100 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY from sight; they knew the old licks and the old trails. They practiced the lost arts of the woodsman ; they had eyes and ears of which their successors in these valleys do not know. They did not become white Indians for, it would seem, they did not mingle as closely with the red men as did the French ; but they became exceedingly proficient in the Indian's woodland wisdom. Browned by the sun and hardened by wind and rain and snow, they were a strong race of men ; they could paddle or walk the entire day with little fatigue. Yet their day's work was not such usually as made mere brute machines of them. . . . There were songs to be sung as the canoe glided speedily along beneath the shadows of those tremendous forest trees ; dangers intensified the joys, and, as everywhere else, added a flavor to living, a romantic tinge to what otherwise might have been commonplace." As the fur trade passed away, these rivermen found other occupations which their knowledge of the river and its surroundings fitted them for. They became bargemen and flatboatmen. As the Indians disappeared and white settlers came, there came also hordes of desperate men, gamblers. horse thieves, and worse, into this valley. Cassedy, in his History of Louisville, says : "The bargemen were a distinct class of people, whose fearlessness of character, recklessness of habits and laxity of morals rendered them a marked people. Their history will hereafter form the groundwork of many a heroic romance or epic poem. In the earlier stages of this sort of navigation, their trips were dangerous, not only on account of the Indians whose hunting grounds bounded their track on either side, but also because the shores of both rivers were infested with organized banditti, who sought every occasion to rob and murder the owners of these boats. Beside all this, the Spanish government had forbidden the navigation of the lower Mississippi by the Americans, and thus hedged in every way by danger, it became these boatmen to cultivate all the hardihood and wiliness of the pioneer, while it led them also into the possession of that recklessness and independent freedom of manner, which even after the causes that produced it had ceased, still clung to and formed an integral part of the character of the western bargeman. . . The crews were carefully chosen. A `Kentuck,' or Kentuckian, was considered the best man at a pole, and a `Canuck,' or French Canadian, at the oar or the `cordelles,' the rope used to haul a boat up stream. Their talk was of the dangers of the river ; of 'planters and sawyers,' meaning tree trunks imbedded more or less firmly in the river ; of 'riffles,' meaning ripples ; and of 'shoots,' or rapids (French chutes). It was as necessary to have violins on board as to have whiskey, and all the traditions in song or picture of 'the jolly boatman' date back to that by-gone day. Between the two sides of the river there was already a jealousy. Ohio was called 'the Yankee state,' and Flint tells us that it was a standing joke among the Ohio boatmen when asked their cargo to reply, Pi'Pitcoalndigo, wooden nutmegs, straw baskets, and Yankee notions.' The same authority describes this sort of questioning as being inexhaustible among the river people and asserts that from one descending boat came this series of answers, all of which proved to be truthful : 'Where are you from ?"Redstone.' `What is your lading?' Millstones."What's your captain's name ?"WhWhetstone.' 'Wherere you bound ?"To Limestone.' " CINCINNATI--THE QUEEN CITY - 101 The first ocean going vessel that passed out of the Ohio was the St. Clair. She came down the Ohio to Cincinnati April 27, 1801, with a cargo for the West Indias. The banks of the river at this port were crowded with people anxious to gaze upon this wonder. As early as 1801, a decade before the inventor of steamboats was considering placing these upon western waters, there was a call among citizens of Cincinnati for a meeting at Yeatman's tavern to discuss the practicability of driving boats up stream by the "power of steam—or elastic vapor." But for several years yet the boats moved by poles, oars and sails continued to hold the river traffic undisputed. These boats were capable of conveying fifty to one hundred tons each. Five or six dollars a hundred was the freight charge to New Orleans from this place. When the river was full, these boats made two trips annually to and from New Orleans. Baum and Perry, and Riddle, Bechtle and company controlled most of the river traffic at this point. They conveyed up the Mississippi and the Ohio a greater part of the goods brought to Cincinnati, and they continued their business for several years after steamboats had been introduced on these waters. Flatboats and small keelboats as well as packets were employed in the traffic with the upper Ohio. Canoes were also employed for journeys to Wheeling. "The New Orleans" was the first steamboat to come to the port of Cincinnati. This was on the 27th of October, 1811. Liberty Hall, October 30, 1811, stated, "The steamboat, lately built at Pittsburgh, passed this town at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, in fine stile, going at the rate of about ten or twelve miles an hour." The editor, apparently, did not grasp the vast significance of the event and the revolutionary effect that event was to have on the commerce of this city, as \Veil as on all towns on the western waters. When Theodore Roosevelt, as president, made a memorable trip down the Ohio and Mississippi, he recalled with justifiable pride that it was his uncle. Nicholas J. Roosevelt, who had built and commanded this first steamboat on western waters. When Fulton and his associates in the New York company decided to build a steamboat for the western waters. William Robson, who had worked on the Clermont, Fulton's first steamboat on the Hudson, was sent to Pittsburgh to superintend its building. Robson came to Cincinnati in June, 1818, and was for years prominent in the coppersmith and brassmaking business in Cincinnati. This Cincinnati is related to the pioneer of steamboat making in the west. Charles J. Latrobe, in his "First Steamboat Voyage on the Western Waters," said in regard to this first voyage of the "New Orleans :" "Circumstances gave me the opportunity of becoming acquainted with the particulars of the very first voyage of a steamer in the West; and their extraordinary character will be my apology to you for filling a page of this sheet with the following brief relation : "The complete success attending the experiments in steam navigation made on the Hudson and the adjoining waters previous to the year 1809, turned the attention of the principal projectors to the idea of its application on the western rivers ;.and in the month of April 'of that year, Mr. Roosevelt, of New York, pursuant to an agreement with Chancellor Livingston and Mr. Fulton, visited 102 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY those rivers with the purpose of forming an opinion whether they admitted of steam navigation or not. At this time two boats, the North River and the Clermont, were running on the Hudson. Mr. Roosevelt surveyed the rivers from. Pittsburgh to New Orleans, and, as his report was favorable, it was decided to build a boat at the former town. This was done under his direction, and in the course of 1811 the first boat was launched on the waters of the Ohio. It was called "The New Orleans," and intended to ply between Natchez, in the state of Mississippi, and the city whose name it bore. In October it left Pittsburgh for its experimental voyage. On this occasion no freight or passengers were taken, the object being merely to bring the boat to her station. Mr. Roosevelt, his young wife and family, a Mr. Baker, the engineer, Andrew Jack, the pilot and six hands, with a few domestics, formed the whole burden. There were no woodyards at that time, and constant delays were unavoidable. When, as related, Mr. Roosevelt had gone down the river to reconnoiter, he had discovered two beds of coal, about one hundred and twenty miles below the rapids at Louisville, and now took tools to work them, intending to load the vessel with the coal and to employ it as fuel, instead of constantly detaining the boat while wood was procured from the banks. "Late at night, on the fourth day after quitting Pittsburgh, they arrived in safety at Louisville, having been but seventy hours descending upwards of seven hundred miles. The novel appearance of the vessel, and the fearful rapidity with which it made its passage over the broad reaches of the river, excited a mixture of terror and surprise among many of the settlers on the banks, whom the rumor of such an invention had never reached ; and it is related that on the unexpected arrival of the boat before Louisville, in the course of a fine, still, moonlight night, the extraordinary sound which filled the air, as the pent-up steam was suffered to escape from the valve on rounding to, produced a general alarm, and the multitudes in the town rose from their beds to ascertain the cause. I have heard that the general impression among the good Kentuckians was that the comet had fallen into the Ohio; but this does not rest upon the same foundation as the other facts which I lay before you, and which I may at once say I had directly from the lips of the parties themselves. The small depth of water in the rapids prevented the boat from pursuing her voyage immediately, and during the consequent detention of three weeks in the upper part of the Ohio, several trips were successfully made between Louisville and Cincinnati. In fine, the waters rose, and in the course of the last week in November the voyage was resumed, the depth of water barely admitting their passage. "When they arrived about five miles above the yellow Banks, they moored the boat opposite to the first vein of coal, which was on the Indiana side, and had been purchased in the interim of the State government. They found a large quantity already quarried to their hand and conveyed to the shore by depredators, who had not found means to carry it off ; and with this they commenced loading the boat. While thus engaged, our voyagers Were accosted in great alarm by the squatters of the neighborhood, who inquired if they had not heard strange noises on the river and in the woods in the course of the preceding day, and perceived the, shores shake, insisting that they had repeatedly felt the earth tremble. CINCINNATI--THE QUEEN CITY- 101 "Hitherto nothing extraordinary had been perceived. The following .day they pursued their monotonous voyage in those vast solitudes. The weather was observed to be oppressively hot ; the air misty, still and dull ; and though the sun was visible. like a glowing ball of copper, his rays hardly shed more than a, mournful twilight on the surface of the water. Evening drew nigh, and with it some indication of what was passing around them became evident. And as they sat on the deck, they ever and anon heard a rushing sound and violent splash, and saw large portions of the shore tearing away from the land and falling into the river. 