by Paul R. Spitzzeri
It is striking to see the results of a poll taken to gauge the feelings of Americans, as we approach the nation’s 250th birthday, regarding the country’s founding principles. Meanwhile, the Homestead continues its look back to earlier anniversary commemorations and celebrations dating to 1876 and 1926 with this third part of a post looking at the former year.
When the centennial date of 4 July 1876 arrived, the Los Angeles Star, the city’s oldest newspaper, dating back a quarter-century to May 1851 (and continuously published for most of that time, excepting the years 1864-1868), published a feature called “The Centennial Year,” in which it was noted that there were two historic Philadelphia structures to be featured in the commemoration.
These were Carpenters’ Hall, where the Continental Congress first convened on 5 September 1774, and, of course, Independence Hall, where that body began meeting in May 1775 and where the Declaration of Independence was signed not quite 14 months later. The paper pointed out to readers that “the Centennial ceremonies, appropriate to the occasion, will take place at Independence Hall to-day and will mark one of the grandest events of the celebration.”
As for local festivities, the Star, whose publisher, Benjamin C. Truman, was in Philadelphia, remarked that “the procession, with which the Fourth of July, 1876, will be celebrated in this city will be composed of four divisions, and will be formed at 9:30 this morning.” The weather was pleasant, ranging from 68 degrees at 7 a.m. to a high of 85 by mid-afternoon, whereas Washington, D.C. was broiling for much of the month, with temperatures well over 100 degrees reported on some days.
The parade began at Fort Street (renamed Broadway in 1890) with divisions placed at the intersections of Second, Third, Fourth and Fifth streets for the procession to begin at 10. The route was from Fort and Fifth east to Spring Street, north to that thoroughfare’s northern terminus where it met Temple and Main streets in front of the Temple Block (now the site of City Hall), then south on Main to Commercial Street, then east to Los Angeles Street, then north to Aliso and east to the Aliso Mills (ravaged in a fire two years prior and rebuilt).
From that point, a countermarch followed a review by Grand Marshal Henry M. Mitchell, then the under-sheriff of Los Angeles County and later sheriff, with the procession heading back west on Aliso to Los Angeles and “across Los Angeles and through Arcadia,” this being about where U.S. 101 runs today, to Main. A right, or northerly, turn was made to the Plaza, which was circled by the participants, who then headed south on Main to Second Street and “the Round House Gardens, at which place the literary exercises will be held.”
The marshals of the quartet of divisions included John F. Godfrey, Otto Von Ploenies, Eugene Meyer and Francisco Guirado, whose selection may have been representative of the diversity of the Angel City’s population, as Meyer was a Jew, Guirado from an early Californio family, Von Ploenies a German and Godfrey an American. Notably, however, the Los Angeles Rifleros, a Latino militia marched with Godfrey’s first division, while the Junta Patriotica de Juarez, a political club and the Spanish-American Benevolent Society, participated in the second division led by Von Ploenies.
Also in the first division were the National Guard, Mexican-American War veterans, members of the French community, a carriage featuring a Goddess of Liberty and vehicles containing Mitchell, the day’s orator, poet and chaplain and invited guests. The second division also included the two volunteer fire fighting organizations, the 38s and the Confidence companies. Division Three comprised a marching band, a vehicle representing the 13 colonies of the Revolution, the fraternal societies of the Knights of Pythias, Odd Fellows, and the Red Men, and the Irish literary and temperance organizations and the Ancient Order of Hibernians. Lastly, Guirado’s group included another band, the German-American society, the Turnverein Germania, the Butchers’ Association, a cavalry unit, groups of tradespeople, a vehicle representing the 38 states of the country and, on horseback, “Representatives of the Days of ’49,” or the Gold Rush.
