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In fact, a disciple of Miller’s had calculatedthat the Rapture would take place on October22, 1844, more than a decade before the Severancesrelocated to Boston, a center “famous,” inCaroline’s view, “in the world of letters, moralsand unfettered thought.” Most likely the family’sdeparture in 1855 was prompted by T.C’s businessmisadventures. When the forty-one-year-oldbank employee suddenly found himself withoutemployment, the Severances’ friends in Massachusettshelped him secure a job with a Bostonbank. The proffered position was that of teller, onthe bottom rung of banking’s career ladder. 23It was not the first time that T.C. was required tostart over. During the early 1840s, when Cleveland’sbanks were lost to repercussions of thePanic of 1837, T.C. had helped to build the Fireman’sInsurance Company into a quasi-bankinginstitution, taking advantage of a state law thatgave insurers note-issuing privileges. In 1845,the Ohio legislature passed a new bill placingbanking authority exclusively with chartered stateand independent banks. Fireman’s collapsed, takingcorporate secretary Severance down with it.“T.C. bears up under his losses like a man,” hisbrother John observed to their sister-in-law, MaryLong Severance, “and although he has lost hishouse & nearly every thing if not more—yet he isT.C. all over . . . says if he ‘has got to begin at thebottom and look up again, why very well, I’ve agood head & good pluck’ such a spirit at such atime is worth all the Indians in America.” 24T.C. and his business partners quickly regrouped.With a $50,000 investment from a new partner,they established City Bank, the first independentbank to be chartered in Cleveland under the newstate law. Severance served as the bank’s secretaryand cashier until 1849, when he jumped (orwas pushed) into a cashier’s position with CanalBank, an independent house catering to businessesdependent upon or related to water transportation.T.C. joined Canal Bank the same yearthat the Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnatirailroad began operations. As City Bank beganits evolution into Cleveland’s long-lived NationalCity Bank, Severance’s new employer traced adownward spiral. Perhaps Canal Bank’s reducedcircumstances motivated T.C. to take a second jobin 1851, selling the “Phillips’ fire annihilator,” anextinguisher designed for residential use. 25Its clientele diminished by the advent of the railroadera, Canal Bank failed during a depositors’run in 1854. “The bill holders, who got the goldfor their notes, were arrayed in smiles,” observeda reporter from Cleveland’s Plain Dealer whowas on the scene, “and contrasted, most ludicrously,with the grim-visaged depositors, whogot nothing.” Except, that is, for a certain CaptainGrummage. The day before the bank collapsed,Grummage had deposited $1,000 earned from ayear’s work on the Great Lakes. Upon hearing ofthe institution’s apparent insolvency, he grabbeda gun, forced his way into the bank’s offices atSuperior Avenue and Bank (West Sixth) Street,and ordered cashier Severance to return hisdeposit or else. Unprepared to “meet his maker,”T.C. complied. 26The welcome the Severances received in Bostonwas considerably warmer. William Lloyd Garrisoninvited them to a reception to meet his fellowreformers “as soon as Caroline had unpacked.”She needed no second invitation to join theirranks. “My Mother . . . never entered the mostfashionable society in and around Boston,” herson Mark recalled. “The predominant feature ofour domestic life was . . . reform. . . . [W]heneverany matter involving the improvement of the lifeof men or women or children was brought to thefore, my mother at once took part in it.” Carolinebegan speaking in abolition circles, became correspondingsecretary of the Boston Anti-SlaverySociety, and delivered her “Humanity” lecturethroughout New England. During the Civil War,she served on the Boston board of the U.S. SanitaryCommission, an agency that coordinated thevolunteer efforts of women to support the Union.California History • volume 88 number 1 2010