The Bay State Monthly. Volume 1, No. 5, May, 1884

During the rest of the century the inhabitants of this Indian village on the ground where Buffalo was to stand, consisted of redskins and semi-redskins, a few Indian traders who doled out the firewater, and a settler or two. The present city of Buffalo, according to the encyclopaedia (and for once that mass of condensed wisdom is correct about the date of settlement of a Western city), was founded in 1801, by the Holland Land Company, which opened a land office here in January of that year. The notice of this event may be found in the region of page 146, in vol. ii, of Ketchum's book,—the uniform lack of concise statement, the huge amount of irrevelant matter, and the absence of lucid summaries and intelligent comment, making more exact reference impossible.

The rest of this "comprehensive history" is occupied with the course of events down to December 30, 1813, when the British burnt the town, leaving but two houses standing—a dwelling-house and a blacksmith's shop. Here, having brought his Phoenix to ashes, our comprehensive historian brings his narrative to an abrupt end. This is at page 304. Then follows the "appendix," an invariable feature of city histories, which makes of every one of them a huge anti-climax. In this instance, one hundred and thirty-nine pages of appendix contain, according to the author, "for the purpose of preservation, a mass of papers not absolutely necessary to the elucidation of the history contained in the body of the work. Most of them consist of original papers and letters never before published, and which are now, for the first time, placed in an accessible and permanent form." To compare small things with great, these documents are made just about as "accessible" as are the State papers to which Carlyle devotes so much paper and bile in his book on Oliver Cromwell.

In short, this book contains much valuable information, which is very hard to extract, and when extracted is not germane to the history of the city of Buffalo.

Some information about Buffalo's history was found in a pamphlet on the Manufacturing Interests of the City of Buffalo, published in 1866. In it were historical sketches, covering about twenty-five pages,—verbose, with little meat, written in the flowery style so dear to the heart of the American editor or "Honorable" when extolling the virtues of his constituency. Turner's History of the Holland Purchase, published in 1849, and containing six hundred and sixty-six pages, would have been more useful, had it not been composed for the greater part of the biographies of insignificant pioneers, and had not the rest related in the main to the early history of the section. A book promising much on the outside was Hotchkin's History of Western New York. An examination of the title-page, however, dampened our expectations, for there was added the rest of the title, namely, "And of the Rise, Progress, and Present State of the Presbyterian Church." The book proved indeed a delusion and a snare, for of its six hundred pages more than nine tenths pertained to church affairs,—were part and parcel of the cahiers of the clergy. As for the magazine articles on Buffalo, they are few and, from the historical point of view, insignificant.

Of far more interest than the histories of either Cleveland or Buffalo, though perhaps no more important, is that of their nearest common neighbor of equal rank,—Pittsburgh. In very many respects this is one of the most interesting cities in the Union, which is mostly due to the fact that it has such a remarkable location, and that its topography is picturesquely unique. Here we have the strange combination of the blackest, smuttiest, dirtiest hole in the United States,—at night, as Parton said: "All hell with the lid taken off,"—with surroundings half rural, half urban, which for loveliness can scarcely be rivaled by any other city in the land. Sir Henry Holland, who was of the Prince of Wales's suite, when he visited Pittsburgh, remarked to one of the committee of reception that he had, in 1845, spent a week in an equestrian exploration of the suburbs of Pittsburgh; that he had traveled through all the degrees of the earth's longitude, and had not elsewhere found any scenery so diversified, picturesque, and beautiful as that around Pittsburgh. He likened it to a vast panorama, from which, as he rode along, the curtain was dropping behind and rising before him, revealing new beauties continually. "If the business portion of Pittsburgh is a city, half enchanted, of fire and smoke, inhabited by demons playing with fire, the surrounding portion is also under enchantment, of a different kind, and smiles a land of beauty, brightness, and quiet. The one section might be a picture by Tintoretto, and the other by Claude Lorraine."

