Society of the Cincinnati

“ The inferior has been a slave, a serf, a paid freeman; he may in time become an associate or partner without ceasing to be an inferior. However this may be, there is no germ of industrial feudalism in Cincinnati, there are no great factories or workshops. Mechanical industry is subdivided there, pretty much as the soil is amongst us; each head of a family, with his sons and some newly arrived emigrants as assistants and servants, has his domain in this great field. Cincinnati is, therefore, as republican in its industrial organisation, as in its political. ”

“ The moral aspect of Cincinnati is delightful in the eyes of him who prefers work to every thing else, and with whom work can take the place of every thing else. But [Pg 206] whoever has a taste for pleasure and display, whoever needs occasional relaxation from business, in gaiety and amusement, would find this beautiful city, with its picturesque environs, an insupportable residence. It would be still more so for a man of leisure, desirous of devoting a large part of his time to the cultivation of the fine arts and the rest to pleasure. ”

“ We might wonder whether a town with a name like that would ever grow into a great city. It did not have to try, for it was not long before General St. Clair, who had come there, made fun of the name and insisted upon a new one. He and other officers of the American army had formed a society commemorating their experience in the Revolution, and in honor of the Roman patriot Cincinnatus had called themselves the Order of Cincinnati. St. Clair thought this a good name for the town, and Cincinnati it has been since that time. ”

“ The Society of the Cincinnati was founded here in 1783. "To perpetuate among the officers of the army and their descendants, the memory of their toils, trials, friendships and triumphs, for succeeding ages." The following were among the signers: Lieutenant Robert Burnett, Brigadier James Clinton, Lieutenant Alexander Clinton, Lieutenant Daniel Denniston, Lieutenant George J. Denniston, Captain James Gregg, Captain Jonathan Lawrence, Major Samuel Logan, Ensign Joseph Morrell, Lieutenant William Stranahan, Lieutenant William Scudder, many of whose descendants are residents of the county. ”

“ The prosperity of Cincinnati, therefore, rests upon the sure basis of the prosperity of the West, upon the supply of articles of the first necessity to the bulk of the community; a much more solid foundation than the caprice of fashion, upon which, nevertheless, the branches of industry most in favour with us, depend. The intellectual also receives a share of attention ”

“ No political purpose was to be subserved by this order of the Cincinnati, save in so far as the members pledged to one another their determination to promote and cherish the union between the states. In its main intent the society was to be a kind of masonic brotherhood, charged with the duty of aiding the [Pg 116] widows and the orphan children of its members in time of need. Innocent as all this was, however, the news of the establishment of such a society was greeted with a howl of indignation all over the country. ”

“ Cincinnati is the most healthy large city in the United States. The streets are wide; and the terraces afford fine situations for houses. The furnishing of the dwellings is as magnificent as the owners may choose to make it; for commerce with the whole world is carried on from their port. ”

“ The most remarkable circumstance, and the most favourable, with regard to the peopling of Cincinnati is, that its population contains contributions of almost every element that goes to constitute society; and each in its utmost vigour. There are here few of the arbitrary associations which exist among the members of other societies. Young men come with their wives, in all directions, from afar ”

“ Lowell, for example, is an enterprise of Boston merchants, who, after having raised the necessary funds, have collected workmen and told them, "Build us a town." Cincinnati has been gradually extended and embellished, almost wholly without foreign aid, by its inhabitants, who have for the most part arrived on the spot poor. The founders of Cincinnati brought with them nothing but sharp-sighted, [Pg 201] wakeful, untiring industry, the only patrimony which they inherited from their New England fathers, and the other inhabitants have scrupulously followed their example and adopted their habits. ”

“ It is a rich city, priding itself on the solidity of its individual fortunes and business, and the freedom of its real property from foreign mortgages. Usually in our development the pursuit of wealth comes first, and then all other things are added thereto, as we read the promise. In Cincinnati there seems to have been a very considerable cultivation first in time, and we have the spectacle of what wealth will do in the way of the sophistication and materialization of society. ”

“ The prevailing manners of society at Cincinnati, are those peculiar to larger cities, without the formalities and mannerism of the eastern sea ports. Freedom of thought prevails in a high degree, and toleration is exercised without limitation. The women are considered very handsome; their deportment is free from pride ”

“ Franklin saw in it the germ of a future aristocracy; and at a meeting held in Philadelphia in 1784 several changes were made in the constitution of the society, the right of succession being made conditional on approval in each case by the society. Membership descends to the eldest lineal male descendant, if judged worthy, and, in failure of direct male descent, to male descendants through intervening female descendants. The general society is composed of the general officers and five delegates from each State society, and meets triennially. ”

“ Cincinnati, Society of the, a society of officers of the Revolutionary army, organized at the close of the war to keep up friendships and especially to raise a fund for widows and orphans of their comrades who had lost their lives in the war. ”

“ Industries.—Although the second city in population in the state, Cincinnati ranked first in 1900 as a manufacturing centre, but lost this pre-eminence to Cleveland in 1905, when the value of Cincinnati’s factory product was $166,059,050, an increase of 17.2% over the figures for 1900. ”

“ According to the official report of the Trustees and visitors of the common schools, dated July 30, 1833, there were then in Cincinnati 6,000 children between the ages of 6 and 16 years, exclusive of 230 children of colour for whom there is a separate school. About 2,300 children attended the common schools and 1,700 private schools. The number of common schools is 18, under the care of 12 masters and 5 assistants, 6 mistresses and 7 assistant mistresses. The masters receive 400 dollars a year, and the assistants 250 ”

