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On This Day In Cincinnati History
The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, with Frank A. van der Stucken on the podium, performed its first concert on 17 January 1895 at Pike’s Opera House of Fourth Street. Although Mozart led the bill at the premiere, the next night’s concert featured only American composers – believed to be a first. #CincinnatiCuriosities
Thanksgiving 1919: Pricey Birds, Americanism, And A ‘Baby Marathon’
One hundred years ago, Cincinnati was hardly in the mood for giving thanks. Prices for everything rebounded after wartime rationing and booze, outlawed during the war, would remain forbidden as the U.S. drifted into Prohibition.
Sugar prices made front-page news in 1919. After years of scarcity, cane sugar was back on the market, albeit at 22 cents per pound (compared to around 50 cents per pound today).
But the big Thanksgiving birds hit the pocketbook worst of all. Turkeys ran 45 to 50 cents per pound – maybe $5.00 for the somewhat skinnier birds available back then. With inflation, $5.00 in 1919 is approximately equal to $74.00 today. Lots of Cincinnati households opted for duck or chicken, even shoats (young pigs) that year.
For those who could afford a turkey, the Cincinnati Post [26 November 1919] offered a suggested Thanksgiving menu that will mostly look familiar to families today:
“Oyster cocktail, consommé, roast turkey with stuffing and giblet sauce, cranberry jelly, mashed potatoes, creamed onions, celery, salted nuts, ginger sherbet, pumpkin pie, coffee.”
Notice that no alcoholic beverages are listed. With national prohibition imminent and wartime restrictions still in place, Cincinnati was pretty much dry in 1919. People hoarded beverages and burglars followed the liquid loot. The Post’s “Village Gossip” [25 November 1919] offered advice:
“Again somebody’s cellar has been robbed. This time it’s a cellar on Bach-av., from which 18 bottles of wine and 3 ½ gallons of whiskey were stolen. As usual, I feel obliged to write the unfortunate victim a letter, to wit: My Dear Sir: I see by the papers that your cellar has been robbed. It merely goes to show how dangerous it is to keep one’s valuables at home when all the banks rent safety deposit boxes. Trusting you will profit by the lesson, I remain, Yours for conservation, The Village Gossip.”
The long association of Thanksgiving and sports had certainly been established by 1919, even without a television to gather around. Miami University easily defeated the University of Cincinnati in their 20th match-up. With the win, Miami led the series 11 to 9 (after this year’s game, Miami still leads the series 59-58-7).
While some may trace Turkey Day races to the mid-Twentieth Century, the YMCA sponsored what they called a “Baby Marathon” of six miles from Fort Thomas to downtown Cincinnati – a bit short, but roughly equivalent to a 10-K race. Winner was Carl Liebtag of Madisonville, a UC sophomore.
The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra under a new conductor, Eugene Ysaye, spent Thanksgiving at Carnegie Hall, performing a concert to excellent reviews. Henry T. Fink of the Evening Post was delighted:
“I expected a great deal from Mr. Ysaye, but I was taken off my feet by the splendid vitality he put into the Franck symphony. I didn’t know there was so much red blood in it as played by the well-balanced Cincinnati Orchestra under Ysaye leadership.”
The Cincinnati Post editorialized that Americans should unite in their thanks for Americanism. Positioning a decidedly jingoistic outlook against the threat of Bolshevism, the Post [27 November 1919] thundered:
“We – each of us – have many good and sufficient reasons for being thankful this Thanksgiving Day. And not the least of these is that we are Americans. The Americanism, planted on the virgin soil of a new land, an unbroken wilderness of savages and waste, shaped and guarded by the lifeblood of men noble and brave, is ours by inheritance and ours by acceptance.”
The Enquirer [27 November 1919] picked up the same theme in decidedly more obtuse language:
“We are being tried in the fires of an incipient revolution; we have been led into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil of lawlessness; we have problems to solve which stagger our wisest and noblest leaders.”
Throughout the city, children celebrated Thanksgiving in ways that have long (and in some cases happily) been forgotten.
The Sisters of Charity observed entertainments for Catholic school children featuring fancy dancing, Swedish dancing, “drilling” and songs.
At the Boys Opportunity Farm, the residents had a gunless rabbit hunt, chasing cottontails over the institutional lawn.
The Cincinnati Orphan Asylum inmates presented a program that included songs, recitations, and a dramatic reading of the President’s annual proclamation.
The Young Ladies Sodality at St. Xavier High School offered a doll palace, a sale of dolls and a turkey supper.
At Holy Cross Hall on Mount Adams, the holiday was marked by a euchre tournament.
At 1745 Denham Street in Fairmount, a most unusual occurrence marked Thanksgiving in 1919. While Henry and Lena Garling celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary, three of their children were married at the family home. Daughter Frieda was married to George Stortz Jr., son Edward married Annah Johnson and Henry Garling Jr. married Hilda Heutle.
Seven couples marched into the Hamilton County Courthouse, which was open for business as usual on Thanksgiving Day, to take out marriage licenses. One couple in particular seemed, at first glance, to be unusual: Pearl Belyea Watson married Mildred F. Krapp. It turns out that Pearl was, in fact, a man, a lieutenant in the U.S. Army in fact.