On the twenty-fourth of November, 1753, no human habitation stood on the peninsula between the Alleghany and Monongahela Rivers. On that day Washington recorded in his journal: "I think it extremely well situated for a fort, as it has absolute command of both rivers." In the following spring the English began the erection of a stockade here, which, on the twenty-fourth of April, was surrendered to the French under Captain Contrecoeur Who at once proceeded to the erection of Fort Du Quesne.

Round this name centres a wealth of incident, romance, and history, but no one has risen to do it justice. Braddock's ill-starred expedition was followed by the abandonment of the fort by the French, in November, 1758, and its subsequent rebuilding as Fort Pitt. The fate of the little hamlet which sprang up around it was for a long time most dubious, but its position as a frontier post on the line of the ever westward-retreating Indians, and on the edge of the vast unknown wilderness, just beginning to allure adventurous pioneers, kept it from falling into the oblivion with which it was threatened by the dismantling of the fort and the troublous Revolutionary times. Yet as late as 1784 so experienced a man as Arthur Lee, the Virginian, who had been a commissioner at the court of Versailles with Franklin and Deane, and who visited this hamlet in December of this year, said of it: "Pittsburgh is inhabited almost entirely by Scots and Irish, who live in paltry log-houses, and are as dirty as in the north of Ireland, or even in Scotland. There is a great deal of small trade carried on, the goods being brought at the vast expense of forty-five shillings per cwt. from Philadelphia and Baltimore. They take in the shops money, flour, and skins. There are in the town four attorneys, two doctors, and not a priest of any persuasion, nor church, nor chapel; so that they are likely to be damned without the benefit of clergy. The place, I believe, will never be considerable."

This "small trade" which Lee speaks of was to develop in a very few years to gigantic proportions, and was to make Pittsburgh for the while the commercial metropolis of the West. She maintained this position until the westward march of civilization had left her far in the rear; and then the garrison which the vast army of pioneers left here found in the coal and iron under their very feet a Fortunatus's purse. Thus, far different was the fate of Pittsburgh from that of Marietta, Portsmouth, Lexington, and the like, which sank into comparative obscurity as soon as they had ceased to be outposts of Uncle Sam's army of emigrants.

Here, then, do we lack materials for history? What historian could ask for a more romantic starting-point than Old Fort Du Quesne? a more interesting topic for a chapter than Fort Pitt? a more picturesque subject than the batteurs and voyageurs of the Ohio? What more fruitful themes can there be than the rise of the iron, the glass, the oil industry, the steamboat commerce of our interior, the subjection of the Monongahela, the combination of a city which reminds the traveler of Hades, with suburbs which suggest metaphors about Paradise? And can he not find food for inquiry and thought in the great riots of 1877?

Yet the only historian of Pittsburgh is Neville B Craig, whose short and not over-attractive history ends with the middle of this century, if we remember rightly. His subject is neither thoroughly nor ably treated, and it is not presented to the public in an agreeable form. The book is one of the past generation, and we publish better histories than did our fathers. In 1876, Samuel H. Thurston presented the public with a small volume, entitled Pittsburgh and Alleghany in the Centennial. It contained a little history and a great deal of bombast; and, moreover, the greater part of it was filled with statistical details pertaining to the Centennial year alone. Yet from this book had to be taken most of the historical sketch which will be found in the Census Report. Egle's History of Pennsylvania tells us something about Pittsburgh, and magazine articles are plenty, though historically of little value.

St. Louis is more plentifully supplied with histories than any other Western city, and these histories are as much worse as they are more numerous. One of these deserves notice, from the fact that its title-page so ridiculously and exasperatingly misrepresents its contents. This page reads as follows: "Edwards's Great West and her Commercial Metropolis, embracing a complete History of St. Louis, from the landing of Ligueste, in 1764, to the present time; with portraits and biographies of some of the old settlers, and many of the most prominent business men. By Richard Edwards and M. Hopewell, M.D. Splendidly illustrated. 1860. $5." This seemed to promise well, but when we turned the page and read the introduction, our expectations were, to say the least, somewhat shaken, and our sense of the eternal fitness of things somewhat shocked, when we found the citizens of St. Louis called "a powerful Mæcenas." Shade of Virgil! What a profanation!

