BOOK REVIEWS
Journey Through My Years. An
Autobiography. By James
M. Cox. (Simon and Schuster, New York,
1946. xi + 463p.
$4.50.)
When the youthful James M. Cox left his
job with the Cin-
cinnati Enquirer to become the private secretary of a Congress-
man, his initiation into public life had
begun. Cleveland was one
of his first heroes, and the debates of
the Fifty-third Congress,
which he followed closely, were his
"equivalent for a university
course." At 28 Cox acquired his
first newspaper. In Taft's ad-
ministration he represented the Third
Ohio District in his own
right; by 1912 he was nominated by acclamation for the governor-
ship of Ohio. He became the first
governor in the history of his
native State to serve three terms. In 1920 he was the
national leader
of his party, and gallantly fought
Wilson's losing fight for the
League of Nations. Thereafter he retired
from public duties to
manage his rapidly growing newspaper
holdings in Ohio, Florida,
and Georgia. He declined opportunities
to head the Federal Re-
serve System and to go to Europe as an
ambassador, but he con-
sented to represent the United States at
the London Economic
Conference of 1933.
Two great causes seem to have dominated
Cox's career. One
was his deep concern for greater social
justice. The other was the
struggle for an international order
which would bring peace and
happiness to the world.
Cox came into the governorship on the
progressive tide that
produced the new Ohio Constitution of
1912. With
remarkable
talent for leadership and a genuine
faith in the processes of dem-
ocracy, he implemented the new
constitutional amendments by
securing the enactment of a legislative
program during his first
205
206 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
two years in the State House which
constitutes one of the most
remarkable examples of executive
leadership in the history of
Ohio. His program included workmen's
compensation, mothers'
pensions, a new school code, good roads,
and long overdue penal
reforms. Cox has every reason to point
with pride to his guber-
natorial record, which includes, in
addition, his efficient handling
of the flood disaster of 1913, the
creation of the Miami Conserv-
ancy District, and his services as war
governor, which he per-
formed with as little hysteria as could
be expected in those over-
heated years. Even his temporary defeat
in 1914 is a credit entry
in the record, for it was brought about
by a combination of the
forces of the Anti-Saloon League,
anti-Catholic bigotry, and the
vested interests whose special
privileges had been impaired by
his program of reform.
Cox reveals that he was responsible for
the selection of
Franklin D. Roosevelt as his running
mate in 1920. He recom-
mended him sight unseen because of his
political and geographical
availability. The two men became warm
friends, as a number of
their letters, here published for the
first time, clearly show. We
get Cox's version of his famous visit to
the stricken Wilson in
1920, and it becomes clear that the two
men had had many personal
and official relations throughout
Wilson's presidency and that Cox
had convictions of his own concerning
the imperative need for an
international organization to enforce
peace even before he dis-
cussed the League at that memorable
conference in the White
House. Cox believes that in 1920 he and
the country were the vic-
tims of the "Great
Conspiracy," and that the "peace effort of a war-
weary world was sacrificed on the altar
of partisan politics." He
blames Lodge, in large measure, for the
disaster, and deals all
too gently with Elihu Root in that
connection. Any Democrat
would probably have lost in 1920, in a campaign in
which the peo-
ple expressed all the grudges they had
accumulated during our
short experiment with knight errantry
for democracy in Europe.
Cox fought a valiant and honest battle
against great odds, and
nothing so became the man as the dignity
and good sportsmanship
with which he accepted the results of
that election.
In the furtherance of the
internationalism which he had come
BOOK REVIEWS 207
to espouse with deep passion, Cox made a
tour of Europe, talked
with the leading statesmen, including
those of the German Re-
public, and as early as 1922 proposed to
Harding that something
drastic be done to solve the reparations
problem, lest the German
Republic, and all of Central Europe, go
down again into chaos
and war. But the Harding administration
found it inexpedient
to take action.