'It was,' as my informant said, an awful day.; so still that you could have heard a pin drop on the .deck. They spoke little, for everyone on board appeared thunderstruck.' The comet had disappeared about this timer which circumstance' was noticed with awe by the crew. "The second day after their leaving the Yellow Banks, the sun rose over the forest the same ball of fire, and the air was thick, dull and oppressive as before.. The portentous signs of this terrible natural convulsion continued and increased. The pilot, alarmed and confused, affirmed that he was lost, as he found the channel everywhere altered ; and where he had hitherto known deep water, there lay numberless trees with their roots upwards. The trees were seen waving and nodding on the bank, without a wind ; but the adventurers had no choice but to continue their route. Towards evening they found themselves at a loss for a place of shelter. They had usually brought to under the shore, but everywhere they saw the high banks disappearing, overwhelming many a flatboat and raft, from which the owners had landed and made their escape. A large island in mid channel, which was selected by the pilot as the better alternative, was sought for in vain. having disappeared entirely. Thus, in doubt and terror, they proceeded hour after hour till dark, when they.. found a small island, and rounded to, mooring themselves to the foot of it. Here they lay, keeping watch on deck during the long autumnal night, listening to the sound of the waters which roared and gurgled horribly around them, and hearing from time to time the rushing earth slide from the shore, and the commotion as the falling mass of earth and trees was swallowed up by the river. The mother of the party, a delicate female, who had just been confined on board as they lay off Louisville, was frequently awakened from her restless slumbers by the jar given the furniture and loose articles in the cabin, as several times in the course of the night the shock of the passing earthquake was communicated from the island to the bows of the vessel. It was a long night, but morning dawned and showed them that they were near the mouth of the Ohio. The shores and the channel were now equally unrecognizable; everything seemed changed. About noon that day they reached the small town of New Madrid, on the right bank of the Mississippi. Here they found the inhabitants in the greatest distress and consternation; part of the population had fled in terror to the higher grounds ; others prayed to be taken on board, as the earth, was opening in: fissures on every side, and their houses hourly falling around them. "Proceeding thence, they found the Mississippi, at all times a fearful stream, row unusually swollen, turbid and full of trees; and after many days of great danger, though they felt and perceived no more of the earthquakes, they reached their destination at Natchez, at the close of the first week in January, 1812, to 104 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY the great astonishment of all, the escape of the boat having been considered an impossibility. At that time you floated for three or four hundred miles on the rivers, without seeing a human habitation. Such was the voyage of the first steamer." This steamer ran regularly between Natchez and New Orleans up to July 14, 1814, when it sank at Baton Rouge. In 1818, its engine and a new boiler were placed in a new boat also called the New Orleans. The second steamboat on the Ohio was the Comet, also built at Pittsburgh, sometime previous to the summer of 1813. It was of one hundred and forty-five tons burden, and had a novel stern wheel. The third steamer on these waters was the Vesuvius, which was constructed at Pittsburgh by Robert Fulton, and launched in November, 1813. The first effort made by a steamer to come up the Ohio past the falls at Louisville was made by this boat, but the attempt was a failure, as she grounded on a bar seven hundred miles above New Orleans. After remaining five months on this bar and then being floated off by rising water, this boat was employed on the lower Mississippi. In 1814 the "Enterprise," forty-five tons, was built at Brownsville. The Aetna, of three hundred and forty tons, came next while the Despatch, the Buffalo, the James Monroe, the Washington, and others, came in due time. The Enterprise was the first steamer to successfully make the trip up the Ohio and past the falls at Louisville. A local newspaper of that time announced the event : "The Steam Boat Enterprise.—This is the first steam boat that has ascended the Ohio. She arrived at Louisville on the first inst., sailed thence on the l0th, and came to this port on the evening of the 13th, having made her passage from New Orleans, a distance of one thousand, eight hundred miles, in twenty-eight running days (by the aid of her machinery alone, which acts on a single wheel placed in the stern), against the rapid currents of the Mississippi and the Ohio. This is one of the most important facts in the history of this country, and will serve as data of its future commercial greatness. A range of steamboats from Pittsburgh to New Orleans—connecting Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, Cincinnati and Louisville, Louisville and Smithland, at the mouth of the Cumberland, or some eligible place on the Mississippi, below the mouth of the Ohio, thence to Natchez, and from Natchez to New Orleans—will render the transportation of men and merchandise as easy, as cheap and expeditious on these waters as it is by means of sea vessels on the ocean, and certainly far safer. And we are happy to congratulate our readers on the prospect that is presented of such an establishment. Two steamboats, considerably larger than the Enterprise, and yet not too large for the purpose, are already built at Pittsburgh, and will no doubt commence running in the fall. Others will follow. The success of the Enterprise must give a spring to this business that will in a very few years carry it into complete and successful operation." It is said that the first steamboat built in Cincinnati was the Eagle, of seventy tons. It was made in 1818 for the firm of James Berthoud & Son, of Shippingport, Kentucky, for the Louisville, later the Natchez, trade. About the same time there was built the Hecla, of seventy tons, for Honorie & Bar- CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 105 barox, of Louisville. The Henderson, eighty-five tons, was constructed for the Messrs. Bowers, to run between Henderson and Louisville. The "Cincinnati," one hundred and twenty tons, was partly owned by men in this city, and was the first steamboat in which Cincinnatians held any shares. This boat was built for Pennywitt & Burns of Cincinnati, and Paxson & Co., of New Albany ; it was to ply in the Louisville trade. The first steamboat wholly owned in Cincinnati was the Experiment, of forty tons and built in 1818. Mr. Cist observes, "it seems that thirty-two boats had to be built before we could furnish capital and enterprise to own one." In spite of the increasing numbers of the steamboats the old style of boats continued their business for a considerable period longer. Dr. Drake notes that in 1815, though two kinds of steamers were plying on the Ohio, navigation was conducted by flatboats, keelboats and barges only. It still required a hundred days for the round trip to New Orleans. Though Cincinnati had been made a port of entry in 1808, since shipbuilding had ceased on the Ohio, no vessel was cleared here until 1815. The Cincinnati Gazette of July 15, 1815, announced : "Arrived on Thursday, the sixth instant, at this port, the elegant barge Cincinnati, Captain Jonathan Horton from New Orleans ; passage eighty-seven days. Cargo : sugars, molasses, rum, lignum vitae, Spanish hides. etc., to Jacob Baymiller." The traveler Burnet states that in 1817 numerous arks, bearing emigrants on their way to the West were to be seen frequently near the landing. At the same time Burnet noted seven Kentucky boats with coal, iron and dry goods from Pittsburgh. He saw four barges or keelboats, one of one hundred and fifty tons and two masts, which ran up and down the rivers between Pittsburgh and New Orleans. He noted four flats of scows laden with building stones and salt from the Kenhawa salt works. He saw six arks with emigrants and their possessions these people on their way down the river commonly tarried here to lay in provisions. But Cincinnati soon afterward awoke to the importance of the shipbuilding: industry, and between 1817 and 1819, about one-fourth of the vessels constructed on western waters were built here. Niles Weekly Register, Jan. 4, 1823, said : "Steamboats on the Mississippi, etc. From the Louisiana Advertiser of the 25th November. The first steamboat employed in trade on the Mississippi, was called the New Orleans, of New Orleans. Built at Pittsburgh in 1812, and enrolled and licensed for the coast trade, at the port of New Orleans, in 1813, nine years ago, since which period, up to the present time, there has been eighty-one different boats enrolled at the port of New Orleans. "Of this number, several have been built at New Orleans, but they have been principally built on the waters of the Ohio, being, in the aggregate, a tonnage exceeding 18,000 tons. "This first boat was lost in 1814, and tip to the present time there have been 23 other boats lost, either being sunk or destroyed by fire, decayed or laid up, and out of use, forming in the aggregate, about 4,000 tons—and leaving a balance, say in round numbers, 14,000 tons of this description of vessels now 106 - CINCINNATI-THE QUEEN CITY employed or which may be employed in trade on the Mississippi and its tributary waters, with the port to New Orleans. "This 14,000 tons does not probably employ mbre than 1,000 hands, and can do more in a given time than 50,000 tons could have done in barges, keelboats, or any other kind of vessels employed ten years ago, with 20,000 hands." The rapid increase of steamboats head very soon the natural tendency of reducing freights, and although the owners suffered severely from this cause and the consequent diminution in the value of the vessels, yet the country at large has been greatly benefited by their introduction ; and it is to be hoped the number in existence can now be beneficially employed." Niles Weekly Register, Balt., Jan. 18, 1823, states : "The Western Waters. - No less than seven steamboats are prepared, or preparing, to start from Pittsburgh early in the spring, to ply between that place and St. Louis, Nashville, New Orleans, etc., regularly. They are amply fitted for the transportation of passengers and merchandise or goods of all sorts, and will depart and arrive in succession, so as to afford the greatest possible facilities to transportation, whenever the river will admit of it. The land carriage to Pittsburgh is now very moderate." From about 1817 the steamboat traffic began to come into its own. Navigation changed from the broadhorn to the steamer. In 1818, the first steamboat, the Eagle, that was built here, as before stated, was put into commission. Immediately succeeding that date the business of steamer building went forward rapidly. There was in the building of steamers on the Ohio the great advantage of cheapness compared with those constructed in eastern cities. Cincinnati appears to have led in this industry. In 1824-1826, Cincinnati rivalled any other city in the world in this business. The black locust of this vicinity proved better for ship building than any wood available elsewhere. It is astonishing to contemplate the growth of steamer building in this region. By 1826, two hundred and thirty-three steamboats had been launched. 