Lost Communities of Chicago - The Village of Pennock.

The little village of Pennock was founded in 1881. It was located at Diversey Street and Ballou (St. Louis Ave.), Fullerton, and Crawford (Pulaski Rd.) avenues. The village of Pennock was in Jefferson Township, a former civil township in Cook County, that existed as a separate municipality from 1850 until 1889 when it was annexed into the city of Chicago. Its borders were Devon Avenue on the north, Harlem Avenue on the west, Western Avenue to the east, and North Avenue to the south.

The village of Pennock was founded by Homer Pennock, a mining entrepreneur, and con man. He was going to make money, and if things didn’t work out the way they ought to, Pennock was not above cheating his way to a profit.

Perhaps the first scam Pennock pulled was in 1871 when he lied about having discovered an incredible amount of tin in a region of Canada not known for its tin. Pennock was ultimately jailed, but once he got out, he continued to pull more scams.

Pennock must have been persuasive and charismatic because he continually found financial supporters for his mining adventures. In the 1880s, Pennock, who, at that time owned a gold mine in Colorado, took over a chunk of Northwest Side farmland, from Diversey Street to Ballou Avenue (now St. Louis) and Fullerton and Crawford (now Pulaski) avenues, with the goal of building an industrial town there “that would cause the world to marvel,” according to a 1903 Chicago Tribune article below.

Pennock wasted no time getting to work. He brought carload after carload of bricks to the area and enlisted a lot of workmen to help him realize his dream. He dubbed Wrightwood Avenue “Pennock Boulevard.”

Osgood Manufacturing Company, a refrigerator and furniture maker, moved into one of Pennock’s plants, bringing about 500 workers to the area. Realizing the workers needed places to live, builders then constructed brick homes and shops to accommodate them.

That boom was short-lived.

Pennock’s main factory was destroyed in a fire and one of his mines flooded, which left him unable to finance construction. Those two setbacks combined marked the beginning of the end for Pennock and his “City of Dreams.”

With the factory gone, there was no reason for the existence of the village out on the prairie, and those who had cast their lots with Pennock flocked back to Chicago. Essentially, Pennock’s plan failed and the village crumbled. 

Pennock’s failure came at a time when farms across Chicago were transforming into clusters of factories and homes.

Wrightwood Avenue (Pennock Boulevard), Looking West, Chicago, Circa 1900.
The Village of Pennock was annexed by the City of Chicago in 1889.

The village of Pennock was annexed by the City of Chicago in 1889. Today's west side of Logan Square had many life cycles and was relabeled over time with distinctly different local identities—Avondale, Pennock, Polish Village, the Land of Koz (after Kosciuszko Park), and finally Logan Square, one of the official 77 communities of Chicago.

Few Houses from the Village of Pennock Still Stand.

In the ensuing years, most of the buildings in Pennock had reached a stage of decay which made them untenable to the most miserable squatter,” according to the Tribune, “A Deserted Village in Chicago,” reprinted below.

After his Chicago failure, Pennock went on to found Homer, Alaska in 1896. As the story goes, he “lured others to the Homer area with promises of gold, although the area was known for coal mining.

"A DESERTED VILLAGE IN CHICAGO"

Chicago Sunday Tribune, June 14, 1903

Standing like tombstones over a village that now exists only in name, there are within Chicago's borders a dozen or more picturesque ruins which represent all that is left of what once promised to be a great manufacturing center.

And hanging about the crumbling bricks and rotting timber is an almost forgotten chapter in the city's history—a story of a boom that collapsed almost before it gains an impetus and left its promoter with little more than the valuable farmland to show for the money he had invested.

How many Chicagoans, as they are whisked by the station of Pennock on the St. Paul railway, have viewed the great ruins and wondered what they meant? And how many, to this day, can tell? Few of the oldest residents of the neighborhood are able to explain, and then in the vaguest way.

"There was a soap factory there once—a long, long time ago," one will say.

