Pittsburgh Post-Gazette from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania • Page 6

Some Outstanding Women of Pittsburgh's 200 Years Pittsburgh POST-GAZETTE PAGE 8- DEC. 31, 1958 A 4, lKbl, she had changed her name for her first theatrical job, She had been married three times before becoming Mrs, Alexander P. Moore, and had played in top musical shows in New York and London before her retirement in 1912. Each year the Post Gazette Frieda Pittsburgh's Women of the Yrar nnd oils something about each cf them. This year, the city's "00th birthday, we have selected ten outstanding women of the past, each of whom has been a native, or has had a profound influence on Pittsburgh.

Negley donated the "choicest site which the beautiful valley afforded "for the East liberty Presbyterian Church. This was a portion of Mrs. Negley's ancestral inheritance which adjoined her husband's estate. The gift was given jointly by Mr. and Mrs.

Negley. Hy IS 17 the congregation had grown large enough that the need for additional properly became apparent. Again Mis. Negley, now a widow, donated a portion of her land to build a second structure. Another of Mrs.

Negley's gifts to the church was a bell. It was purchased In 1M12 when Sirs. Negley lay on her deathbed at the age of 89. As it was being tested, her windows were opened In the hope that she might hear its lories. The hell's first peals tolled Mrs.

Negley'g requiem on May 10, 1SG7. -1 mi i i 1 I ft A I College and scrvpd her internship theie. After returning to Pitts-luiigh in as a general pi act inner, Dr. Di anga helped to ruganie Ihe Milk and be J'und. As medical director for the fund she spent vears watching thousands of needy infants heing helped.

Amelia Diang-i was the pci sun to deliver a public lectiue in Pittsburgh on the leaching ot sex hygiene to i luldien. For manv before her death in Kill, Dr. Dranga maintained a small priva'e hospital similar to those found in many eastern cities. To her many r.ieees and nephews and to the many rhildien she met and eared for this prominent woman physician was affectionately known as "Auntie Doctor." Her greatest joy in life, however, was being able to surmount the onstacle of her se in the mission of medicine. Mary Schenley WM OUK a century ago William Croghan, lavished his wealth and affection on his young daughter, Mary, after th death of his wife and young son.

Yeais later Mary lavished her inherited wealth and affection on Pittsbuigh. a city she alwavs considered "home," all hough she lived heie but a few years. A In ut K'iO Mr. I'mghnn began building the great mansion "Picnic'' on what is now Stanton Heights. Here he expected his little daughter to reign as hostess when slie grew older.

While Mary, a teenager, was attending Mrs. MeLrod's said, "I would rather see you dead." Traveling through many countries on the continent, Mary visited the galleries and studied the works of the old masters. In 1877 a mutual friend Introduced her to Edgar Degas who invited her to join the rebel Impressionists. Accepting with delight Mary said, "At last I could work In complete freedom." She hated conventional art. Although she was never a pupil of Degas, she won his complete admiration.

He said of her, "I will never admit that a woman can draw like that." At the age of 43 Mary Cassatt gave her first independent exhibition in Paris in 1S9.1 She was the only woman among 10 Americans who exhibited at the 1934 Chicago World's Fair. One hundred and one of her pieces were shown In a me-morlal exhibition In 1928 In Carnegie Institute. She was famous as a painter of motherhood and children. Her creations of these stress dignity and wholesomeness rather than sentimentality and bpauty. Her pastel, "Mother and Child." hangs in the Louvre.

"After all," she said, "woman's vocation in life is to bear children." She died in 1926 at the age of 81. Mary Rinehart MARY ROBERTS Rine- I "I hart knew fame as few have known it. This Pittsburgh-born writer' who became one of the most successful women authors in American history produced more than (SO books, including such best sellers as "The Circular Staircase." "The Man in Lower 10," "The "Breaking Point" and "The Swimming Pool." Her humorous stories of the adventures of Letitia Car-berry (Tish Carherry), which began appearing in the Saturday Evening Post in 1910, as well as her novels, made her the household favorite of two generations. A few years before her death last September 22, her sons published the choicest of these stories under the title, "The Best of Tish." Born In old Allegheny on August 12, 187fi, Mrs. Rine-hart dreamed of being a doctor.

Balked In this desire, she studied nursing at the Homeopathic Hospital. Contrary to all rulps and regulations she and the chief of staff, Dr. Stanley Marshall Rinehart. fell in love and were married after her graduation. She and Dr.

Rinehart had Mary Cassatt THAT MARY CASSATT is America's greatest woman artist is common knowledge. Rut what may not be known is that Mary Cassatt was a native of Pittsburgh. She was born in 181.) in Rebecca Street, in Old Allegheny. Her father, Robert Simpson Cassatt, served a term as mayor of the city of Allegheny. At the age of four Mary went with her family to I IP 'r MARY CASSATT France but returned five years later and settled in Philadelphia.

