Ohio History Journal

ALBERT SHAW'S OHIO YOUTH by LLOYD J. GRAYBAR

In the twenty-eight years between 1829 and 1857 there were born in Ohio four distinguished American journalists: Murat Halstead, Whitelaw Reid, William Dean Howells, and Albert Shaw. In 1857, Murat Halstead, born in 1829, had already achieved recognition, Whitelaw Reid and William Dean Howells were commencing their brilliant careers, and Albert Shaw had just been born. All four were intimately associated with one small corner of the state--Butler County--and two, Halstead and Shaw-- cousins--were born there.1 We know much about Murat Halstead, for in a half-century career, spent primarily on the Cincinnati Commercial, he made many significant contributions to American journalism. In the years after the Civil War Halstead stood with Whitelaw Reid, Samuel Bowles, and Henry Watterson at the summit of editorial prowess. A prolific and versatile writer, Halstead was best known for his military and political commentary. Although his participation as a wire-puller in the Liberal Republican convention of 1872 did not turn out successfully, as an observer of political gatherings Hal- stead was most astute. And following the Franco-Prussian War, during which he served as a correspondent, he received the nickname of "Field Marshal."2 Albert Shaw lived to within a month of ninety, and his active career-- spanning the years from 1879 to 1937--was even longer than Halstead's. His editorship of the American Review of Reviews from its start in 1891 to its finish in 1937 is a story of ability and consistency.3 He had come to New York to operate the new Review in 1891 after prior editorial work on the Grinnell (Iowa) Herald and the Minneapolis Tribune. This previous experience had given him a detailed knowledge of the newspaper profes- sion and at the same time the chance to see that the routine of a news-     NOTES ARE ON PAGES 72-73

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paper was not quite what he wanted. The tempo was too rapid and the

mood too partisan for Shaw to write in the reflective manner that he

preferred. The recipient of a doctorate in history and political economy

from Johns Hopkins University in 1884, Shaw had the offer of a Cornell

professorship but declined it to accept the position with the Review of

Reviews. The decision was prompted to some extent by financial considera-

tions but mainly by the opportunity to remain in journalism. Since the

Review appeared but monthly, Shaw reasoned that he would have the

time to write with greater erudition than before.

The Review of Reviews featured an inventory of other periodicals and

abstracts of their lead stories, a sketch of some prominent person, and

"The Progress of the World," an editorial section dealing with foreign

and domestic news. Shaw's contribution, "The Progress," was especially

esteemed for its genial and intelligent approach to current problems.

International affairs he surveyed from a broad perspective and domestic

politics from the outlook of a temperate Republican. In 1892 Shaw ac-

quired a majority interest in the magazine, and in the following year it

began to prosper. As the Review of Reviews increased in popularity

through the 1890's and particularly during the two decades thereafter,

Shaw's stature in New York and the nation grew apace. Member of some

three dozen social and charitable organizations, sought-after expert on

municipal institutions, friend and confidant of Theodore Roosevelt, Shaw

had a full and rewarding life. Much of his success he owed to the lessons

of his youth. It was in Butler County, Ohio, where Shaw spent his boy-

hood, that he acquired a Republican preference in politics, an interest in

scholarship, and a taste for journalism.

The family that could produce a Murat Halstead and an Albert Shaw

in successive generations was in no sense an ordinary one. In its annals

are found numerous farmers, but also a conspicuously large incidence of

professional men, plus the proverbial rascal or two.⁴ Although none of

its progenitors had arrived on the Susan Constant or the Mayflower, they

had not been far behind. Nathan Halstead, the first to arrive from

England, came to Dedham in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1641, or

perhaps a few years before. His son Henry, who moved to Norfolk in

1651, began the southern branch of the family. John Holstead, a descend-

ant of this Henry, and his wife Ruth moved to Butler County from North

Carolina in 1804. Their daughter Rebecca married Hezekiah Shaw, a

Methodist circuit-rider of Ulster-Scot derivation who had made several

stops on a roundabout route from Pennsylvania before settling perma-

nently in Ohio in 1808. The couple had a daughter and three sons, John,

Daniel, and Griffin.5

The last-named studied medicine in Ohio, settled in Indiana, and mar-

ried a Susan Colburn who gave him two children, Griffin, Jr., and Lucy.