"No, it was a big warehouse—and it burned." another will impart.

But in all the neighborhood, which in most part has been peopled since the big plant and the once substantial brick houses which are adjacent to it were given over to the elements, not one person could be found who could recall the spectacular operations of Homer Pennock, who, in his dreams, saw on the prairie of the northwest side a manufacturing community that would cause the world to marvel.

WILLING TO TAKE CHANCES

It was twenty-two years ago that Pennock, then owner of a rich gold mine in Colorado, came to Chicago, intending to multiply his fortune and startle the financial world. He had the daring of a D'Artagnan [meaning; one who is exceptionally skilled in the use of sexual persuasion.] and was willing to risk his all in a single throw.

The mine was paying—how long it would continue to pay he did not know, but he planned to push his operations forward so rapidly that he would be prepared for any crash that might come.

Out at Fullerton and Fortieth avenues, Pennock found a stretch of level farm land that suited his needs. It was within easy access to the St. Paul railway and could be bought for a song, for in those days Chicago did not extend to the far northwest.

Pennock secured options on several thousand acres of land and almost before the farmers knew of his plans car-load after car-load of bricks was being dumped beside that track where the little frame railway station of Pennock now stands. Scores of workmen followed the building material and a foundation 600x650 feet had been erected.

"We'll have a car wheel factory there—the largest in the world," Pennock announced, as he stood by and proudly watched the workmen pilling brick upon brick. The foundation was completed and then came a halt. Perhaps word came from the west which delayed operations—but that is for Pennock himself to tell.

But the interested farmers had not long to wait, for Pennock again he was serenely confident that his City of Dreams would be carried to a glorious completion, put a force of men at work building what he called "the east wing" of his plant. "Thereat will come in time; it's sure to come—it must come," he mused.

When the "east wing" had been completed Pennock set about looking for a tenant, as for some reason or other his car wheel factory had not materialized. People were skeptical and hesitated in moving so far out of the city, but Pennock was not to be denied.

BEGINNING OF THE BOOM

Soon the Osgood manufacturing company, makers of refrigerators, and certain articles of furniture moved into the plant, and then came the first breath of the short-lived boom. The factory employed many hands—as many as 500, some authorities say—and these men had to be housed and fed.

Small stores began to spring up around the neighborhood and the real estate men made a rush to be first on the field. Like other booms, things were overdone. Brick houses that cost $3,000 were erected—and these to accommodate the men of modest wages who were working in the plant Pennock had built!

But all this time Pennock would smile and say: "Better times are coming." and there was magic in his words.

It so happened that Pennock, whatever else he may have been, was no prophet. Better times did not come, either for Pennock or those who had staked their fortunes with his. The plant—already large—was not increased to cover the big foundation and one day all except the somber walls that are now standing went up in smoke. Pennock's dream was over and the awakening had come.

Then, according to men who were close to Pennock in his venture, the mine out west became unproductive and Pennock's cup of despair was filled to overflowing.

Just what caused the factory fire is not known, but if human handset it the torch might just as well have been applied to the other buildings that had been erected in the boomtown. With the factory gone, there was no reason for the existence of the village out on the prairie, and those who had cast their lots with Pennock flocked back to town.

NEGLECTED HOUSES TUMBLE

Thus it came to pass that time and the elements, destroyers of the staunchest structures, laid hold of the buildings that the fire had spared. The brick houses began to crumble, and as Chicago began to spread toward Pennock's abandoned village the boys made pilgrimages to the ruins and aided in the destruction. First window panes and then window casings were broken from their fastenings till soon the elements had the once-proud houses at their mercy.

With the expansion of Chicago, a few of the brick residences were rescued and patched up, and are now tenanted by families who can afford no better shelter, but many of the $3,000 structures have reached a stage of decay which makes them untenable to the most miserable squatter.

