1,026 volumes have been added since. The circulation for the past year was 21,198 volumes. Readers' cards have been issued to 1,703 persons. The officers of the library board for the current year (1906) are: Wm. F. Hoyt, President; Frances M. Ross, Vice President; Grace ReShore, Secretary and Librarian.

BECKWITH MEMORIAL THEATRE.

The Beckwith Memorial Theatre, dedicated by Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll in January, 1893, is constructed of Lake Superior red sandstone with backwalls of brick. The building is 85x115 feet in dimensions, and is three stories in height. The front has a genuinely monumental effect, the first story being a magnificent arcade of four great arches, with twenty feet to each span, and showing the depth of the walls. On each pier is the portrait of a noted woman in bold relief, such famous women as George Eliot, George Sands, Mary Anderson, Sarah Bernhardt, Rachael and Susan B. Anthony being represented. Above this space smoothly chiseled stone reduces the effect again, and the top story front consists of semi-circular headed arches which form another arcade. Upon the bay directly over the main entrance is a large medalion portrait of Philo D. Beckwith, beneath which a magnificently carved panel bears the name "Beckwith." In the other front bays are portraits in medalion of Beethoven, Chopin, Rossini, Wagner, Verdi, Liszt, Voltaire, Ingersoll, Payne, Hugo, Emerson, Whitman, Goethe and the immortal Shakespeare.

The main entrance to the building is in the middle division of the ground floor front and is eighteen feet in width. This also furnishes the entrance to the corner ground floor room, which is occupied by Lee Brothers & Company's bank, than which there is no finer banking room in the country. On the opposite side is the entrance to the postoffice, which is fitted up with the latest appliances for the expeditious handling of the mails. From off the arcade a magnificent flight of stairs leads to the second floor, the front portion of which is occupied by the offices of the Beckwith estate.

The stage is fifty feet wide and thirty-eight feet deep, with beautifully ornamented boxes on either side. Everything has been done with a lavish hand. There are fifteen elegantly furnished dressing rooms, in which are all the conveniences for the comfort of the disciples of Thespis who visit this house. The drop curtain is a composite work of art. The general design is an original figure composition in classic Greek,

and is monumental and decorative in contradistinction to the realistic. school and apparently inspired by the artist's study of the theatre itself. The figures are superbly drawn and painted, and the landscape portion is magnificent. The whole presents a fitting picture by the greatest artists of the time. Each has done well his part. No one mind could have conceived it; nor could any one hand have executed it. It will live as a classic work of art when its makers shall have passed away.

The scenery is designed for the cyclorama effect which has been found so effective, and which was first used in the Auditorium in Chicago. By this arrangement a scene can be set as a street or a garden by simply moving the scenes, which are profiled on both sides and top, anywhere desired. Every set of machinery is a finished piece of art. It is, after the latest fashion, lashed together with ropes, and is capable of being made into seventy-five distinct stage dressings.

All the ornamental work in the house is after the fashion of the Grecian school, and everything possible has been done to make this, the first memorial theatre erected in the country, the most beautiful playhouse in the land. There are 499 over-stuffed mohair plush chairs, dyed in a light fawn and flesh colors, 329 of which are in the parquette and 170 gracing the balcony. The gallery seats 200 comfortably.

The problem of electric lighting of theatres has been solved in this house by the use of a large switchboard, in which there are twentyfive levers and nine powerful resistance coils. The lighting of the stage itself is exceptionally complete, four hundred electric lamps in three colors being utilized for this purpose. The heating and the ventilation have been well looked to, and there never was a theatre whose air was more pure and whose warmth was more regular and comfortable.

There is a roomy foyer and an abundance of fire escapes; in fact nothing has been left undone which could add to the attractiveness and completeness of this house. It is a new and splendid model which time will demonstrate to be almost, if not quite, the acme of human skill in architecture, design and decoration.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE CASS COUNTY PRESS.

In the year of this writing there are eight newspapers published regularly in Cass county. Of these there is one daily, and one published twice a week. Outside of the two large centers Edwardsburg and Marcellus support each a paper.

In one respect, at least, the newspaper history of Cass county is noteworthy. All but one of the eight papers have had a continuous existence though not all under continuous proprietorship-for at least a quarter of a century. The newspaper graveyard of Cass county is surprisingly small. The live ones are not so much troubled by the ghosts of defunct enterprises as in many other counties that might be named. Not that journalism has been without the usual reefs and shallows in this county. Not that there are no wrecks to record. Here, as elsewhere, some newspapers, delivered in hope, have died in blameless. infancy; one or two, having served their ephemeral purpose, passed out without the sting of failure; the existence of one or two others was fitful and stressful from the first, and the end was the happiest part of their career.

The early settlers of the county had no newspaper. Perhaps the most familiar paper that could be considered a "home paper" was the Niles Herald, which was published by A. E. Draper from 1833 to 1838, being suspended at the latter date. In its columns, no doubt, were published the legal notices from Cass county. The only other paper in southwestern Michigan that was regularly published at that time, so far as is known to the writer, was the Kalamazoo Gazette, which was established in 1834, and is now in its 73rd volume.

More than fifteen years elapsed after the organization of Cass county before the first newspaper enterprise ventured a permanent abode in the county. The Cass County Advocate issued its first number March II, 1845. The publishers got their equipment from the old Niles Express. It announced a regular weekly appearance, but, as is well known, the intentions of early editors-often, too, of those still with us—did not possess the breadth and height and irresistible force needed to over

come the insuperable obstacles that beset pioneer publishing. Very often the person whose name conspicuously appeared as "editor and proprietor," also was incumbent of the long list of positions that rank below the supreme office down to the despised "devil." As business manager, as news gatherer, as typesetter, as foreman of the press room, and power man for the hand press, the old-time publisher had no sinecure. Too often his supply of paper ran out before the means of transportation by wagon could bring him his next invoice. These conditions, and many others that we cannot here describe in detail, might have interfered with the regular editing of the first Cass county newspaper. Certain it is, that its career was fitful.

Mr. E. A. Graves was the editor and proprietor; a Democrat in politics and conducting his paper accordingly. Abram Townsend bought the enterprise in 1846, but he, too, failed to make it prosperous. In 1850 it fell into the hands of another well known citizen, Ezekiel S. Smith. He evidently believed that Cassopolis was not a good field for a newspaper, and that the new railroad-born village of Dowagiac offered a better location.

The removal of the Cass County Advocate to Dowagiac in 1850 gave that village its first newspaper. Mr. L. P. Williams soon bought the plant of Mr. Smith, and by him the name was changed to the Dowagiac Times and Cass County Republican. In 1854, while the proprietor was away on a business trip, the office and the entire plant was destroyed by fire. Thus perished the first newspaper, after having lived nearly ten years. Its history was closed, for no successor, phoenixlike, ever rose from its ashes.

The contents of the early newspaper call for brief comment. Apropos of this point, Mr. C. C. Allison says: "If you turn over the pages of the early paper expecting to find local news you will be disappointed. Now our papers exist and are patronized for the local information they contain; at that time this idea of journalism had not arrived, at least not in this part of the country. A letter from a foreign country, describing alien people and customs, was eagerly seized upon by the editor, and its none too interesting facts spread over several columns of type. At the same time local improvements, county news, and the personal items which now form the live features of the small newspaper, were usually omitted entirely or passed over with scant attention. Marriages and deaths and births formed the bulk of the local news in the newspaper of fifty years ago."