basement story, is the boiler and engine-room, fifty by sixty feet, and containing four large double-flued boilers, twenty feet long by forty-two inches diameter, and set in two separate batteries of two boilers each, furnishing a sufficiency of steam for heating of buildings, cooking, laundry, and all other purposes. A doctor engine, for supplying the boilers with water, is also in its proper position, which, together with low-water detectors, steam gauge, etc., has been added to insure safety. A ten- by twenty-inch cylinder horizontal engine is provided for furnishing the necessary power for driving the laundry machinery. A large boiler-iron tank, fifty-two inches diameter, and twelve feet long, with an interior heating surface, supplies the institution with an abundance of hot water. Next in order is the officers' kitchen, where all food for officers and employes is prepared, and by means of a dumb waiter passed to the officers' dining-room, immediately over the prisoners' kitchen. On the north or left is the laundry, where all the clothing for the prison is regularly renovated. In connection with these apartments is the store-room, twenty by twenty feet, bakery eighteen by twenty feet, with bread-room attached; these departments being all under one roof, and separated by a hall and passage-ways. East and in the rear of the domestic apartments is the chapel, a beautiful hall, sixty-five by sixty-eight feet, thirty feet in height, and capable of seating five hundred to six hundred persons. On the south, and disconnected from the chapel, is the male bath-house, eighty-seven by twenty-five feet, and two stories high, the first story having a spacious pool for bathing, with ante-room attached; the second story of this building is set apart for the male hospital, drug-stores, bath-room, etc. On the north of the chapel (and also disconnected) is the female bath-house, seventy by twenty-five feet, one story high, containing a large bath-room and ante-rooms. East and in the rear of the chapel is the stable and carriage house, with accommodations for twelve horses. East and in the rear of the chapel and out buildings, are the male workshops, extending north and south, and fronting on the west, two hundred and eighty-four feet long by sixty-two feet in depth, and two sixteen-foot stories in height, divided in the centre by boiler and engine-house and small packing rooms. The main building, chapel, shops, and outbuildings are all substantial brick structures, with freestone finish. During the year 1873 a large and commodious work-shop, two hundred feet long by sixty feet wide, was added to the improvements, affording ample room fo1 the employment of any number of prisoners, equal to the capacity of the prison. During the year 1876 a new and commodious guard-house, sixty by sixteen feet, a brick structure, with freestone finish, two stories in height, containing eight iron cells, for the confinement of refractory cases, was erected. Also, connected with this building, is a room for keeping the clothing of prisoners, fifty-eight by fourteen feet; together with a room, provided with a fumigating apparatus, for the purpose of exterminating vermin in the prisoners' clothing. Commencing at the extreme end of the north wing of the main building, and running due east six hundred feet, then south five hundred and seventy-five feet, then due west six hundred feet to the south end of the main building, is a solid stone wall fifteen feet in height, and enclosing the entire back part of the main structure, as well as all out-buildings—the entrance to which is made through three large portals or gateways. The grounds on which these several structures are built comprise a strip of land fronting on Colerain Avenue five hundred and seventy-five feet, and running due east to the Miami canal, containing in all twenty-six acres. A beautiful lawn five hundred and seventy-eight feet in length, and two hundred and eighty-three feet in depth, is laid out in HISTORY OF CINCINNATI, OHIO - 395 front of the premises, with a lake and sparkling fountain in the centre, while the whole is dotted with a profusion of shade-trees and shrubbery. Inclosing these improvements is a substantial white paling fence, with gateways, etc. The building and grounds are lighted with gas, furnished by the Cincinnati Gas-light and Coke company. Pure water, for all purposes, is obtained from the city water-works, th10ugh the medium of a four-inch main pipe leading through the grounds. The building was occupied in the late fall of 1869, while still in an incomplete condition as to its heating and cooking apparatus, laundry machinery, and general furnishing. The temporary workhouse upon the grounds then contained seventy-three male and ten female prisoners, who were transferred to the new edifice; and on the ninth of December forty-two more women were received from the female city prison, making one hundred and twenty-five inmates of the workhouse at its opening. Mr. Ira Wood, first superintendent, said in his initial report to the board of directors: All of them were thrust into the new city workhouse before we were p10perly prepared to receive them, from which we suffered no little embarrassment; and our charge was attended with many inconveniences, which but few could appreciate, except those who were directly connected with the institution. The inclement season of the year, and the destitute condition of the male portion of the prisoners, particularly in the way of clothing, prevented our making their labor available in any great degree. About the first of February your contract with J. D. Hearne & Co. was made for the labor of any number of our male prisoners, not exceeding seventy-five. Since the ninth of February a portion of our male prisoners have been