“ Probably to a stranger the chief interest of Cincinnati is not in its business enterprises, great as they are, but in another life just as real and important, but which is not always considered in taking account of the prosperity of a community—the development of education and of the fine arts. ”

“ Shrewd calculators and of indomitable industry, they were more able to accumulate property than disposed to risk it in bold, far-reaching enterprises, and took more pride in possessing than in displaying wealth,—in having a large barn than an attractive residence. They were more certain to build a church than a school-house, and few of them wanted anything of the book-pedler except an almanac. The descendants of such men founded Cincinnati, and made it a thriving, bustling, dull, unintellectual place. ”

“ Cincinnati was born again,—began a new life. There is now prevalent among the rulers of the city that noblest trait of freemen, that supreme virtue of the citizen,—Public Spirit; the blessed fruits of which are already apparent, and which is about to render the city a true metropolis to the valley of the Ohio, the fostering mother of all that aids and adorns civilization.
Cincinnati, like New York, is a cluster of towns and cities, bearing various names, and situated in different States. ”

“ For more than ten years preceding the Civil War the city was much disturbed by slavery dissension—the industrial interests were largely with the South, but abolitionists were numerous and active, and the city was an important station on the “Underground Railroad,” of which Dr Norton S. Townshend (1815 –95) was conductor, and one of the stations was the home of Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, who lived in Cincinnati from 1832 to 1850, and gathered there much material embodied in Uncle Tom’s Cabin. ”

“ I have no statistics by me of the population and property of the colored people of Cincinnati, but I am told that their wealth exceeds that of the same class, in any other city in the American Union—that is, according to their numbers. ”

“ He had never been to Cincinnati. Indeed, except on picnic days, he had scarcely ever been outside of Dexter. But Cincinnati was the great city of his State, the one towards which adventurous youth turned its steps when real life was to be begun. ”

“ As stated in a previous report, Cincinnati enjoys the most complete system of public-school education of any city in the world; for the pupils of both sexes have not only open to them the advantages of the district, intermediate, and high schools, but possess the privilege of attending, free of charge, the University of Cincinnati. ”

“ Till I thoroughly understood that Cincinnati is the centre of a circle embracing the populous towns of the south, and the increasing populations of the lake countries and the western territories, with their ever-growing demand for the fruits of manufacturing industry, I could not understand the utility of the vast establishments for the production of household goods which arrest the attention of the visitor to the Queen City. ”

“ Again, some three or four years later, on the occasion of the formation of the Ohio State Colonization Society, another meeting was called, in opposition to Colonization, in the city of Cincinnati, which, among others, passed the following resolution:
"Resolved,—That in our opinion the emancipation and elevation of our enslaved brethren depends in a great measure upon their brethren who are free, remaining in the country; and we will remain to be that 'agitating element' in American politics, which Mr Wise, in a late letter, concludes, has done so much for the slave." ”

“ Cincinnati is a very fine town, and elegantly (not only in the American acceptation of the word) situated on the banks of the river, nearly opposite to Licking Creek, which runs out of Kentucky, and is a stream of considerable importance. The country round the town is beautiful, and the soil rich; the fields in its immediate vicinity bear principally grass, and clover of different sorts, the fragrant smell of which perfumes the air. The town itself ranks next to Pittsburgh, of the towns on the Ohio, in point of manufactures. ”

“ There are seven mayors about Cincinnati for the reasons following. On the southern bank of the Ohio, opposite the city, many large manufactories have found convenient sites, and thus the city of Covington has grown up, divided into two towns by the river Licking. ”

“ The city has about 290 church organizations, including 219 Protestant and 56 Catholic. There are 12 Jewish synagogues. The city is the seat of a Roman Catholic Archbishop and a Protestant Episcopal Bishop. There are over 60 benevolent and welfare organizations and 17 hospitals, besides numerous denominational and non-sectarian homes. The public school system is thoroughly modern and well organized. There are 83 schools with over 1,800 teachers. Higher education is provided by the University of Cincinnati (q. v.) ”

“ As the former are mostly from the New England States, the general character of the inhabitants has taken an adventurous turn, which is conspicuous in their buildings. Most of the houses in the city are elegant, many are truly beautiful; but they belong to the bank of the United States, which possesses at least 200 of the finest houses in Cincinnati. ”

“ The wealthy men of Cincinnati must beware of secluding themselves in their beautiful villas on the other side of the hill, and leaving the city to its smoke and ignorance. The question for Cincinnati, and indeed for the United States, to consider, was well stated by Mr. Mayo in his celebrated lecture upon "Health and Holiness in Cincinnati," one of the most weighty, pathetic, eloquent, and wise discourses we ever read:—
"Shall our Western city children be saved to lead the civilization of America by their superior manhood and womanhood? ”

“ There are no theatres fit to attend. There is no "Museum," no menagerie, no gallery of art, no public gardens, no Fifth Avenue to stroll in, no steamboat excursion, no Hoboken. There ought to be in Cincinnati a most exceptionally good and high social life to atone for this singular absence of the usual means of public enjoyment; but of that a stranger can have little knowledge.
When we turn to survey the industry of Cincinnati, we find a much more advanced and promising state of things. Almost everything is made in Cincinnati that is made by man. ”

“ Cincinnati is handsomely situated on a first and second bank of the Ohio, opposite Licking river. It is a flourishing town, has a rich, level, and well settled country around it. It contains about four hundred dwellings, an elegant court house, jail, three market houses, a land office for the sale of Congress lands, two printing offices, issuing weekly Gazettes, thirty mercantile stores, and the various branches of mechanism are carried on with spirit. Industry of every kind being duly encouraged by the citizens, Cincinnati is likely to become a considerable manufacturing place. ”