She studied art at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. This was her only formal training. In lRfiS with her mother, Mary Cassatt returned to Europe to pursue her art study, although her father 1 iii tiiriiiiiiiwMjiML ll herself." The book wa printed in Horn in Somerset County, N. In 1770, Massy White, daughter of a Revolutionary War soldier, "heard the roar of rannon and din of war" at the battles of Long Island, Trenton, and Monmouth. After "the establishment of peace," she moved to Western Pennsylvania, on the Monongahela River, "to a place railed Redstone Fort, where Brownsville now stands." There, against the wishes of her father she married John Harbison, in 17S0, and two years later went to live "on the hanks of the Allegheny," settling at the headwaters of Chartiers Creek, where from 17X9 to 1791 all went well.

"Then the Indian wars broke out and blasted all our hopes." Massy blames the English for stirring up the Indians against the settlers. Her husband enlisted for six months' service as an Indian spy under General Arthur St. Clair and she was "left with three helpless children." On the night of May 21, two spies took shelter in her home. Next morning 1hey left, and Massy fell asleep. She relates: "The first thing I knew was the Indians pulling me out of bed by my feet," Indians were everywhere, with a gun in one hand, a tomahawk In the other.

They ripped fealher-bods open, stole or destroyed all household belongings. Because one little boy cried, an Indian "took him by the feet and dashed his brains out." Then he scalped and stabbed him. The second boy was killed nnd scalped after he fell from a horse when the Indians proceeded on horseback to the river bank. There they took canoes "opposite the island between Kiskimenelas and Ruffaloe." Guarded, but permitted to keep her baby, Massy "repeatedly dreamed of escape and safe arrival in Pittsburgh." She got her chance to break away as her sole Indian watcher slept. She took from "a pillowcase of plunder" a short gown, a handkerchief, a child's frock, "and so made my escape." Her account of her trek back to Fort Pitt is an amazingly simple one.

She proceeded on foot, toward the Allegheny River. On the sixth day she heard the sound of a cowbell, and "followed the sound until I came to the fort at the Six-Mile Island." Lillian Russell GRACIOl'S, gorgeous, magnificent were the adjectives used to describe Lillian Russell. Star of operettas and musical shows, she was famous for her pretty face, her hourglass figure, and was the real glamour girl of Ihe early 1900 s. In 1912 she married Alexander Pollock Moore, owner and publisher of the Pittsburgh Leader, and came to live in this city. Although she was then 51.

she was blond and beautiful, and still retained her majestic carriage. An ideal hostess, she 4 1. 1 f. 2 MRS. JACOB EG LEY Mrs.

Jacob Negley CHt R( SERYICES and ball games have no analogy. This belief which Mrs. Jacob Negley heid in the days immediately following the Revolutionary War became the cornerstone for the building of the East Liberty Presbyterian Church. At that time the East Liberty valley was an agrarian community called "Negley-town." Most of the land was owned by Jacob Negley, the son of ihe first permanent settler in the valley, and his wife, Barbara Anna Winebid-die Negley. The nearest church was five miles away.

Threats of Indian massacre and impassable' winter roads made travel virtually impossible. Ministers were scarce, too. Rut these factors were no obstacle to the relentless, devout spirit of Mrs. Negley. Like her mother-in-law, Mrs.

Alexander Negley, she opened her home for church services. A portable pulpit was kept in reserve for these occasions. These religious gatherings drew many neighbors together who didn't see each other often. After the service the genllemen and boys would dash out in the yard of the "Negley Mansion" for a ball game. This did not please Mrs.

Negley. And so in April 1819 Mrs. in- -rfrrr 'i r- i i in i MOTHER FRANCIS WARDE ters of Metcy Order in Ireland in First to be invested in the habit of the new congregation, she received the name of Sister M. Francis Xavier. After founding four convents in her homeland, Mother Fianeis answered a call from liisliop Michael O'Couner who needed sisters for his Pittsburgh Diocese.

Willi six other nuns, she sailed from Liverpool, England, on November in, IS Docking in New York a month later, they finished their journey by railroad and stage coach. On December 22, they opened 1he first Convent of Mercy in this country at what is now 800 Penn Avenue. Mother Francis Warde opened Mount Mercy Academy in IStt, St. Xavier's Academy in 1 in, assumed charge of St, Paul's Orphanage in 1 Ifi, and opened Mercy Hospital in IS 17. Originally able to handle just f0 patients at a time, Mercy sheltered victims of the city's ma jor typhus and cholera epidemics and Civil War casualties as well.