After his wife died, he was married again, in 1852, to Susan Fisher of

Chester, Vermont. Of old New England stock, Susan Fisher had been

reared in the Congregational tradition and educated at Mary Lyon's school

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ALBERT SHAW'S OHIO YOUTH                                        31

 

before contracting to go west to teach. Together with the children of his

first marriage, the Shaws moved to Ohio in 1854 in order to avoid a

malaria epidemic which had already infected his two elder children and

claimed the life of the first-born of his second marriage. Two children

were born to them in Butler County, Mary and--on July 23, 1857--the

baby of the family, Albert.6

The Shaws were a close-knit family, and Albert's childhood seems to

have been reasonably happy. Their home was in Paddy's Run, a small

village in Butler County six miles from the Indiana line and twenty-two

miles from Cincinnati. This crossroads village had once carried the fa-

cetiously exotic nickname of "Bagdad," and would receive the mundane

name of Shandon in 1893, but the "Paddy's Run" of Albert Shaw's boy-

hood was a title both quaint and descriptive. The little creek of that name

rippled by on its way to the Great Miami River, giving the area a basis

for a number of prosperous farms. The foliage of the pawpaw, persim-

mon, maple, and oak lined the banks of the creek and dotted the country-

side. So rural was the village that its residents could, as the Shaws them-

selves did, keep some livestock and raise vegetables. The elder Shaw's

interests were in fact quite diversified, for besides being a doctor and a

"farmer," he owned a store, dealt in real estate, and mixed in politics.7

If, as his first few years passed, the world of a small child was un-

disturbed by events in the world beyond, the lives of the area's adults

were of course dramatically altered by the impact of the Civil War. Most

of the neighbors were Union-loving, but a considerable number of south-

erners had migrated to the area, and there seems to have been a certain

amount of "Butternut" sympathy as well.⁸ Griffin Shaw himself was a

Douglas Democrat, who, as a former Indiana legislator, had joined in

Ohio politics with enthusiasm. After secession, however, he transferred

his allegiance to the Republicans. He thus joined the party that his abo-

litionist father had undoubtedly preferred and to which his wife was

already devoted. As a reward for his new loyalties, Dr. Shaw was ap-

pointed to the Butler County conscription board, but these and other

duties seriously undermined his health. His death in 1863 brought the

first great sorrow into his youngest's life.9

Albert was but six years old at the time, and the tragedy probably

rested easier on him in its immediate impact than on the others in the

family. But though Mrs. Shaw was devoted and strong-minded, his

father's guidance was still missed by the growing boy. "I was only six

years old when my father died," he recalled, "and nobody will ever know

how bereft and forlorn I felt as I grew older and realized the need of a

father's direction and general backing."10

As concerns his daily life, however, the activities he pursued were

quite normal and pleasurable. He grew close to his mother and sister

Mary, who was but two years older. Of Lucy and Griffin, Jr., he was fond,

and there certainly was none of the discord that one usually associates

with the relationships of stepchildren, but they were considerably older

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32                                                OHIO HISTORY

 

and had gone their own way by the time Albert reached his early teens.

Nor was money a major problem. To be sure, the family provider was

gone, leaving a mother and four children. But he had left them well

taken care of; a house, a farm, several parcels of land, and the store, the

last of which Mrs. Shaw soon sold, all passed to his heirs. The net worth

of these possessions came to about $10,000, and there was always enough

for pleasant trips to Cincinnati for the theater, for concerts, or for shop-

ping, and even for lengthy visits to maternal relatives in Vermont and

Iowa.11

The tenor of this predominantly Welsh community, Shaw later wrote,

was one "of intelligence promoted by good schools, and of social conduct

influenced by churches," and Mrs. Shaw reared the children in her own

tradition of Congregationalism and sound learning.12 Her own knowledge

of the fundamentals was, of course, quite respectable. To complement

Albert's natural aptitudes there was thus the interest in education at

home which makes for conscientious studying. He attended a two-room

frame elementary school, where, as he remembered, he had the special

privilege of carrying the water buckets from the pump. His teachers

were methodical, stressing spelling, the "³ R's" (Shaw, it can gratefully

be stated, became a superb penman), and memorization of selections from

McGuffey's Readers. Thus were emphasized the values of sobriety, moral-

ity, piety, and industry that was his heritage from his mother. As the

years passed, Greek and Latin, algebra and geometry, English stylistics,

readings in Story's Commentaries on the Constitution, and various works

of history formed the ascending levels of his education. In every case

Shaw was encouraged to forge ahead of his schoolmates, but only after

he had mastered the fundamentals. In leisure hours he read Robinson

Crusoe, Tom Brown's School Days, Scott, Dickens, Mark Twain, the sea-

faring tales of Elisha Kent Kane, and the biographies of Jared Sparks.13

Yet Albert Shaw, while an exceptionally able student, was hardly a

bookworm and found ample time to participate in the various activities

of a rural life. A share of his spare time he spent in play. Swimming,

skating, singing, snowball fighting, and baseball were all great favorites.