Perhaps no resident of Chicago has a clearer recollection of Pennock and his operations than J. F. Keeney, who held stock in Pennock's mine and bought heavily of farmland in the vicinity of the Dream City.

"It's so long ago that even I have to search my memory," he said in speaking of the village that has gone to ruin. "Pennock came to Chicago fresh from the west, where he had made money in mining, and conceived the idea of building the factory and town out there on the prairie. He was enthusiastic and secured options on farmlands on every side of his plant-to-be. I had owned some stock in his mine—the 'Small Hopes,' I think he called it—and had made money, so I followed him in his new venture, putting some money into the factory and also buying farmland in the vicinity of the factory.

"As I remember it, the first trouble came when something went wrong with the mine. It filled with water or something of the sort, and Pennock was without the means to carry his operations to completion. He was resourceful, though, and it is hard to say what he might have succeeded in doing had it not been for the fire. As for myself, I held on to the land I had bought and several years after disposed of most of it at a good profit.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

The History of Chicago's Public Bath Houses.

Johnson's Bathing and Shaving Saloon.

The subscriber takes pleasure in informing his old customers, and the public generally, that he has removed his establishment opposite his old stand, on Clark Street, between Lake and Randolph, where he has fitted up in a superior manner for the reception of all who may favor him with a call. While in anticipation of the Cholera making its appearance in Chicago this spring and summer, it is well known to all that Bathing in considered a great perventive of this dreadful disease, therefore, I repeat that one perventive is better than a hundred cures.

Friday Evening of every week, from 9 o'clock till 11, will be set apart for the express accommodation of Ladies, at which time the public shop will be closed.

Bathing, Shaving, Hair Cutting, and SAhampooing, all done at the shortest notice.

Single Tickets 30¢ ─ Four Tickets $1.

The subecriber returnsa his greatful thanks to the public for their liberal patronage, and hopes iot will be continued.

WM. JOHNSON

Chicago Tribune, April 23, 1849: In the first Tribune.

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By the late 1800s, personal cleanliness had become a cultural norm for Americans, necessary for social acceptance, symbolic of good character, and essential for protecting public health from infectious diseases. 

Without bathing facilities in their homes, the urban poor and working class could not conform to this cleanliness standard. During the Progressive era, reformers urged city governments to build public baths for the poor. Chicago's government responded by building 21 small, utilitarian public bathhouses in poor and immigrant neighborhoods between 1894 and 1918.

A women's reform organization in Chicago, the Municipal Order League (later renamed the Free Bath and Sanitary League), led the campaign for public baths. Three women physicians, Gertrude Gail Wellington, Sarah Hackett Stevenson, and Julia R. Lowe, headed the crusade. Beginning in 1892, Wellington led the effort, utilizing the network of women reformers in Chicago centering in the settlement houses, especially Jane Addams's Hull House, the Chicago Woman's Club and the Fortnightly Club. These women gained support for the cause of public baths from the press and the city government under Mayor Hempstead Washburne and city council finance committee chairman Martin Madden. Chicago's first public bath, located at 192 Mather Street, near Hull House on the Near West Side, opened in 1894. It was named after the assassination of mayor Carter H. Harrison and cost $20,649. After that, Chicago public baths were generally named after prominent local citizens.

Small Public Bath, William Mavor Bath, Chicago, 1900.

Although some American cities built elaborate, monumental, and expensive public baths, Chicago conformed to the bath reformers' ideal that public bathhouses should be modest, unpretentious, strictly functional, accessible, and located in poor and immigrant neighborhoods readily accessible to bathers. Chicago's bathhouses generally contained between 20 and 40 showers, attached dressing rooms, and a waiting room. There were no separate sections for men and women; two days a week were reserved for women, girls, and small children with their mothers. Bath patrons did not control water or temperature, which were regulated by an attendant who turned on the shower for 7 to 8 of the 20 minutes allowed for a bath.

