Cora's Journey

by robspace54

Downton Abbey, and its characters, people, and situations are owned by Carnival Films and Masterpiece Theater. The following story is for purely entertainment purposes.

Chapter 1 – June 1887 - Cincinnati

"What do you mean you let her go downtown?" Isidore Levinson whirled onto this wife and shouted as he could tell his wife was ignoring him since she continued reading. "I'm speaking to you! Martha, answer me!" In frustration, he half threw his Ibold cigar at the ashtray and missed, scattering sparks and ash across the mahogany table. "I'd just as soon she stay here in Clifton where she belongs!"

His wife Martha lowered her book. "Oh Izzie, she's with cousin Tillie. She's perfectly fine. The girls are having an outing." She went back to reading. "And pick up that cigar! How many tables have you ruined in the house?"

He tossed down his copy of the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette in a huff and jumped to his feet, all five foot two inches of him and marched to his wife's side.

She sat in the bay window overlooking the rear garden, filled with geraniums and roses, her overstuffed chair turned to face the glass.

Isidore glared at his younger and shapely wife and glared. "Martha! Tell me where she's gone! And you know we can buy as many new tables as we need!" His voice dropped. "But we only have one daughter."

Martha sighed and put her book down. She considered how she should approach this answer. Should she tell the truth or embellish the facts a little? "They're out in the surrey. Janine is with them of course," she added, naming their daughter's chaperone and nurse. "They're in good hands."

"Why must you deflect every question I ask? Just answer me woman!"

Martha stood up, her two-inch heels putting her five foot-seven frame seven inches higher than her husband's head. She bent her neck and kissed the crown of his head. "Oh Izzie, let the girl explore a little. She's almost nineteen." She took his hand. "And nearly her birthday! And she so wanted to see a game." She walked to a floral arrangement and started toying with it.

"A game? My God, Martha! The streets downtown are filled with people, carts, and horses! I had to go to City Hall the other day and the streets were packed going to League Park. You know they play ball at this time of day!"

Martha Levinson looked over the top of the flowers reproachfully. "Now how would I know what time the baseball games are? I don't go to them, dear. You do."

Her husband harrumphed a bit. "Well there's drinking on every street corner. Two young girls on their own? Half the riverboat men congregate there!"

She cut him off. "Janine Bauer is no shrinking violet and Jim does drive carefully. I trust those two to keep the girls out of harm." She primly sat back on her chair, ankles neatly together, with back and head erect and facing him as she knew that facing him in this way she could stare him down.

This time her soft words would not slow his anger. "The whole area along Findlay and Western Avenues is crawling with toughs and drunks and there's a saloon at every other doorway! And the smoking, the crush of people, the beer swigging brutes! That's where the Irish and The Germans tend to mix it up, don't you know? And when the riverboat crowd come up there…"

"And you don't smoke or drink beer, Izzy?" Saying this Martha knew he'd fly off the handle once more, but now his ire would be more directed at her, and not their daughter.

True to form, Isidore rose to her expectations with bluster, his own form of logic, and a far reaching address on how the entire fabric of society, especially in Hamilton County, Ohio was falling to wrack and ruin.

Martha let her husband rattle on for a while, then returned to her book, a rather thick volume bound in red leather. When she thought it safe to interrupt, after some of his vitriol had faded, she spoke. "Dear. It's fine. She'll be quite all right. Let her have some fun."

"Fun? Down in that crush of people? She should be home studying the piano! Why did I buy the damn thing if she'll not play it?" He turned to look at the grand piano in the library and walked to it. He raised the cover and stroked the ivory keys.

"How I wanted to be able to play this instrument! As a boy, I'd stand outside saloons and gaze in to see the piano player and to hear the music. But I could never afford the time or the money! Now here I am, able to buy a hundred pianos, and still don't know how to play!" he slammed down the cover. He had vacillated for weeks over with one to buy. Should it be the Krell, the Starr, or the Church, or have a Steinway shipped from New York? Finally after striking a deal to have a special piano made for the girl by Steinway, it was installed in the music room, after a lengthy delivery process.

Martha pursed her lips and frowned. "Dear, don't curse. It sounds…"

"Every day? Common?" he laughed. "If you could hear all of us when the Merchant's Club gathers, then you'd hear real swearing! That Gamble, he can throw off words like that like a sailor, and Harper and Goode aren't any slouches either! And Dr. Meyer, now he's a real curser! Well, Martha Braun Levinson, I am every day. Common. Grew up on the street! The streets of Philadelphia were a tough school!"

Martha sighed as she had heard this story at least a million times. "I know dear. How you delivered papers and hauled coal…" she waved her hand. "Don't go on. I know it all by heart."

"When my parents and sisters all died of the cholera do you think I had any chance?" He beat his chest, clothed in a fine suit with a gold watch fob stretched across his substantial stomach. "Do you? None! Not a one!"