1811 saw one built ; 1814 another; 1816 three; in 1817 there were seven built. In 1818, twenty-five steamboats were constructed on these waters.. In the intervening years until 1826, one hundred and seventy-six more steamers were built. Forty eight of the total were constructed at Cincinnati. About 1826, the old styles of crafts had almost vanished from the river traffic. By that time the industry of steamboat making had risen to be among the chief businesses of Cincinnati. The annual products, however, of this kind varied greatly from year to year. In 1856, thirty-three steamers were built ; in 1857, thirty-four ; 1858, fourteen; 1859, eleven ; 1860, twenty-eight ; 186r, eleven ; 1862, four ; 1863, forty-three ; 1864, sixty-two ; 1866, thirty-three ; 1867, eighteen ; 1868, eleven; 1869, eleven; 1870, fifty-two ; 1871, forty-four ; 1872, fifty-two ; 1873, forty-eight ; 1874, twenty-nine ; 1875, sixteen ; 1876, nineteen ; 1877, twenty-one ; 1878, thirty ; 1879, twenty-four. In 1880, the report of the committee on river navigation said : "A good number of boats have been built here the past year-the number of all crafts being twenty. with tonnage six thousand, six hundred and eighty-three, against twenty- CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 107 four last year, and tonnage ten thousand, six hundred and forty-one. In the future we must not look for a greater number of boats, but expect a heavy increase in tonnage ; this is more applicable to stern wheel boats, which in former years were of small size and used mostly in making short trips. There are those that have attained the carrying capacity of three thousand tons. Now, however, boats, whether of a side or stern wheel, for short packet trade or for more distant ports, are of large size ; indeed it seems a question to what point the size of boats may reach. This change in building larger boats .for the Upper Ohio, with more speed, is only following the prediction of those who advocated the lengthening and widening of the Louisville and Portland canal and lessening the rates of its tolls." In 1880, the report of the Chamber of Commerce stated : "The arrivals for the year aggregated three thousand, one hundred and sixty-three boats, compared with two thousand, seven hundred and twenty-five in the year immediately preceding, and the departures three thousand, one hundred and sixty-seven, in comparison with two thousand, seven hundred and thirty. The whole number of steamboats and barges which plied between Cincinnati and other ports in the past year was three hundred and twenty-two, with an aggregate tonnage of eighty-three thousand, five hundred and sixty-nine. In this connection it must be kept in mind that in the past year vessels have run with great regularity and frequency, and that, in consequence, an equal. number of vessels represents a larger business, because each vessel in the latter category is counted but once, no difference how frequent may have been the visitations. Again, it is true that the same number of arrivals and departures also represented an increased business, inasmuch as it comprised generally vessels which from the regularity of arrival and departure, and the general exemption of transient boats, had uniformly good cargoes. It is worthy of note that the number of arrivals and departures for each leading point has increased over the preceding year. Thus, the arrivals from New Orleans aggregated, in the past year, one hundred and three vessels, compared with eighty-five in the preceding year and the departures one hundred and sixteen in comparison with ninety seven. From Pittsburgh the arrivals were one hundred and eighty two, compared with one hundred and sixty-three, and the departure one hundred and seventy-seven, in comparison with one hundred and sixty-two. From St. Louis the arrivals aggregate ninety-three, compared with sixty-four, and the departures ninety-four, in comparison with seventy-five. From all other points the arrivals aggregated two thousand, seven hundred and eighty-five, compared with two thousand, four hundred and thirteen, and the departures two thousand, seven hundred and eighty, in comparison with two thousand, three hundred and ninety-six. A study of the figures through a series of years reveals the fact that the increase the past year was not solely over 1878-79, which was a year that was seriously interfered with by cold weather that diminished the number of arrivals and departures for the year, but exhibits a general increase extending through a series of years. Thus, the entire number of arrivals and departures exceeds any preceding year in a period of fourteen years, and has but three times been exceeded in the history of the city, which was in 1857-58, when the excess was very small, and in 1864-65 and in 1865-66, the years that closed and immediately succeeded the war, which was a time 108 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY that, for a period of normal conditions, would not be a fair measure." The whole number of steamers in the freight and passenger traffic between Cincinnati and other ports, and total tonnage, compared for ten years, between 1893 and 1902, was as follows : 1893, steamers 36, tonnage 22,569 ; 1894, 34 and 20,527; 1895, 30 and 18,587; 1896, 25 and 15,032; 1897, 27 and 15,881; 1898, 25 and 14,677; 1899, 29 and 16,311 ; 1900, 28 and 15,618 ; 1901, 29 and 15,130; 1902, 30 and 15,483. The first ocean going vessel to load at Cincinnati for Europe was the Muskingum, in 1844. This boat was built at Marietta, and was of three hundred and fifty tons burden. In the autumn of 1844 she took on her cargo at Cincinnati and started for Liverpool. The Times of Liverpool, January 30, 1845, stated : "Arrival direct from Cincinnati.—We have received a file of Cincinnati papers brought by the first vessel that ever cleared out of that city for Europe. The building of a vessel of 350 tons, on a river seventeen hundred miles from the sea, is itself a very remarkable circumstance, both as a proof of the magnificence of the American rivers and the spirit of the American people. The navigating of such a vessel down the Ohio and the Mississippi, and then across the Atlantic, would, a few years ago, have been thought impossible. She brings a cargo of provisions ; and we trust that the success of this first adventure will be such as to encourage its frequent repetition. The name of the vessel is the Muskingum." The Gazette of Cincinnati spoke editorially of this event : "If one had stood upon the eastern hill top which overhangs our city, in the early gray of the morning on Saturday, and looked out upon the river he might have thought a phantom ship was floating upon it. The quick puffing of the steamer was heard, and out beyond it seemingly a full rigged ship, its masts towering up and all spars set, was evidently looming on and making direct for the landing of the city. Early risers were startled. Even those who knew that enterprising men of Marietta were building a sea vessel were astonished when it unexpectedly hove in sight. But when it approached nearer and nearer, and bodied itself forth plainly to the naked vision, the cry went up, 'a ship, a ship,' with a thrill akin, at least, to that which men and women feel on the ocean shore, when welcoming back the long absent 'sea homes' of relative and friend." Previous to 1850, John Swasey and Company of Cincinnati, built three ships of two to three hundred and fifty tons. One of these was the Louisa, a full-rigged brig. The others were barks, one named the John Swasey and the other the Salem. These were towed by steamers to New Orleans. At that place they set out for sea. A ship of eight hundred and fifty tons, called the Minnesota, was constructed in Cincinnati at the same period by other builders for a New Orleans man. About 1826, one hundred flatboats were annually brought down the Big Miami. There were thirty came down each year out of the Little Miami. These carried thirty-three thousand five hundred barrels of flour, worth about one hundred thousand dollars. The time had been reduced by the steamboats between Cincinnati and New Orleans to twelve or fourteen days. Heavy merchandise, groceries, queensware and so on, still came by way of New Orleans. Dry goods and lighter materials were brought from eastern cities CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 109 to Pittsburgh and Wheeling and came to Cincinnati by the river. Iron came from Pittsburgh and from the Licking and Sandy rivers. From the vicinity of Paint creek and Brush creek, in Ohio, came most of the castings. Pittsburgh furnished nails. Missouri supplied lead ; salt was brought from Conemaugh, Pennsylvania and the Kanawha, Virginia. Lumber came in rafts from the head waters of the Allegheny. Cincinnati sent its exports chiefly to the West Indies and South America. Whiskey and pork went to the eastern cities. The Mississippi region bought a large part of the Miami products. In 1832 the commerce of Cincinnati figured $4,000,000. In 1835 it exceeded $6,000,000. In 1835 the steamer arrivals were two thousand, two hundred and thirty. In that year there were imported ninety thousand barrels of flour and fifty-five thousand barrels of whiskey. Five million, two hundred thousand &tars were in 1840 invested in foreign trade and commerce. There were $12,877,000 in retail dry goods business, hardware, groceries and the like. There was an investment of $133,000 in the lumber trade, which occupied twenty-three yards, with seventy-three employes. The lumber sales in 1840 were $342,500. In 1841 there were eighty-eight steamboats owned in the Cincinnati region. The tonnage was eleven thousand, seven hundred and thirteen. In 1850 trade and commerce had grown greatly. At that time a single house in Cincinnati was doing $1,200,000 of commercial business. More than half its shipments were sent to Great Britain. In 1851 the city's commerce was rated at thirty-six millions. Coal had now come to be a great import to this city. In 1851 there were seven millions, seven hundred and eighty-five thousand bushels used here. In 1859 there were sixty-eight coal yards here and there were fifteen million bushels used. In 1858, the increase of coffee imports was eleven per cent ; sugar thirty per cent and molasses sixty per cent. Wool import increased one hundred and fifty-five per cent ; import of potatoes two hundred and sixty-nine per cent ; manufactured tobacco ninety-six per cent. The exports of horses increased one hundred and forty-one per cent. Those of furniture eighty-nine per cent ; molasses sixty-one per cent. The river traffic of Cincinnati in 1869 was one hundred and sixty-nine million, five hundred thousand dollars. At that time Cincinnati manufacturers began to send crackers to China and candies to Greece. A vast amount of provisions was sent to the Eastern cities. Still, the chief markets for exports were in the South. The West and the Southwest received most of Cincinnati's manufactures. In 1873 the local commerce of Cincinnati amounted to five hundred and forty millions. 