most part led a busy, happy life. The women especially had their hands
full--keeping their houses clean and neat; doing the cooking and baking;
spinning, weaving, cutting out, and sewing the clothes for their families
(usually large) and knitting their stockings. Then there were the sick to
be visited and nursed, and the neighbors to be helped with their
quilting.
When a new settler arrived, all the men would pitch in and help in the
"cabin raising," finishing the work in short order. They often ended up
with a jolly dance, though the music was sometimes nothing more than the
whistling of the dancers.
For the first ten years Cleveland was only a hamlet of a few dozen
people. Still it continued to exist, and in 1815 was incorporated as a
village. Another year saw the first bank started, and before long its
first newspaper was printed. This paper was supposed to be a weekly, but
often appeared only every ten, twelve, or fifteen days, at the
convenience of the editor.
Already, in supplying her own needs, Cleveland was laying the foundation
for some of her future industries. In fact, soon after the settlement was
founded, Nathaniel Doan built a blacksmith shop on what is now Superior
Avenue. Though the shop was only a rude affair built of logs, it deserves
the name of Cleveland's first manufacturing plant. Here Nathaniel Doan
not only shod the few horses which needed his services but made tools as
well. A gristmill and sawmill came next, and then began the building of
small schooners.
In the early years of the nineteenth century there was practically no way
of communicating with the settlements on the Ohio River. And except for
an occasional party of French and Indians, there was no means of hearing
from Detroit. In 1818, however, regular stage routes began to be opened.
One line went to Columbus, one to Norwalk, and one to Painesville. This
last route advertised that its stage would leave Cleveland at two on
Friday afternoon and would reach Painesville on Saturday morning at
eight--a journey which to-day can easily be made by automobile in a
little more than an hour. Turnpikes soon displaced these rough stage
routes, and over them great six-horse wagons drew freight into Cleveland.
Though all these things helped Cleveland, it was still nothing more than
a village--and so primitive a village that when two hundred dollars was
voted for improvements, one of the old citizens asked, "What on earth
can the trustees find in this village to spend two hundred dollars on?"
[Illustration: CLEVELAND AND HER NEIGHBORS]
Finally, came two events which were the making of Cleveland. In 1827 the
Ohio Canal was opened from Cleveland to Akron and later to the mouth of
the Scioto River, which flows into the Ohio at Portsmouth; and in 1828 a
channel was cut through the bar at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River.
Consider what this meant to Cleveland. The Ohio Canal connected the
village with the Ohio River, thus putting Cleveland in touch with the
rich coal, iron, oil, and coke lands of western Pennsylvania. Travelers,
too, found the canal boats much better to journey on than the old
stagecoaches.
[Illustration: A RIVER SCENE]
The deepening of the mouth of the Cuyahoga River gave Cleveland a harbor
and a place to build the enormous docks which to-day line the river's
shore for the last few miles of its length. A few years earlier an effort
to protect lake vessels had been made by building a pier out into the
lake near the sand bar. The lake soon tore the pier to pieces, however,
and the vessels still had to be hauled over the bar to safety. But with
the sand bar cut, boats could sail in and out of the river at their
pleasure.
Splendid results followed. The population increased, frame houses
gradually came to take the place of log cabins, business greatly
improved, and in 1836 Cleveland became a city.
[Illustration: AN ORE STEAMER ENTERING CLEVELAND'S HARBOR]
The year 1851 saw a great celebration in Cleveland over the opening of
the first railroad. This brought added prosperity to the city. Then, too,
iron ore began to arrive by water from the Lake Superior mines. At the
same time more and more coal was being received. The manufacturers
commenced to appreciate the tremendous advantages of living at a natural
meeting place of these two great necessities. Cleveland awoke to a new
business activity.
[Illustration: COAL DOCKS]
Then came the Civil War, and the manufacturing of iron products for the
government crowded Cleveland's factories. During the years of the war
the refining of coal oil developed into one of the city's leading
industries. It was then that the great Standard Oil Company was
organized. Many came to the city, attracted by these growing industries,
so that what proved a disastrous period in many sections of our country
was really a time of growth for Cleveland.
