« -5fltUfflVEWfc. FCAIIF(%, /~^% S?\ t^'d of , / ** AS >- 1 &£l "7* O / % ^UIBRARY^ — 1 l^t^^k "T» d r SP*** rim %m j SXNfc ^/HHAINHV^ ^OFCAIIFOB^ ^OF-CAIIFO/^ ^AwaaiH^ ^AavaaiH^ ^lUBRARY^ ^UIBRARYC^ 3 1 if^ s i ± // *> u A DECADE of CIVIC DEVELOPMENT By CHARLES ZUEBLIN PROFESSOR OF SOCIOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO AUTHOR OF "AMERICAN MUNICIPAL PROGRESS" CHICAGO THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS 1905 Copyright 1905 By The University of Chicago z&^d FOREWORD " The Civic Renascence " was the title given to the following chapters when they appeared in The Chautauquau, 1 to whose publishers obli- gations are due for the kind permission to revise and reprint. The periods of rebellion, reconstruction, industrial expansion, and im- perialism will be no more conspicuous in the orientation of the end of the century than the civic awakening which is now too near in time and has been too spontaneous in character for proper appreciation. It is too early to measure the full meaning of the new civic spirit and its accomplishments, but to sum up a few of the ^spectacular evidences of civic progress may r serve to interpret a movement already as broad is the continent. While we have long been disheartened by municipal mismanagement and civic apathy, 7". we must be stirred and inspired by the fact, already demonstrated beyond dispute, that the Lk civic progress of the last decade is greater than i— that of all our previous national existence. So c3 rapid has been the development since the days of the Columbian Exposition of 1893 that 'September, 1902 — May, 1903. 327138 vi FOREWORD unrelated civic improvements, however impera- tive and worthy, no longer satisfy enlightened citizens. The goal has come to be the compre- hensive city plan, the ripest expression of the new civic spirit, which it is the purpose of these chapters to describe. This very day marks the public opening in San Francisco for exhibition of the improvement plan of the Pacific metropo- lis, which is second only in importance to the scheme of the Washington Commission. The Society for the Improvement and Adornment of San Francisco, under the leadership of Ex- Mayor Phelan and with the co-operation of Mr. D. H. Burnham and his associates, has produced a plan for the comprehensive treat- ment of the city which is the herald of the next decade of civic development. Charles Zueblin. Berkeley, Cal., September 27, 1905. TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. The New Civic Spirit . . i II. The Training of the Citizen 13 III. The Making of the City . 33 IV. "The White City" and After 59 V. Metropolitan Boston . . 83 VI. Greater New York . . . 103 VII. The Harrisburg Plan . . 127 VIII. Washington, Old and New . 145 IX. The Return to Nature . . 167 THE NEW CIVIC SPIRIT The characteristics of different generations change as unnoticeably as the generations themselves. Ideals transforming the spirit of a nation may come as angels unawares or as thieves in the night. In the perspective of years we recognize that ideals widely divergent actuated the generation preceding and the generation following the Civil War, but we do not so readily see that a transformation of thought and activities, equally significant, although less spectacular, has taken place since the close of the war. The industrial expansion of the decade which followed the Civil War has had no parallel except in the decade just clos- ing, each being characterized by progress and the creative spirit rather than by order and construction; nevertheless the social and civic differences are as marked as the industrial simi- larity. It may not be without profit, therefore, to contrast the intellectual and social attitudes of the period defined by the panic of 1873 and the period succeeding the panic of 1894. The dominant characteristics of the ideals of the seventies may be described as theological and individualistic, of the end of the century 2 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT as ethical and social. In the earlier period reli- ance was put upon individual effort which was assumed to be providentially guided to success if impelled by a holy zeal ; while in the latter time, with its new conception of responsibility, individual effort is sanctioned because it pro- motes social welfare. The former was a time when the only social or altruistic forces were supposed to emanate from the church and the church schools. The young man or woman with the impulse to serve his fellow-man had no choice, therefore, outside the church, the school, or charity. In this latter day the workers and reformers are found in political and social endeavor made possible by the multi- farious municipal, charitable and social organi- zations. The theological point of view added emphasis to the prevailing faith of the indus- trial world, that opportunity was free, that success was dependent only on individual effort, and that social good was merely the result of the performance of individual obliga- tions. The results of this philosophy were that the industrial world knew no social obligation, the church knew only condescension and patronage, the school was in the throes of reorganization, and politics bore a stigma. In the last decade of the century there came a new conception of public responsibility and THE NEW CIVIC SPIRIT 3 activity. The characteristic note of the new era is social. The public-school system began to accommodate itself to the conditions of industry and life, abandoning the all-sufficient pedagogy of the " three R's " and teaching the power of observation, accomplishment and self- reliance. The administrative reform of cities was promoted with a success which would have seemed incredible in the ninth decade of the century. Villages and towns undertook the organization of improvement associations. The last decade of the century also witnessed an astounding development of free libraries, health regulations, factory legislation, inter- state commerce provisions and the extension of municipal functions such as street paving and cleaning and lighting, water supply and sewage disposal, parks and boulevards, all expressing a changed conception of public life. It is worthy of note that in these earlier years some of the most important public move- ments of the close of the century had their in- ception, but died a-borning. In 1866 the first steps were taken to provide public baths in Boston, possibly as the result of the revela- tions of the war in matters of sanitation. The next public bath was established in Milwaukee in 1889. In 1872 a children's playground was instituted by vote of town meeting at Brook- 4 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT line, Massachusetts. The next playground of moment was the Charlesbank, in Boston, opened to the public in 1892. In 1872 the school authorities of Cambridge, Massachu- setts, proposed the establishment of a vacation school. It was not until 1886, however, that the first vacation school was established, and that in Newark, New Jersey. The first village improvement society was organized in Stock- bridge, Massachusetts, in 1853, but the great civic awakening dates from the year of the Chicago World's Fair. The country was not ready for these progressive movements, for the feeling of social obligation was unde- veloped. In the midst of great intellectual, social and spiritual advances it is sometimes difficult to do justice to the importance of the material basis of progress. The cry so often raised against the materialism of our time has a rela- tive but not an absolute justification. The materialism is great in proportion to the intel- lectual and spiritual possibilities, but it is no more serious in its menace than was the materialism of past times. In fact the great creative periods of industrial development are accompanied by social and intellectual revivals. Progress in the industrial, social or intellectual world is the result of a reaction from an estab- THE NEW CIVIC SPIRIT 5 lished order. The comfort of prosperity in- duces complacency, conservatism, aristocracy, a deadening optimism. In each succeeding period the democratic spirit is compelled to fight the benumbing influence of the new riches, but meanwhile it has been aided by the stimulating influence of prosperity with its accumulation of new wants and ambitions. The decade after the war was a time in which all efforts were devoted to establishing order out of the chaos of industrial depression. But the ensuing period of prosperity was the result of an industrial expansion made possible by increasing density of population and the consequent greater power of co-operation. In spite of the disturbances in the industrial world and the demoralization of government due to numerous accessions from the unskilled and undisciplined forces of Europe, which threat- ened both the standard of living and democratic administration, the greater co-operative power of the large urban community has been respon- sible for notable advances in popular education, industrial organization, municipal reform and civic improvement. The logical steps in civic progress are prosperity, leisure, culture. Prosperity pro- vides the leisure which makes possible a cul- ture unknown to the pioneers in industrial 6 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT expansion. If in time this culture become pedantic and exclusive, at least the enthusiasm of its new possession usually prompts a desire for service. The growing prosperity, leisure and culture of the eighties provided not only the sowers but the soil for the new seed of social service. In the perspective of a decade it may seem strange that civic obligations rested so lightly on the shoulders of the people who were enjoying the enlarged opportunities of those days. We must, however, remember that the conception of social responsibility held so widely today is in direct variance with the experience and thought of the nineteenth century. The conscious effort of the convinced re- former is, of course, not primarily responsible for great civic changes. He draws his power from the undercurrent of the popular move- ments of his time. American society was being slowly educated, apart from the objective con- sequences of industrial development, by the high-sounding declarations of the Knights of Labor, by the stirring and unmeasured phrases of Henry George's Progress and Poverty; by the threatening protests of discontent which culminated in the Haymarket riot in Chicago, and the dreams of a happier state which found their most dramatic expression in Bellamy's THE NEW CIVIC SPIRIT 7 Looking Backzvard. Those were also days of calm examination and analysis by such a friendly and helpful critic as James Bryce in his American Commonwealth. Add to the native intellectual and spiritual forces the grow- ing consciousness of an interrelation of the nations, especially a community of interest among English-speaking countries, and we find the cause for the adoption of English social movements in the absence of any fitting native efforts. We are not surprised that the young Ameri- can of the last generation, unfamiliar with the duties of citizenship and social service, should have turned to the movements becoming popu- lar in Great Britain as the means of expressing that human interest for which church, school and politics seemed to offer inadequate chan- nels. Then, happily at a time when on the one hand prosperity, leisure and culture gave encouragement to altruistic effort, and on the other democratic and even revolutionary move- ments demanded attention, the zealous youth of America discovered the merits of charity organization, university settlements, and uni- versity extension. These significant social movements oppor- tunely appropriated by the younger American generation had stood the test of several years' 8 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT service in England. The university extension work undertaken in Cambridge University in 1865 had received new impetus and com- manded international attention in 1885 when it was popularized by the new methods and increased vigor of Oxford University. The first university settlement, Toynbee Hall, was organized in 1884, after the untimely death of Arnold Toynbee, the friend and teacher of workingmen. Already a number of progress- ive men and women were applying in Ameri- can cities the methods of charity organization approved by some years' experience in Eng- land. University extension and university settlements afforded a still better outlet for the higher and more democratic expression of fraternity, and in 1887 and the next succeed- ing years were given spontaneous recognition in the establishment in New York of the Neighborhood Guild by Stanton Coit; in Chi- cago, of Hull House by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr; and in the inauguration of university extension with experimental lectures by Professor E. W. Bemis and others, and in the organization of the American Society for the Extension of University Teaching, in Philadelphia. The number and accessibility of institutions for higher education in America made the need THE NEW CIVIC SPIRIT 9 for university extension among the well-to-do less conspicuous than in Great Britain. Its earliest promoters in this country, therefore, were full of hope that the opportunity had arrived for men of "light and leading" to minister to the intellectual needs of the indus- trial classes. The democratic character thus given to the movement was short-lived in appearance, however, because of the only too natural unresponsiveness of the manual work- ers to a movement emanating from the hitherto remote and unknown universities. Recent developments lead to the belief that the most popular and permanent democratic expres- sion of university extension will come later through the extension of the public-school system. Meanwhile, the movement has made a place for itself in American life, so far as the institutions and funds have been found to carry it on, because people of some means and culti- vation welcome the results of scientific investi- gation coming in the easily appropriated form of university extension, with the added inspira- tion of the presence of the teacher. It must not be overlooked, moreover, that those com- munities where the audiences are made up of representative people, do not of necessity belie the democratic character or, at least, possi- bilities of the university extension movement. io A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT The university or social settlement, in its most modest activities, is an expression of neighborhood or community interest, and as such has served to bridge that gap referred to by Jacob Riis in Hozv the Other Half Lives. In the larger civic life of the community also, the growing spirit of fraternity has enabled it to take a most conspicuous part in the develop- ment of the higher civic life. Some of the settlements, notably Hull House in Chicago, may be called civic centers, even of the metro- politan communities in which they are located, chiefly perhaps because the new civic spirit finds its ripest expression in them, and from them permeates not a few of the conventional and fashion-ridden quarters of the city. Thus the social settlement has found its place not only in the poorer wards of the cities in which it is located, but in the larger civic life of the community. When we consider that the many social movements, noted at the beginning of this chapter, took life or new life at the close of the ninth and the beginning of the tenth decade of the last century, it is evident that these imported English movements were the first fruits of a desire to be of greater social utility than the older native forces seemed to permit. It is not surprising that many of the subse- THE NEW CIVIC SPIRIT n quent activities such as playgrounds, vacation schools, public baths, compulsory education and factory and health legislation should have emanated from the settlements or should have been inspired by university extension teaching. While the social settlements and university ex- tension were adopted partly because they were being successfully tried in England, and partly because thoughtful and public-spirited young Americans saw the need of them at home, their success was largely due to their timeliness. A new social spirit is expressed and defined by these movements. Participation in the life of the masses of the people, rather than vain- glorious attainment of the evanescent honors of conventional society, becomes the ambition of a portion of the new generation. To the multitude are carried some of the fruits of prosperity, leisure and culture; from them are gained democracy, fraternity, freedom of so- cial expression ; with them is developed a new dynamic force capable of remaking the Ameri- can community by inspiring the American citi- zen with the new civic spirit. THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN The industrial and social needs of each generation should determine the character of its educational opportunities. We began our national existence with a belief in democracy — not merely the political ideal popularized by Lincoln, "government of the people, by the people, and for the people" — but a democracy which meant more than government, which was expressed in the high-sounding phrase "Liberty, Equality and Fraternity." At the dawn of the twentieth century there seems to be a relaxation of democratic enthusiasm, due per- haps, to a recognition that the French philoso- phers and the American patriots had been too sweeping in their democratic demands and aspirations. Yet the obligation is upon us to prepare our future citizens for life in a democ- racy, and the demand is therefore urgent to define democracy in realizable terms. The progress of education has given us a threefold educational ideal : education for occupation, for citizenship and for manhood. May we not unite this ideal with the democratic trinity, and demand as a rational goal, liberty for the worker, equality for the citizen and fraternity 13 i 4 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT for man ? We find, indeed, that industrial and educational progress is paving the way for the realization of this limited democratic concep- tion, which may, however, prove to be a fuller democracy than the previous unattainable ideal. The nineteenth century has given us indus- trial, political and moral conditions which facilitate the realization of this qualified democ- racy. The economic changes have been ex- pressed in an industrial and a domestic revolu- tion. The industrial revolution has substituted machinery for handwork, has introduced the division of labor, has provided a place for women and children, as well as men, in the huge factories which supplant the old-fashioned workshop, while the principles of organization, bringing masses of people together for eco- nomic advantage, have led to the growth of the modern city. This would necessitate changed methods of education were the influence of the domestic revolution absent, but the latter has been equally significant in altering the educa- tional opportunities outside the school. The labor-saving devices used in the household, the satisfaction of many wants through communal effort, and the general diffusion among urban populations of the news of the world, giving thus a superficial literary training — all con- duce to the sending of the boy to school with- THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 15 out that training of hand and eye which would have been secured under the primitive domestic conditions. When this is coupled with the necessity of fitting children for modern indus- trial conditions, we find that the old-fashioned education of the "three R's" is entirely inade- quate. The new education, like the new indus- try, must make for a larger liberty. The last century's progress in representa- tive government has also made new demands upon the educational system. While we have not witnessed such marked advances in America as have been seen in Europe, because we began the century with a more representa- tive system, we have nevertheless been trying to interpret the documents of our forefathers, and endeavoring to adapt our political institu- tions to the industrial changes. We have, therefore, gained new conceptions of political responsibility for which the old-time school made no provision, but which give to the school of today the opportunity for a fuller expression of equality. A no less significant result of the march of events in the nineteenth century is the development of humanitarianism, which has received notable reverses in recent wars and other barbaric activities, but never- theless encourages the belief that the fraternal 16 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT spirit is influencing men, and may become a greater inspiration in the school of tomorrow. We may ask ourselves, then, how may the results of the nineteenth century's industrial, political and social advances be utilized in the school for the extension of the worker's liberty. During the nineteenth century the greatest con- tribution to education came from science. Theoretical and applied science contributed to man's welfare and penetrated even into the recesses of the academic curriculum, while in the scientific schools education is paying its debt to industry. Nineteenth-century science is the direct result of the industrial revolution and the greater emphasis laid on the relation of man to natural advantages. Not only was man's dependence on the earth evidenced in the use of raw materials, but in the application of machinery for purposes of industrial progress the same laws were exhibited which attracted the attention of the evolutionists in the bio- logical world. Charles Darwin is not merely the product of an age which was devoted to scientific research ; he is chiefly the child of an industrial era in which the survival of the fittest and the doctrine of natural selection were daily demonstrated. Industry thus con- tributed to education its most important doc- trine, that of evolution or development, and THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 17 education reciprocates by giving the youth not only general intellectual training, but special technical skill. One result of the exaltation of industry was the appreciation of the value of manual train- ing, not only for industrial but for educational purposes. If the training of the hand and eye is essential to economic fitness, it must involve a better development of all the faculties and hence have pure pedagogic merit. When we comprehend the value of the discipline which comes from the mechanic arts, then we begin to see that, as it is an aid to culture, so it may contribute to that chief necessity of the worker of today — the power of adaptability. The manual worker of the twentieth century enjoys a heritage from the past in the form of liberty to search for work, but liberty in his occupa- tion is almost unknown. The elaborate organi- zation of modern industry and the high sub- division of labor make the individual worker insignificant, while the changes are so rapid that even the most skilled may suffer without a general education which permits them to accommodate themselves to industrial changes. The man of executive capacity passes with ease from one occupation to another, but the manual worker in perfecting his knowledge of a trade often pays the penalty of losing his job — be- 18 A DECADE OE CIVIC DEVELOPMENT cause the introduction of some mechanical device may supplant his special skill. He needs, therefore, in self-defense, above all else the capacity for adapting himself to new indus- trial situations. When manual training is given in the grades, from the kindergarten on, the student is ready, upon entering the high school, for a technological course. The technical schools of today are very often neglecting the poorer youth for whom they were designed, and be- coming training schools for professional workers. The technical high school of the future may still perform its service for the children of manual workers, if manual training has been an organic part of the educational system from the beginning; and thus the workman of tomorrow may have not only the general training which makes him adaptable, but the special training which gives him imme- diate economic advantage. Out of the industrial evolution of today there has emerged a serious problem, which may also be met by this application of educa- tion to the necessity of giving the workman liberty. The irregularity of employment which results from invention has been intensified by the further displacement of labor due to the economy of the higher organizations, com- THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 19 binations and trusts. This surplus labor can with difficulty be employed in the machine in- dustries, but it may find a place in the cultiva- tion of handicraft for the beautification of the home and the community, which happily is among the demands of our recent culture. Thus it may be expected that the educa- tional ideal of fitting the worker for occupa- tion may be harmonized with the first element of democracy — liberty — not the absolute lib- erty to do as one pleases in all affairs of life, but liberty in life's chief essential — liberty in occupation. The preparation of the citizen for his spe- cial function of government will be aided by every improvement in education, but is being immediately assisted by some of our newer educational methods. The kindergarten estab- lished the standard of true citizenship in giv- ing education, as Mrs. Wiggin puts it, to the " whole boy." Citizenship is not to be attained by mere attention to the ballot ; equality is not secured by gaining the franchise; but equality in citizenship may be taken as a substitute for that fuller equality of riper civilization, if citi- zenship is interpreted in its broadest sense. This kind of citizenship is enjoyed by the child in the kindergarten in his common relations with other children — all struggling toward 20 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT the goal of the perfection of the fullest capa- cities of each. The public-school system as a whole con- duces to a social equality which is scarcely known in adult life, but some of its newer features make a more direct contribution toward giving the citizen equality, special men- tion being necessary of the vacation school. The first proposal for vacation schools was made in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1872, with a view to occupying children in the sum- mer time, especially the children of the con- gested city quarters. The first vacation school was established in 1886 in Newark, New Jersey, the former suggestion having been pre- mature. From this time on it has extended and multiplied until it is to be found in most of the large American cities of today, the first purpose usually being that of the original pro- jectors — the employment of the dull hours of a long vacation. This would of itself justify the vacation school. Indeed we may say with Professor C. Hanford Henderson, in Educa- tion and the Larger Life, that vacations are unnecessary if the school is properly conducted, though as often operated today, it might be advantageous to increase the weekly holidays from one to seven, and the months of vacation from two to twelve. THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 21 The reaction from the confinement of the old-fashionecl school makes some employment in the summer time especially desirable. Happily, the occupation provided is of not only a diverting but a healthful character. The abandonment of textbooks, the use of manual exercises, the introduction of excursions, the provision of visits to the country and the parks — all give relaxation as well as instruction. There is thus obtained not only a useful sum- mer occupation, but the opportunity for the introduction of newer pedagogic methods than the frequently conservative school board is willing to sanction in the usually bureaucratic school system. There is a third and more important reason for the vacation school. Its chief significance is now seen to lie in the possi- bility of equalizing opportunity. The chil- dren of the poor in all urban communities suffer from the heat of summer as the children of the well-to-do certainly do not. The latter have the freedom of their gardens or the city parks, the lake or the sea, the mountain or the forest, and come back to school in September refreshed and rejuvenated. The child of the city street, on the other hand, returns to school wan and weak, if not vicious, as the result of the circumscribed environment of his summer months. He is no competitor for the child 22 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT with superior advantages. The vacation school aims to give him diversity of instruction, occu- pation for his hands and eyes, outdoor activities and excursions — and thus by minimizing physical difference is opportunity equalized. A still more direct method of encouraging equality in citizenship is found in the systems of self-government introduced in many schools today. Citizenship is learned from experience, not from books. One can be a citizen only by participation, and that not merely in the annual casting of the ballot, but in daily citizenship. The futility of silk-stocking politics is a con- stant reminder that mere intellectual capacity is no guarantee of good citizenship. A large part of the most intelligent voters in the city of Chicago desired at one time a very able and prominent young man as mayor, and wished the opposition party to choose him as candidate in competition with the very unsatisfactory incumbent of the office. There was no objec- tion to this promising young man except that he was not acceptable to the ring which had at the time no other candidate. In spite of the united efforts of those who are commonly called the "best citizens," a ring candidate was nominated, who, inevitably as was expected, met defeat. The routine performance of the dictates of the party boss is no more successful THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 23 than the study of textbooks on civics, for imparting instruction in citizenship. The readers of Bryce's American Commonwealth and Von Hoist's Constitutional History of the United States are not only inexperienced as a rule but commonly fail to grasp the fact that participation in any representative system is the best school of political citizenship. A society in which workingmen have no voice in industrial management, the rank and file frequently being without influence even in their own labor organizations, where the majority of those who furnish the capital for industrial undertakings do not share in their administration, where the members of the church acquiesce in clerical domination and the children in the school live under the tyranny of the teacher, is not likely to excel in the man- agement of political affairs. Self-government in the school is the best avenue to citizenship. A system by which the children maintain their own discipline and look after the external affairs of the school life is the best means as yet devised for the training of the future citi- zen. It must be not a mere duplication of the forms of city government, which may have no special application in the schoolroom, but an organic treatment of the school problems, such as one finds in the Gill School City in Phila- 24 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT delphia, now officially endorsed by the school board and in operation in thirty-three schools of that city. Equality in citizenship alone may be counted a faulty ideal as compared with the dreams of our forefathers, but if it be realized, it will be vastly more than we enjoy today, and will be the precursor of a fuller equality. There remains to be considered the educa- tion for manhood and womanhood, or for fra- ternity. Several new departures in educational methods may be counted as allies in the pursuit of this goal. The development of the free library system during the past decade is among the most marvelous of American educational advances. Nearly every state in the union has its library commission. Most of them have had some experience in sending traveling libraries to remote rural districts, while the establishment of the free public library in the cities is almost universal. Massachusetts, the banner state, has reached that happy condition, under the direction of the library commission, where only four tiny communities, with an aggregate population of fewer than four thou- sand people, are without free library facilities. There are now nearly seven thousand public libraries in the United States, containing fifty- four million books. New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago and Buffalo alone circulate THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 25 ten million volumes annually. The adminis- tration of the library has kept pace with its numerical increase, until its pedagogical im- portance is second only to the public school, and its methods are usually superior because of the greater liberty possible in the library. Not the least of the contributions of the best public libraries to the diffusion of a fraternal sentiment is the growing co-operation between library and public school and museum, whereby the ablest educators of the community are unit- ing in the unification of the best public educa- tional institutions in the service of the people. The free lecture system of New York City is the most notable expression of an ideal akin to that of the use of public libraries, namely, that education never ceases — that no diploma can serve as a certificate of a complete educa- tion. The enlightenment of the adult through the public school system is one of the demands of the hour, and is met better in New York City than anywhere else in the world. Begin- ning with 78,295 auditors at one hundred and eighty-five lectures in 1890-91 in Manhattan, the attendance at the four thousand free lec- tures given in Greater New York this last winter reached the astounding figures of a mil- lion and a quarter. The superintendent has also inaugurated a successful experiment in 26 A DECADE OE CIVIC DEVELOPMENT giving lectures to foreign populations in their native tongues, the subjects usually being in the field of American history. The spirit of frater- nity ought certainly to be advanced when the American public schoolhouse is opened in the evening for the instruction of recent immi- grants in the principles of American life, through the medium of a tongue familiar even to the unlettered. Free lectures have also been given in Bos- ton, Philadelphia, Chicago and elsewhere, the city of Milwaukee having made an enviable record in being the chief example outside of New York where public funds have been ap- propriated for the delivery of lectures in the schools, under the auspices of the board of edu- cation. These public-school patrons are not merely hearers of instructive lectures, or auditors at entertaining concerts, or spectators at lantern