Any book that is preceded by a dedication, a preface, an introduction, and a full-page portrait of the author (with a big A), must, in the very nature of things, be a monstrosity. But, leaving these anomalies out of account, in the present instance, the composition of the book is sufficient proof that the epithet is not undeserved. "And this is so, for,"—as Herodotus would say,—in a book called Edwards's Great West, the "Great West" is summarily and mercilessly disposed of in just five pages. Then follow eighty-two pages of biographies and portraits, ingeniously defended by the author as follows: "Biographies of those who have become identified with the progress of the great city, who have guarded and directed its business currents year by year, swelling with the elements of prosperity, and who have left the impress of their genius and judgment upon the legislative enactments of the State, must be sought after with avidity, and must be fraught with useful instruction." There is no question that these biographies are fraught with useful instruction—all biographies are; but to assert that they must be sought after with avidity is a little too much to be swallowed. Such assertions show either deplorable ignorance or unwarrantable misrepresentation of human nature, and in this case we are convinced it must be the latter. Edwards knew perfectly well—for he seems to have been sane—that nobody but the subjects of these biographies would seek them "with avidity," and he made these plausible, bombastic assertions to excuse himself for having sprung such a trap on an unsuspecting public. That he tries to palliate the offence is, sufficient proof of his guilt.

Mark what he says about the "splendidly illustrated" portion of his book. "It will be a source of satisfaction to the reader," says he, "that the engravings of individuals who adorn this work are not drawn by the flighty imagination from airy nothingness, but represent the lineaments of men," etc. "Airy nothingness" is refreshing!

Part II, also, is almost wholly devoted to biographies, one batch being introduced with this sage remark: "Biography is the most important feature of history; for the record of the lives of individuals appears to be invested with more vitality and interest than the dry details of general historical narrative." Q.E.D.—of course. With Part III we reach the history of St. Louis, contained in one hundred and eighty pages, and worth more or less as a history. Then come one hundred and seventy pages more of biographies, an appendix of fifteen pages, and about thirty pages of views of manufacturing establishments. And this book is called The Great West. No further comment seems necessary.

Of all the many rich and racy things the writer has run across in his explorations in the literature of American cities, the richest and raciest is a book called St. Louis: The Future Great City of the World, by L.U. Reavis. The very title-page gives an inkling of the nature of the contents by its motto, savoring somewhat of cant: "Henceforth St. Louis must be viewed in the light of the future—her mightiness in the empire of the world—her sway in the rule of states and nations." This book, strangely enough, was "published by order of the St Louis County Court," in 1870, on the petition of forty-five of the leading citizens and firms of the city, who were represented before the court by a committee headed by Captain James B. Eads, the renowned engineer, and containing one captain, five honorables, and two esquires. The first edition consisted of one hundred and six pages, which were as vainglorious and boastful, as crowded with laudatory adjectives, glowing periods, and bombastic prophecies, as ever one hundred and six published pages were.

However, it evidently suited the St. Louis palate, for a second edition bears date of the same year, and in 1871 a third appeared in a considerably enlarged form. This last one is the most interesting, for it contains a preface and a finis which for pure, undiluted presumption have never been excelled. The former is entitled "Explanatory," and is worth quoting entire: "A presentation of Causes in Nature and Civilization which, in their reciprocal action tend to fix the position of the FUTURE GREAT CITY OF THE WORLD in the central plain of North America, showing that the centre of the world's commerce and civilization will, in less than one hundred years, be organized and represented in the Mississippi Valley, and by St. Louis, occupying as she does the most favored position on the continent and the Great River; also a complete representation of the great railway system of St. Louis, showing that in less than ten years she will be the greatest railway centre in the world." Even the most arrogant citizen of St. Louis would hardly have the boldness to maintain that ten years after this prophecy was made, in 1881, St. Louis was "the greatest railway centre in the world," or even that she was one of the greatest. As to the one-hundred years prophecy nothing can as yet be affirmed, for it has eighty-seven years more to run, but if the last thirteen can be taken as a criterion, St. Louis has a big contract on her hands.