110 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY The corning of the steamboat wrought in due time a change, in the personnel of the rivermen. The new mode of boat propulsion met, of course, bitter opposition from the old time men whose industry was threatened. Heretofore sheer muscular strength had, counted in river traffic, but steam introduced need of better intelligence as well as the learning of new. modes. Flatboat, barge and steamboat continued to do business side by side, but the old boatman found themselves outstripped and outclassed. The steamboat necessarily ran sharper division between the management and employes than ever before. Captains and other officers were separated as by a gulf from deck hands. The captains were usually of a fine type of men. The "hands" were generally much inferior to the old time, independent bargemen'! One of the most notorious features of steamboat life for many years was gambling. Professional gamblers swarmed on the packets from Pittsburgh to New Orleans. Victims of the card sharpers were to be counted by thousands, and traditions of murders and all manner of crimes still linger in regard to those days. A gambler has given this account of one of his experiences : "Coming up on the Sultana, one night, there- were about twenty-five of the toughest set of men as cabin passengers I believe I ever met. They were on their way to Napoleon, Arkansas, which at that time was a great town and known as the jumping-off place. In those days these Napoleon fellows were looked upon as cutthroats and robbers, and thought nothing of murdering a fellow simply to make them appear big men with their gang. I had for a partner a man named Canada Bill, as game a party as ever; strode the deck of a steamboat, and one of the shrewdest gamblers I ever encountered. As soon as supper was over this gang of Arkansas toughs got in the cabin and of course wanted to play cards. Bill had opened up business in the main hall, .and a great crowd had gathered about him.. I saw-that most of these devils had been drinking, and gave Bill the nod, which he of course understood. He only played a short while and left the ,game, pretending to be broke. Then we fixed it up that I should. do the playing and he would watch out for any trouble. Well, the result was I got about everything the twenty-five men had, including their watches, and beat some seven or eight other passengers. The men all took it apparently good natured at the time, but as the night wore on and they kept drinking from their private flasks I made a sneak to my room and changed my clothes. By the back stairs I skipped down into the kitchen and sent a man after my partner. I had blackened my face and looked like one of the negro rousters. I only had time to warn him when a terrible rumpus upstairs told me the jig was up, and with their whiskey to aid them they were searching for me, and if they caught me it would be good day for me. I paid. the cooks to keep mum, and Bill made himself scarce. They had their -guns out and were kicking in the stateroom doors hunting for me. Some of them came down on deck, and were walking back and forth by me, cursing and threatening vengeance. I heard one of them ask a roustabout if he had noticed a well dressed man down on the deck lately. He of course had not, as Bill had gone back up the kitchen stairs, and with these devils was raising Cain, looking for me, and my disguise had not been discovered under the darkness of the night. The boat was plowing her way along up the CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 111 coast. The stevedores were shouting to the darkies, hurrying them along with the freight for a landing soon to be reached. The boat's whistle blew, and soon she was heading in for the shore. A crowd of these fellows were waiting for me, -as they suspected I would try and get off. They were looking, mind you, for a well-dressed man: As soon As the boat landed., about ten of them, guns in hand, ran out over the stage to shore and closely scanned the face of every person that carne off. There was a stock of plows to be discharged from the boat's cargo, and noting the fact, I shouldered one and with it followed the long fine of 'coons' amid the curses of the mates, and fairly flew past these men who were hunting me. I kept on up the high bank and over the levee and when I threw my plow in the pile with the others made off for the cotton fields and laid flat on my back until the boat got again under way, and the burning pine the torches' on deck had been extinguished. It was a close call, I can assure you Bill met me at Vicksburg the next day and brought the boodle, which we divided. He said the crowd took lights and searched the boat's hold for me after we left the landing. Bill must have played his part well, as he told me afterward that they never suspicioned him. Yes, I could tell, many of my exploits. The river was for the greater portion of my gambling career my strongest hold. But it's all over now. Even should a man strike a big winning, there are always too many smart Alecks about, and you would have to whack up with so many that there would be little left for the winner." The rivalry in speed and the racing of steamboats was another notorious feature of some years ago. The stories go that frequently the passengers incited the officers of the boats to race, paid for extra fuel and became wildly excited over the result. Stories go that sometimes; when 'other fuel failed, hams were cast into the furnace as a last resort to create more steam. James Hall, in "Statistics of the West," 1836, quotes William C. Redfield, steam navigation agent, as saying: "The contests for speed, or practice of racing, between rival steamboats, has been the cause, and perhaps justly, of considerable alarm in the community. It is remarkable, however, that 'as far as the information of the writer extends, there has no accident occurred to any boiler which can be charged to a contest of this sort. The close and uniform. attention which is necessarily given to the action and state of the boilers Wand engines, in such contests, may have had a tendency to prevent disaster. But this hazard as well as the general danger of generating an' excess of steam, is greatly lessened by the known fact that in most ;steamboats the furnaces and boilers are not competent to furnish a greater supply of steam than can be used with safety, with an ordinary degree of attention on the part of the engineers. "The magnitude and extent of the danger to which passengers in steamboats are exposed, though sufficiently appalling, is comparatively much less than in other modes of transit with which the public have been long familiar ; the accidents of which, if not so astounding, are almost of every day occurrence. It will be understood that I allude to the dangers of ordinary navigation, and land conveyance by animal power on wheel carriages." The beginning of work to improve the Ohio river was in 1825. At that period the river in its whole length was obstructed by sand bars, snags, rocks and gravel. Much has since been done by the government to better the condi- 112 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY tions on the river and its tributaries. Lighthouses have also been placed. Ice harbors have been formed at a number of points as refuges for boats in time of peril from ice was The amount of money invested in boats is about ten millions, while the expenditure for improvements in the river have not been more than three per cent of the value of the freight carried in one year. The series of movable dams now in progress constitute the greatest effort ever made to make the Ohio navigable. The Davis dam, near Pittsburgh, was opened in 1885. The series of dams is to be in time extended to the mouth of the river. The Fernbank dam near Cincinnati was opened in August, 1911. The present condition of government work in the improvement of the West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky tributaries of the Ohio river is detailed in the annual report sent to Washington July, 1911, by Major John C. Oakes of the United States engineer's office. The rivers are the Big Sandy, Muskingum, Kentucky and Guyandot, forming what is known as the Second Cincinnati district. The Kentucky river, with its stretch of navigable waters reaching back into the state for 240 miles from its mouth at Carrollton, is now the biggest and most important of them all. Its freight traffic for the past year reached the aggregate of $1,921,581.28, and by the completion of Dam 13 the slack water of the river is at last brought to the coal fields, which were the great objective point all along. The government improvements of the Kentucky are now at the beginning of the finish. The contract for the building of Dam 14, to be located at Heidelberg, has been let to Gahren, Dodge & Maltby, and is to be completed by December 31, 1913. It is the last of the locks and dams on the Kentucky. Contractors W. F. Garretson of Cincinnati, is to finish building the lock at Dam 13 by September 1, 1912. All the other locks are in regular operation. There are nineteen steamers plying on the river, and they carried 9,842 passengers in the year, while 2,003 rafts of logs were also floated down its waters to the Ohio. Timber was the chief article of commerce on the Kentucky, the amount of this being nearly six million cubic feet, valued at $510,056.75. It was brought down the river distances of 155 miles. Great quantities of lumber and staves were also carried. Next import of the Kentucky products was tobacco, the value of it being $341,460. Iron and steel and oil also figure in the river's freight, and the coal brought down was $209,810. Whiskey is among the unimportant items of the traffic, the boats carrying but forty-two barrels of it during the whole year ; its value was $3,150. The operating expense for the year was $130,860.04. The Muskingum river, with its system of eleven locks and dams, cost $49,521.45 for operating expenses. The craft on this river include 16 steamers, 25 gasoline boats, 132 launches and others, all of them together carrying 35,153 passengers during the year. The total traffic is valued at $2,644,150. There were 63,250 tons and the hauls varied from four to fifty-five miles. Merchandise was the chief item, its value being $1,938,700. Great quantities of eggs were also in the freight, their value being represented by $138,000. Horses and mules, live stock and poultry are also in the showing. CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 113 All the regular construction work has been finished for this river and only repairs and maintenance are now called for. The expenditures for this were $49,52 I .49. Navigation was much hindered on the Big Sandy in the past, there being 151 days in which it stood suspended owing to low water or dangerous currents. Ties were the chief article of traffic, there being $175,175 worth of them shipped down the river. Twenty boats ply on the main stream and its two forks, carrying manufactured iron, timber and other merchandise. The operating expenses for the year were $19,608.30. Plans for the improvements during 1912 are not yet announced. The completion of the Fernbank darn, officially Dam 37, is the big and significant particular in the annual report of the past year's work on Ohio river improvements sent to Washington by Major H. Jervey, now in charge of the Cincinnati division. The work on this darn was begun in May, 1905, so that it has been six years in building. Some