[Illustration: THE CITY OF CLEVELAND]
Soon after the war East Cleveland was annexed to the city, and in 1873
Newburgh too became a part of Cleveland. Then, in 1893, West Cleveland
and Brooklyn were taken in, and when Cleveland celebrated the anniversary
of its founding in 1896, it had become a city of great importance in the
country.
[Illustration: HUGE VIADUCTS SPAN THE VALLEY]
At present Cleveland extends for over 14 miles along Lake Erie and covers
more than 50 square miles. The larger part of the city lies to the east
of the Cuyahoga River. The valley of this river is filled with car
tracks, lumber yards, car shops, coal sheds, ore docks, and shipyards.
Being in the valley, these are partially hidden from the city. Huge
viaducts span the valley and unite the east and west sides of Cleveland.
[Illustration: THE HEART OF THE BUSINESS QUARTER]
The heart of the business quarter and the center of the street railway
lines is Monumental Square, which lies about a mile from the lake shore.
From this square radiate the streets in a fan shape, at every angle from
northeast to west. Euclid Avenue is Cleveland's most famous street,
having for years enjoyed the reputation of being one of the country's
finest avenues. The lower end is taken up with business, but farther out
are many splendid residences surrounded by extensive and beautifully kept
lawns. Cleveland is called the Forest City, and it is to the old trees
which grace its parks and line both sides of Euclid Avenue that it owes
its name. Another important business street is Superior Avenue, which
runs through the main business portion of the city.
[Illustration: MONUMENTAL SQUARE]
[Illustration: LOOKING UP EUCLID AVENUE]
Though Cleveland is a beautiful city, its importance really lies in the
fact of its occupying just the position that it does. Being on Lake Erie
puts it in touch with the copper fields of Michigan, the iron mines of
Minnesota and Michigan, and the huge forests along the Great Lakes.
Through railroad connections it is also in touch with the coal, oil, and
iron supplies of western Pennsylvania and Ohio. Thus, lying in the center
of eastern and western commerce, Cleveland has become a great
manufacturing center, and the Cleveland district is the largest ore
market in the world. Lake vessels bring the ore to Cleveland's enormous
docks, where huge machines quickly transfer it to cars waiting to carry
it to Pittsburgh and other cities.
[Illustration: ORE DOCKS]
[Illustration: WHEELING & LAKE ERIE BRIDGE]
Cleveland, also, has several blast furnaces and immense factories of iron
and steel supplies. It holds first rank in America for the making of wire
and nails. More ships are built in the Cleveland district than anywhere
else in the world except in the shipyards on the Clyde River in Scotland.
Then, too, Cleveland makes steel bridges and buildings, automobiles,
and gas ranges. Quantities of women's clothing are made in Cleveland.
Slaughtering and the wholesale meat-packing business are other important
industries.
[Illustration: THE UNIVERSITY CIRCLE]
It is a simple matter to ship Cleveland's manufactures in every
direction. The main lines of the New York Central and the Nickel Plate
pass through Cleveland, and it is a terminal city of the Cleveland,
Cincinnati, Chicago, & St. Louis Railroad,--commonly known as the Big
Four,--the Pennsylvania, the Erie, the Baltimore & Ohio, and the Wheeling
& Lake Erie railroads. More than this, Cleveland is the center of a vast
network of interurban electric railways that carry both passengers and
freight and keep the city in hourly communication with the many smaller
cities of northern Ohio.
Cleveland gets its water supply from Lake Erie through tunnels built out
under the lake, which connect with two intake cribs, one of which is five
miles from the shore. Natural gas, pumped through large mains from the
gas fields of West Virginia, more than 200 miles away, is sold to the
people of Cleveland at 30 cents a thousand. The street railway service is
among the best in the country, and the fare is lower than in any other
large American city.
[Illustration: A DRIVE IN GORDEN PARK]
Cleveland has excellent educational advantages. Western Reserve
University, founded in 1826, is especially noted for its law and medical
schools. In Cleveland, also, are the Case School of Applied Science, the
Cleveland School of Art, St. Ignatius College, the Homeopathic Medical
College, and the University School. The public schools of the city are
among the best.
[Illustration: THE CITY HALL]
[Illustration: THE NEW COURTHOUSE]
Cleveland has a beautiful park system. The different parks are connected
by boulevards, which form a great semicircle through the residence
districts. There are also numerous small parks and playgrounds in the
more congested districts. A plan for grouping the city's public buildings
about a broad parkway is being carried out. Several of the buildings are
already completed. When finished, this will be one of the most beautiful
and most imposing spectacles in America.
All of these things, added to the great possibilities for occupation
offered by the city's many lines of work, have given Cleveland a
population of over 560,000. To-day the little settlement of Cleaveland,
made in 1796 at the mouth of the Cuyahoga, has become the second of all
lake ports and the sixth city in size in the United States.
=CLEVELAND=
FACTS TO REMEMBER
Population (1910), over 500,000 (560,663).
Sixth city in rank according to population.
Important manufacturing center.
Center of the largest ore market in the world.
Ranks first in America in making wire and nails.
Great shipbuilding center.
A center of trade in copper, iron, lumber, coal, and oil.
Important railroad center.
QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW AND STUDY
1. Give the history of the name and the settlement of Cleveland.
2. Tell something of the dangers and difficulties of the first
settlers of Cleveland.
3. What was Cleveland's first manufacturing plant, and what others
did it soon have?
4. What means of communication with other cities did Cleveland have
in the early days of its history?
5. To what two events does Cleveland chiefly owe its rapid growth?
Why?
6. What two products found a meeting place at Cleveland, and with
what results?
7. How did the Civil War help the growth of the city?
8. What benefits does Cleveland derive from its location on Lake Erie?
9. What are the most important industries of the Cleveland district?
10. What railroad facilities has Cleveland to-day?
11. Mention some of the things that make Cleveland a pleasant place
in which to live and a good place for business.
BALTIMORE
Near the head of Chesapeake Bay stands Baltimore, the largest of our
Southern cities and the seventh city in size in the United States.
Because of her importance as a Southern railroad center and her excellent
harbor on the largest bay of the Atlantic coast, Baltimore is called "The
Gateway to the South." Great ships from all parts of the world unload
their cargoes at her docks and take in return products from nearly every
section of the United States.
The railroads bring to Baltimore vast quantities of iron, coal, and grain
from the West, and up from the South ships and trains come laden with raw
sugar, tobacco, fruits, and vegetables. Here the oysters, fish, and crabs
from Chesapeake Bay and the products of the rich farm lands of Maryland
and Virginia find a ready market.
Knowing these things, one can surmise what the city's leading industries
and exports must be. Baltimore is the world's greatest oyster market, she
leads the world in the canning of vegetables and fruits, she is one of
the country's largest banana markets, and more corn is exported from this
city than from anywhere else in America.
Baltimore is a great sugar-refining center, she leads the world in the
making of straw hats, and among her foremost industries are the
manufacture of clothing and the making of tobacco goods.
[Illustration: AN OYSTER BOAT]
Thanks to the coal and iron she receives, Baltimore builds cars, ships,
and almost everything made of iron and steel. Then, too, the city has the
largest copper-refining plant in America.
If this story had been written a few years ago, it would tell you that
Baltimore's streets were narrow, that miles of them were paved with
cobblestones or were not paved at all, and that the city generally was
developing very slowly. But to-day we have a quite different Baltimore.
[Illustration: THE BALTIMORE FIRE]
On February 7th and 8th, 1904, a great fire swept the business section of
the city, destroying $125,000,000 worth of property. While the ruins were
still smoldering, the courageous people, refusing all help from outside,
began to plan a bigger and better Baltimore.
The work began in the burned part of the city. The narrow down-town
streets were widened and paved, and new and better buildings took the
place of the burned ones. Most of these new buildings are three or four
stories high, though a few tall ones range from ten to sixteen stories.
Fortunately three of Baltimore's oldest and most imposing buildings
escaped the fire--the post office, the city hall, and the courthouse.
[Illustration: THE BURNED PART OF THE CITY]
Two important streets cross this newly built business section--Charles
Street, running north and south, and Baltimore Street, running east and
west. Baltimore Street is the chief business thoroughfare, and north and
south of it are the wholesale, financial, and shipping districts.
[Illustration: PIER 4]
[Illustration: ONE OF THE NEW WHARVES]
The city owned little wharf property of importance before 1904, but the
fire made it possible to buy all the burned district fronting the harbor.
This the city purchased and laid out in a wonderful system of public
wharves and docks open to the commerce of the world.
[Illustration: THE POST OFFICE]
Pier 4, at the foot of Market Place, has been set aside for the use of
market boats, and here small crafts bring much of the fruit, vegetables,
fish, crabs, and oysters which make the markets of Baltimore among the
most attractive in the United States. There are eleven of these markets,
and on market days they are a most interesting sight with their busy
jostling crowds all eagerly buying or selling.
[Illustration: THE CITY HALL]
But these great improvements in the business center and along the water
front are only part of the good results which have followed the fire. In
past years Baltimore had many miles of open sewers, an unhealthful
arrangement which caused much sickness. The very year after the fire,
work was begun to do away with this evil, and to-day the city has a
sanitary, up-to-date sewer system.
[Illustration: LEXINGTON MARKET]
[Illustration: FALLSWAY]
Another important work of the city-betterment plan has to do with a
stream called Jones Falls, which used to flow in an open channel right
through the center of the city. This stream now flows through great
concrete tubes, over which is a broad highway running diagonally across
the city, all the way from the docks to the railroad terminal. Then, too,
the city has a new water system, great enough to supply the entire city
with purified water from Gunpowder River. And besides all these a great
dam, the third longest in the world, has been built across the
Susquehanna River at McCall Ferry, furnishing electric power which lights
the streets, runs the cars, and supplies power for many of the city's
factories.
[Illustration: McCALL FERRY DAM]
From the harbor Baltimore stretches away to the north and west, covering
thirty-two square miles. Within the city are green hills and pleasant
valleys, and a chain of beautiful parks with many splendid old trees
bordering the boulevards which connect them. Two of these parks, Mount
Vernon Place and Eutaw Place, are near the center of Baltimore. The
former is cross shaped, and here stands the famous monument to George
Washington, the first statue erected to his memory in this country. Eutaw
Place is a long parkway made beautiful with statuary, flowers, fountains,
and winding walks, and on either side stand handsome residences.
Covering seven hundred acres of picturesque rolling land is Druid Hill
Park, with its miles of driveways, its ancient oak trees, its athletic
grounds, tennis courts, botanical palace, zoo, and a large reservoir
lake. The rugged scenery of Gwynn's Falls Park challenges Druid Hill's
claim to unequaled beauty. In Patterson Park there is the largest
artificial swimming pool in the United States.
[Illustration: THE CITY OF BALTIMORE]
Besides its many swimming pools and indoor baths, the city has organized
a system of portable baths--small houses which are moved from corner to
corner in the crowded sections, supplying hot- and cold-water shower baths
to many thousands each year.
[Illustration: THE FIRST WASHINGTON MONUMENT]
[Illustration: PATTERSON PARK SWIMMING POOL]
Baltimore has won a reputation as an educational center through the
splendid equipment and wonderful accomplishments of Johns Hopkins
University, which is noted throughout the world, especially for its work
along medical lines.
[Illustration: A PORTABLE BATHHOUSE]
[Illustration: A JOHNS HOPKINS BUILDING]
Goucher College, for women, ranks with the best women's colleges in the
South. The Baltimore College of Dental Surgery is the oldest college of
its kind in the world. The Walters Art Gallery, and the Peabody Institute
with its art gallery, conservatory of music, and library, afford
opportunities for the study of art, music, and literature.
With its more than 550,000 inhabitants, Baltimore, like Philadelphia, is
a city of homes and is renowned for its good old Southern hospitality.
Way back in 1634, a company of Catholic pilgrims came to America to
found a colony where their religion would not be interfered with. King
Charles I of England granted to these people a certain territory north of
the Potomac River, which he named Maryland in honor of his wife, Mary,
who was also a Catholic. The founder of the province was Lord Baltimore,
and from the very beginning, settlers of all beliefs were made heartily
welcome.
About one hundred years after the planting of this Catholic colony, sixty
acres of land on the north side of the Patapsco River was purchased and
laid out for a city. To honor the generous-hearted founder of Maryland,
the place was named Baltimore.