In 1933 Cox was one of the American
delegation to the
World Monetary and Economic Conference
in London. In spite
of his charitable appraisal, there can
be little doubt that President
Roosevelt torpedoed the Conference. But
Cox is right in arguing
that it was too late in 1933 for such a
conference (he does not men-
tion the Hoover Moratorium); that its
inglorious end was inevit-
able, and that its objectives were
basically in conflict with the
domestic program on which Roosevelt now
based all his hopes
for American recovery. Cox takes sharp
issue with Raymond
Moley's account, and points out that
Secretary Hull, on one occa-
sion, was ready to resign because of a
complete lack of under-
standing between himself and his chief
in Washington. One of
the most amusing sidelights on the
Conference is Ramsay Mac-
Donald's suggestion that the date not
interfere with the grouse-
shooting season, and another is Nancy
Astor's remark that "the
way to make Russia a part of the world
would be to put a five-
and-ten-cent store in every town over
there."
The New Deal was in line with Cox's
perpetual concern for
greater social justice; so it had his
support, in general terms. He
points out, however, that much of it was
not really new, and that
its "Achilles heel" was the
method of dealing with labor problems,
and "the very unwise conduct of the
FEPC." In connection with
the racial problem, he makes the
observation that the Negro "must
not be held down by prejudice";
"neither can he be elevated by
fanaticism."
Cox's reminiscences will be weighed and
compared by the
historians of the period with the
accounts of other participants in
these events. They will find them the
straightforward observa-
tions of a straightforward man, with
surprisingly few slips either
of fact or of interpretation with which
a critic could take issue.
208 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
Cox's word will not be the last word on
some of these events, but
it is one to which no historian can fail
to give great weight.
The style is that of a practised
journalist. Personal judgments
more frequently than not err on the side
of generosity, evidence
of the author's friendliness, and of the
good sportsmanship of a
veteran politician. Only Harry M.
Daugherty is severely casti-
gated as a product of the
"political underworld." Cox is a pro-
gressive with the brakes on, a reformer
of good intentions and
common sense. Over the years he has not
lost his faith in the ulti-
mate good of mankind, and he is more
convinced than ever that
"the future is wrapped up in the
question of world peace."
Every Ohioan will read this book with
pleasure and profit.
To the general reader, many of its
sidelights will be as interesting
as the major events, for it contains
illuminating comments on the
Wright brothers and John H. Patterson of
the National Cash
Register Company; on the deepening rift
between Bryan and
Champ Clark; and on such giants of the
newspaper fraternity as
Walter Locke and James W. Faulkner. It
comes as something of
a surprise to have Cox bracket John
Sharp Williams and John
Quincy Adams as "the two most
scholarly men in the history of
the United States Congress."
Herbert Hoover he characterizes
as a man of "high purpose" and
"by disposition a liberal," but
caught in a party that was under
reactionary control and-in a re-
actionary mood. Cox throws some light on
the break between Al
Smith and Roosevelt in 1932, and on the
activities of many other
men like Tumulty and Borah who always
were close to the center
of things. Historians will be interested
to learn that Cox was
instrumental in getting Claude Bowers to
write his Jefferson and
Hamilton as an antidote for Beveridge's Life of John
Marshall.
Carl Wittke, Dean
Oberlin College
Land of Promise: The Story of the
Northwest Territory.
By Walter Havighurst. (New York, Macmillan
Company, 1946.
384p., index. Cloth, $3.)
On July 13, 1787, Congress organized the
vast region between
BOOK REVIEWS 209
the Great Lakes and the Ohio and Upper
Mississippi rivers into
the Northwest Territory. It was a
momentous day in the history
of the Republic and a major act of
statesmanship on the part of the
Congress. The action amalgamated into a
national colonial empire
territory formerly claimed by separate
states on the Atlantic sea-
board. It charted the course of
development by which the colony
should become a part of the Union on an
equality with the original
states. It provided as an instrument of
government--the cele-
brated Ordinance of 1787 -- a document
second in importance only
to the Declaration of Independence. It
affirmed for citizens of the
territory complete political and
religious independence; it provided
for a free public school system; it
banished slavery from the
domain; and it provided for the creation
of states to be carved out
of the region as the population
justified.
