My father was a lawyer who came to the bar of Ohio in the ’forties. He was United States Attorney under President Harrison, was a State Senator, and twice declined appointments to the Bench because the salary attached to these positions was not enough to support his large family. I was the fourth in a family of eleven, eight girls and three boys. One boy and two girls died before I can remember.

Our house was one of a block of grey brick houses in Pike Street, at the east end of Cincinnati, which, at that time, was the fashionable residence section of the city. Pike Street runs down to the river on a rather steep incline and, as it was paved with cobblestones, my early memories are somewhat marred by an impression of the frequent clatter and clang of heavy wagons pulling their way up the hill from the river landing.

While our house was not particularly distinguished, being much like those on either side of it, across the street from us there were two very striking and imposing residences which lent distinction to the neighbourhood, and in which, as I grew up, were formed the pleasantest associations of my life. The one directly opposite was a large, square, red brick house which had an air of great dignity. It was the home of Mr. Larz Anderson. There were ten boys in the Anderson family and, though they were all much older than I and most of them had gone away before I grew up, I remember that it was a very lively household always. In my later girlhood we were specially linked to this family by the marriage of one of the boys, Charles, to my sister Jennie.