                     Pilsen Public Bath                                        Ogden Public Bath

Despite this functional emphasis, bath patrons utilized public baths more to cool off in the summer than to bathe in the winter. Additionally, utilization of public baths began to decline even as the city opened new baths. Peak attendance was reached in 1910 when a total of 1,070,565 baths were taken in the 15 bathhouses in operation; by 1918, when 21 bathhouses were open, utilization had declined to 709,452 baths. The opening of bathing beaches and swimming pools in the early 1900s and housing reform laws that required private toilets in apartments (many landlords added bathtubs as well) contributed to the decline in public bath usage.

Negro Owned Bathhouses and Baths.

Middle-aged civic activist Lewis Isbel's (1818-1905) journey from obscurity to celebrity mirrored the possibilities for Negroes of the frontier age. When he first arrived, he worked in primitive conditions on Clark Street between Lake and Randolph. Soon he struck out on his own and established a shop in Frink and Walker’s Stage office at Lake and Dearborn, opposite the popular accommodations offered at the Tremont House.

Early in the 1840s, he moved again to an alley location north of the Sherman House Hotel. With a growing clientele with constant tonsorial needs (a word that describes the work of those who give shaves and haircuts), Isbel secured space within the Sherman House itself, offering what he described as the town’s first combination barbershop and bathhouse. Lewis Isbel owned and operated two of the three bathhouses in the city by 1842, one with a section for women.

At an Emancipation Day celebration, Barber Lewis Isbel fell victim to a white pickpocket. After catching the perpetrator, Isbel suffered insult after injury when his testimony against the white man was disallowed in court by the provisions of the black laws that forbade Negro testimony against whites.

Settlement houses, for example, often provided limited bathing facilities for the neighborhoods they served. This was true of Hull House and the University of Chicago Settlement House. Chicago built simple bathhouses with shower baths and little else. Chicago opened its first year-round bath in 1894. By 1920, Chicago had built 21 bathhouses in poor and working-class districts.

After World War II, Chicago began to close down its public bathhouses. By the 1970s, only one bathhouse remained open to serve Skid Row (SRO; single-room occupancy) residents, which also closed in 1979.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

The Village of Godfrey, Illinois

The Village of Godfrey lies on the east side of the Mississippi River between the confluences of the Illinois and Missouri rivers. When waterways were the only highways, the junctions of the three rivers formed important intersections. The location drew Indians, Europeans, and—during Illinois’ territorial period—three groups of frontier settlers: “First, the white man born in a slave state…; second, the negro, generally a slave; and third, the Yankee, from over the Mountains.”

Benjamin Godfrey House

Reverend Jacob Lurton and his wife, the former Sarah Tuley, left their longtime home in Louisville, Kentucky, in the spring of 1817. Accompanied by an extended family and six slaves, the Lurtons were Godfrey’s first recorded settlers. Like many of their frontier counterparts, the Lurtons held slaves, engaged in whiskey making, and shared an antagonism toward Yankees. When Yankees took issue with the Southerners’ ways, the Lurtons and their neighbors moved on.

New Englanders led the second wave of Godfrey settlers. Nathan and Latty Scarritt were temperate, hardworking, devout Methodist farmers who recruited like-minded neighbors. Five years after the Scarritts settled in Godfrey, an influx of eastern businessmen developed nearby Alton’s riverfront. The Yankee businessmen considered Godfrey to be Alton’s chief source of natural resources and agricultural goods. By 1833, Alton and Godfrey were joined economically, but local settlers were deeply divided by social issues—especially slavery.

The small settlement of the Rocky Fork area in Godfrey may be the oldest and largest Underground Railroad site in Illinois. Rocky Fork was a refuge for runaway slaves. Courageous Negroes risked their lives to escape slavery, then continued to reach back to help others gain freedom. Indians provided protection and shelter to runaways until the close of the War of 1812. White “Friends to Humanity,” acting in response to their antislavery beliefs, also assisted slaves. In 1828, with the protection and assistance of Don Alonzo Spaulding and his family, Rocky Fork became a large-scale Underground Railroad station. Operated by both blacks and whites, the station drew fugitive slaves from Southern Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee. The history of Rocky Fork presents a compelling, multi-racial effort that spanned decades.

Benjamin Godfrey, the man for whom Godfrey is named, has long been a subject of local speculation. Was he a hardened pirate with ties to the infamous Jean Lafitte? Or was he a pious and humble businessman with a passion for reform? The former New England sea captain came to the area in 1832 with $50,000. He quickly expanded his fortune as a partner in the successful freight-forwarding firm of Godfrey, Gilman & Company. He built the first church in Alton, a mansion in Godfrey, and the first women’s college west of the Allegheny Mountains. Yet, when asked about his past, Godfrey only said: “It would make a novel.” Benjamin Godfrey’s reticence concealed his past involvement in the domestic slave trade. By 1835, he and his partner were among the most successful businessmen in Illinois. In alliance with others, Godfrey embarked on a phenomenal array of economic development and philanthropic reform projects. By 1838, Godfrey had an interest in land, stock companies, lead mines, smelting equipment, steamships, and the proposed Alton-Shelbyville Railroad. Lower Alton was the scene of a commercial empire that was projected to rival St. Louis.

Several tragic events occurred in rapid succession in 1837. First, Elijah Lovejoy, a young minister and newspaper editor from New England, was killed by a proslavery mob while guarding his printing press in Godfrey, Gilman & Company’s Alton warehouse. Lovejoy’s martyrdom and the farcical trials that followed his death destroyed Alton’s reputation in the East. Next, a national economic downturn reached panic proportions. Godfrey and Gilman’s vertical monopoly on the Galena lead market collapsed, triggering the failure of other Alton businesses. Construction stopped, and land values dropped. Hard times set in. When a subsequent bank investigation of Godfrey and his partner in management abuses, the two men resigned their positions and prepared to dissolve their commercial empire.

Monticello Female Seminary opened in 1838 at the height of Benjamin Godfrey’s financial woes. Nevertheless, Godfrey spared no expense in building a palatial three-story stone building. Godfrey placed Reverend Theron Baldwin, a member of the Yale Band, in charge of academics. Baldwin modeled Monticello’s rigorous curriculum after that of his alma mater and hired three Eastern women to teach. Philena Fobes, a twenty-seven-year-old “blue stocking” with a love of learning and high academic standards, quickly rose to a leadership position at the college. Seminary students included the privileged daughters of the wealthiest, most powerful men in the state, as well as slaveholders’ daughters, Cherokee Indian girls, and orphaned girls on scholarship.

Monticello Female Seminary, Godfrey, Illinois

Benjamin Godfrey suffered a staggering series of personal and financial losses in the aftermath of the Panic of 1837. Turning his attention to his farm, family, the Seminary he founded, and the village he platted, Godfrey used the period to regroup and polish his remaining assets. He sought to insulate the college and the community from the reputation for violence that descended on the area after Lovejoy’s murder. 

During the following decade, the Village of Monticello, a conservative New England community in both appearance and values, revolved around the Seminary, its two Protestant churches, and Benjamin Godfrey and his family.

In 1850, with the help of Abraham Lincoln and other members of the Illinois State Legislature, Benjamin Godfrey began construction on the long-awaited Alton-Sangamon Railroad. Godfrey encountered engineering difficulties, bad weather, labor problems, and cost overruns from the outset. In desperation, the founder sought additional funds from a New York financier, mortgaging everything he owned. When the double ribbon of track was completed in 1852, the road was renamed the Chicago and Mississippi Railroad. At the same time, Godfrey was replaced as superintendent of the road and embroiled in a series of lawsuits that dragged on for years. His efforts, however, brought renewed hope and prosperity to the region. Farmers cultivated more land, and land prices rose; coalmines, sawmills, flour mills, factories, and distilleries operated at capacity. New industries opened, and jobs were plentiful. At the height of its academic and cultural achievement, Monticello Seminary was dubbed “the ornament of the West.”

The Mexican War, the California Gold Rush, the railroad, and the telegraph brought the rest of the nation closer. Change spawned new antagonisms and conflicts.

The death of Elijah Lovejoy in 1837 gave rise to the abolition movement. Antislavery men and women were appalled as growing numbers of free blacks and runaways were jailed and kidnapped. Eastern missionaries drew a line east from Alton across the State of Illinois. The area south of the line was considered proslavery and outside the boundaries of the missionaries’ cause. Godfrey was just north of the line. St. Louis slaveholders formed a secret organization and stepped up their efforts to return runaways and expose those who assisted runaways. Secret Copperhead societies formed. Local black leaders emerged to combat the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. Sympathetic whites, including Dr. Benjamin Franklin Long of Godfrey, founded the Illinois Mutual Fire Insurance Company. This legitimate business provided a highly organized, well-disguised cover for an Underground Railroad system that spanned central and northern Illinois. Dr. Long’s farm became the first stop on Rocky Fork’s Underground Railroad. Rocky Fork’s population doubled between 1850 and 1860. When Lincoln and Douglas debated at Alton in 1858, the United States was on the path to war.

Abraham Lincoln carried Monticello Precinct in the 1860 presidential election but did not carry Madison or surrounding counties. When the southern states seceded from the Union, many residents of Southern Illinois sympathized with the Confederacy. In Godfrey, however, a large, enthusiastic crowd immediately gathered to express their loyalty to the Union. Amidst rumors of traitors, county secessions, and invasion, Godfrey residents formed the secret “Monticello Prudential Committee.” Sons of Godfrey’s original settlers served with the Mississippi Ram Fleet, fought in the battles of Ft. Henry and Ft. Donelson in Kentucky, and at the bloody battle of Shiloh in Tennessee. Sgt. Carlos Colby, a Godfrey resident and a nephew of Dr. Benjamin F. Long, was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for heroism during the Siege of Vicksburg.

It was time for a fresh start when the soldiers came home victorious and honored the dead. There was a feeling of hope, gaiety, and change in the air. A new generation was in charge. Reminiscences of the pioneering generation became history. New leaders emerged. Reverend Erasmus Green, a black Civil War veteran, presided over the newly built Rocky Fork A.M.E. Church. At Monticello Seminary, women laid aside their hoop skirts and performed in gymnastic exhibitions. Philena Fobes retired. “What is unfinished in one administration,” she said, “may be completed in another.”

Godfrey’s original settlers made astounding progress despite differing styles, values and beliefs. Within a generation, they cleared land, built homes, cultivated farms, and successfully established churches, schools, and businesses.

In 1991, the Village of Godfrey was incorporated. Local monuments, historic landmarks, churches, and traditions commemorate Godfrey’s pioneering generation.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

Herbert Televox, the Mechanical Man, Chicago, Illinois

Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Co's first robot was Herbert Televox, built in 1927 by Roy Wensley at their East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania plant. The robot was based on the patents of Wensley, filed in 1923, 1927 and 1929. The first man weighed 600 pounds, but the one above only weighs 40 pounds. The Televox could accept a telephone call by lifting the telephone receiver. It could then control a few simple processes by operating some switches, depending on the signals that were received. Televox could utter a few primordial buzzes and grunts and could wave his arms a bit. Although speechless when first created, Televox later learned to say two simple sentences.

From the January, 1928, issue of Popular Science Monthly journal:

Look first at that mechanical creature answering the telephone. He is the invention of R. J. Wensley, an engineer of the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company, and goes by the name of Televox. It you could dissect him you would find his inner workings much like those of your radio receiver, and little more complicated. Yet if you should establish him at home in your absence—which the inventor says is not at all impracticable—he would serve you as a trustworthy and obedient caretaker.

