Ohio History Journal

Book Reviews

 

 

 

Baseball: The Early Years. By Harold Seymour. (New York: Ox-

ford University Press, 1960. viii??373p.; illustrations, bibliographical

note, and index. $7.50.)

The author of this important volume started as a bat boy with the

Brooklyn Dodgers, earned a Ph.D. in history at Cornell, and now is an

associate professor in a New York college. He knows and loves his

baseball, and he knows his American history, and so he has given us

what is without question the best book on the subject. In the present

volume he covers from Valley Forge to the formation of Ban Johnson's

American League in 1903. A second volume is promised, and will be

eagerly awaited.

Professor Seymour's prodigious research has effectively disposed of

several myths, such as Abner Doubleday's "invention" of the game in

1839, and the claim of the Baltimore Orioles for "the hit and run."

Baseball clearly developed from the English game of "rounders" and

its various Americanized versions. From an amateur sport for con-

vivial gentlemen, baseball changed rapidly after the Civil War into

a commercialized amusement business with distinct monopoly, not to

say feudal, characteristics.

The well-known Knickerbocker Club of New York (1845) was pri-

marily an exclusive social club to which members paid dues and an

initiation fee. For thirteen years, the National Association of Baseball

Players, founded in 1858, tried to govern amateur baseball clubs, and

there quickly developed a twilight zone between amateurism and pro-

fessionalism that opened the door to all kinds of hypocrisy. Boss Tweed,

for example, had the best players of the New York Mutuals on the pay-

roll of the city street cleaning department. To William A. Hulbert

belongs the credit for founding the National League, which established

many of the feudal rules, such as the controversial reserve clause in

players' contracts, and other monopolistic practices which still charac-

terize modern organized baseball. From 1876 to 1900, no fewer than

twenty-one clubs were members of the league at one time or another.

Competition brought on bitter trade wars, with the American Associa-

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BOOK REVIEWS          399

 

tion, and the Brotherhood War of 1890, which resulted from the futile

revolt of the ball players against their employers, and had many of the

characteristics of the efforts of unions to force a recognition of collec-

tive bargaining. The movement had the support of such famous players

as Connie Mack, Charles Comiskey, and John K. Tener, and such

industrialists as Albert L. Johnson, the brother of Cleveland's famous

reform mayor, Tom L. Johnson. By the 1890's, the National League,

consisting of twelve clubs, had a virtual monopoly of the business, only

to meet its match in Ban Johnson, president of the Western League,

and founder of the second "big league" in 1903.

All of this complicated story is recounted in great detail, perhaps

with a little too much detail, but it is all there, the result of prodigious

research. Of more interest to the fans, once known as "cranks," are

such matters as the evolution of the pitching art, the curve ball, change

of pace, and the balk rule; salaries paid the players; the infield fly rule;

baseball equipment, spring training, double-headers, and ladies' day;

the role of the umpire; the influence of the telegraph; and the emergence

of the expert sports writer, who continues to be a powerful influence in

organized baseball. We read of such famous players as Connie Mack,

Honus Wagner, Cy Young, Ned Hanlon, Nap Lajoie, "King" Kelly,

and Willie Keeler; managers like "Cap" Anson, and such eccentric

owners as Chris von der Ahe, of the St. Louis Browns. There was a

long battle over Sunday games, and in 1897, the Liquor League and

the Ministers' Association of Cleveland formed an unholy alliance on

the issue. In many cities, there was a close liaison between club owners,

beer brewers, and transit companies. The under-the-table payments

to outstanding players suggests the present-day competition for col-

lege athletes by offering them athletic scholarships.

All of this, and much more, is interesting material for the general

reader. As a historian, the author has constantly related the story of

baseball to the larger theme of American social history, and particu-

larly the influence of industrialism and urbanism, and the development

of better facilities of transportation and communication, and the impact

of baseball upon American journalism and the American language.

Western Reserve University                      CARL WITTKE

 

The Leopard's Spots: Scientific Attitudes Toward Race in America,

1815-59. By William Stanton. (Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1960. ix??245p.; index. $4.00.)

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400    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Popular accounts of the history of racism usually begin with

Count Arthur de Gobineau (often called "the father of modern racial

theories"), who, in 1853, published his Essai sur l'Inegalite des Races

Humaines. This is manifestly an oversimplification, for belief in the

inherent superiority of one's own racial group far antedated Gobineau,

and ethnocentrism, in one form or another, is probably as old as the

human species itself.

William Stanton, in this excellent book, The Leopard's Spots,

demonstrates that the issue was indeed a lively one in the United States

in the first half of the nineteenth century. He begins with the Jefferson-

ian idea that "all men are created equal" which enjoyed considerable

vogue in the late eighteenth century, despite the fact that the presence

of the Negro and the Indian placed serious strains upon the equalitarian

faith.

In 1787 the Rev. Dr. S. S. Smith, later president of the College of

New Jersey (Princeton), published a widely read book in which he

undertook "to establish the unity of the human species," to explain the

differences among the varieties of men, and to reconcile the process

with the biblical story of creation. Smith had many able supporters

who joined him in defending the "monogenist" point of view.

On the other side were the "polygenists," including some of the ablest

scientists of the period, who rejected the biblical chronology, and who

insisted that the races of man were distinct species, profoundly different

in their capacities.

The men who participated in the debate were legion, but the principal

characters treated in this book are the following:

Samuel George Morton, Philadelphia physician and professor of

anatomy, eminent craniologist, completely dedicated to science;

George R. Gliddon, popular lecturer, master of humbug, implacable

foe of parsons, popularizer of Egyptology, "with delusions of pro-

fundity, his mind was as shallow as a mountain stream";

Josiah Clark Nott, physician of Mobile, Alabama, who, when he first

read Darwin in 1859, said, "The man is clearly crazy";

Louis Agassiz, distinguished scientist, Harvard professor, critic of

Darwinism, who held that "though the Negro is human, he is not of

the same species as the white man";

E. G. Squier, the first authoritative voice in American archaeology,

co-author of Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, whose re-

search raised doubts about man's having appeared on earth only

4004 B.C.;

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BOOK REVIEWS          401

John Bachman, Lutheran minister of Charleston, South Carolina,

competent scientist, skillful debater, spokesman for the monogenists,

formulator of a theory of his own that approached evolution.