Eventually five states and a portion of
a sixth were created
within the Northwest Territory: Ohio,
Indiana, Illinois, Michigan,
Wisconsin, and a segment of Minnesota.
As an agricultural, manu-
facturing, and distributing center, this
region was destined to be-
come the heart-land of the Republic.
Without it, the Nation would
certainly have become great, but it
would not have attained the
supremacy which it today enjoys among
the nations of the world.
Walter Havighurst has chosen this region
as the subject of
his new book, Land of Promise: The
Story of the Northwest
Territory. The subject and the author are admirably suited to each
other. Mr. Havighurst was born at
Appleton, Wisconsin, he lived
as a boy in Illinois, and he studied at
Ohio Wesleyan University.
Since 1928 he has been a
professor of English at Miami Univer-
sity, Oxford, Ohio. He has already
written brilliantly about
portions of the Territory in his Upper
Mississippi: A Wilderness
Saga, in The Long Ships Passing, a book on the Great
Lakes, and
in his sensitive and understanding
novel, The Winds of Spring,
dealing with pioneering life in the
Wisconsin region. He writes of
this region in a distinguished style
with a mature scholarship and
a natural feeling for the subject.
This story of the Northwest Territory is
one that needed to be
told. Mr. Havighurst writes, "This
is a book which I have long
wished someone else would write. But it
seemed that no one else
210 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
was going to do it, and so I sat down to
the job myself." Students
of the region and the general reader
interested in the growth of
America will be .grateful to him for
assuming the task. He has
discharged it with warmth and, in
appropriate sections, with a fine
poetic sense.
The poetic note is sounded in a superb
opening chapter in
which Mr. Havighurst summons up a vision
of the vast panorama.
Let us, indeed, listen to a paragraph of
his prose. "This is a
region, then, comprising many regions
and it cannot be sum-
marized. It is the wide green
countryside of corn and wheat and
clover. It is the warm summer night in
an Illinois town with the
Prairie Flyer racing through. It is the
pounding life of Halsted
Street and a dirt road through the hills
of Brown County, Indiana.
It is a hundred county-seat towns with
the business gathered
about Court House Square and a bandstand
under the maple trees.
It is the skyline of Chicago lifting
above the Loop's blue haze, and
Cincinnati spreading on her seven hills
above the curving Ohio. It
is the stately George Rogers Clark
Memorial at Vincennes, the
drab little house where 'Cap' Grant
lived in Galena before the
world knew him, and the big bronze
Lincoln on the lake shore at
Chicago. It is the square farms that
line U.S. 40 for five hundred
miles and the long straight crossroads
laid off at one-mile inter-
vals." After adding a few more
pertinent pictures, he concludes,
"If these are not symbols of the
good life, they are still the signs
of the urgent new world, with its love
of things and its passion for
material mastery. So the territory that
two hundred years ago was
an outlying land has become the most essential
region."
This evocative first chapter is followed
in like vein by an
impressionistic survey of the ancient
inhabitants of this land and
the mysterious fragments of their life
that still lie strewn over the
region in the mounds, forts, effigies,
and graves. And by an easy
transition we are led to consider the
gradual unfolding of a knowl-
edge of the region from the tales of the
first travelers beyond the
Alleghenies. We see Simon Kenton
counting "a thousand buffalo
pacing in a single file to the salt
licks along the Ohio River." We
hear French inhabitants telling Father
Gravier that the mosquitoes
in August swarmed so thick that "a
man could not be distinguished
BOOK REVIEWS 211
at ten paces' distance"; and Noah
Major reporting that "there
were twenty thousand deer" in
Morgan County, Indiana, when he
arrived there in 1820; and fabulous
tales of the fertility of the
Illinois prairie lands.
Inevitably men contended for possession
of such a rich terri-
tory--Indians, Frenchmen, Englishmen,
and men of the young
Republic. The contest is the major theme
of the second part of
the book. The general scope of thisstudy
necessarily restricts this
section to a hundred pages, but Mr.
Havighurst has used his space
wisely by centering attention upon a few
illuminating episodes.
His retelling of the exploit of George
Rogers Clark in taking
Kaskaskia and Vincennes from the British
is a little masterpiece
of compressed drama.
Mr. Havighurst has a kind word to say
for Simon Girty, the
terror of the early settlements. On that
intriguing subject an
author has two choices. He may picture
Girty as the settlers saw
him and report the growth of his legend
as the notorious and
vicious "renegade" of the
frontier--the incarnation of the devil
who struck panic into the hearts of the
isolated settlers who, in
turn, frightened the children with his
name. Or he may strip away
the popular legend and pry into the
historical facts with the
detachment of a modern historian whose
emotions and security are
not involved. Mr. Havighurst recognizes
the first, but slants his
study toward the second and writes a
fine and unbiased chapter on
Girty, the man, and his doings in the
Northwest Territory.
The development of the Territory after
the West was won
came with such a rush and in such
complexity that an author is
inescapably embarassed by the richness
of his material and the
harsh necessity of making choices. The
reader will have to accept
the fact that some of the things that
seem to him important to the
story will be omitted. Mr. Havighurst,
confronted with this deci-
sion, has let his interest center quite
heavily on Ohio. It is easy to
understand why. It was the capital of
the Territory, the center of
its early government, the home of its
governor and judges, the
scene of the first settlements, the
first to become a state, and in
closest proximity to the East. And many
picturesque figures and
episodes occurred within its boundary.
Hence we find considerable
212 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
space given over to a very able
retelling of the story of Blenner-
hasset Island and Aaron Burr's
conspiracy, of the National Pike
and the canals, of the incomparable
Johnny Appleseed, and of the
rise of the cities and port towns along
Lake Erie.
By contrast, the rest of the vast and
interesting region of the
Northwest Territory seems much less
generously treated. Mil-
waukee and its contiguous region, for
example, are alive with
significance, but it gets less space
than Ashtabula Harbor. Indiana,
Michigan, and Wisconsin do not fare well
in the apportionment of
the pages. I should have welcomed a more
ample realization of
these regions from the pen of one who
knows so much about them.
I would not have objected to a chapter
on the growth of the great
state universities, the literature and
art, and the political force of
these six states. And I wish Mr.
Havighurst had done the chapter
which he could do superbly well on the
forces at work, and the
atmosphere of the region, which created
and nurtured Abraham
Lincoln.
This is merely another way of saying
that the Northwest Ter-
ritory is a gigantic portion of the
nation, that it resists compression
into 366 pages, and that the reader
could accept a good deal more
of this distinguished prose.
Harlan H. Hatcher, Dean
College of Arts and Sciences
Ohio State University
Mineral Resources of Ohio (Geological
Survey of Ohio,
Fourth Series, Information Circular
No. 1), By Wilber Stout.
(Columbus, Geological Survey of Ohio,
1946. 33p.)
This 33-page Information Circular
describes the minerals
found in Ohio as sedimentary deposits at
or close to the surface
such as coal, clay, shale, limestone,
dolomite, sandstone; conglom-
erate, iron ore, marl, peat, gypsum,
salt, and flint; and oil, gas, and
the salt brines which are found in the
sedimentary rocks at various
depths below the surface. Water, which
is a mineral in the broader
sense of the term is also considered.
From the above list it is
obvious that Ohio owes its rank as sixth
state in the United States
BOOK REVIEWS 213
in the value of its mineral resources to
the production of the non-
metals--the industrial minerals and
fuels.
Each mineral is defined and treated
separately with a histor-
ical background of its first use in
Ohio, its present usage, its
known distribution, its quality, annual
production, and in some
instances known reserves and normal
annual dollar value.
This excellently written circular is not
designed to furnish a
detailed and exhaustive account of any
of the minerals described.
It gives, rather, a summary treatment of
the mineral resources of
Ohio. It serves to acquaint the
residents of Ohio with informa-
tion regarding the minerals produced in
the State and is of value
to prospective operators in this and
other states. More detailed
information on the various minerals
described is available in the
publications and files of the Geological
Survey of Ohio.
Paul R. Shaffer, Chairman
Department of Geology
Ohio Wesleyan University
The Long-Horned Beetles of Ohio
(Coleoptera: Ceramby-
cidae). By Josef N. Knull. (Ohio Biological Survey, Bulletin
39, Vol. VII, No. 4. Columbus, Ohio
State University, 1946.
P. 133-354, illus., index. Paper $1.50.)
The long-horned beetles consist of a
group of insects which
are popular with amateur entomologists
because of their handsome
coloring and striking form. As a whole,
they are characterized,
as the name implies, by a very long
antennae which in some species
are twice as long as the entire body of
the insect.
The family is also of importance
economically, since the
larvae are the notorious
"round-headed borers" which cause much
damage to orchard, shade, and forest
trees. Other species attack
non-woody plants. Practically all of the
injury is caused by the
immature forms. The adults, on the other
hand, are sometimes
beneficial in effecting the pollination
of flowers. The larvae of a
few species, like the milkweed
long-horn, attack weedy plants, and
hence, from man's viewpoint, are
beneficial.
214 OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND
HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
Professor Knull, who is curator of the
insect collections at
Ohio State University, has listed 262
species which occur, or are
likely to occur, in Ohio. Under the
heading of each species are
given the references in the literature
most likely to be helpful to
the student, a concise description of
the insect, and, finally, brief
notes on the habits of larvae and
adults. In the case of the rarer
species, all the known Ohio specimens
are listed with data. There
are full keys for indentifying the
species, and handsome, black
and white illustrations of 118 species
from the author's own hand
together with two plates of photographs.
In preparing the Bulletin, the
author has consulted his own
extensive collection of long-horned
beetles, those of Ohio State
University, the Ohio Experiment Station,
Ohio University, the
Ohio State Museum, and the private
collections of Annette F.
Braun, Claud R. Neiswander, Henry F.
Strohecker, and Ralph
Dury. The collections of the Ohio State
Museum contain up-
wards of 140 species and 1,000
specimens.
The author has performed a great service
in bringing to
gether in one volume the descriptions
and references on the long-
horns. The literature is scattered and
difficult to obtain. The only
general manual, Blatchley's Coleoptera
of Indiana, is now selling
at $40 and more. A great many of the
species illustrated have
never before been figured. The Bulletin
will prove of inestimable
help to amateurs and students as well as
specialists, not only in
Ohio but throughout the eastern United
States.
Edward S. Thomas, Curator of
Natural History, Ohio State Museum.
BOOK REVIEWS
Journey Through My Years. An
Autobiography. By James
M. Cox. (Simon and Schuster, New York,
1946. xi + 463p.
$4.50.)
When the youthful James M. Cox left his
job with the Cin-
cinnati Enquirer to become the private secretary of a Congress-
man, his initiation into public life had
begun. Cleveland was one
of his first heroes, and the debates of
the Fifty-third Congress,
which he followed closely, were his
"equivalent for a university
course." At 28 Cox acquired his
first newspaper. In Taft's ad-
ministration he represented the Third
Ohio District in his own
right; by 1912 he was nominated by acclamation for the governor-
ship of Ohio. He became the first
governor in the history of his
native State to serve three terms. In 1920 he was the
national leader
of his party, and gallantly fought
Wilson's losing fight for the
League of Nations. Thereafter he retired
from public duties to
manage his rapidly growing newspaper
holdings in Ohio, Florida,
and Georgia. He declined opportunities
to head the Federal Re-
serve System and to go to Europe as an
ambassador, but he con-
sented to represent the United States at
the London Economic
Conference of 1933.
Two great causes seem to have dominated
Cox's career. One
was his deep concern for greater social
justice. The other was the
struggle for an international order
which would bring peace and
happiness to the world.
Cox came into the governorship on the
progressive tide that
produced the new Ohio Constitution of
1912. With
remarkable
talent for leadership and a genuine
faith in the processes of dem-
ocracy, he implemented the new
constitutional amendments by
securing the enactment of a legislative
program during his first
205