of the hardest of the hard work here was that encountered in getting ready for operating the dam after all the rest had been done. Mud, rubbish and debris enough to build a hill had to be removed from the foundations where it had collected. The chief trouble came in getting the lock gates to move. This kept engineers and workers busy for several months past, but all the usual means failed and it was not until the regular engines were aided by others with the tremendous force of 150 tons extra power that the gates were finally made to move as they should. The difficulty, Major Jervey stated, was due to the axles of the gate bearings getting corroded in the water in which they have been standing the past two and one-half years. At present the gates can be moved by their own engines without other help. Work has begun on the newest of the important dams—dam No. 29. The location for the buildings includes 13.22 acres on the Kentucky side of the river. The Bates & Rogers Construction company have the contract. The total appropriations made by the United States government to date for improving the Ohio river since 1827, when it was first begun, to date, amount only to $8,201,439.72. Considering the long period of eighty-four years and the importance of the Ohio as a trade artery it is small. The great event of opening the Fernbank dam took place July 22, 1911. The Commercial Tribune of that date said : "The nine-foot stage of water for the Ohio river, talked of for years, today becomes a reality. Beginning at 5 o'clock this morning the new Fernbank dam will go into operation by the raising of its wall of wickets, now ready for their task of holding back the water of the river until all that part above Fernbank and reaching along the city's entire water front and for some distance beyond Coney Island, reaches a depth of nine feet. "The stretch of slack water will extend for a' distance of twenty-six miles, from Fernbank to a point one-fourth of a mile from the head of Eight Mile dyke. "When this pool is full to the depth required the river at the foot of Broadway will show a stage of 11.3 feet. At the head of the lower Four Mile bar there will be a raise of 6.3 feet above the present low water stage ; at Gander bar a raise of 3.8 feet ; at Five Mile bar 2.1 feet raise, and at the quarter mile above the head of Eight Mile the slack ends altogether. Vol. II.-8. 114 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY "All day the filling up of the pool will be going on. It is proposed to make it very slow work, so that the temporary fall of water in the river below Fern-bank will not give trouble to the boats plying there. Some alarm had started yesterday already on this subject among boatmen, who were led to think that the fall in that part of the river would be enough to stop navigation entirely for' some time at least. "Their fears about this were communicated to the managers of the darn and they were assured there would be no trouble, the intention being to have the raising of the wickets effected so gradually that the fall in the river below the dam would be very slight. It is likely the work will not be finished before Sunday morning, depending on circumstances. "The river stage for this city yesterday was 5.7 feet at the foot of Broadway, and not till this is brought to 11.3 feet will the filling up be completed. "Boats passing the dam will have to enter the lock on the Ohio shore after exchanging signals as follows : "Signals—Boats approaching from either direction and desiring to pass through the lock will notify the lock-tender by four short whistles. The signals from the lock for boats or other craft to enter will be three short whistles ; the signal for leaving the lock will be one long whistle. "Lights—When the dam is up signal lights will be displayed after dark as follows : "At the head of the river wall of the lock three red lights in a vertical line. "At the foot of the river wall of the lock two red lights in a vertical line." On the next day the Commercial Tribune said : "All yesterday and last night the work of harnessing the Ohio went forward without hitch or halt at Fern-bank, and by noon today there will be seen the realization of the nine-foot river stage for the whole Cincinnati harbor and for miles of its approaches above and below the city. "The operation was a slow one, because that was necessary. The- need to keep the river below the dam supplied with water sufficient for the boats plying there required that the raising of the wickets should be very gradual and that they should be brought into place one at a time. It was not till after midnight that the last one of them was raised, and then the wall of sheet steel was complete from the Kentucky to the Ohio shore, holding back the waters above. "Crowds from the city and surrounding towns were on the scene all day. Hundreds of spectators crowded the tractions to the place, and as many more took in the sights from the excursion boats that made the trip down from the city. Launches without number kept coming and going with gay outing parties bent on being among those to claim having seen the big dam's opening day. "Very fitly the distinction of being the first of the boats to pass through the lock fell to the pleasure craft Romona, in command of Albert Bettinger, the strenuous and devoted advocate and leader in the cause of the river's improvements. "The Romona had made the passage of that section of the Ohio many times before, and a shade of sadness was added .to the feelings of those aboard by the CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 115 void in their ranks made by the death of George Guckenberger, president of the Atlas National bank, missing now for the first time in the party, to which he contributed life and pleasure. "The Ramona had laid up the evening previous just below the dam, and before retiring for the night its crew held brief memorial services for Mr. Guckenberger. In the morning Captain Bettinger headed the boat for the lock, and in response to his signal its gate opened and the craft, with flags flying, made its way through to the upper course.. All the machinery of the lock worked to perfection. The Roniona was duly credited on the records as the first boat to pass. Those in the party with Mr„ Bettinger were George A. Dieterle, Louis J. Hauck, George F. Dieterle, Charles Albrecht, Charles Wiedemann and George and Herman Guckenberger. "Half an hour later the steamer Douglas Hall, coming up the river to the city, arrived at the dam and signaled. "It had been its captain's intention to be the first to make the passage through the lock, arid although the regular channel was still open and the way clear, the captain insisted on having second honors for the Douglas Hall, and the lock was operated a second time to let that boat through. "The raising of the wickets was begun at 6 o'clock in the morning, starting at the Kentucky shore abutment. It went on at intervals. Each time a wicket was raised the water passage of the river between the Ohio and Kentucky shores was shortened by three feet, that being the width of the wickets, of which there are 225 in all. "The need for letting enough water pass to the river below the dam obliged the men to go very slowly in extending the steel wicket wall. It was not until the afternoon that wickets adjacent to the Ohio shore began to be raised, and all day a central passage was left open for boats to pass up or down without having to go through the lock. The steamer Indiana of the Louisville and Cincinnati Packet company went through this passage on its way to the Falls city last evening, there being some doubt as to whether the water stage at the lock would be sufficient for a boat of the Indiana's draught. "The Romona and the Douglas Hall were the only boats making the lock passage during the day. With the stage that will be effective today the lock will be able to accommodate all comers. It has a length of 600 feet and a width of 110 feet. "The working of the upper gate of the lock was interrupted for a few hours in the afternoon by the breaking of a cross-head in the driving engine. This added some of the necessary delay in raising the wickets. "Assistant Chief Engineer R. R. Jones of the United States engineer corps, was personally in charge of the arrangements for the starting of the dam. These were carried out with entire success at all points. Major Jervey of the engineer corps, in charge of the Ohio river, was among those present to witness the workings. "When the filling up of the Cincinnati pool is completed today the river stage at the foot of Broadway will stand at 11.3 feet, and from that will gradually decline to 9 feet at a short distance above Coney Island, and the Eight Mile bar." 116 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN 'CITY Cincinnati looks forward eagerly to the completion of the nine-foot stage to Cairo, and then to the opening of the Panama canal and to the vast increase of business these two events are bound to give to the Queen City. In the autumn of 1911, Cincinnati expects to take part in the celebration of the hundredth anniversary of steam navigation on the Ohio. The hull of the steamer New Orleans, a replica of the first steamboat that navigated the Monongahela, Ohio and Mississippi rivers, from Pittsburgh to New Orleans, was launched Thursday, August 30, 1911, at the Elizabeth Marine Ways company, Pittsburgh, in the presence of several members of the Historical society of western Pennsylvania, under whose auspices the vessel is being built. The boat will be finished by the middle of October and will take part in the river pageant, repeating the first voyage to the port of New Orleans. The vessel will be christened October 31, when Mrs. Nicholas Longworth will break a bottle of champagne over the bow of the boat. Mrs. Longworth is a grand-niece of Nicholas J. Roosevelt, who built the original New Orleans. The boat is 138 feet long and 26% feet beam, eight-foot depth of hold and of about 400 tons burden and every way a duplicate of the original steamer. CHAPTER X. THE POSTOFFICE. THE PRIMITIVE POSTOFFICE A VERY RUDIMENTARY AFFAIR-ABNER N. DUNN KEPT THE FIRST POSTOFFICE IN HIS LOG CABIN ON SECOND STREET-FIRST MAILS CARRIED BY A POST RIDER-POSTAGE ON LETTERS TWENTY-FIVE CENTS IN COIN-POSTMASTERS AND POSTOFFICE BUILDINGS. The colonial postoffice, as well as that of the early days after the independence of the country, was a very rudimentary affair. Perhaps the earliest official notice of it is seen in the following paragraph from the records of the general courts of Massachusetts in 1639. "It is ordered that notice be given that Richard Fairbanks, his house in Boston, is the place appointed for all letters which are brought from beyond the seas, or are to be sent thither to be left with him ; and he is to take care that they are to be delivered or sent according to the directions ; and he is allowed for every letter a penny, and must answer all miscarriages through his own neglect in this kind." That court in 1667 was petitioned to make better postal arrangements, the petitioners alleging the frequent "loss of letters whereby merchants, especially with their friends and employers in foreign parts are greatly damnified many times the letters are imputed ( ?) and thrown upon the exchange, so that those who will may take them up, no person without