constantly employed in the shops, temporarily prepared for that purpose, at making shoes for the above named contractors, and some part of the time, the full number, viz: seventy-five, men have been employed, from which a slight income is now being received. While the full number of men is being furnished as per contract in the shoe-shops, we have still a large number engaged in other pursuits, such as grading and improving the grounds around and adjacent to the workhouse; from which, although no immediate income is derived, I trust the future will show is by no means labor lost. When this report was made, about the close of the first year; the cost of buildings and permanent improvements for the workhouse aggregated four hundred and seventy thousand eight hundred and thirty-two dollars. THE HOUSE OF REFUGE. The necessity of a special place of confinement for youthful offenders, as well as preventive measures of reform for the ill-disposed youths of the city, as the "Fly Market Rangers," and the "Swamp Boys," had long been apparent to the more thoughtful citizens of Cincinnati. In 1839 Mr., afterwards the Rev. James H. Perkins, made a report on his own account, which set out forcibly the imperative need of institutions like the present House of Refuge. Twenty years afterwards, a public meeting was held to consider the matter, at which a considerable sum was subscribed for a house of refuge for bad children, and a committee appointed to solicit further subscriptions. Subsequently another committee was nominated to visit the eastern cities and inspect similar institutions. The city finally, in 1850, took hold of the matter, bought from Joseph R. Riddle; for seven thousand eight hundred and ninety-six dollars, a tract of about ten acres on the Colerain turnpike, just north of that occupied later by the city workhouse, and upon it erected a splendid building, in the collegiate Gothic style, of which the following is the official description: The Cincinnati House of Refuge was opened for the reception of in mates October 7, 1850, and is situated in Mill Creek valley, but now within city limits, about four miles f10m the city post office in a northwesterly direction, on Colerain avenue. The grounds belonging, to the institution contain nine and seven-eighth acres, five and three-fourths of which are inclosed by a stone wall, twenty feet high, within which stand all, the buildings except the stable. The main building which faces the west is a castellated edifice of rough blue limestone, with windows, cornices, casings, and portico of white Dayton stone, and presents an imposing front of two hundred and seventy-seven feet, and is composed of a centre building eighty-five by fifty-five feet, four stories in height, with towers at the extremities projecting two feet in front, and which are five stories high, besides the basement. The north wing (boys' department) contains one hundred and twelve dormitories, and the basement a bath, fifty by twelve feet, broad and deep enough for swimming, and twenty-six dressing rooms. The south wing (girls' department) contains seventy-two dormitories, two sewing-rooms, one school-room, one store-10om, and girls' hospital. In the basement are wash-rooms, bath-room, and play-ground. In the rear of the main building, and connected with it by covered passage-ways, is the school and chapel building, containing on the first floor the bakery, kitchen, three dining-rooms, and four store-rooms; and on the second floor, the chapel, fifty-six by sixty feet, and two school-rooms. East, and to the rear of the chapel, is a shop building, forty-four by eighty, containing on ground floor two covered play-grounds, two wash-rooms, closets, etc., for boys. Second floor—Shop-room, forty-four by eighty. Third floor—School for small boys, twenty by eighty, and dormitory for same, twenty-four by eighty, and two bedrooms for officers. Connecting with this is the principal shop building, thirty-seven by one hundred and forty-two, containing engine and fuel rooms, covered playgrounds, and wash-rooms, etc., on first floor, and on second and third floors, five work-shops and school-room, also dormitory containing forty-six rooms for third division boys. To the south of the shop buildings stands a substantial brick structure for laundry purposes, and containing all the necessary machinery to make it complete. Connected with the shop-building are the boiler-room, thirty-eight by thirty; gas-house, twenty-one by twenty; printing office, sixty-nine by twenty-six; all one story in height and covered with metalic roofing. None of the buildings are detached. They will accommodate three hundred and fifty inmates and the requisite officers. The boys are divided into three, and the girls into two divisions or families. Each of the five families have separate schools, dining and wash-10oms, open and covered play-grounds, work-shops, and dormitories. The buildings are heated th10ughout by steam and lighted with gas, made upon the premises. The whole number of rooms in the building is two hundred and seventy-seven. Water for drinking and culinary purposes is furnished from six large cisterns, supplied with filtered rain water. For fountains and cleansing purposes, an abundant supply is obtained from the city and Miami canal. The building and fixtures, in the original cost represented about one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. They were pronounced by competent judges at the time the best constructed and most convenient for the purpose in the United States. The House of Refuge was provided for April 25, 1850, and was already in operation in October of the same year; The number of children since inmates, year by year, of the respective sexes, and the total number, are shown in the following table: