Seven Hills High School - Yearbook (Cincinnati, OH)

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teaching of the young ladies by her daughters, one of whom was musical and gave piano lessons. Anne Wood had this School for several years. Between 1855 and 1860, after all but one of her daughters had been mar- ried, she moved out on Madison Road. The house was on the site of the entrance to Annwood Street, which street is named for her. She lived there with an attendant and her daughter, Catharine, until her death in 1867, on December 19th, at the age of eight-seven. lf the little old lady could have gone through a day with her great, great, grand-daughter, she would probably have been most interested in seeing a present-day Cincinnati school for girls. She would have been interested in the freedom of the girls of today, and in the marked difference between the modern girl and a young lady in her 4'School for Respectable Femalesf' ANNE RAMSEY, 1942 A Contrast in Social Life After 1802 Cincinnati began to grow into a civilized town with, as the Rev- erend Coss says, a definite social life of its own. To be sure, this social life was brought from the East, but in the new West it took on a different flavor. The primitive existence in a fort on the frontier became more civilized as more and more people flowed West. Instead of soldiers, men were coming West who were interested in raising their families and making their fortunes. As this steadying influence increased, social life became stabilized, and a social system was developed, in which there were class distinctions. It was all very well to talk of the democracy of the West and, in truth, the West was more democratic than the East, but there were still social barriers. A visitor from England, Mrs. Frances Trollope, was surprised to find that mechanics were not recognized socially, whereas shopkeepers were. Upon inquiring, she was told that the shopkeepers were HMerchants,' while the mechanics made the articles they sold. This constituted the difference. Early entertainments were, of necessity, simple, but entertainments there were. The first ones were cabin raisings where the men got together and helped their neighbor to build a cabin. While this was being done, the women cooked and, when the work was finished, they all feasted. A fiddler added to the merriment as he played for the Virginia Reels and country dances. The Reverend Goss says that perhaps the gayest of the pioneer parties was the ,Hstraw ridel' which was climaxed by a ball. For the ride, an old river boat was put on runners. There were ten outriders, two fiddlers, two fiute players, and a bottle of '4Black Betty circulating freely. The dance at the end of the ride was always a memorable event. The dancers were dressed in linsey-woolsey and buckskin suits. Despite the simplicity of the clothes, there was as much discussion over a new shade of home-made dye as there is today W atm, 193 9 i841

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title-page reads, uPoole,s lnstructive Memorandum-Book for the year 1809.-Printed by C. Whittingham, Goswell Street, London, England. There are also sketches on geography, history and astronomy, written in a series of dialogues by pupil and master. 6'Cahusac's New Country Dances for 1809,' is extremely interesting, though very hard to understand. An example is the '5Morgiana-First lady change places with second gentleman, first gentleman do the same with second lady, poussetteg and right and left. Other pages contain certain pieces of prose and poetry, '4Latin Words and Phrasesf' 6'lVlarks and Principles of True Politenessw and c'The Royal Family of Great Britainf' The pages on which my great, great, grandmother wrote her diary have one question for each day printed on them to uexercise the On January 28th, 1809, she writes, HAn agreeable proposal and a resolu- tionf' I imagine that this means that James Wood made a proposal of marriage and she resolved to marry him. On March 18th, she 'ccame to Cheltenham. While there she wrote, HA confirmation and a new resolve, but I do not quite understand what she means by this. On July 13th, she was apparently married to James Wood, and she writes, '6Que le bon Dieu nous rende tous heureux faMay God make us happy. j She and her husband then went to live in the United States. They left on August 31st from Liverpool and arrived in Philadelphia on October 14th, the journey taking forty-four days. The new Mrs. Wood was apparently very homesick in America, for she sent a great many letters to friends and rela- tives in England. During the month of November she sent a few letters every day by 'cpacketv fa type of vessel carrying mails and passengers and sailing at fixed timesj. There are no entries for the month of December. The Woods lived in Philadelphia for about fifteen years, during which time they had five daughters and one son. The one son was sent to England for his education. He became a Catholic and later Frederick William, Archbishop Wood of Philadelphia. The Woods moved to Cincinnati about 1824 or 1825. They lived on Broadway below Fourth Street, then the center of the residential district of Cincinnati. The house was near the present Queen City Club. Anne Wood's husband died in the Cholera epidemic in Cincinnati, in 1832. He became ill suddenly and died on the same afternoon. After her husband's death, Anne started on Pike Street a 4'School for Respectable Females in the present Taft Museum. She was assisted in her mdafone, 193 Q 1831

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over the latest strapless evening dress. When supper time came, the men ate in a big room by themselves. The women, seated in chairs around the walls of another room, ate their supper from plates held on their laps. This ar- rangement was followed because Hthe men preferred it that way.'7 How dif- ferent from today when the women have things arranged the way they prefer! The cultural side of life was looked into also. There was an early musical society and also a literary society. Imagine the busy pioneer ladies writing their papers on the latest books, brought by coach on a long ride from the East! Were they so very different from the busy clubwomen of today in their efforts to keep abreast of the times? Are there not clubs today where the ladies meet and discuss interesting topics, not always confined to cultural subjects? There is a hint in the old records of clacking tongues and spicy gossip, which lends a familiar note that causes us to wonder if a hundred years or so makes much diliference after all. Social life has changed in many of its outward forms and we laugh at the crudities of early timesg nevertheless, there is much in human nature today which has changed very little from pioneer uSociety.w HARRIET Woons, 1939 Early Newspapers Cincinnatfs first newspaper was the Centinei of the Northwestern Territory published in 1793 for three years, before it was sold to Edmund Freeman. He renamed it and published it elsewhere. The news from Marietta was usually eight days old, from New York, fifty-six days, and from London five months. It was often copied from other newspapers. The Cqntinel had four pages the size of a manis handkerchief and was a light brown in color. Cin- cinnatiis second newspaper, Western Spy, was more important than the first. It started as a weekly on May 28, 1799, and was irregularly published until 1809, when it was sold to Carney and Morgan who renamed it The Whig. After being sold several times, it became part of the Cincinnati Gazette in 1815, an important Cincinnati paper of later years. After that a number of papers came, such as The Literary Cadet, Spirit of the West and others which soon disappeared. They seem very dull today but while they were published they were regarded as wonders. Finally real progress was made by the printing of the Commercial-Register Daily. It lasted only six months of 1826, but by that time merchants knew the value of daily advertising. Eleven years later, the publishers of the Gazette were persuaded by merchants of Cincinnati to make a daily issue. There were only about one hundred and fifty subscribers at the beginning and the paper was nineteen by twenty-six inches with only two men to put the paper out. On April 25, 1840 another paper came out weekly called Spirit of the Times and later Daily Times which was printed every day. April 10, 1841, the Whtfone, 193 Q T351