The mechanism consists primarily of a series of electrical relays, each sensitive to a sound of a certain pitch, and capable of translating that sound into specified mechanical action, such as opening and cloning the switches of electrical appliances. Each relay is actuated through a tuned electrical circuit responsive to vibration of a given frequency and no other, somewhat as the circuits of your radio can be tuned to a broadcasting station of a given wave length.

The mechanical man is not connected electrically to the telephone, but listens much as you would. His ear is a sensitive microphone placed close to the receiver. His voice is a loudspeaker close to the transmitter. And the language he speaks is a series of mechanically operated signal buzzes.

Experimentally, he has been made to understand and respond to words uttered by human voices, but for practical operation the language which spurs him to action has been simplified to three different sounds of different pitches. These sounds are made either by three tuned pitch pipes or, as in the New York demonstration, by three electrically operated tuning forks.

For illustration, imagine you are at the house a friend and are calling your home equipped with a Televox. In the ordinary way you telephone your home. Why, your phone rings. Televox lifts the receiver and utters a combination of buzzes which tell you that you have the right number.

Now you sound a single high note from the first pipe, which means, "Hello, get set for action." Televox stops buzzing and responds with a series of clicks, saying "All set: what do you want?".

Next you sound two short notes from the same pipe. These tell Televox to connect you with the switch on the electric oven. The reply is two short buzzes saying, "You are now connected," followed by a long buzz-z-z-z, which informs you that "the switch is open."

At this, you sound a deeper note on the second pitch pipe, meaning "Close the switch and start the oven." Immediately Televox ceases the long buzz, closes the switch, then replies with a short, snappy buzz informing you that the switch has been closed and the oven is going.

Next you may wish to inquire about the furnace, and with the first pitch pipe you sound three shrill notes. This means "Connect me with the furnace and tell me how hot it is." The reply is three short buzzes, telling you that the connection has been made, followed by a pause, then two more buzzes which say, "The furnace is pretty low."

So you blow four blasts from the same pitch pipe, meaning "Connect me with the switch operating the drafts." Televox replies with four buzzes, signifying that the connection has been made; then one short buzz informing you that the drafts are closed. With one blast from the second pitch pipe you order the drafts opened. Televox instantly opens them, then gives the long buzz to say that the job is done.

If nothing further requires attention, you blow the third pitch pipe, the lowest in tone of the three, which says "Good bye." Televox hangs up the receiver, and stands ready for the next call.

Each of these astonishing actions, as already explained, is accomplished by a different sound-sensitive relay. When the bell rings, the noise causes the first relay to lift the telephone hook and start the signal buzzer. The high note of the first pipe serves to connect any desired one of a number of relays, each of which has been arranged to control a certain operation. Thus, when the note is sounded twice, it moves a switch that connects relay number two, controlling the electric oven. When sounded three times, it connects relay number three, and so on, according to the number of operations for which the apparatus is designed. Each time a relay is connected, Televox gives a corresponding number of buzzes, indicating that the connection has been made. Moreover, it sounds an additional long or short buzz indicating whether the switch to be operated by the relay is open or closed.

The lower note of the second pitch pipe is the operating note; that is, it causes the connected relay to open or close the switch as may be required; also to report the fact by changing its long buzz to a short one, or vice versa. The deep note of the third pitch pipe simply causes Televox to quit work and ring off.

To demonstrate that Televox will respond to spoken words as well as musical notes, the inventor has set up in the Westinghouse laboratories at East Pittsburgh, Pa., a mechanism which will open a door to the call of "Open sesame!". The sounds of the voice, however, are too highly complicated for use in general practice. Still, a person with a good ear for music can get response from Televox by whistling or singing in the exact notes to which the relays of the machine are tuned.

Three of the machines already are in actual use in Washington, D. C., replacing watchmen at reservoirs. By their buzzes they tell the distant caller the height of water as shown by the gage in the reservoir, and also control the flow of water at his bidding…

The Herbert Televox robot became a national sensation, and was followed by a parade of increasingly advanced machines.