Isidore felt his face start to flush and heat as he rose to the occasion. "They said I'd never amount to anything at that orphanage! Well, I showed them! I own the second largest chain of dry-goods stores in the city, second only to Mabley and Carew, and I'm raking in profits!" He stopped as he saw his wife hold up her hand, a well-practiced move on her part.

"Isidore, dear," Martha stood and glided over to him took his hand gently. "Yes. I know. Why don't you have a tonic water and go lie down in the gazebo? The breeze is very nice this afternoon. You should go rest before dinner." She said this soothingly and she saw him relax. "Have cook fix you some with ice."

Isidore felt the tension glide from his body as he listened to Martha. Yes, she was right. No need to be so disturbed. "You may be right." He ran his hands along the piano, knowing that for all of his fixation with music, there was not a musical bone in his body. Neither song nor notes ever came from his mouth or fingers.

His father, now long dead, used to drag him to Temple and praise the cantor. "Now, Isidore," he'd whisper to him, "Doesn't Myron Gelbfliesch sound wonderful?"

The nine year old Isidore would roll his eyes. "No. Hurts my ears."

A comment like that would often get his ears boxed and did that time too. He'd not been inside a temple in decades, although he did contribute to Rabbi Wise's Temple downtown.

Martha gazed at Isidore, an extremely self-made man, who looked unremarkable, until you got to know the keen mind behind the plain exterior. She did love him, although had learned to carefully temper his attacks with a mixture of sweet politeness and all-out battle.

She recalled their many years of tears on her part and tirades on his, until they had reached a balance. Oh the balance shifted from time to time, but over the last ten years she had held sway. Isidore had a heart of gold, in spite of his tough life, and the many things he bestowed on her and their daughter was breath taking. Plus he did contribute handsomely to many charities from his generous heart.

"Of course, dear." He picked up and his paper and went into the kitchen where she heard him speak very politely to the cook, Mrs. Potter.

Martha watched as her beloved husband left the room and smiled at his retreating back. She drummed fingers on the chair cushion until he disappeared and only then did she let out a sigh. If Izzy knew what she was planning his tirade would go on until midnight.

She turned back to her book 'Burkes Peerage & Baronetage' the cover said in gilt letters. She looked at the bookmarked page and continued to read; nodding ever so slightly at the fount of information it held.

"Yes," she murmured. "Yes. This could work. It could work very well indeed. I'll show them!"

Notes:

Most of the names mentioned in this chapter are icons of Cincinnati history in business and the community.

Cincinnati Commercial Gazette – Published from 1883 to 1896, one of the many newspapers available in the city both in English and German.

Ibold Cigar Company – Founded in Cincinnati (1884) by Michael Ibold

Clifton – A community that overlooks both the Ohio River valley and downtown Cincinnati.

Cincinnati, Ohio – Founded 1788 by John Cleves Symmes and Colonel Robert Patterson; originally named Losantiville by John Filson. The city was built on the flat ground at the northernmost extent of the Ohio River, being bordered by the hills overlooking the river. The city is purported to have 'seven hills' just like Rome, Italy. In 1790 the name was changed to Cincinnati by Arthur St. Clair first Governor of the Northwest Territories to honor the Society of the Cincinnati. The society was formed in 1783, by a group of General Washington's officers; named for Cincinnatus.

Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus - A Roman citizen soldier who saved Rome. He left his farm, raised an army and saved Rome from an invasion by the Aequi and the Volscians. Upon his victory he immediately, in spite of the calls of the people and Senate to be Caesar, resigned his generalship and returned to plowing his fields. This heroic action, both on and off the field of battle showed Cincinnatus as a great patriot who did not seek personal gain from saving the city.

William Proctor and James Gamble – Co-founder of a company named Proctor & Gamble which was founded in 1837. Since Cincinnati was a transportation center of canals, the Ohio River and railroads, it became a slaughtering center for livestock. Therefore there was plenty of tallow available for making soap and candles.

Dwight Baldwin – Founded a string of piano stores in 1857 and later started building his own pianos. Krell, Starr, and Church were all contemporary piano makers in the 1880s.

Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise – One of the founders of Reformed Judaism in North America in Cincinnati.

Mabley and Carew – A large 'department' store for clothing, shoes, etc. founded in 1877. One of the first commercial companies to incorporate many stores into one and to use full-page ads in the newspapers.

Baseball – Cincinnati is home of the oldest professional baseball team, The Cincinnati Reds (originally named Cincinnati Red Stockings) who started playing for pay in 1869.

Findlay and Western Avenues – A street intersection where a baseball field – the League Park stood. The baseball park changed names several times, becoming Crosley Field. The Reds played on that site from 1882 to 1970.

Findlay Market – A city market started in 1852 which exists to this day.

Riverboats – Before railroads, the lifeblood of the Midwest was the steam powered riverboat, either stern-wheeler or side-wheeler. Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) was a riverboat pilot on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers for a time.