Young Shaw also found occupation on neighbors' farms, where he worked

on some week ends and during the summer. Moral censure was attached

to the idler.14

Some such activities still form part of the developmental years of the

contemporary youth. But a century has wrought profound changes in

patterns of life, and Shaw engaged in pursuits which now may be re-

captured only through imagination or analogy and not by experience.

Picketing for prohibition and "politicking" were the most notable. In 1874

a temperance movement appeared in the community. Mrs. Shaw and most

Republicans--the "God-and-Morality Party"--embraced the cause. Albert

in a protective spirit accompanied his mother as she kept her vigils of

protest in front of the local saloons and witnessed the glee that would

follow a hard-earned triumph by the temperance campaigners. Politics

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engendered similar enthusiasm. As a small boy Albert had been exposed to the new-found Republican ardor of his father and the more settled faith of his mother, and impressions have a way of becoming durable. At first his political credo (if such it may be called) was summed up in the notion that to be a Republican was a good thing--and fun. His active experience in politics dated from the age of seven, when he first banged his drum in behalf of Abe Lincoln; four years later he was a regular participant in torchlight parades. Enthusiasm was so tremendous and the reputation of the Shaw household for staunch Republicanism so renowned, that on one occasion the Shaws had their windows shattered by the re- verberations of strategically--and perhaps maliciously--positioned Demo- cratic cannon.15 Shaw, who had always been close to his mother, had drawn even closer in these years, for his small circle of intimates had been suddenly and shockingly reduced. Griff, his half-brother, died; Roger Williams, an older friend, passed away shortly thereafter in 1873. Actually the loss of a brother was the lesser tragedy, for Griff had left home several years before. But the passing of Williams--able in scholarship, strong of char- acter, and warm of personality--had brought profound grief. It was Williams who had shown Albert the happy times of a good baseball game; he had also given his young friend much good advice, plus a personal example which had much to do with Shaw's going into journalism. Williams (whose brother-in-law was a teacher) had even planned a pro-

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34                                                OHIO HISTORY

 

gram of education that Shaw should follow in high school. The study of

English, with the practical thought of a journalistic career evidently in

Williams' mind, was to be stressed. Williams himself, while still attend-

ing Miami University in nearby Oxford, had in 1870 purchased the Citizen,

the weekly newspaper of that college community. There Albert, to his

delight, had every chance to observe the operation of the presses and the

many activities of a newspaper. The example of Shaw's now-famous

cousin, Murat Halstead, was not uninspiring. But this more tangible con-

tact with an actual newspaper, and with an editor whom he worshipped,

impressed him profoundly. Williams' death grieved people all over the

county; no one felt it more than Shaw.l6

The deaths of the men closest to him left him thus with only his mother

and sisters. Of the latter he lost one (even while gaining a brother-in-law)

when Lucy married lawyer Richard R. Stephenson and moved to Indiana.17

With only two children left at home, Mrs. Shaw decided it would be

sensible to move to Grinnell, Iowa, where she had numerous relatives.

Albert had graduated from high school in 1874, and with neighboring

Miami closed, he would have to go away to school anyhow.18 What then

could be better than to move to Grinnell, where he could attend Iowa

College? But the children were reluctant to leave Paddy's Run, so Susan

Shaw decided to spend one more year in Ohio. Her son, forewarned by a

catalog, was tutored by schoolmaster Clark in a fashion paralleling the

program of Iowa College freshmen. He had always had a distinguished

school record, so there should have been no doubt of his ability to do

college work. Nevertheless, he feared that "he wouldn't be thought any-

thing of" in Grinnell.19

In the spring of 1875 the Shaws made the much-discussed move to

Iowa. Shaw was almost eighteen, somewhat immature, and still impres-

sionable, yet the fundamental lessons he had learned in Ohio were in the

future only modified, never eradicated. This is especially true of the ones

that were to influence his career most deeply: a Republican political bias,

the attitude of a scholar, and above all an interest in journalism as a

vocation. He would end up as editor of a magazine, not a newspaper;

he would decline an academic position but only to remain in journalism;

he would qualify his politics by a reformer's outlook but stray only

temporarily from Republican ranks in 1912 to vote for his "Bull Moose"

friend Theodore Roosevelt. And although he would reside in the East,

his later life bore other reminders of his Ohio background. One was a

genuine sympathy with the problems of rural America. The others were

personal: he would name his home "Shandon" and his second son "Roger."

 

THE AUTHOR: Lloyd J. Graybar is a

doctoral candidate at Columbia University.

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