PADUCAH 



4444 



PAGANINI 



of the river, and there are numerous medieval 

 palaces and churches. Its art treasures perpetu- 

 ate the memory of some of Italy's greatest mas- 

 ters Donatello. Guido Reni, Canova, Giotto, 

 Fra Filippo Lippi and others. In its famous 

 university, founded in the thirteenth century 

 by Emperor Frederick II, Galileo lectured for 

 eighteen years. When the War of the Nations 

 broke out in 1914 over 1,500 students were in 

 attendance there. A celebrated Botanic Gar- 

 Icn, the oldest in Europe, is connected with 

 the university. 



Padua claims to have been founded several 

 centuries before Christ, by the Trojan hero 

 Antenor. Under the Romans it was the most 

 important place in the north of Italy and, like 

 other cities of that country, had an exciting 

 throughout the Middle Ages. Livy was 

 bora in Padua, and at one time it was the resi- 

 dence of Dante. At the present time it has con- 

 siderable industrial importance, possessing a 

 flourishing automobile factory and other manu- 

 facturing establishments. There is also a pros- 

 perous trade in fruit, grain, oil, wine and cat- 

 tle. Population of city and suburbs in 1915, 

 estimated, 105,135. 



PADUCAH, padu'ka, KY., one of the largest 

 markets in the United States for dark leaf to- 

 bacco. It is situated on the extreme northwest- 

 era border of the state, in McCracken County, 

 of which it is the county seat, and on the Ohio 

 River at the point where it receives the waters 

 of the Tennessee River. Cairo is thirty-eight 

 miles west, by water. Transportation is pro- 

 vided by the Illinois Central, the Nashville, 

 Chattanooga & Saint Louis and the Burlington 

 railways, and steamboats connect Paducah with 

 all river ports on the Mississippi, Ohio and Ten- 

 nessee rivers. In 1910 the population was 22,- 

 760; in 1916 it was 24342 (Federal estimate). 



The city is located in a rich agricultural, tim- 

 ber and mineral region. Large capital is in- 

 vested in the lumber and tobacco interests in 

 Paducah, and the wholesale trade is extensive. 

 The leading industrial plants make tobacco 

 products, and other establishments produce 

 lumber products, cordage, clothing and pottery. 

 There are in addition boat-building yards and 

 the machine shops of the Illinois Central Rail- 

 way. Noteworthy structures are the United 

 States government building, the municipal 

 buildings and the City National Bank building. 

 Saint Mary's Academy and a Carnegie Library 

 supplement the public and parochial schools. 

 Two hospitals are maintained, one by the city 

 and one by the Illinois Central Railway. 



The first settlement on this site was made in 

 1809; it w.is named in honor of the Indian chief 

 Paduke. The village was incorporated in 1828, 

 and in 1856 the city charter was granted. In 

 September, 1861, during the War of Secession, 

 Paducah was occupied and fortified by General 

 Grant, and in March, 1864, the garrison of 800 

 men under General Hicks successfully resisted 

 an attack by 5,000 men under General Forrest. 

 The commission form of government providing 

 for a mayor and four commissioners was adopted 

 in 1913. 



PAGANINI, pahgahne'ne, NICCOLO (1782- 

 1840), sometimes referred to in musical history 

 as the greatest of all violinists, was born at 

 Genoa, Italy. He received music lessons from 

 his father before he was six years old and later 

 was taught by the best instructors in Genoa. 

 In 1795 he went to Parma, Italy, to study, but 

 the teachers there told him they could do noth- 

 ing more for him. He then commenced a 

 course of self-training so rigorous that he often 

 played fifteen hours a day. In 1797 he began 

 his concert tours, which for many years con- 

 sisted of triumph after triumph. His playing 

 of tender passages was so beautiful that his 

 audiences often burst into tears, yet he could 

 perform with such force and velocity that at 

 Vienna one listener became half crazed and 

 declared for some days that he had seen the 

 devil helping the violinist. 



While engaged in the concert field Paganini 

 had become devoted to gambling and lost so 

 much that in 1800 he had to pawn his valuable 

 violin. From 1801 to 1804 he lived in Tuscany 

 with a wealthy woman who was violently in 

 love with him, but after the latter year once 

 more began his tours and earned a great deal 

 of money. For some years he was musical in- 

 structor to Napoleon's sister, the princess of 

 Lucca, but in 1815 removed to Venice, where 

 for thirteen years he lived a rather loose life 

 in the company of a beautiful dancer. His 

 playing, however, gained him greater fame each 

 year. In 1831 he appeared in London, where 

 such crowds of admirers surrounded him in the 

 street that mounted guards were given him as 

 an escort. His profits in England during six 

 seasons there were $85,000, and this sum was 

 probably exceeded in his French tours. Hard 

 work and dissipation impaired his health so 

 that his last years were spent in much physical 

 suffering at his villa near Parma. In spite of 

 the fact that after his retirement he lost large 

 amounts in gambling he left $400,000 to his son 

 by the Venetian dancer. He bequeathed his 