The “literary exercises” at the Round House was to begin with the performance of “Hail Columbia” by one of the bands, after which was to be an invocation by a Protestant pastor. President of the day, Phineas Banning, the “Port Admiral” of Wilmington was to open with remarks before a united group of choirs sang “America” and another band performance. Los Angeles schoolteacher, Thomas A. Saxon, was charged with reading the Declaration of Independence after which was a second choral offering. Journalist James J. Ayers of the Los Angeles Express was to recite a poem after which “Yankee Doodle” was the last musical piece. The keynote of the day was to be from attorney James G. Eastman and a closing benediction was to be delivered by Rabbi Abram W. Edelman of the Congregation B’nai B’rith.
There were several other references to the holiday in the Star‘s 4th of July edition, including that “an inviting Centennial lunch” would be given by the women of the Fort Street Methodist Episcopal Church. This included home-made ice cream, so the paper advised “let the hungry drop in and have their wants supplied with all the delicacies of the season.”
Meanwhile, the ladies of the Presbyterian Church held a dinner at the former quarters of the Union Club, located in a building constructed by F.P.F. Temple as part of his Temple Block (soon to be lost in the aftermath of the Temple and Workman bank failure of earlier that year). For 50 cents, meals were served from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and “ice cream and strawberries may be obtained at all hours of the day.” Lastly, “an entertainment for the young folks” was to be presented and it would have been interesting to know what was on the program. The Los Angeles Guards, a citizen militia, also presented a ball that evening, which, the Star suggested, “must not be forgotten” because the organization “will provide good music, and spare no pains to make the evening pass pleasantly.”
The paper informed readers that, while Independence Day was a general holiday, but it published an issue for the day, the employees, “since they may not be able to keep the next Centennial [in 1976],” were given the 5th off and there was to be no paper that day. As to how the Angel City appeared for the holiday, the Star remarked,
Our city presents, this Centennial morning, a grand and gala aspect, reflecting the utmost credit on the patriotism of our citizens. Everywhere houses and stores are decorated with a lavish hand and in exquisite taste. Evergreens, flowers and lively and contrasting colors will greet and please the eye of the monster procession at every turn as it moves along the line of its prescribed march.
An editorial simply titled “To-Day” takes the reader into rhetorical flights of fancy as it mused upon the meaning of the Centennial Independence Day, as it remarked upon “the fire of the poet and the zeal of the orator” providing “ten thousand glowing pictures of the splendid results which stand as the record of the growth and progress of the American Union,” even as these must “fall short of the splendid reality.”
The piece remarked that there were certainly some “dreaming of some impossible Utopia, some visionary Atlantic” who would claim that, if they’d been given the power “of shaping the destinies of this country, they would have achieved results” that would have been far superior to what had been done in the century since the Declaration was signed.
When it came to what was accomplished by the founders, it was declared that,
They builded [sic] better than they knew, those mighty men who a hundred years ago declared that the thirteen colonies were, and ought of right to be, free and independent States, and to the consummation of their intrepid and splendid declaration, pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honors. The shadow of an unknown fate hung darkly over them and clouds and darkness compassed them around, but through the gathering storm they saw with the eye of courageous faith the future crowned with sunlight and garlanded with flowers of immortal birth.
The Revolutionary War was a crucible through which our founders and their contemporaries passed and for whom our memories were filled with admiration of how “their mighty works should be accomplished” in the face of enormous adversity. Yet, the editorial continued, “count every failure” and “marshal every adverse element,” as well as any “dereliction of duty” and “shameful violation of trust,” but none of these was such that “the light of the sun of freedom . . . is dimmed to-day.”
Rather, it was posited,
The steps of the Genius of Freedom have kept pace with the marvelous march of the hosts who have hewed pathways from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the Lakes to the Gulf. The song of the Pilgrim Fathers has roused the echoes of lake and river, field and flood, and mountain valley and plain. The starry banner [American flag] flaunts everywhere in triumph, the symbol of the unquestioned right of man to become the arbiter of his own fortunes, the earnest of a day when the crown shall become a legend and the tiara the dim memory of a page that even the antiquarian shall come to turn.
Whether or not those in 1776 could foresee the celebrations of a century later, it was wondered “may we not safely prophesy for those who in the years to come, shall . . . assemble together to commemorate the natal day of Liberty[?]” It was anticipated that the freedoms fought for and won in America would be sought the world over and result in “victorious termination,” so that, “the American flag shall kiss the same breeze which stirs the folds of the banners of nations yet unborn, who shall catch their inspiration from the spirit which animates our native-land today.”