Compiled by Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

The East St. Louis, Illinois Race Riots of 1917.

The city of East St. Louis, Illinois was the scene of one of the bloodiest race riots in the 20th century.  Racial tensions began to increase in February of 1917 when 470 African American workers were hired to replace white workers who had gone on strike against the Aluminum Ore Company.

A mob beats a Negro man in front of a streetcar, while the militia charged with restoring order stands by and does nothing.

The violence started on May 28th, 1917, shortly after a city council meeting was called. Angry white workers lodged formal complaints against black migrations to the Mayor of East St. Louis.  After the meeting had ended, news of an attempted robbery of a white man by an armed black man began to circulate through the city.  As a result of this news, white mobs formed and rampaged through downtown, beating all African Americans who were found.

The mobs also stopped trolleys and streetcars, pulling black passengers out and beating them on the streets and sidewalks.  Illinois Governor Frank O. Lowden eventually called in the National Guard to quell the violence, and the mobs slowly dispersed.  The May 28th disturbances were only a prelude to the violence that erupted on July 2, 1917.

Negroes Fleeing their homes as local whites look on. East St. Louis, July 2, 1917.

After the May 28th riots, little was done to prevent any further problems.  No precautions were taken to ensure white job security or to grant union recognition.  This further increased the already-high level of hostilities towards African Americans.  No reforms were made in the police force which did little to quell the violence in May.  Governor Lowden ordered the National Guard out of the city on June 10th, leaving residents of East St. Louis in an uneasy state of high racial tension.

On July 2, 1917, the violence resumed.  Men, women, and children were beaten and shot to death.  Around six o'clock that evening, white mobs began to set fire to the homes of black residents.  Residents had to choose between burning alive in their homes, or run out of the burning houses, only to be met by gunfire.  In other parts of the city, white mobs began to lynch African Americans against the backdrop of burning buildings.  As darkness came and the National Guard returned, the violence began to wane but did not come to a complete stop.

Six blocks of Walnut Street reduced to rubble from fires started during racially motivated riots in East St. Louis, IL.

In response to the rioting, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) sent W.E.B. DuBois and Martha Gruening to investigate the incident.  They compiled a report entitled “Massacre at East St. Louis,” which was published in the NAACP’s magazine, The Crisis.  The NAACP also staged a silent protest march in New York City in response to the violence.  Thousands of well-dressed African Americans marched down Fifth Avenue, showing their concern about the events in East St. Louis.

Police and others look for bodies after the riot in East St. Louis. Local investigations were inept, making an accurate death count improbable. The bodies of some black victims were buried in a common grave. Others were thrown into Cahokia Creek, which ran between downtown and the riverfront railyards.

The Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) also responded to the violence.  On July 8th, 1917, the UNIA’s president, Marcus Garvey said: “This is a crime against the laws of humanity; it is a crime against the laws of the nation, it is a crime against Nature and a crime against the God of all mankind.”  He also believed that the entire riot was part of a larger conspiracy against African Americans who migrated north in search of a better life: “The whole thing, my friends, is a bloody farce, and that the police and soldiers did nothing to stem the murder thirst of the mob is a conspiracy on the part of the civil authorities to condone the acts of the white mob against Negroes.”

A year after the riot, a Special Committee formed by the United States House of Representatives launched an investigation into police actions during the East St. Louis Riot. Investigators found that the National Guard and also the East St. Louis police force had not acted adequately during the riots, revealing that the police often fled from the scenes of murder and arson.  Some even fled from stationhouses and refused to answer calls for help. The investigation resulted in the indictment of several members of the East St. Louis police force.

VIDEO

East St. Louis Race Riots.
(PBS - KETC TV, St. Louis, Missouri)
Runtime [8:04]

Compiled by Neil Gale, Ph.D.