Mother Warde's work here had national as well as local significance. From the Mother House In Pittsburgh, her order has spread throughout the whole of North America and to Puerto Rico, British Honduras and Rritish Guiana and has established1 a total of 119 hospitals, 71 schools of nursing, numerous schools and orphanages. Queen Alliqulppa THERE WAS an Important pre-Rirentennial woman in this area, ton. Not too long before Pittsburgh became Pittsburgh by word of General Forbes, Queen Alliquippa was ruling over a village of Seneca Indians on the north side of the Allegheny River just on Ihe site which became ihe first ward of the City of Allegheny. Here Conrad Weiser and William Franklin ison of Ben Franklin I stopped on their way from Kiskiminetas to Logstown, and Weiser wrote later, "an old woman reigns there with great authority." The men "dined" with Queen Alliquippa and she gave them wampum and a dish of fish to carry along when they departed.

The Queen had one great virtue. She was ever faithful to the Rritish. Possibly she was influenced by a visit she made In earlier days, with her husband and son, 1o meet William Penn in Delaware. Alliquippa seems to have moved ahout the district. At one time she was at Shanno-pin Town on the Allegheny, lly she was liv ing' at the mouth of the Youghiogheny River, nnd is considered the first resident of what is now McKeesport.

On New Year's Eve, George Washington recorded "as we intended to take horse here it required some time to find them. I went up ahout three miles to the mouth of the Youghiogheny to visit Queen Alliquippa who had expressed great concern as we passed her in going to the fort. I made her a present of a match coat and a bottle of rum which latter she thought much the best present of the two." Queen Alliquippa was an anomaly among Indian rulers, being one of the very few women who became the leader of a band. When the French drove the English from the Forks of the Ohio the Queen joined Washington's camp at Fort Necessity. "Just a wrinkled old squaw" was her description at that time.

When the Fort surrendered she was sent to where she stayed until her death. Massy Harbison ONE OF THE most poignant, most dramatic stories of Indian raids near Fort Pitt is told in a slim volume at the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania. Its title is: "Narrative of the sufferings of Massy Harbison from Indian Par-barify, giving an account of her captivity, the murder of her two children, and her escape with an infant at her breast Communicated by i ii 1 1 GIMBELS MELLON SQUARE NORTH HILLS MARY ROBERTS RINEHART three sons, Stanley, Alan and" Frederick, and the future author had no other Idea than to be a good wife and mother. But economic necessity in the form of a loss of $12,000 in the 1903 stock market crash, sent Mrs. Rinehart searching for some means of augmenting the family fortunes.

Her first myslory, "The Circular Staircase," published in 190K, was an instant success. Later it was made into a Broadway hit, called "The Rat," and grossed several million dollars. Mrs. Rinehart excelled as a reporter as well as a novelist as indicated by her assignment in Europe to cover World War I in 1915 before the United States entered the conflict. She visited the Folgian, British and French troops, sending back stories of life in the front lines.

Then she interviewed King Albert and Queen Elizabeth of Relgium and climaxed it all with the first interview ever granted by Queen Mary of Kngland. "With her country's entrance in World War the author's husband went overseas as a major in the medical corps, and their two older sons enlisted. The author volunteered for Red Cross duty in France and was decorated by the Belgian government for her efforts. The? Rineharts moved to Washington, D. when Dr.

Rinehart was appointed a consultant in tuberculosis for the Veterans Administration. After Dr. Rinehart's death there in 1932, Mrs. Rinehart moved to New York to be near her sons who were engaged in the publishing business there. 2.50 2.50 a $2 Mere Alia WerfU HUH jam: swivsmki.m Jane Swissholm HISWKY rails iry Swisshelm a crusader because of her flaming against slavery, her drive for better food for wounded Civil War soldiers and hrr light or women's rights.

Rut history reveals all of this mighty m'tivity stemmed from hrr ability a a newspaperwoman who know how to write with power-ami venom. As Washington rnrrospniui-ent for Horace (ireeley's New York Tribune, she became one of the best know writers in metropolitan papers in an era when women were not ao. oepted in the business ami professional world. One item ahout hospital gangrene appeared in her column, and lemons poured Into Washington and every place where wounded Civil War soldiers were hospitalized. She was the first woman reporter admitted to the Senate press gallery.

She won this privilege nearly a generation before another noted Pennsylvania horn newspaper woman, Nellie Rly (Elizabeth Cochran I marie her famous trip around the world. Jane was born in Pittsburgh on December sixth, 1815, to Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Cannon. The family moved to Wilkinshurg for a time and then returned to live in Sixth Avenue, the present site of Gimbels store.

In lP.vl, the Women's Historical Society, lepresenied by Mrs. K. P. Harshbarger, the late Mayor William N'. MrNair and members of the Chamber of Commerce, honored her memory by placing a bronze tablet on the Sixth Avenue side of the store.