some satisfaction, being willing to trouble their houses therewith." In Virginia the postal system was yet more primitive. The colonial law of 1657 required every planter to provide a messenger to convey the dispatches as they arrived to the next plantation, and so on, on pain of forfeiting a hogshead of tobacco in default. The Government of New York in 1672 established "a post to goe monthly from New York to Boston," advertising "those that bee disposed to send letters, to bring them to the secretary's office, where, in a lockt box, they shall be preserved till the messenger calls for them, all persons paying the post before the bagg be sealed up." Thirty .years later this monthly post had become a fortnightly one, as we see by the following paragraph in the Boston News-Letter. "By order of the postmaster general of North America. These are to give notice, That on Monday night, the 6th of December, the Western post between Boston and New York sets out once a fortnight, the three winter months of December, January and February, and to go alternately from Boston to Saybrook and Hartford, to exchange the mayle of letters with the New York Ryder ; the first turn for Saybrook to meet the New York Ryder on Saturday night the 11th currant ; and the second turn he sets out at Boston on Monday night the loth currant, to meet the New York Ryder at Hartford, on Saturday night the 25th currant, to - 117 - 118 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY exchange mayles ; and all persons that sends letters from Boston to Connecticut from and after the 13th inst. are hereby notified first to pay the postage on the same." This office of postmaster-general for America had been created in 1602. In the American colonies postal improvements may be dated from the administration of Franklin, who was virtually the last colonial postmaster-general, as well as unquestionably the best. In one shape or another he had forty years' experience of postal work, having been appointed postmaster at Philadelphia as early as October, 1737. When he became postmaster-general in 1753 he bestirred himself for the improvement of his department in that practical painstaking way with which he was wont to guide any plough he had once put his hand to, whatever the ground it had to work in. He visited all the chief post-offices throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and New England, looking at everything with his own eyes. His administration cannot be better summed up than we find it to be in a sentence or two which he wrote after his dismissal. Up to the date of his appointment, he says, "the American postoffice had never paid anything to that of Britain. We (himself and his assistant) were to have six hundred pounds ($2,916) a year between us, if we could make that sum out of the office. . . . In the first four years the office became above nine hundred pounds ($4,374) in debt to us. But it soon began to repay us ; and before I was displaced by a freak of the minister's, we had brought it to yield three times as much clear revenue to the crown as the postoffice of Ireland. Since that imprudent transaction they have received from it—not one penny." Benjamin Franklin was removed by the home department of the government of Great Britain from his office of postmaster-general in America in 1774. On July 26th, 1775, the American Congress assumed direction of the postoffices, reappointing Franklin to his former post. Shortly afterwards, when Franklin was sent as ambassador to France, his son-in-law, Richard Bache, was made postmaster-general in November, 1775. In 1789 the number of postoffices was seventy-five; in 1800, nine hundred and three; in 1825, five thousand, six hundred and seventy-seven ; in 1875, thirty-five thousand, seven hundred and thirty-four ; in 1909, sixty thousand, one hundred and forty-four. In 1789 the gross revenues of the postal service were $30,000 ; in 1800, $280,000. In 1884, the receipts were $43,325,959; the expenditures were $47,224,560, and salaries of postmasters were $11,283,830. In 1909, the receipts were $203,562,383 ; expenditures $221,004,102 ; salaries of postmasters, $26,569,892. At first, and for many years, the postage. rates varied with the distance the matter was carried. In 1792, the rates were from six cents for distances of thirty miles or less to twenty-five cents for distances of four hundred and fifty miles or more. One cent was the rate for a newspaper for one hundred miles or less ; one cent and a half for greater distances. Post riders carried the mails in saddle bags. Long distances and bad roads caused prolonged intervals between mail days and often great delays beyond the appointed times. When the post rider did come the community turned out en masse. The mail carrier was also a dispenser of news by word of mouth and always had an excited and eager group of hearers hanging on his words as to events beyond their boundaries. CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 119 Nearly every post road was at some time the scene of a mail robbery, a capital crime then, and many points are still indicated by traditions where such robbers have been shot or hanged. In September, 1789, Jonathan Dayton, of New Jersey, and a member of Congress, wrote John Cleves Symmes, "Do not send your packets by the mail, as the expense is heavy. The letter said to be forwarded by Major Willis was by him, or some other person, thrown into the postoffice, and I was obliged to pay six shillings and eight pence in specie for it." It was not every one who cared to receive mail in those days if the postage had not been prepaid. Sometimes people declined to take out their letters, not knowing whether or not they were of interest or value enough to justify the payment of the postage. The Centinel of the Northwestern Territory, of June 28th, 1794, announced : "We learn that there is a post established from Pittsburgh to this place and that Albert M. Dunn, Esq., is appointed deputy postmaster-general in this place." This naturally caused a stir in the frontier, village. The same paper announced a fortnight later that the post from Pittsburgh had come, and that the office would be in the home of Dunn. The first postmaster was Abner M. Dunn. His cabin on the corner of Butler street and Columbia Road, now Second street, beyond Fort Washington and the Artificers' yard, was the first postoffice. On account of dearth of news and the uncertainty of the mails, the printer Maxwell stated in November that his first page each week would be devoted to printing the laws of the Territory. In March of 1795 the postmaster Dunn warned "those who have a right to calculate on receiving letters or papers at his office that in future they must come prepared with ready cash in hand or no letters or papers." In 1795, M. T. Green of Marietta agreed to convey the mails between Cincinnati and Pittsburgh in a canoe equipped with paddles and poles. On down stream journeys, on which traveling was easier, Greene carried some freight and an occasional passenger. A line of rowboats was soon established between these points, with relays at different stations to carry the mail. After certain postoffices were established further up in the Miami region the mails were carried on horseback by William Olim. Abner Dunn, postmaster, died July 18, 1795. He was succeeded in office by William Maxwell, the editor and the founder of the first newspaper in the Northwest Territory. His appointment was followed by the announcement : "Gentlemen and others wishing to send letters by the post may leave them at the printing office where the postoffice is now kept." In the Centinel of October 3, 1795, John G. McDowell announced that he had contracted to carry the mails between Cincinnati and Graham's Station; that he would arrive at Cincinnati on Monday at twelve o'clock noon and remain until the following morning, "which is giving a sufficient time for the inhabitants of Cincinnati to answer their letters." April 2d, 1796, the postmaster gave notice to such as were indebted to the postoffice to pay at once and that such as were looking for newspapers in the mail should come and pay the postage. 120 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY As throwing some light upon the relations of the Miami region to Cincinnati in the matter of the mails in early days the following facts in regard to Warren county will prove of interest. There were no postoffices within the limits of Warren county for more than eight years after the settlements were commenced. Cincinnati was for several years the postoffice for the whole Miami valley. In the year 1800 letters were advertised as remaining in the postoffice at Cincinnati addressed to the following persons in Warren county : John Bigger, Fourth Range; Thomas Espy, Little Miami ; John Wallace, schoolmaster, Turtle Creek ; Moses Crane, Fourth Range ; others were addressed "Bailey's Station," "Below the Big Miami," "Duck Creek," "Big Prairie," &c. Within two years after the, organization of the State government, four post-offices were established in Warren county ; at Waynesville, Deerfield, Franklin and Lebanon. Ten years elapsed before any others were established. In 1812, Montgomery, in Hamilton county, was made a postoffice, and it accommodated a portion of the people of Warren living in the southwestern part of the county. Thus the people to the northward were gradually but slowly relieved of the necessity of depending upon Cincinnati for their mails. The first mails to postoffices in Warren county were carried by a postrider. The route was from Cincinnati to Lebanon, Xenia, Urbana, thence across to Piqua, down through Dayton, Franklin and Hamilton to Cincinnati, taking a week to make the trip. The people thought themselves fortunate in having a weekly mail for some years. The mail was carried by postriders until about the year 1825, when stage lines were started with the mails. There are perhaps people still living who can remember when the postage on a letter, which must be written on a single sheet of paper, was twenty-five cents between' Cincinnati and New Orleans, while the freight on a barrel of flour between the same points was sometimes below that figure. Most men at that time would have regarded our present mail facilities an impossibility, and especially would the prediction that letters' would one day be carried from Maine to California for two cents have been regarded as a Utopian dream. Daniel Mayo succeeded Maxwell as postmaster of Cincinnati in July, 1797. On his removal to Newport, Kentucky, he was no longer eligible to the Cincinnati position but he was soon appointed postmaster at his new home and continued to act in that capacity during the remainder of his life. William Ruffin became postmaster January 1st, 1799. He removed the post-office to his home, a two-story frame house, on Columbia and Lawrence streets. Major Ruffin held this position until the end of 1814, when he resigned and went into business with his son-in-law Major Oliver. In Ruffin's time of service, the postage of a letter was twenty-five cents in coin. Four weeks was not an unusual period for the mail to be enroute to or from the east. The amount of mail matter in the Cincinnati office was so small as to be cared for in the corner of one room, where Major Ruffin attended to it behind glass doors. He had no assistant. The mail from the east then came once a week from Maysville, Kentucky, in one pair of saddle bags. On May 17, 1799, the Western. Spy and Hamilton Gazette announced : "Postoffice.