Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 September 1894 — FAIR LILLIAN'S BIRTHPLACE. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

FAIR LILLIAN'S BIRTHPLACE.

Cottage la Which the (Jucen of Comic Opera First Saw (he Light. Born to Mr. anil Mrs. Charles E. Leonard. at. their home on Fourth avonne, Dec. 4. 18(11. a bright baby girl, weighing 0% pounds. This, the first press notice the acknowledged queen of comic opera, Lillian Russell, ever received, appeared on Dec. 7, 1861, and was penned by her own father, the editor of the Clinton (Iowa) Weekly Herald. The house in which the interesting event occurred was situated in the rear of the office building of H. B. Horton, located on Fourth avenue, between First and Second streets, and faced east on the alley running north and south between Third and Fourth avenues. At that time this house was situated almost in the center of the business district, across the street from the lowa Central Hotel, then the largest hotel in lowa, and one of the finest west of Chicago. A St. Louis Post-Dispatch correspondent in Clinton has photographed the house, which, it willbeseen, was exceedingly primitive. The main portion was “squatty,” scarcely a story and a half in height, and covered a ground space of 18x25 feet. The front door opened directly into the room used as a parlor. There were three other rooms on the ground floor, occupied as sitting-roonl, bedroom and kitchen and dining-room combined. The main portion of the house has been moved and now constitutes an addition to the building occupied by a bottling company: and the old walls, which were the first to

hear the voic6 of the now great singer, resound with the hissing noises of machines used in bottliDg the effervescent pop. Shortly after Lillian’s birth the Leonard family removed from their abode on the alley to 408 Seventh avenue, immediately in the rear of the Baptist Church, and at that time one of the finest residences in the town. Here the remainder of their days in Clinton were spenh

LILLIAN RUSSELL'S BIRTHPLACE.