When Jane's father died in 1S23, she helped her mother make lare and paint on velvet to support the family. She taught school in Wilkinshurg In lS3fi and is credited with being the first to teach children without beating them. Jane began her newspaper career in 112 after her marriage to James Svvisshelm, son of a Revolutionary soldier. At fust her abolitionist and women's rights arlirles ere puhlishod anonv mously, some of 1hem appearing in the weekly called, The Spirit of Liberty, and in the daily Commercial Journal, owned and edited bv Robert M. Riddle.

While she was one of the editors of the Pittsburgh Saturday Yisiier Jane attacked Daniel Webster's stand on the Fugitive Slave Law. Her col-lumns are said to have helped defeat the great orator's ambitions for the Whig nomination for President in 1S52. Jane used her pen to assist Lucretia Mo't and Mary A. Grpw of Philadelphia to oh-tain passage of a law in tins ftate permitting married women to own property. Dr.

Amelia Dranga IN THE EARLY part of this I century mnt people "wouldn't have a woman doctor for a sick This was the pteailing opinion that pioneeis like Dr. Amelia A. Dranga had to overcome to be recocnicd as prominent physicians. Amelia Dranga spent her early life in the West. She attended California Stale Normal School at Los Angel's and taught in the California public schools before entering Harvard Annex, now hvl-diffe College, Cambridge, After she wax graduated from Women's Medical College In Philadelphia, she came to Pittsburgh, Although she was the first woman to take examinations for internship in West Penn Hospital, she did not occppt this position.

Instead she Joined the far-ulty cf Women's Mediral if COTY I COTY YO Pari eii III ion Mrt 11 In I MOISTURE BALANCER (o rteiS fiin i 4 MOISTURE ALANCER or city skin I COMr'iCi 'VITAMIN A-D' CO S( HENLEY fashionable school on Stalen Island, N. she met a dashing liritish officer, twice married 43-vearold Captain Edward W'" H. Schenley. Their elopement was an international incident with repercussions from Queen Victoria and the Pennsylvania State Senate. They went to Surinam, Dutch Guiana, where Cap-lain Schenley was serving is commissioner to suppress the slave trade.

I-ator they returned to England. Lonely Mr. Citighnn forgave his daughter and urged the Schenleys to come and live with him in Pittsburgh. He built an addition to patterning il after their English home. For a few' brief years they lived here, but in some years after Mr.

Croghan's death, they left, never to return. When Mrs. Schenley died in England in 1903 a joint session of Pittsburgh councils was called by May or William B. Hays an honor never before accorded a woman. A message sent to her surviving son named Mrs.

Schenley. "A queen among women, tender and true." Mrs. Schenley a granddaughter of General James Ollara, pioneer and Revolutionary hero, whose holdings in Allegheny County numbered in thousands of acres. She inherited a third of the O'Hara estate and all of her father's, and she gave generously to Pittsburgh. Rest known of her gifts to the city is the vast Schenley Park.

In 1 SHTj she gave Ihe P.lock House and adjoining properly to the Daughters of the American Revolution. She gave land for West Penn Hospital, for Riverview Paik on the Northsjde, and for various schools and churches she either sold land at nominal prices or gave it outright. Frances Warde OCR CITY'S first real hospital, two of Its oldest schools and orphanages, are the visible mementos of the eight years Frances Warde spent in Pittsburgh. Horn at Mountralh, County Queens. Ireland, in the early 1 woris, she was a member of the original society of wealthy young ladies, all rjaughlers of distinguished Irish families, who founded the Catholic Sis- Coty Beauty Creams how lovely you'll look when you use the cream made just for you LILLIAN Rl'SSELL gave fabulous parties in her home at Linden and Penn Avenues, attended by top theatrical folks, such as Nora Raves, Dp Wo If Hopper, Sophie Tucker and Fay Tern-pleton.

Mr. Moore confessed to friends that Queen Lll had married him because he had promised to help her care for her only daughter, Dorothy Russell Calvit, for whom Lillian had stage ambitions. The promise failed to materialize and Dot oU broke Moore's will leaving her a mere thousand dollars. Rumor had it that Lillian had spurned a million dollar marriage with Diamond Jim Brady, who had given her a diamond studded bicycle and paid S.iOO for a box at one of her performances. Many oldlimers remember Lillian for her charming appearance at benefits.

For a number of years she conducted a beauty column in the Pittsburgh Leader, Lillian Russell did not live to see her husband become ambassador to the court of King Alfonso of Spain, an appointment given him by President Harding. She died in bpr home in Pittsburgh on June fi. 1 Born Helen Louise Leonard, In Clinton. Iowa, December A. Reg.

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