My great, great Aunt, Josephine Park Cranston, was a prolific writer. She loved writing essays and descriptions of things she greatly admired. This is a short letter about Columbus, Ohio, written in the late 1870s. Her handwriting is beautiful. ~ CC

A Description of Columbus

Columbus is the capital of the state of Ohio. It is situated on the bank of the Scioto river at the mouth of Whetstone river in Franklin county near the center of the state. It is a handsome laid out town. The streets are broad. The National road passes through it and there is a splendid bridge over the Scioto. There are a number of public buildings. There is a public square laid out in the center of the city for the state house, United States court-house and public offices. There are three asylums, one for the lunatics, one for the deaf and dumb, and one for the blind. The lunatic asylum is very well finished inside. The Penitentiary is a very large stone building. It has at this time between four and five hundred convicts. The county court-house and jail is a large and beautiful building. Columbus is a place of considerable business. There are a number of stores and ware houses and some handsome dwellings. The population is six thousand. North of the city there is a beautiful garden where they cultivate all kinds of flowers, trees and shrubbery of every description.

Composition No. 1st
Josephine P. Cranston

A few notes: the population figure of six thousand places this fairly early — Columbus had roughly that number in the late 1820s to early 1830s, which fits a child’s or young student’s penmanship exercise from that era. The reference to the National Road passing through is consistent with that period as well.