If there were any persons in the United States who were not in accord with celebrating the triumph of American democracy, this was “not because the genius of our institutions has failed to keep the promise” of those who established the Declaration and the government of the Union. Given this, then, the piece concluded with the admonition:
Rejoicing in our destiny and consecrating ourselves anew to the task of preserving our liberties intact, let us keep this day as a feast, and recognize the hand of Providence in the priceless boon which is our heritage and our hope.
Speaking of freedom, the Los Angeles Express of the 5th informed its readers that, on the evening of the 3rd, “some of the prisoners confined in the jail,” this a two-story edifice of adobe, on the first floor in the city lockup, and stone at the second level in the county’s calaboose, behind an adobe building on the west side of Spring Street between Temple and 1st streets, once used as the courthouse and then including a police station, “made a desperate attempt for liberty by boring through the wall,” but were thwarted by the jailer, “and they enjoyed their Centennial in the peace and quietude of their usual retirement.”
Another piece of verse penned for the holiday and submitted to the Star was by Albert T. Hawley, a former journalist who ran a real estate business in town and who written a poem for the 4th of July celebration in the Angel City two years prior, as well as other selections since, including one about Mission San Gabriel. Hawley also wrote a promotional pamphlet of southern California published in July by the Chamber of Commerce and printed by the Mirror Printing, Ruling and Binding House, later the Times-Mirror Press.
Hawley was also with the Star and seems to have held down the fort (presses?) while Truman was at Philadelphia for the Centennial expo and, after leaving Los Angeles within a couple of years, resumed journalistic work when he moved to San Francisco. He later resided in Oregon as well as Washington Territory and died in Portland in 1895. His poem began with an observation of what Napoleon may have pondered when he sought glory in Egypt but confronted the reality of faded empire and then posited a greater edifice than the pyramids, with the lines,
Its base, the Constitution and the Law
Its living stones, the free and sovereign States,
Its shining apex Freedom’s saintly form,
Triumphant lift its venerated height,
And speaks with soundless voice, but understood
Of every living race upon the earth,
Of those who died to gain our liberties;
And those who died that they might be preserved;
Died for their right to live like men, unchained,
By priestly dogma, or by monarch’s will.
Hawley’s piece also asserted that “Freedom is the Priest” in the democratic temple, while also lionizing those who died in battle during the Revolutionary War, as well as marked “the fearsome times that tried men’s souls” in the century since.
He then rose to a rousing conclusion:
And through the vanished years are hands stretched out
We fain would clasp, but find them only air
And faces, splendid with the light that shines
On the men who battle for the truth and right,
Look down, and the greetings from their ghostly lips
Fall like a benediction on the land,
And give us solemn charge to keep the faith
They gave their lives to teach, inviolate,
And leave it as a priceless heritage
Unto our children and to men unborn
And, as they vanish from the viewless air,
A strain of deathless harmony descends,
The prelude to a grander, loftier strain,
The faint, far music of the coming years,
When one, vast swelling symphony shall rise,
From all the teeming nations of the globe,
And our fair land shall lead the choral strain,
Whose burden shall be, Peace upon the earth!
Peace and good will to all who dwell therein!
With this, we’ll return next with more about the Angel City’s Independence Day celebration, as well as more from the Philadelphia centennial exposition, so check back with us for that.
When I noticed that there were only 38 stars on the American flags during the 1876 Centennial celebration, I paused to think the nation then still had 12 to go before all 50 stars would appear on the flag.
After looking into the history, however, I realized that prior to American Centennial not only had the nation been reunited after the Civil War, but America’s territorial expansion was also nearly complete. The United States had already become a vast, full-sized nation stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
Most of the remaining stars were added to represent new states that were later carved out of existing U.S. territories as their populations grew. In other words, the map of the United States that we see today on its 250th anniversary is remarkably similar to the one our ancestors saw at the time of the Centennial.