—Notice is hereby given that a postoffice is established at Chelicotha. The persons, therefore, having business in that part of the country may have speedy CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 121 and safe conveyance by post for.letters, packets, &c." That mail was then taken on horseback, following an Indian trail. The same paper stated March 12, 1800, that a post route had been opened between Louisville and Kaskaskia, also one between Nashville and Natchez. "This will open an easy channel of communication with those remote places, which has heretofore been extremely difficult, particularly from the Atlantic States." The mail carrier from Louisville was compelled to carry food for himself and horse from Louisville to Cincinnati. His path lay all the way through woods, where he was exposed to perils from animals and Indians as well as to hunger. The Daily Commercial, Cincinnati, December, 1874, gave some reminiscences of this period in an interview : "In 1808-09 Peter Williams had contracts for carrying the mails between Louisville and Cincinnati, Cincinnati and Lexington, Cincinnati and Chillicothe, and Cincinnati and Greenville in Darke county. All these contracts were performed with pack horses through the dense forests and along the 'blazed' tracks or paths which, in those days, were called roads. The trip from Cincinnati to Louisville was generally performed in about two weeks' time. The provender for the horses had frequently to be carried along, it being impossible to procure any on the way. So of the other routes to the different places named,—everywhere through the grand dense forests, filled with wild game of all kinds. Our informant recollects many rude incidents which occurred on many trips he, as a boy, made with his father, and afterwards by himself, as he became older, to Chillicothe, Greenville, Louisville, &c. Mr. Williams retained these mail contracts up to 1821, using pack horses during the whole time, and only releasing them on the advent of the stage coaches, owners of which could afford to carry the mails at about one half the price he was getting. In those early days the pack horse was the only way in which supplies of every kind could be transported any distance ; and Mr. Williams distinctly remembers that his father possessed the only wagon in the country around Cincinnati, and that, being of no use, was suffered to rot down in the barn." Samuel Lewis was one of the youthful carriers of mail employed by Mr. Williams. His son said in an account of his life : "After working a short time upon the farm, he was employed in carrying the United States mail, for which Mr. Williams had a contract at that time. His route was at first from Cincinnati to Williamsburg, and afterward from the latter point to Chillicothe. This work often required seven days and two nights in the week, making the labor very severe. In addition to this, the creeks and small rivers along the route were to be forded, bridges at that period being out of the question. This was all clone on horseback. The routes covered most of the country east of Cincinnati to the Scioto river at Chillicothe, and southward of this to the Ohio river, including Maysville, Kentucky. "Over some of these .streams, during high water, it was necessary to swim the horse ; while often the attempt was accompanied with much danger. At one time, being compelled to swim his horse, he had secured the mail bag, as he supposed, and commenced grossing the stream, swimming himself and leading the horse. When nearly over, the mail bag from some cause became unloosed and 122 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY floated off. His horse was first to be secured, and then the mail. Its recovery and the renewal of his journey would have been speedy, but he was struck by a floating log and severely injured. Making his way with extreme difficulty to the shore, he succeeded in mounting his horse and continuing his journey to the next town, which he reached completely drenched and exhausted, and where he remained for some days before he was able to renew his round. The accident unfitted him for his employment for the time, and when he returned to Cincinnati he was occupied with other labor." Mr. Lewis afterward became a distinguished man, was largely influential in the founding of the two greatest high schools of the city, and was the first superintendent of public schools in this state. January 1st, 1815, William Burke became postmaster. He was commonly called "Father Burke," was a Methodist itinerent preacher and had been presiding elder. Mr. Mansfield states that Burke was a southerner : "He seemed to have lost his voice and always spoke low and in guttural tones. He was always chewing tobacco and, being a postmaster, was always a democrat. He was a strong Methodist and seemed an amiable man." Burke separated himself from his denomination, procured a place of worship for his followers, and often preached there. He was inclined to politics, was at first a Jeffersonian and then a Jackson democrat. He held office until the whigs came into power. Burke had as his assistant for a long time Elam P. Langdon, who also maintained the Cincinnati Reading Room, where many newspapers and journals, American and foreign, could be consulted. The postoffice in 1819 was at 157 Main street. April 13th, 1841, President Tyler appointed as postmaster W. H. H. Taylor, who removed the office to Main street above Columbia or Second street ; subsequently he chose a site on Main street, near Fourth. The number of mails to and from Cincinnati in 1826 was twenty each week. A portion of these was carried on ten stage coaches, three on the Chillicothe route, three on the Lebanon, three on the Dayton and Columbus route, and one on that to Georgetown, Kentucky. Ten mails were conveyed by postriders. In 1826 the income of the Cincinnati postoffice from postage was eight thousand, one hundred and odd dollars. There were delivered in that year three thousand, seven hundred and fifty free letters. Early in 1827 another line of stage coaches was started by way of Xenia, Urbana, Maysville, and Bucyrus to Lower Sandusky. At Sandusky the mail was put on a boat, and by this change letters reached New York in ten days. A daily line was also run to Wheeling, reaching Baltimore in eight or nine days; this route was almost the same as that taken later by the National pike. Stages at this time also were run from Cincinnati to Lexington, eighty miles. In 1828-29 the income of the Cincinnati postoffice was twelve thousand, one hundred and fifty dollars, an increase of fifty per cent in three years. Twenty-three mails came and went each week, eighteen by stages and five by horseback. In 1829-30 the income was sixteen thousand, two hundred and fifty odd dollars. In 1833, it was twenty-six thousand, one hundred and odd dollars. In this latter year, sixty-four mails came and went each week. Of these, thirty-six were by stages, eleven on horseback, ten on steamboats, and seven part way by steamboat and partly by land. CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 123 In 1836 there were the eastern mail, the southern mail by steamboat, the northern mail by way of Hamilton, Chillicothe, West Union ; southern by way of Georgetown, Brookville, Cynthiana ; western by way of Lawrenceburg, Maysville, Newport, and Covington, Walnut Hills, Mount Healthy and Cumminsville. There was a twice-a-week mail to Guyandotte, Virginia. For distances less than thirty miles the letter postage was six and a quarter cents. This increased to twenty-five cents for distances more than four hundred miles. This was for single sheet letters ; double sheet letters were charged double, and there was apportionate increase according to the number of sheets. The postoffice was removed about 1836 to Third street between Vine and Walnut streets. In November, 1841, the office was removed to a new building on East Third street, between Sycamore and Main streets. This had been erected especially for the postoffice by R. L. L'Hommedieu ; the office occupied the first floor. Dickens in his "American Notes," gives an entertaining account of his observations of the stage coaches. He says : "We rested one day at Cincinnati, and then resumed our journey to Sandusky. As it comprised two varieties of stage coach traveling, which, with those I have already glanced at, comprehend the main characteristics of this mode of transit in America, I will take the reader as our fellow passenger, and pledge myself to perform the distance with all possible dispatch. "Our place of destination in the first instance is Columbus. It is distant• about a hundred and twenty miles from Cincinnati, but there is a macadamized road (rare blessing) the whole way, and the rate of traveling upon it is six miles an hour. We start at eight o'clock in the morning, in a great mailcoach, whose huge cheeks are so very ruddy and plethoric that it appears to be troubled with a tendency of blood to the head. Dropsical it certainly is, for it will hold a dozen passengers inside. But, wonderful to add, it is very clean and bright, being nearly new, and rattles through the streets of Cincinnati gaily. "Our way lies through a beautiful country, richly cultivated, and luxuriant in its promise of an abundant harvest. Sometimes we pass a field where the strong, bristling stalks of Indian corn look like a crop of walking sticks, and sometimes an enclosure where the green wheat is springing up among a labyrinth of stumps ; the primitive worm fence is universal, and an ugly thing it is ; but the farms are neatly kept, and, save for these differences, one might be traveling just now in Kent. "We often stop to water at a roadside inn, which is always dull and silent. The coachman dismounts and fills his bucket, and holds it to the horses' heads. There is scarcely ever any one to help him ; there are seldom any loungers standing around, and never any stable-company with jokes to crack. Sometimes, when we have changed our team, there is a difficulty in starting again, arising out of the prevalent mode of breaking a young horse ; which is to catch him, harness him against his will, and put him in a stage coach without further notice ; but we get on somehow or other, after a great many kicks and a violent struggle, and jog on as before again. "Occasionally, when we stop to change, some two or three half-drunken loafers will come loitering out with their hands in their pockets, or will be seen 124 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY kicking their heels in rocking chairs, or sitting on a rail within the colonnade ; they have not often anything to say, though, either to us or to each other, but sit there idly staring at the coach and horses. The landlord of the inn is usually among them, and seems, of all the party, to be the least connected with the business of the house. Indeed, he is with reference to the tavern, what the driver is in relation to the coach and passengers ; whatever happens in his sphere of action, he is quite indifferent, and perfectly easy in his mind. "There being no stage coach next day upon the road we wished to take, I hired an extra, at a reasonable charge, to carry us to Tiffin ; a