The last page is the most curious in the book, and in its way is certainly unique. It is called "A Closing Word," and, being printed in italics, has an air of emphasis and force peculiarly appropriate. The author begins: "Thus have I written a new record—a new prophecy of a city central to a continent of resources;" and so he goes on for half a page of ridiculous bombast until he finishes the climax of epithets by calling this "the Apocalyptic City—

'The New Jerusalem, the ancient seerOf Patmos saw.'

"All hail! mistress of nations and beautiful queen of civilization! I view thee in the light of thy destiny. Thou art transfigured before me from thy present state to one infinitely more grand, and which overshadows and dwarfs all civic forms in history.

"The influence of thy empire will pervade the world with invisible and electric force. Yet, vivifying and benignant capital,—emporium of trade and industry, seat of learning and best-applied labor, pivotal point in history, supreme and superb city of all lands,—I behold thy majesty from afar, and salute thee reverently as the consummation of all that the best human energies can accomplish for the elevation and happiness of our race.

"All hail! Future Great City of the World, and 'Glory to God in the Highest and on Earth Peace, Goodwill toward Men.'"

This reminds one equally of Walt Whitman and Artemas Ward. Yet it is not burlesque. It appears to have been written in good faith, and for this reason the incongruity of such a grandiloquent rhapsody on such a prosaic subject is all the more noticeable. As an example of "fine writing" it has seldom been surpassed, and for sheer nonsense it is unequaled in American literature.

These books on St. Louis call to mind a history of Milwaukee of a somewhat similar nature—similar in its magnificent pretensions to the last-described work, and in its biographical characteristics to Edwards's Great West. The book referred to was published in Chicago, in 1881, by the Western Historical Company, A.T. Andreas, proprietor. Holy Herodotus! To think of history becoming a thing of "companies"—on a par with life insurance, railroads, gas-works, and cotton factories! And an "historical company" with a proprietor, too!

But let us look into this monumental tome. (Do not think that adjective hyperbolical, for surely monumental is not too strong a word to describe a book which would just about balance in weight an unabridged dictionary.) Some idea of the immensity of the undertaking can be obtained when, as the preface says, "it is known that nearly one year's time was consumed and an average force of twenty-five men employed in the labor of obtaining information and preparing the manuscript for the printer's hands. The result of this vast effort is the presentation of a History which stands unparalleled in the experience of publishers." The book is a quarto and contains sixteen hundred and sixty-three pages. The letter-press is unexceptionable; each page is surrounded by a neat border; the paper is good; the binding is excellent.

And yet the actual history of this city dates back little more than half a century—not a lifetime. Here is history with a vengeance! The riddle, however, is solved the instant we glance over the pages, for we find the mass of the book made up of biographies,—biographies in front, biographies to the right, biographies to the left, everywhere biographies,—to the grand sum total of nearly four thousand. A book much like this would have been made had the Crown published the Giant Petition trundled into Parliament on a wheelbarrow in the times of George the Third, when Lord George Gordon was the hero of the day. About as valuable, about as readable, about as bulky, about as good for kindling fires!

But let the perpetrator plead his cause in his own words—and it must be conceded he does it well. "The plan of the History of the city of Milwaukee, which is herewith presented to the public," he says in his preface, "possesses the merit of originality. It is based upon the fact that in all older regions, a serious deficiency exists even in the most exhaustive histories which it is possible now to compile through the absence of personal and detailed records of pioneer men and deeds. The primary design of this work is to preserve for future historians as complete an encyclopædia of early events in Milwaukee, and the actors therein, as patient labor and unstinted financial expenditure can procure."

