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December 3, 2008

Showcase of Student Research provides glimpse into Terre Haute’s past

By Howard Greninger

TERRE HAUTE — To learn how to research, some history students at Indiana State University need look no further than Terre Haute and the Wabash Valley.

The third annual Showcase of Student Research, conducted Wednesday at Cunningham Memorial Library on ISU’s campus, showed the work of about 40 students “who have to do the background, the archival research,” said Christopher J. Olsen, chair of ISU’s Department of History.

“One of the goals is to get them out into different places. They go to the public library, the historic society, and a group, about a fourth of the students, went to the National Archives in Washington,” Olsen said.

The showcase is supported by grants through the Programs of Promise and Promising Scholars, funded by the Lilly Foundation. Some exhibits included 19th Century Indiana politician and former U.S. Secretary of the Navy Col. Richard W. Thompson; Terre Haute’s prohibition-era entertainment scene; and the impact of jazz.

Julia Costello, Tony Sanabria and Austin Brewer were among some ISU seniors to conduct research at the National Archives for a week in mid October.

They researched Thompson, who at the end of his congressional term in 1843 moved to Terre Haute to practice law and lay roots, believing Terre Haute would be a city of importance, Costello said.

Thompson died in 1900 at age 90 in Terre Haute. He lived at “Spring Hill,” his home of many years that stood on a hill on the east side of 25th Street, Costello said. A bust of Thompson was dedicated in front of the Vigo County Courthouse in December 1902.

“Thompson made the first long distance call ever made in Terre Haute,” Costello said. The call was made to Chicago.

“He was Secretary of the U.S. Navy, which is kind of strange to have a man from Indiana because there are no major ports,” Sanabria said. “He was picked as a political favor” to Walter B. Hayes, the 19th U.S. president, after Hayes won the election of 1876 by one electoral vote, Sanabria said.

Thompson suggested the electoral vote decide the presidency, Sanabria said. Also, Thompson had a destroyer named after him, the USS Thompson, but it never saw action against an enemy, and was decommissioned in 1930.

Sanabria said he appreciated researching in the National Archives. “It gave us a better understanding of what it means to be a historian,” he said.

Entertainment from 1910 to 1930 was a focus of four students, ISU seniors Sara Croft, Wade Fenwick, Tim Black and junior Adam Clawson.

While local lore has well-known gangster John Dillinger avoiding Terre Haute because of the number of railroads, Clawson said there is no clear evidence of that. There is evidence that Dillinger had a “safe house” in Terre Haute at 2531 Fenwood St., he said. “If [gangsters] come down here for a safe house, they don’t want to be seen for whatever reason,” Clawson said.

Two members of Dillinger’s gang, Edward Shouse and Russell Clark, were born in Terre Haute.

Croft said their research went farther than 1930, but the group tried to stay focused on that time period.

“We tried to stick with vice, the red light district and organized crime and entertainment. We found that much of that really went on into the 1970s,” Croft said.

“That scene lasted for so long in Terre Haute compared to other cities. After prohibition, a lot of this stopped in bigger cities, but it kept on going in Terre Haute with the prostitution and theaters,” she said.

“Most considered legal prostitution a social evil, but more controlled in a red light district,” Croft said. “The general consensus at that time was they accepted it. To have something like that now would be almost impossible.”

Theaters made up the biggest portion of the night scene in Terre Haute from 1910 to 1930.

“There were 20 theaters in Terre Haute in 1920, and five of those were Vaudeville houses,” Black said.

Indiana Theater still remains, as does the Hippodrome theater now used by the Scottish Rite.

Jazz was an important part of life in Terre Haute in the 1920s, said Sara Beckman, a sophomore history major.

Dance halls included the Trianon, opened in December 1923. “It was a hall that could fit about 1,000 people and was actually built in the shape of a octagon to hold more people,” Beckman said. “It was where the Cricket Box [furniture store] is now on Wabash Avenue.”

Other dance halls include the Phoenix, the Flashlight and a more formal “Tokyo” dance hall. “It was a higher-end dance hall. Newspaper articles said that is where Terre Haute’s 400 club would go. It actually had Japanese decorations,” Beckman said.

It was on South Eight Street and South Ninth Street, but Beckman said she could not determine exact spots for that theater as store or building references given in older articles are no longer standing.

“What I thought was interesting was the pride taken in musicians, like when people said they looked up to musicians as role models, unlike today, when someone says they want to be a musician, you look at them and say, yeah, right,” Beckman said.

“Our project looked at the local music scene and what happened locally to foster musicians to go out on the national stage and affect the national jazz scene,” she said, such as musicians like Eddie Condon and Hoagy Carmichael. “The jazz scene like it was is totally gone now from Terre Haute,” she said.



Howard Greninger can be reached at (812) 231-4204 or howard.greninger@tribstar.com.

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