Ocean to Ocean on Horseback: Being the Story of a Tour in the Saddle from the Atlantic to the Pacific; with Especial Reference to the Early History and Development of Cities and Towns Along the Route; and Regions Traversed Beyond the Mississippi; Together with Incidents, Anecdotes and Adventures of the JourneyGlazier, Willard W.
History
Ocean to Ocean on Horseback: Being the Story of a Tour in the Saddle from the Atlantic to the Pacific; with Especial Reference to the Early History and Development of Cities and Towns Along the Route; and Regions Traversed Beyond the Mississippi; Together with Incidents, Anecdotes and Adventures of the Journey
Glazier, Willard W.
United States -- Description and travel
[Illustration: ON THE SHORE OF LAKE ERIE.]
Superior street, which forms its southern boundary, is lined with retail
stores, and its fine buildings and neat pavements hardly suggest the
indifferent houses and plank road of forty years ago. Ontario is another
busy thoroughfare running north and south, and bisecting the square.
Where it begins, at Lakeside Park, it is lined with private residences,
but beyond the square it develops into a genuine work-a-day business
street. In 1813 there was a small stockade on the lake shore just below
it, for Cleveland was a depot for supplies, and was waiting to give a
warm reception to the English. Most of the public buildings are on or
near the square--the Post Office, Custom House, City Hall, and several
of the churches. Not far away is the library of the Young Men's Literary
Association, which has had a singularly favored career. Established in
1845 upon a very unpretentious basis in the Case Building, it was soon
given a perpetual lease by the owner, and later received a large sum of
money for its extension and support from a son of Mr. Case. The Public
Library is located in the old High School Building on Euclid avenue
and has 26,000 volumes in circulation. The Board of Trade is another of
the city's time-honored institutions, having been founded in 1848. It is
now in the Atwater Building on Superior street.
Euclid avenue, which from its rustic popularity in pioneer days, came to
bear the proud distinction of being one of the handsomest streets in the
world, stretches off eastward from the square, for four and a half
miles, until it reaches Wade Park, a beautiful spot, still shaded by the
groves and forests which have been left from the wilderness. It was a
gift from Mr. Wade, one of Cleveland's millionaires.
From this point the avenue continues for a mile and a half until it
finds its terminus in Lake View Cemetery, a magnificent stretch of
woodland overlooking the lake from a height of two hundred and fifty
feet.
The avenue is in its entire length a feast of beauty. The homes that
line it on either side are fine specimens of architecture, and the
gardens surrounding them show a lavish devotion to the sweet goddess
Flora. Thousands of people who are unable to leave town during the
summer find a grateful change of scene here, and it so impressed Bayard
Taylor that he bestowed upon it the splendid praise of calling it the
most beautiful street in the world. Nor is its charm purchased at the
expense of squalid surroundings, for the streets of Cleveland are well
kept and almost all of its homes have their little gardens around them,
while the tenement house is "conspicuous by its absence." In fact the
people have chosen rather to sacrifice a trifle more to time and expense
and less to space. They have expanded and have built longer street-car
lines in proportion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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