small town from whence there is a railroad to Sandusky. This extra was an ordinary four-horse stage coach, such as I have described, changing horses and drivers, as the stage coach would, but was exclusively our own for the journey. To insure our having horses at the proper stations, and being incommoded by no stranger, the proprietors sent an agent on the box, who was to accompany us the whole way through ; and thus attended, and bearing with us, besides, a hamper full of savory cold meats, and fruit and wine, we started off again, in high spirits, at half past six next morning, very much delighted to be by ourselves and disposed to enjoy even the roughest journey. "It was well for us that we were in this humor, for the road we went over that day was certainly enough to have shaken tempers that were not set at fair, down to some inches below stormy. At one time we were all flung in a heap in the bottom of the coach, and at another we were crushing our heads against the roof. Now, one side was down deep in the mire, and we were holding on to the other. Now the coach was lying on the tails of the two wheelers ; and now it was rearing up in the air in a frantic state, with all four horses standing on the top of an insurmountable eminence, looking coolly back at it, as though they would say, 'unharness us. It can't be done.' The drivers on these roads, who certainly got over the ground in a manner which is quite miraculous, so twist and turn the team about in forcing a passage, corkscrew fashion, through the bogs and swamps, that it was quite a common circumstance on looking out of the window to see the coachman with the ends of a pair of reins in his hands, apparently driving nothing, or playing at horses, and the leaders staring at one unexpectedly from the back of the coach, as if they had some idea of getting up behind. A great portion of the way was over what is called a corduroy road, which is made by throwing trunks of trees into a marsh and leaving them to settle there. The very slightest of the jolts with which the ponderous carriage fell from log to log was enough, it seemed, to have dislocated all the bones in the human body. It would be impossible to experience a similar set of sensations in any other circumstances unless, perhaps, in attempting to go up to the top of St. Paul's in an omnibus. Never, never once that day was the coach in any position, attitude or kind of motion to which we are accustomed in coaches. Never did it make the smallest approach to one's experience of the proceedings of any sort of vehicle that goes on wheels: "Still it was a fine day, and the temperature was delicious, and though we had left summer behind us in the west, and were fast leaving spring, we were moving towards Niagara and home. We alighted in a pleasant woods towards the middle of the day, dined on a fallen tree, and leaving our best fragments with CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 125 a cottager and our worst with the pigs that swarm in this part of the country like grains of sand on the seashore, to the great comfort of our commissariat in Canada, we went forward gaily. "As night came on, the track grew narrower and narrower, until at last it so lost itself among the trees, that the driver seemed to find his way by instinct. We had the comfort of knowing at least that there was no danger of his falling asleep, for every now and then a wheel would strike against an unseen stump with a jerk, that he was. fain to hold on pretty quick and pretty tight to keep himself upon the box. Nor was there any reason to dread the least danger from furious driving, inasmuch as over that broken ground the horses had enough to do to walk ; as to shying, there was no room for that ; and a herd of wild elephants could not have run away in such a wood ; with such a coach at their heels. So we stumbled along quite satisfied." June 24, 1845, William H. Taylor was removed from the postmastership by President Polk, and George Crawford was appointed to the position. At this time the postoffice was taken to the corner of Walnut and Third streets. Major William Oliver was appointed May 2, 1849, by President Zachary Taylor, and the postoffice was taken to the Art Union building, Sycamore and Fourth streets. As Major Oliver died in office, James C. Hall was appointed February 4, 1852, to serve out his term. April 29, 1853, Dr. John L. Vattier became postmaster. He was removed by President Buchanan and James J. Faran was appointed June 4, 1855. October 21, 1859, Dr. Vattier was again appointed and served until April, 1861. In 1851 the government purchased ground at Fourth and Vine streets, paying fifty thousand dollars for the lots. In 1856 the government building on that site was completed and the postoffice was removed to it. J. C. Baum took office April 15, 1861. He was succeeded May 12, 1864, by F. J. Mayer, and he by William H. H. Taylor, November 6, 1866. Calvin W. Thomas became postmaster April 20, 1867, and Thomas H. Foulds, April 5, 1869. • January 9, 1874, Gustave R. Wahle became postmaster and John P. Loge succeeded him January 25, 1878. The position was given S. A. Whitfield January 31, 1882. The next to hold this office was John C. Riley, appointed August 6, 1886. John Zumstein was appointed February 9, 1891, and Charles E. Brown March 30, 1895. Captain Elias R. Monfort, who had been a brave soldier in the Civil war, and is a citizen of prominence and usefulness, became the postmaster of Cincinnati March 2, 1899, and still holds this office. He is highly esteemed by all citizens and under his long administration the postoffice has seen its greatest development until it is now one of the model offices of the world. In March, 1874, the government sold its old building and the site at Fourth and Vine streets to the Chamber of Commerce for one hundred thousand dollars The government in 1873 purchased ground at Fifth street, between Main and Walnut streets for a new government building. This ground cost six hundred and ninety-six thousand, seven hundred and odd dollars. Eleven years were 126 - CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY occupied in the erection of the building, at a cost of four million, five hundred and fifty-three thousand, two hundred and eighty odd dollars. In May, 1885, the postoffice was removed to the new Federal building, where it occupies the ground floor. Free city delivery was established in July, 1863. The railway mail service came into use August, 1864. Special delivery service was established October 1, 1885. The International parcel post, January 1, 1888. Rural free delivery, October, 1896. The first postage stamp was sold in New York, July 1, 1847. The first stamped envelope June, 1853. The first newspaper wrapper February, 1861. The first special request envelope, 1865. The first postal card May 1, 1873. The first registered letter at the New York postoffice was handled July 1855. The first letter that was returned to the writer was in 1829. The first money order was issued November I, 1864. The first international money order in 1867. The first permit matter was authorized April 28, 1904. The first post cards May 19, 1898. The first newspaper mail at pound rates was sent March 3, 1879. UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT BUILDING. This great structure, the finest, most imposing and colossal of all the public buildings in the city, is a magnificent contribution to the many architectural attractions of Cincinnati, and is justly a source of pride to its citizens. It includes the postoffice, custom house, internal revenue department, offices of the railway mail service, weather bureau, and federal courts of the United States, and occupies one-half of the square bounded by Fifth, Sixth, Walnut and Main streets, with the main front facing on Fifth street. The building is 364 feet front and 164 feet deep, four stories in height above ground, exclusive of the attics and roof stories. There is an underground basement fourteen feet high and a sub-basement ten feet, furnished with light and air from an area twelve feet wide, running entirely around the building. The exterior is designed in the Renaissance style of four superimposed orders. The principal facade. 354 feet long, is divided into center and corner pavilions, connected by receding bays, while the end facades have corner pavilions only, connected by receding bays. The pavilions are strongly marked by porticos, with full, detached columns, and the divisions rendered more effective by large dormers and prominent roof lines at the corners, while the center pavilion terminates in an attic of two stories and high towering roof 170 feet from the ground. The windows, liberal in size and simple in form, are kept entirely subordinate to the orders which form the decorative features of the facades. The lines are generally rigid and the openings square at head, except in the crowning story, where arched openings give a very pleasing termination. The orders are very originally treated in the first story. The pilasters and columns, placed on a high pedestal, are rusticated, and by an ingenious introduction of the triglyph into the capitals, the characteristics of the Doric order are given with a decidedly new effect. This rusticated order, with its reinforcement of piers, forms an appropriate and massive substructure on which the other and lighter orders rest. These upper orders are a modified CINCINNATI—THE QUEEN CITY - 127 tonic in the second story and composite in the third and fourth, the whole at a height of ninety-five feet from the ground, surmounted by a modillion cornice of ornamental detail. The exterior walls are of granite, the basement and stylobate from the red granite quarries of Middlebrook, Mo., and the superstructhre from quarries at Fox Island, Maine. The interior construction is of a strictly fireproof character, as in other first-class government buildings. with partitions of brick, and floors of iron beams and brick arches. The entire first story of this magnificent building is devoted to the postoffice department, rooms for the postmaster, cashier, money order and registry offices, vaults, etc., being located at the ends of the building, while the central portion forms one vast business room, 132x225 feet, which in addition to the usual complement of side windows, has a large portion of its ceiling of glass, making a skylight 63x220 feet. The building was commenced in 1874 and completed in 1885, the total cost, including the site ($800,000), being nearly five million dollars. In 1826 there were 20 weekly mails carried on ten stages and ten horseback routes. In 1833 there were 64 mails per week, received and sent on thirty-six stages, ten steamboats, eleven horseback routes, and seven on steamboat and land carriage. In 1884 there were 229 dispatches by railrods, four by steamboats and four by hack, a total of 237 daily. In 1909 there were 709 mails received and dispatched daily, 331 on railroads and 278 on traction lines. In 1884 there were 104 clerks and 87 carriers and in 1910, 391 clerks and 20 substitutes, 326 carriers and 50 substitutes. The growth of the Cincinnati postoffice may be shown by the revenues collected from 1800 to 1909, as follows :

RATES OF POSTAGE. Established by Act of Congress March 3, 1825, and the amendatory Act of March 2, 1827. On a single letter composed of one piece of paper