We thank the Western Historical Company, or Mr. Andreas, for this benevolent and philanthropic spirit, but really he must not expect us to believe that pecuniary profit is only a secondary design of this work. But supposing for a moment that the primary design was as philanthropic and unselfish as Mr. Andreas would have us think, let us consider its worth; for, if we grant this premise, we must admit the truth of the conclusion reached, and then must give unstinted praise to the fruits of such a conclusion, a volume like the one before us. But the premise is specious and false. The deficiency that exists through the absence of personal and detailed records of pioneer men and deeds is not serious: on the contrary, in most cases, we should be devoutly thankful that it exists. Of the generations after that of the pioneers we would know much; of that of the pioneers themselves, something. But who is there, or will there be, that cares a picayune whether the third cobbler in Milwaukee (this history would call him the third manufacturer of shoes) was born in April or June, 1806, or whether he came from Tipperary or Heidelberg, or whether his wife died of the pneumonia or the whooping-cough? To be sure we would be glad to know whether the early settlers of Milwaukee were mainly young or mainly old when they came here, whether they were mainly German or Irish, and what where the prevalent diseases in different localities at an early period, but to ask an intelligent being to wade through nearly four thousand "personal histories" in order ascertain these facts is, to say the least, somewhat of an imposition on his good nature.

Later on in his preface the author contradicts himself in this regard, for he shows us how far from philanthropic were the publisher's motives and how little he thought of posterity in inserting these biographies, by writing the following well-turned and suggestive sentences: "It may be asked, Why have the biographical sketches of comparatively obscure men been inserted? The reasons are obvious to business men and should be to all. None but citizens are represented. Whatever Milwaukee is her citizens have made her. Shall the publisher exercise a power higher than the law, and erect a caste distinction or estimate each man's work from some fictitious standard of his own? Assuredly not. If, in the preparation of this work, a citizen has shown commendable pride, and aided its publisher by his patronage, he is entitled to mention in its pages. Such men and women have received a sketch, but the fact of pecuniary assistance has not biased the character of the book."

This is a very specious attempt to throw a glamour of respectability over a very unpleasant and repugnant fact, namely: that a mass of "biographical sketches of comparatively obscure men" has been given to the public under the guise of a history of a city, with the sole object of making money. It is indeed consoling to know that "none but citizens have been represented," but why this statement should be coupled with the platitude that follows it would be hard to say. And then the utter ridiculousness of the nonsense about the publisher exercising a power higher than the law and erecting a caste distinction! "What fools these mortals be!"

But whatever may be said of the historical value of such books as the above, there can be little doubt that they are remunerative business enterprises, for the country has of late years been flooded with them. Perhaps we ought to be thankful for any history at all of these new Western cities, even though the wheat therein be so scarce and the chaff so plenty. The prevalence of this same affliction—the biographical history—in literary New England seems more anomalous than it does in the West, but it is even more widespread. A fair type of the Eastern species is the Quarter-Centennial History of Lawrence, Massachusetts, compiled by H.A. Wadsworth, in 1878. It contained seventy-five very poor wood-engravings, called portraits by courtesy, which, with the accompanying biographies, were inserted to represent the leading (?) men of the city at an entrance fee of five or ten dollars apiece.

Next in number below the biographical histories, but far above them in value, come what may be called the chronological histories, that is, those which make little or no attempt to group the important facts of a city's history in homogeneous chapters, but which, diary-like, give all facts, important as well as insignificant, in the order of their occurrence. Fortunately most local historians of this sect have made more or less attempt at bringing like to like, although they have generally preserved the purely chronological order within their groups, whether these be of subjects or periods. Among the histories of the larger cities, Scharf's Chronicles of Baltimore comes to mind as typical of this class. This work, published in 1874, is an octavo of seven hundred and fifty-six pages. The author tells the truth when he says in his preface: "The only plan in the work that has been followed has been to chronicle events through the years in their order; beginning with the earliest in which any knowledge on the subject is embraced, and running on down to the present." The book is printed "solid," with not a single chapter-heading from one end to the other, so it is not strange that it contains such an immense amount of material.