The 2020 Grammy Awards are scheduled for this Sunday at 8 p.m. on CBS.
So proud of our Cincinnati Pops and Symphony! Grammy Nominated!!
On a theme of freedom, concert of premieres and Dvorak's "New World" Symphony was filmed for future broadcast on CET
This was a great event. I feel very honored to have been a part of it, and to have had the opportunity to work with Maya Angelou's poetry up close. Regina Taylor was amazing at capturing the spirit of the words. I hope more people get to hear the work.
Clarence G. Newsome: 'Our nation’s story is one that is not easy to tell but must be told.'
Excited to have a work premiered by the Cincinnati Symphony this coming weekend, which features the words of Maya Angelou, and celebrates the anniversaries of the signing of the 13th Amendment and the Voting Rights Act.
Scandalously Bare, Maud Allan Caused Cincinnati To Shiver In 1910
Was Cincinnati, in 1910, ready for Maud Allan?
She had shocked Chicago with her "Salome" dance, influenced by the notorious play by Oscar Wilde that had been banned in Britain for decades, and was now on her way to the Queen City. The Cincinnati Post on 5 February 1910 exulted in anticipation:
"Maud Allan, the beautiful English classic dancer, who bears the distinction of being the most exquisite and charming of all exponents of the Greek art, will be seen here in Music Hall next Friday evening in connection with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Leopold Stokovski. Pure in her art, wonderfully beautiful in person and enchantingly graceful, her appearance here will be one of the most widely anticipated events of our season."
You will note the insistence that the performance would be "pure." The reporter acknowledged that Maud Allan wore scandalously brief costumes, but almost begged his Cincinnati readers not to make a fuss about it.
This was a trying time for Cincinnati as upstart cities like Chicago and St. Louis had the nerve to grow larger and a hard-earned but fragile reputation as an arts destination was under constant threat of destruction by the uptight nouveau riche of what was still a major manufacturing hub.
Cincinnati had lobbied hard to get a symphony conductor like Leopold Stokowski (as it was later spelled), and Cincinnati was nervous about losing him. And lose him Cincinnati did, in 1912, when he jumped to Philadelphia for a long, long engagement as conductor of their symphony and star of the Walt Disney magnum opus "Fantasia."
Although the Post described her as English, Maud Allan was born in 1873 as Beulah Maude Durrant in Canada and brought up in San Francisco. She changed her name to distance herself from a brother who was hanged for murdering two women. Originally a Berlin-trained pianist, she shifted her artistic expressions to dance after her brother's execution in 1898.
Despite little or no formal training in dance, Maud took Europe by storm, with success after success across the ancient capitals of art. She was often compared to Isadora Duncan, which enraged her. The Cincinnati Enquirer enthused:
"She has been the rage in London for two full seasons, and previous to that was equally successful in Vienna, where she made her debut, in Berlin, Paris, St. Petersburg, Munich and other important art centers. All of the art critics agree that nothing more bewitching or entrancingly beautiful has been seen than her dances. Her art is pure and delicate. Her pictures may have been figures come down and brought to life from some Greek vase. She is of the highest and purest type, exquisite in her movements and representing the truest poetry of motion."
Note, again, that emphasis on purity. The cultural critics of the Queen City worked overtime to insist that there was a difference between obscene nakedness and pure nudity and hoped their audiences would just behave themselves and stop slobbering over the risqué postcards of Miss Allan that flooded the city in advance of her appearance.
The Cincinnati Post published a front-page editorial cartoon showing Music Hall stagehands installing steam heat and a coal stove on stage to keep the beautiful danseuse warm while gyrating about in her abbreviated costumes. The cartoon suggested that most seats should be equipped with shock absorbers or (even in the front rows) binoculars.
In any event, Cincinnati would be spared "Salome." The Cincinnati Symphony presented Maud in three pieces: Mendelssohn's "Spring Song," Grieg's "Peer Gynt Suite," and Rubinstein's "Valse Caprice."
Tickets, as they say, sold like hotcakes. The newspapers reported people buying up to 20 seats at a time. Music Hall was packed.
Maud appeared On 11 February 1910. Leopold knocked it out of the park. Cincinnati was titillated but unscandalized, and Maud kept most of her clothes on. The Post reviewer sounded almost disappointed:
"Those who attended the performance in the 'fear' that something unusual might occur were disappointed - Miss Allan's program included the best works in her repertoire, and was given with such attention to stage detail, lighting and correctness of garb as to demand hearty commendation."
Maud Allan published an autobiography, My Life and Dancing, in 1908. She toured England that year, logging 250 performances. In 1910 she began a tour the United States (including Cincinnati), Australia, Africa, and Asia. In 1915 she starred as 'Demntra' in the silent film, "The Rug Maker's Daughter."
As noted, Leopold decamped for the City of Brotherly Love. Maud spent much of the 1920s embroiled in a retrospectively unnecessary scandal about her sexual orientation. She was a lesbian and suffered for it. As Wikipedia notes:
"From the 1920s on Allan taught dance and she lived with her secretary and lover, Verna Aldrich."
Maud Allan died in Los Angeles in 1956. She was cremated and her ashes scattered.