[Illustration: LOCATION OF BALTIMORE]
One of the most thrilling events in Baltimore's history led to the
writing of our national song--"The Star-Spangled Banner."
Francis Scott Key, of Baltimore, was a prisoner on a British man-of-war
in 1814, when the British attacked Fort McHenry. Fort McHenry guarded
Baltimore, and if the fort fell, the city too must go. All day the
English ships fired shot and shell at the fort. During all the night the
attack went on. Anxiously Key watched through the darkness. Could the
fort hold out against such a terrible bombardment? From time to time, by
flashes from bursting bombs, he could see the outlines of the fort. Then
came the dawn. In the early morning light Key saw our flag still waving,
and in his joy he wrote on the back of an old letter the words of the
song that has since become so famous.
A wide thoroughfare which follows the curve of the water front for
several miles is named in honor of Francis Scott Key. Key Highway, it is
called, and it leads to Fort McHenry, which the War Department has lately
given over to the care of the city of Baltimore.
=BALTIMORE=
FACTS TO REMEMBER
Population (1910), over 500,000 (558,485).
Seventh city in rank, according to population, in the United
States.
Located near the head of Chesapeake Bay.
Has a fine harbor and a splendid dock system.
An important railroad center.
Has a large and growing foreign commerce.
An important manufacturing center.
Ranks first among the cities of the United States as a canning and
preserving center.
The world's chief center for the manufacture of straw hats.
An important center for shipping oysters and crabs.
Associated with the writing of "The Star-Spangled Banner."
QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW AND STUDY
1. What advantages of location does Baltimore possess?
2. Why is Baltimore called the gateway to the South?
3. What are the leading exports of this city?
4. In what industries does Baltimore rank first in the United States?
5. What great disaster visited Baltimore in 1904, and how did the
people of the city make this great trouble result in a better city?
6. What educational institution has won a splendid reputation for
Baltimore?
7. Tell something of the settlement of Maryland and the city of
Baltimore.
8. Tell the story of the writing of a famous song of which Baltimore
is justly proud.
9. Find by inquiry or by consulting time tables the time required to
reach Baltimore from the following places:
New York City Atlanta
Philadelphia Norfolk
Washington, D.C. Richmond
Pittsburgh New Orleans
PITTSBURGH
Pittsburgh and New Orleans--both of vast commercial importance--are
connected by one of the greatest water highways in the world. Never were
two cities more unlike. New Orleans, near the mouth of the Mississippi,
with its French and its Southern population, might be termed the Paris of
our country--this gay, fashionable town, with its fine opera houses, its
noted restaurants, and its brilliant Mardi Gras pageants. Pittsburgh, on
the other hand, at the head of the Ohio River, in the heart of a famous
coal-and-iron region, is well named the "workshop of the world."
Many years ago, when the governor of Virginia sent George Washington to
drive the French from the Ohio valley, there stood, where the Allegheny
and Monongahela rivers unite to form the Ohio River, a small fort which
the French called Fort Duquesne. This fort was captured in 1758 by the
British and renamed Fort Pitt, in honor of England's great statesman,
William Pitt. To-day the place is known as Pittsburgh, and is the center
of the most extensive iron works in the United States.
At first the little settlement was important as a break in
transportation, for here cargoes were changed from the lighter boats
used on the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers to the heavier barges on the
broad Ohio. Even then Pittsburgh was recognized as a gateway of the West.
Gradually the settlement became a trading center, which soon developed
into a big, busy, manufacturing city. Now Pittsburgh has a population of
over half a million and is the eighth city in size in the Union.
[Illustration: FORT DUQUESNE]
In her countless factories, her mammoth steel mills, and her huge
foundries, she uses the products of the rich surrounding country as well
as an enormous amount of iron ore from the Lake Superior mines.
Although western Pennsylvania too furnishes iron ore, its chief
contribution to Pittsburgh is a vast amount of coal, which the city in
turn supplies to the world.
Pittsburgh leads the world in the manufacture of steel and iron,
glassware (including plate and window glass), armor plate, steel cars,
air brakes, iron and steel pipe, tin plate, fire brick, coke, sheet
steel, white lead, cork wares, electrical machinery, and pickles.
[Illustration: BLOCKHOUSE IN FORT DUQUESNE]