The appearance of Darwin's Origin of Species in 1859 placed the

whole problem in a new perspective. Darwin exposed the error of the

monogenists' belief that man arose complete and perfected, distinct

from all other species, and, at the same time, he proved the polygenists

wrong in their insistence that man emerged in several places in several

distinct forms. He presented a revised monogenist theory, according

to which man is the product of a very long process of differentiation.

Many of the principals in this story died before Darwin's book ap-

peared. Nott, however, lived until 1873. Says Stanton, "When their

revolution was rendered irrelevant by the Darwinian invasion, he

possessed the intellectual courage to relinquish a theory built upon

a lifetime of labor and the good grace to accept the new."

This is a solid, thorough, scholarly volume, and it deals with a prob-

lem which has long had priority in man's thought and interest. More-

over, it is presented in a lively, interesting style. The titles of the

chapters are themselves sufficient to arouse one's curiosity and entice

one to read the book: "Whoever Heard of a Cross-eyed Race?" "The

Parson-skinning Goes on Bravely," "Kicking Up a Damn?? Fuss Gen-

erally," "Agitators Often Do Much Good," and so forth.

Ohio State University                        BREWTON BERRY

 

 

George Caleb Bingham, River Portraitist. By John Francis McDermott.

(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1960. xxviii??454p.;

illustrations, appendices, bibliography, and index. $15.00.)

Readers of books about artists quite naturally turn first to the illus-

trations. The pictures in this handsome volume can hardly fail to

heighten respect for George Caleb Bingham (1811-1879), "the Missouri

artist," who was one of America's greatest painters of the everyday

scene. There are 79 black-and-white plates of Bingham's paintings and

112 reproductions of drawings from the artist's sketchbook in the St.

Louis Mercantile Library. The sketchbook has not previously been

published in its entirety. Inclusion of this remarkable group of draw-

ings immeasurably enhances the value and appeal of Mr. McDermott's

book.

But George Caleb Bingham, River Portraitist is much more than a

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402    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

picture book. The text provides as definitive an account of Bingham's

varied life as is likely to be written. Mr. McDermott's industry and

resourcefulness in gathering data and his concern for winnowing fact

from reminiscence, legend, and tradition make the study a model of

biographical research. The book opens with a description of life and

manners in the frontier communities in which Bingham spent his boy-

hood. The middle section combines a narrative of Bingham's career

after 1833 with analyses of his paintings. The last part of the book

evaluates Bingham's achievement in portraiture, landscape, historical

painting, figure sketching, and genre.

Bingham, a Virginian by birth, grew up in river towns in central

Missouri. At the age of twenty-two, having completed an apprentice-

ship to a cabinetmaker, he began painting portraits. Thereafter he

supported himself mainly by taking likenesses. In the course of his

career he must have painted at least a thousand portraits. Bingham's

fame, however, rests on the series of genre pictures he produced be-

tween 1845 and 1855. "Fur Traders Descending the Missouri," "The

Jolly Flatboatmen," and other river scenes belong to the first half of

the decade; "Shooting for the Beef" and "The Emigration of Daniel

Boone" fall in the middle of the period; and the political pictures--

"Canvassing for a Vote," "County Election," and "The Verdict of the

People"--bring the decade to a triumphant close. Mr. McDermott,

who regards the Mercantile Library sketchbook (1844-49) as Bingham's

finest monument, shows how the artist used the sketches in his can-

vasses. With the help of the sketchbook McDermott reconstructs some

of Bingham's lost paintings.

How a young man from the wilds of Missouri, without artistic back-

ground, formal art instruction, or galleries to visit learned to paint and

draw as well as Bingham did remains a mystery. Mr. McDermott is

content to say that Bingham was a self-taught artist who went on teach-

ing himself as long as he lived. McDermott notes the happy combina-

tion of subject matter and temperament in Bingham's work. Bingham

painted the world he lived in, not places he visited. And, although

partisan, combative, and sensitive to criticism, Bingham was at ease

in his world. Far from feeling alienated from society he prided himself

on making an art record of "our social and political characteristics as

daily and annually exhibited." Today his paintings and sketches seem

not documents but poetic evocations of a lost world.

Ohio State University                    ROBERT H. BREMNER

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BOOK REVIEWS          403

The Civil War Dictionary. By Mark Mayo Boatner III. (New York:

David McKay Company, 1959. xviii??974p.; maps, diagrams, list

of abbreviations, and bibliography. $15.00.)

In all probability more books and articles have been written about

the American Civil War than any other war in recorded history. Prac-

tically every phase--military, political, social, economic, administrative--

has been covered by general and special studies, while hardly any

civilian or military leader, major or minor, has escaped the attention

of biographers. No war in American history has inspired so many

novels and plays or developed a more devoted amateur following. In

view of the widespread popular interest and the vast amount of litera-

ture available on this great conflict, The Civil War Dictionary fills a

need long felt by librarians, scholars, and amateurs.

This large one-volume compendium contains entries on military of-

ficers, civilian leaders, campaigns, battles, military organizations, weap-

ons, military terms, and various other subjects. Over half of the space

is devoted to biographical entries, which include all full-rank generals

on both sides and many outstanding officers of lower rank. However,

the book contains a higher percentage of Union officers than Confed-

erate officers. The compiler explains that one reason for this is that

the Union army was larger and had more officers. A second reason

is that the Confederates did not have writers and statisticians such

as Heitman, Cullum, and Dyer. True, but the author could have

remedied this situation to a degree at least by consulting the service

records of the adjutant general's office in the National Archives, which

contain extensive data on Confederate as well as Union soldiers.

It is the general impression of this reviewer that this is a reasonably

inclusive, accurate, and useful reference work. He was pleased, for

example, to find a short sketch of William Dennison, who was governor

of Ohio when the war broke out and later postmaster general in Lin-

coln's cabinet. On the other hand, he was disappointed at the in-

adequate sketches of Salmon P. Chase and Edwin M. Stanton, who

played leading roles as secretary of the treasury and secretary of war

respectively. The entry under "strategy" was a disappointment also

because it merely quotes Webster's dictionary and gives further refer-

ences. Now a person who looks up "strategy" in a Civil War diction-

ary expects to find something on Civil War strategy, not strategy in

general, and he feels let down at being told that "the Principles of War

are the fundamental truths governing the prosecution of war."

Ohio State University                          HARRY L. COLES

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404    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

The War for the Union. By Allan Nevins. Volume I, The Improvised

War, 1861-1862. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1959.

xii??436p.; illustrations, maps, appendices, bibliography, and index.

$7.50.)

With the publication of this volume, one of the most ambitious

projects of contemporary American scholarship enters its mid career.

In a day when the emphasis in historical writing is on specialization,

monographs, and cooperative works, Allan Nevins has undertaken to

write single-handed a general history of the United States from the

Mexican War to Reconstruction. Four previous volumes entitled

Ordeal of the Union and The Emergence of Lincoln covered the period

between 1846 and 1861. The present volume treats events from the

inauguration of Lincoln in March 1861 to Lincoln's appointment of

Stanton as secretary of war in January 1862. The three volumes to

follow will bring the story up to Reconstruction.

The theme of this and subsequent volumes is that the Civil War

transformed an agricultural, unorganized, decentralized society into a

modern, industrial, organized, and centralized society. America in

1861, says Nevins, was a sleeping giant: it had all the potentialities of a

"shaped, disciplined nation," but these potentialities lay dormant until

the Civil War produced an awakening. In short, the Civil War pro-

duced modern America; nationalism triumphed over individualism;

industry vanquished agriculture and paved the way for the age of

John D. Rockefeller and Henry Ford. All this, so far as Nevins is con-

cerned, is entirely to the good. While this general thesis is neither new

nor original, it is explored and developed to an extent never before

attempted.

The book departs from stereotyped military history in that battles

are passed over with scant attention, while the social, economic, and

administrative phases of the war receive thorough treatment. Nowhere,

so far as this reviewer is aware, can one find a better account of the

raising and equipping of the armies and the financing and economic or-

ganization for war, as well as enlightening comparisons between Euro-

pean and American developments. In marshaling a vast panorama of

detail, the author ranges over a wide variety of original sources, some

of which have been used little or not at all before.

Ohio State University                        HARRY L. COLES

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BOOK REVIEWS          405

Patterns from the Sod: Land Use and Tenure in the Grand Prairie,

1850-1900. By Margaret Beattie Bogue. Collections of the Illinois

State Historical Library, Vol. XXXIV; Land Series, Vol. I. (Spring-

field: Illinois State Historical Library, 1959. ³²⁷p.; maps, charts,

appendices, bibliography, and index. $2.50.)

This book is a significant and original contribution to an aspect of

American economic history as yet but little studied, that of land owner-

ship, tenancy, and management. It incorporates the results of research

into the records of an eight-county block in Illinois adjacent to the In-

diana border, which was roughly coterminous with the federal Danville

Land District. To a remarkable extent, it is based on county-court

records and other manuscript material.

The first part of the study deals with the frontier period, that is, till

about 1850. It describes the original pattern of land ownership, and

evaluates particularly the role of large investors, including Illinois and

out-of-state absentee speculators as well as big local cattlemen grazing

and feeding for the eastern markets. The second part is devoted to a

"transition period," which is defined as running to about 1900. The

author shows how the eight-county block reacted to local and national

economic pressures. Special emphasis is placed on the origins and

development of farm tenancy and the problems which accompanied and

followed its growth. There are also valuable chapters on the relations

of the farmer and the mortgage agent and of the farmer and the tax

assessor and collector.

While the book will have its greatest appeal to scholars interested

in the problems associated with land tenure, it has much of interest and

value for all agricultural historians because it deals also in varying

degree with such matters as agricultural improvement, draining, fenc-

ing, and the mid-nineteenth-century cattle industry.

All in all, the study is a careful and competent one, which it is a

pleasure to endorse.

Marietta College                              ROBERT L. JONES

 

The Papers of Henry Clay. Edited by James F. Hopkins and Mary

W. M. Hargreaves. Volume I, The Rising Statesman, 1797-1814.

(Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1959. xv??1037p.; illus-

trations and index. $15.00.)

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406    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

All undergraduates know the name of Henry Clay and can readily

identify him as a great American. After a survey course in United

States history they know that Clay campaigned unsuccessfully for the

presidency on three occasions. They can repeat, meaninglessly, that

he was a Whig, that he espoused a set of ideas called the "American

system," and that he was instrumental in effecting some important

political compromises. They are at a loss, however, if pressed to ex-

plain why historians (and the United States Senate) regard Henry

Clay as one of America's most significant and outstanding political

figures. In the jumble of fact and fiction that is part of their historical

inheritance, schoolboys identify Andrew Jackson with the common

man, Daniel Webster as a magnificent orator, and John C. Calhoun

as the defender of the South. No such positive image of Clay exists.

He is important, apparently, because he lived a long time and because

everyone says he is. Perhaps the publication of Clay's papers, the

editors state, "will contribute to a better understanding of both Clay

and the exciting times in which he lived, when locally, regionally, and

nationally his environment was rapidly maturing; they believe that it

may also reveal something of the great personal charm that endeared

'Harry of the West' to many of his contemporaries."

Prior to this undertaking, surprisingly few of Clay's writings had

been published. Some mid-nineteenth century editions (Calvin Colton's,

in particular) are hopelessly out-of-date; bits and pieces appeared in

various sources, many of which are now relatively inaccessible. Clay's

unpublished material was widely scattered. Any scholar interested in

a full-dress examination of these documents would have had to travel

thousands of miles. Now, finally, it will all be collected in ten hand-

some volumes. Indicative of the labor poured into this first volume is

the fact that forty libraries and institutions, located in seventeen states

and the District of Columbia, contributed copies of their Clay holdings.

Much of the material in the initial volume concerns Clay's legal activi-

ties, land transactions, business dealings, and family relations. Leases,

deeds, tax bills, receipts, orders, bonds, promissory notes, assignments,

bills of sale, and so forth, will not be of much interest to most historians.

His political views, however, begin on page 3; and these views indi-

cate that Clay, not Jackson, was the better Jeffersonian. Under the

pseudonym "Scaevola," in the Kentucky Gazette of April 16, 1798,

Clay argued for a convention to revise the state constitution. Thoroughly

democratic in tone, his essay struck at the aristocratic senate. Since

it was not elected by the people, Clay wrote, it was "a body which to

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BOOK REVIEWS          407

me seems adverse to republican principles, and to be without use." For

"the enlightened representatives of a free people should not be checked

by any power upon earth, except it be the people themselves." The

volume goes on to cover the years of Clay's service in the Kentucky

legislature, his first years in the United States Congress, and his term

as one of the American ministers to Ghent. Clay as westerner, as ex-

pansionist, as nationalist, as politician, are all pictured; as is Clay's

emerging statesmanship--the wisdom gained by hard experience. The

volume ends when the peace treaty with Great Britain is negotiated.

Clay--the War Hawk of 1811--writes privately to James Monroe:

"The terms of this instrument are undoubtedly not such as our Country

expected at the commencement of the War. . . . [However], we lose no

territory, I think no honor."

The editorial work is learned and scrupulous, the index excellent. If

forthcoming volumes are as well executed, those responsible will have

earned the gratitude of historians everywhere.

Montana State University                     MORTON BORDEN

 

 

Grant Moves South. By Bruce Catton. (Boston: Little, Brown and

Company, 1960. xi??564p.; maps, frontispiece, bibliography, and

index. $6.50.)

Mr. Lincoln's General, U. S. Grant: An Illustrated Autobiography.

Edited and arranged by Roy Meredith. (New York: E. P. Dutton

and Company, 1959. ²⁵2p.; illustrations and index. $6.95.)

Together these two books make a strong bid to install U. S. Grant

as the great military hero of the Civil War. Both attempt to exonerate

him of blemishing charges concerning his personal life and military

capacity that have lingered for nearly a century.

Grant Moves South, the second of three volumes projected by the

late Lloyd Lewis, spans Grant's career from the time he assumed com-

mand of an Illinois regiment in 1861 through the victory at Vicksburg.

Bruce Catton has supplemented the extensive research of Lewis, which

had already borne fruit in Captain Sam Grant, with additional investi-

gation of his own and has produced a book not only adequate in scholar-

ship but written with the author's characteristic lucidity and brilliance.

The emphasis is upon Grant the military strategist, who early com-

prehended the significance of the western waterways and understood

that the way to control them was to destroy the armies defending them.

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408    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

The book is narrative, describing in vivid detail Fort Donelson,

Shiloh, and Vicksburg, but in a larger sense the author's purpose is to

defend U. S. Grant as a general and as a person. Catton finds no factual

basis in the oft-repeated tales of Grant's excessive drinking; if he ap-

peared at times to be anti-Semitic, he was only reflecting the spirit and

attitude of his times. As a person, Grant is depicted as wholly lacking

in pretension, devoid of the self-seeking that characterized so many of

his associates, and a devoted and attentive family man. While he was

a military realist, Grant was not reckless in expending the lives of his

men--he removed from command glory-seeking General John A.

McClernand after his costly and futile assault at Vicksburg in May

1863.

The author is at his best in describing battles, but he does not neglect

the problems of command of the Army of the Tennessee: the necessity

of administering occupied territory, routine but vital questions of health

and supply, the difficulties arising when aggressive Yankee merchants

(including the general's own father) moved south seeking speculative

profits in the cotton trade.

Roy Meredith's Mr. Lincoln's General is a useful supplement to the

volumes by Lewis and Catton. A carefully chosen series of prints and

photographs follow Grant from his boyhood through Appomattox

Court House. Although Currier and Ives prints and certain portraits

of political leaders are scarcely relevant to the career of General Grant,

included are some rare prints of West Point in 1839, Mexican War

illustrations, and one "gem" of a sketch (p. 239) by Winslow Homer

of President Lincoln and his son Tad visiting Grant at City Point in

1864. Mr. Meredith, compiler of a similar book, Mr. Lincoln's Camera-

man, Mathew B. Brady, wisely does not reproduce here vast quantities

of commonly available photographs, mostly by Brady, from the Civil

War period. More than half of the book is devoted to Grant's career

before 1861. The text, a series of scissors and paste excerpts from

Grant's Memoirs, is not equal in quality to the illustrations. Lacking

any editorial link, the reader is propelled from one detailed episode to

another. Apparently the excerpts have been selected only because of

some rough equivalence to an interesting illustration.

These two books are significant contributions to the abundant Civil

War literature; they will provoke many a lively discussion at Civil War

round tables. Yet there is lacking here, as in most books on this subject,

any sense of the awful tragedy of this, and of all wars. There is nothing

romantic in the grim slaughter of Shiloh or Vicksburg. Perhaps a

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BOOK REVIEWS          409

hundred years hence avid arm-chair strategists will debate the tactics

of the "nice little skirmish" at Little Rock Central High School in 1957.

San Francisco State College                  JOHN L. SHOVER

 

 

Anthony Wayne--A Name in Arms: Soldier, Diplomat, Defender of

Expansion Westward of a Nation. Edited by Richard C. Knopf.

(Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1959. 566p.; illustra-

tions, end-paper maps, bibliography, and index. $7.00.)

This book is a collection of letters exchanged by General Anthony

Wayne and the three secretaries of war under whom he served between

1792 and 1796 while carrying on his mission to pacify the Indians north

of the Ohio River. The letters seek to bring into proper perspective

the Indian wars of the Northwest during the early years of our nation-

hood. They also endeavor to show that Wayne's successes, both

military and diplomatic, opened the door to westward expansion and

made certain the failure of the international intrigues in the trans-

Allegheny West which had as their purpose the establishment of an

Indian buffer in the region north of the Ohio Valley to hold back the

westward movement. The letters so ably edited by Mr. Knopf are a

part of the Wayne Collection of public papers at the Historical Society

of Pennsylvania.

This is a valuable work on an important event in the early history

of our nation. The letters have been chosen with care. They reveal

that Wayne was anything but mad. Rather, he was skilled in the arts

of both war and diplomacy. He was a perfectionist who demanded the

most of himself and of his men. The letters bring out clearly the handi-

caps and the innumerable difficulties which confronted Wayne in secur-

ing and then supplying troops for service in the distant West. The cor-

respondence has been made all the more valuable for understanding the

events in connection with Wayne's western mission by detailed identi-

fication notes by the editor. He also has an excellent general introduc-

tion giving the background of Wayne's campaign against the Indians

of the Northwest and pointing out the significance of the latter. The

letters are arranged by years. The editor has a good brief introduction

to the correspondence for each year. In each introduction, Mr. Knopf

orients the reader to the nature of the letters which follow.

The reader is aided also by several fine maps and drawings. The

latter are detailed and contain much valuable information on Wayne's

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410    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

expedition. There is also a selective classified bibliography on the

latter at the end of the book. There are several excellent reproductions

of Wayne. Pictures of Henry Knox, Thomas Pickering, and James

McHenry, the secretaries of war under whom Wayne conducted his

western mission, also appear.

This book has much of value for the student of the early West. Both

the editor and the University of Pittsburgh Press are to be highly com-

mended for a first-rate contribution to our understanding of an im-

portant phase of our national history.

Modesto (California) Junior College          GEORGE E. LEWIS

 

 

William Nast: Patriarch of German Methodism. By Carl Wittke.

(Detroit, Mich.: Wayne State University Press, 1959. vii??248p.;

frontispiece and index. $4.95.)

Carl Wittke has given us another portrait of a leader among the

German immigrants, this time of the father of German Methodism.

William Nast, born in Stuttgart, in Wurttemberg, on January 15, 1807,

of Lutheran parents, enjoyed the advantages of a university education.

As a student he heard the lectures of Professor Ferdinand Baur, a man

devoted to the scientific study of the beginnings of Christianity. Among

Nast's classmates was David Strauss, author of The Life of Jesus, a

scholar who had a direct influence on the first exponents of biblical

criticism in the United States. Young Nast, already a highly pietistic

young man, rejected the cold rationalism of his professors, but he ac-

quired a respect for learning and scholarship that eventually made a

mark on early American Methodism.

In 1828, at the age of twenty-one, William Nast sailed for the United

States. Not long after his arrival he found employment as the tutor of

the two sons of a widow, Rebecca Duncan. His employer, some eighteen

years his senior, owned a comfortable estate in Pennsylvania. A romance

developed, but the young immigrant, given to periods of depression

when he was overcome by a deep sense of sin, found his friend in-

capable of sharing his strong religious feelings.

In 1833 Nast found a position as a librarian and instructor in German

at West Point. While at the military academy he first encountered

Methodism. The school's worldly atmosphere disturbed him, and he

soon left and went West. For a short time he taught in the preparatory

division of Kenyon College. In 1835 he experienced a deeply emotional

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BOOK REVIEWS          411

conversion and joined the Methodist Church. That same year the

Ohio Conference appointed him missionary to the German population

in Cincinnati. A year later the conference named him missionary to the

Germans throughout the state. During that year Nast rode horseback

about four thousand miles.

His reputation as the father of German Methodism rests in part on

his being the first German to serve in the ministry of the denomination,

but it was as editor of the German Methodist periodical, Der Christliche

Apologete, that he made his greatest contribution. He wrote on heavy

theological questions, supported the antislavery and prohibition move-

ments, and informed his readers of political developments in the father-

land. Somehow he found time to write and to edit a total of fourteen

books. Nast was scarcely an original or creative scholar, but he per-

formed a service in making available the ideas and interpretations

of European theologians. A life-long project entitled Commentary on

the New Testament embodied more of Nast's own conclusions. De-

fense of the Bible as an inerrant and valid presentation of the divine

provided a major theme.

Carl Wittke has performed a labor of love in the deepest meaning of

that phrase. Few historians of his reputation would take time out to

preserve for the future the record of a rather obscure figure. Fewer

still would bestow on Nast the almost loving treatment that Professor

Wittke has done. Much of what Nast represented would not jibe with

the author's humanistic convictions, but he has risen above making

unkind judgments and sought to understand the Methodist pietist in

his own terms.

Michigan State University                      PAUL A. VARG

 

 

The General's Wife: The Life of Mrs. Ulysses S. Grant. By Ishbel

Ross. (New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1959. xii??372p.;

illustrations, bibliography, and index. $5.00.)

To the historian, this biography has more value for what is implicit

than what is explicit. Making no pretense at a critical study, the author,

most of the time, takes the optimistic, naive, and credulous Julia at her

own valuation and that of her friends. Analysis by the biographer of

situations or predicaments is scanty, but from the unadorned, routine

telling of the subject's experiences there emerges a picture of a woman

of courage, and of devotion to her family. She was throughout a loyal,

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412    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

unfailing helpmeet to her husband, within the range of her own under-

standing and of his. Presumably he could not have been happy with a

wife of greater depth and keener perspective; her pride in him unfail-

ingly sustained him, even through the calamitous final years.

However, few historians would agree--except in a minor connota-

tion-that Julia was "one of the most potent women in American

history" (p.335). The biographer's conclusion to that effect may be

due in part to a lack of historical scholarship. For example, she refers

to the Grant of 1880 as one whose "popularity with the public was

real" (p.²⁷⁵), although that popularity was not so overwhelming as to

make the majority of his party willing to nominate him for a third term.

Little of the seamy side of his administration or of her possible relation

to it comes through. Arthur is termed a "scholar" (p.²⁷7).

The first one hundred pages of the volume naturally suffer from the

pedestrian nature of the happenings chronicled therein. The subse-

quent description, of some of the Grants' experiences during the Civil

War, the presidency, and the trip around the world, contains much of

interest. One gets a good picture of the life of the wives of those

northern generals who with their children stayed with their husbands

in the battle areas from time to time. Also the costumes, table settings,

and manners of the "Gilded Age" emerge in the narrative. The

bibliography and the notes suggest wide reading, apparently for surface

material for the most part. The textual pages are innocent of note

numbers; the notes are relegated to page groupings at the end of the

narrative, so that the historian can only make his own assumptions as

to which sources apply to which statements.

It is to be doubted that extant materials would have permitted a more

satisfying biography of Julia Dent Grant. Therefore, the writer of it in

all probability simply did the best she knew how, under the circum-

stances.

University of Pennsylvania             JEANNETTE P. NICHOLS

 

 

The Electric Interurban Railways in America. By George W. Hilton

and John F. Due. (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press,

1960. ix??463p.; illustrations, charts, bibliographical note, and index.

$9.50.)

This work deals with one of the most colorful and neglected eras in

transportation history. The authors are to be commended for the com-

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BOOK REVIEWS           413

pilation of what appears to be a complete and authoritative economic

history of the industry. Mr. Hilton is an assistant professor of eco-

nomics at Stanford University and Mr. Due is a professor of economics

at the University of Illinois.

The volume is divided into two parts. Part I describes the building

and the technology of the interurbans, their passenger and freight

traffic, and their regulation by public authorities. Part II presents the

histories of more than three hundred different companies that com-

prised the industry.

This history will be of special interest to Ohioans, for not only did

the electric interurban railway movement get its early start in this

state but no "other state approached within a thousand miles of Ohio's

interurban mileage of 2,789." No Ohio town of 10,000 or more was

without interurban service, and there were highly developed networks

along the shore of Lake Erie and from Toledo south to Cincinnati.

Although some interurban lines were built in the 1890's, most of

them were constructed in two bursts "between 1901 and the panic of

1903, and 1905 and the panic of 1907." The interurban network took

shape in an atmosphere of great optimism. The statement, made in

1903, that the interurbans were "the latest harbingers of a higher state

of civilization" was in no way exceptional. Few industries have arisen

so rapidly yet declined so quickly, and no industry of its size has a worse

financial record. The typical interurban was designed to perform the

least profitable kind of railroad service, short distance passenger trans-

portation. It was built with a cheap physical plant and meager provision

for depreciation and maintenance, burdened with heavy fixed charges

for electricity, and set in a geographical pattern that in great measure

was the result of mere chance. The history of the interurbans is so

dominated by their financial failure that it is difficult to consider

seriously their positive contribution to American transportation develop-

ment. Their principal influence was in conditioning the rural popula-

tion to a greatly increased mobility, the mobility which was fully realized

with the general acceptance of the automobile. The interurban also

initiated the commercial decline of many small towns.

Most interurban companies faced the constant danger of bankruptcy,

and the draining of earnings for loan interest seriously impeded the

ability of the companies to modernize by reinvesting their earnings.

Initial disabilities included the lack of high-speed entrances to down-

town areas, poor track construction, excessive grades and curvature,

poor signal systems, and inadequate ballast. As the roads began to

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414    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

emphasize longer-distance travel, such limitations became more serious,

yet by then the funds for major improvements were often lacking. A

decline set in about 1918, and in the decade 1928-37 the industry was

virtually annihilated. The decline was caused primarily by the rise of

the automobile, which was brought into production almost simultane-

ously, but developed more slowly. It seems clear that if the automobile

had been developed earlier, the interurban would never have existed.

The reader of this volume will gain a good understanding of the

economic history of the interurban industry, but the social historian

will probably find much to be desired. The omission, for example, of

any reference to labor organization, working conditions, or strikes

among the trainmen is apparent at once. But as an economic study the

volume is comprehensive and excellent.

Firestone Library and Archives          WILLIAM D. OVERMAN

 

 

The Calumet Region: Indiana's Last Frontier. By Powell A. Moore.

Indiana Historical Collections, Volume XXXIX. (Indianapolis:

Indiana Historical Bureau, 1959. xiii??654p.; illustrations, maps,

bibliography, and index. $6.00.)

This excellent book is a history of the extreme northwestern corner

of Indiana, which borders on the southern shores of Lake Michigan.

The area consists roughly of the northern halves of Porter and Lake

counties and is known as the Calumet region because of two small

sluggish rivers, the "Grand Calumet" and the "Little Calumet," that

formerly flowed through the area. They now are so filled with the

wastes and sewage of this highly industrial area that they do little else

than simply "lie there," stagnant and malodorous.

Because of the sandy and swampy character of the soil and the

absence of natural harbors this was the last section of Indiana to be

settled. Even the removal of all Indian claims by 1832 and the con-

struction of railroads through the area by 1852 did little to bring settle-

ment. Not until the latter part of the nineteenth century, when heavy

industry could no longer find sufficient lake-shore space in Chicago

and began to expand eastward along the Indiana shore, did the Calumet

region come into its own.

The Standard Oil Company began to build its great refineries at the

present site of Whiting, Indiana, in 1889; Inland Steel gave birth to

East Chicago by erecting its first furnaces in 1901; and the United

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BOOK REVIEWS          415

 

States Steel Corporation founded Gary in 1906. Since that time its

network of man-made harbors and canals plus its proximity to the

greatest railroad center in the world have served to attract industry

of every variety.

The industry in turn has attracted laborers, skilled and unskilled,

from all corners of the globe. Southern and eastern Europeans largely

supplied the need for labor until World War I. Thereafter southern

Negroes and Mexicans were the major immigrants. The Calumet

region has as cosmopolitan a population as one is likely to find any-

where. Furthermore, the population is so concentrated that even natives

of the area have difficulty in distinguishing where one city leaves off

and another begins. Unfortunately, with this has come all the multi-

tudinous problems that are invariably associated with such communities:

labor unrest, slums, vice and crime of every description. Its political

history has been as pungent as the industrial fumes which distinguish

the region's very atmosphere.

The only criticisms I might have of Mr. Moore's work are quite

minor. He deals rather lightly with the political history of the region,

which could be historically important, and which, I am certain, would

be fascinating if recounted in more detail. I am not sure that I agree

with the author that "a regional history should be devoted to things

economic, social, and cultural [with] a minimum of emphasis on

political affairs." Also, unfortunately, he has carried his story from

the region's beginnings only to 1933, which he describes as the "forma-

tive years." While I sympathize with any writer faced with the enormity

of the task of covering the complex history taking place thereafter, still

one cannot help wishing it had been possible to bring it further.

What Mr. Moore has completed is excellently done. It is well writ-

ten, and he has obviously undertaken a prodigious job of research. His

bibliography, which lists only the sources cited, should satisfy the most

demanding of scholars. His chapter on the great immigration of

Negroes, Mexicans, and southern Europeans and his description of

their impact on this region is quite good. Other chapters which are

outstanding are the ones dealing with the Prohibition era and with

the area's labor problems. The author's account of the great steel

strike of 1919, I believe, will make a real contribution to the history of

labor. Mr. Moore, who happens to be a fine teacher, has proven with

this book that he is equally adept at scholarly writing.

Bowling Green State University            ROBERT W. TWYMAN

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416    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Minority of One: The Biography of Jonathan Blanchard. By Clyde S.

Kilby. (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company,

1959. ²52p.; illustrations, bibliography, and index. $3.95.)

Appearing in the Christian Cynosure of January 4, 1883, was a

statement by Jonathan Blanchard that might be regarded as symbolic

of his life. Said he, "The minorities have done the good in this world:

the majorities only register it." Though by no means always a "minority

of one," Blanchard was unashamed to be different. "He had discovered

that principle too often becomes the victim of expediency. Because the

status quo is bad and tends to get worse, he felt it both a civic and

spiritual obligation to swim against the current."

About this theme, Clyde S. Kilby, chairman of the department of

English at Wheaton College, Illinois, has constructed a fascinating

biography of one of nineteenth-century America's most controversial

educational and religious leaders. Striving to build a "Perfect State of

Society" on the rock of Jesus Christ, Blanchard became an iconoclast

striking out against the institutions of slavery and secret societies, which

seemed to him to deny Christ. As preacher he served both Congre-

gational and Presbyterian churches. As college president he guided

the destinies of both Knox and Wheaton colleges, the former from

1845 to 1858, the latter from 1860 to 1882.

Eminently readable, the book is of particular significance to Ameri-

can historians for its introduction of hitherto unpublished material

relating to Thaddeus Stevens, John Greenleaf Whittier, Theodore D.

Weld, Salmon P. Chase, Harriet Beecher Stowe, John Rankin, and

others who worked with Blanchard in the abolitionist crusade. Students

of higher education will be delighted with Dr. Kilby's treatment of the

formative years of the Lane Seminary and Oberlin, Knox, and Wheaton

colleges. Those whose principal interest is Ohio history will find both

interesting and valuable the three chapters dealing with Blanchard's

career as a theological student and minister in this state from 1837

until 1845.

Unfortunately, the book is not free from error. The dust jacket

informs us that Blanchard "established two colleges -- Knox and

Wheaton." Within the book one finds that both schools were going

concerns, if not financially stable, when Blanchard became president

of each. One might question whether "Judge Levi Platt, the leading

citizen and business man of Plattsburgh, sent so much timber up to

Montreal one spring that his men could not carry back the solid silver

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BOOK REVIEWS          417

which he received for it" (p.33). On page 87 the reader will be sur-

prised to find Benjamin Harrison a candidate for the presidency in 1840,

and again on page 105 that President Blanchard's recommendation for

appointment to key Knox positions of three close relatives was "not

because they were relatives and friends but because they were the most

efficient to be found under the pressing circumstances." On page 191 the

"nineteenth" should be substituted for the "twentieth" century.

Certainly the most serious error is one of omission. Having de-

veloped the lengthy and detailed story of Blanchard's involvement in the

abolitionist movement for the best part of two-thirds of the book, the

author then fails almost completely to discuss his subject's reactions to

the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation, and the thirteenth,

fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments which would consummate that

movement.

On the whole, however, the book has been ably written. It is well

that it has been published for use in this the centennial year of Blan-

chard's assumption of the presidency of Wheaton College.

Kent State University                      PHILLIP R. SHRIVER

 

Medicine and Society in America, 1660-1860. By Richard H. Shryock.

(New York: New York University Press, 1960. viii??182p.; index.

$4.00.)

Professor Shryock, long known for distinguished contributions to

the history of science and medicine, has, in one small volume, presented

an excellent summary and interpretation of the healing art in the United

States from colonial days until the eve of the Civil War.

In four closely packed chapters, the author, clearly and succinctly,

traces the origin of the medical profession, the development of medical

thought and practice, the progress of health and disease, and the story

of medicine and society in transition. The bulk of the book carries the

narrative to 1820, while the final chapter--the period of transition--

bridges the gap between 1820 and 1860.

Professor Shryock points out, truly enough, that both research and

practice altered during this forty-year interval. Traditional and sub-

jective techniques were being molded by scientific developments in

England, France, and Germany; empiricism was replacing romanticism;

something like systemic medical research was appearing for the first

time; time-honored theories were falling before established facts.

Pathologic research was to become the rule rather than the exception.

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418    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Under the stimulating impact of European investigation, more and

more American physicians journeyed abroad for post-graduate train-

ing. In foreign centers they were introduced to new conceptions in the

area of public health, were made aware of advances in pharmacology,

were stimulated by novel surgical techniques. But Americans at home

also advanced. Thus ether anesthesia was introduced in 1846 at the

Massachusetts General Hospital. A decade earlier, lectures on dental

surgery were given at the University of Maryland. In 1850 Daniel

Drake brought out his monumental Diseases of the Interior Valley of

North America, a classic contribution to the study of environmental

aspects of disease. In short, medical thought was becoming somewhat

more critical.

Of particular interest and fascination is the author's analysis of the

development of medical thought and practice in the decades prior to

the Civil War: medical schools increased, faculties and students grew,

practice became more professional, additional licensing power was

granted to faculties, women were (to the disgust of some) entering the

profession. The American Medical Association was formed in 1847.

On the debit side, professional standards fell, clinical facilities were

inadequate, university affiliations were few, rival systems competed vig-

orously with one another, no serious attempts were made to suppress

quackery, and regular faculties frequently were "rent by dissensions

within as well as by rivalries without."

In addition to praising contributions and describing faults, Professor

Shryock sketches the rise of the general and specialized hospital; dis-

cusses the training of nurses; reviews briefly mortality statistics; and

explains the beginnings of a sanitary movement which eventually was

to expand into not only national quarantine and sanitary conventions

but also, as the years crept by, to evolve into public-health programs.

These essays, first presented in 1959 as the Anson G. Phelps Lectures,

should be of the utmost assistance and a real delight not only to medical

students, nurses, public health officials, and members of the allied sci-

ences but also to the layman interested in discerning what the American

of 1860 did not comprehend--"that science was moving . . . toward

the creation of a type of medicine which would eventually exert a

profound influence on the health of the American people."

University of Minnesota                      PHILIP D. JORDAN

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BOOK REVIEWS          419

 

The Stark County Story. By Edward Thornton Heald. Volume IV,

Part 3, The American Way of Life, 1917-1959. (Canton, Ohio:

Stark County Historical Society, 1959. xvi??1065p.; illustrations,

maps, bibliography, and index. $11.00.)

This is the concluding unit of Mr. Heald's six-unit story. It also

concludes Volume IV, which aims to tell the history of Stark County

since 1917 in three volumes or parts. Part 1 is entitled Free People at

Work, 1917-1945, and Part 2, The Suburban Era, 1917-1958. Part 1

emphasized Canton and its industry and Part 2 the suburbs, the rural

areas, and county-wide government and social organizations. Part 3 is

a rather miscellaneous one. It "rounds out the private industry story,"

bringing up to date some industries treated in earlier volumes. All

mercantile establishments in business twenty-five years or longer, not

previously reported on, are included. The automobile agencies in Mas-

sillon and Alliance take two chapters under the title of "The Automobile

Age." There are chapters on the transition from streetcars to buses

and the development of the freeways. The church story is brought up

to date, as are the colleges and other cultural organizations, including

the YMCA, the YWCA, boys clubs, women's organizations, and old

age homes. Politics are covered by a listing of mayors, senators, repre-

sentatives, a judge, and a rear admiral. Some outlying communities are

modernized, and several more "Unusual Persons" described.

The radio background of the project, which characterized the previous

volumes is followed. Each chapter heading contains the date or dates of

the broadcasts from 1952 to 1959. The bibliographical note states that

the broadcasts and their publication "represent a cooperative enterprise

in which more than 1,500 persons have given information, checked

script copy and verified manuscript."

Now that the entire work is completed, an overall statement of its

value can be made. The set, 4,987 pages in all, was written by and for

Stark Countians. The author gives some interesting light on this in

his preface:

 

A prime objective throughout the six volumes has been to pro-

vide reference materials which have heretofore not existed. Discarded

information might be the very item called for. The lengthy indices and

detailed references are designed to serve the school, college, library,

research student, newspaper, or company organization, or curious person

who has a question about Stark County. . . . That our books serve this

purpose in Stark County is confirmed by their very heavy usage at the

public libraries, and by the comment of an editor of a newspaper that

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420    THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

they could get along without a dictionary before they could do without

The Stark County Story. In fact, it was the need of an index at this

same newspaper that was a stimulus to the whole project.

Certain things not pleasing to Stark Countians are omitted or played

down. An example is the story of the gangster murder of the Canton

Daily News editor, Don Mellett, on July 16, 1926. This, says the author,

"shattered normal political life and gave Canton bad publicity." The

story is told in two paragraphs as part of the thirteen and a half page

laudatory account of Canton's great industrialist, Henry M. Timken,

who gave money to help apprehend the criminals because the freedom

of the press was at stake. A strange perversion: Timken the hero

instead of Mellett. Fifty-eight broadcasts on Canton's "presidents and

mayors" were omitted because it was considered inappropriate to have

Canton officials without Massillon and Alliance officials. The extended

treatment of William McKinley is another piece of laudation and gives

a most distorted and sophomoric view of the man. Mercifully enough,

Jacob S. Coxey gets a pretty fair handling.

In spite of this, The Stark County Story represents some progress.

Information that would perish with those who had it has been saved

by indefatigable interviewers. Archives and diaries and scrapbooks have

been ransacked and resurrected. It is observed that the Canton Repo-

sitory, the fifth oldest newspaper in Ohio, has been entirely microfilmed,

although it is clear that the author has not studied it to catch its full

revelations of Stark County history. The biographical and institutional

coverage is a bit superior to that of the subscription county histories,

with their devotion to subscribers. However, this superiority is not as

great as the author says it is. It is quite clear that the overstress of

industrialists and businessmen is largely responsible for making the

publication financially possible.

The world of scholarship outside of Stark County will be unimpressed

by this work, save by its massiveness and the peculiarly provincial

method of its financing. There is no real synthesis, no analysis of the

vast array of facts assembled. As the author says, it is a reference book

stimulated by a local newspaper that wanted an index. Few people

elsewhere have such a need. Readers of these volumes can acquire no

deeper understanding of the history and the people of Stark County

and the cities of Canton, Massillon, and Alliance than they had before

the books were written.

Historical Society of Northwestern Ohio  RANDOLPH C. DOWNES

• 23