exhibitions, they are adult citizens in process of education in the spirit of fraternity by attendance at the one meeting-place where the distinctions of native and foreigner, white and black, male and female, are unknown. The well-equipped schoolhouse of today is the best promise for the fraternal spirit of the future. The typical school building of the new period includes a great assembly hall, the best examples of which may be found in New York THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 27 City, accessible on the ground floor, so that the children may gather there at the opening of school, the parents' club or boys' or girls' club may meet there in the afternoon, and the open lectures may be given there in the evening. For the education of the children the school- house is provided with classrooms (not for the separation and confinement of the children, but to stimulate activity and co-operation), labora- tories, libraries and museums, toilet rooms, rooms for rest and recreation, gymnasia and lunch rooms. The building is made beautiful by landscape architect and decorator, the latest examples from St. Louis being two- or three- story buildings set on ground terraced above the street, surrounded by beautiful plants, and ornamented within by pictures, sculpture, vases, and mural decorations. The schoolhouse be- comes thus the center for the instruction, recreation, and organization of young and old, and it has added to its material equipment spa- cious grounds for purposes of recreation after school hours and on holidays, as well as during the school sessions. One of the most notable examples of the educational and social possi- bilities of the schoolhouse is furnished by Richmond, Indiana, where the Art Association holds an annual exhibition of American art and craftsmanship in the Garfield school building. 28 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT By clever management and fine ideals, through enlisting not only the attendance but the feeling of possession of one-half of the twenty thou- sand inhabitants, this annual exhibition has become a democratic festival. The spirit of fraternity can nowhere be better cultivated than when people come to- gether for a common purpose, without regard to political, religious, economic, social or other distinctions. This is accomplished today where public-library buildings are used as meeting- places, and above all else in the use of the schoolhouse for free lectures, meetings of mothers' and parents' clubs, or as social cen- ters. The value of education in the formation of character will be better appreciated by a population which is in the habit of visiting the schoolhouse, but fraternity will also be directly encouraged among those people who meet in this one place, in which there should be, and commonly will be, no barriers. The school- house may, in fact, become a neighborhood guild hall. With the advanced democratic ideal of edu- cation there comes a higher appreciation of the work of the educator. The harmonious rela- tionship of teacher and parent leads not only to a mutual understanding which is of benefit to the child, but enables the teacher to embrace THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 29 the functions of friend and citizen. This ex- altation of the place of the public-school teacher in the furtherance of the ends of the state leads indirectly to a popular support of the demands for freer opportunities and greater remunera- tion. It also encourages the teachers them- selves to effect organizations which may prove of value to the educational system in securing for the teacher just economic and social recog- nition, and in inspiring enlightened school boards and honest citizens to frustrate the designs of politicians, contractors and text- book companies. When it is remembered that the average salary of the American public-school teacher is $300 a year, that almost every year new subjects of instruction are added to her burden, and that the work is still done in the majority of cases in ill-ventilated, badly lighted, unadorned school buildings, to groups of children com- monly twice as large as the most skilful teacher can manage, it is surprising that the citizen receives any education in democracy. When it is still further remembered that in the large cities many children find no provision made for them in the overcrowded schoolhouses, num- bers of them are able to attend one session only, and for the others individual instruction adapted to their special needs is almost un- 30 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT known, why do we wonder at the imperfections of the American public-school system? Yet, when we sum up the progressive features which have been discussed in these pages, and recog- nize that they are finding their way into most American communities and receive admirable expression in some of them, we marvel at the excellence of the American public-school sys- tem. If the cost of improvements, better equipped buildings, enlarged curriculum, and well-remunerated teachers is to be met, it will best be done by the training of the taxpayer through the full utilization of the school plant we now have for the education and recreation of youth and adult as many hours and days and months in the year as possible. In Chicago twenty-five million dollars' worth of school properties were kept by the school board for strictly " school " uses until by act of the Illi- nois legislature the people were granted the use of their own. In New York, on the contrary, the public has enjoyed for several years the use of public-school buildings by a more liberal interpretation of the meaning of democratic education. Another educational advance of the last decade which stimulates the spirit of fraternity is the development of public recreation. The provision of public recreation is not only a THE TRAINING OF THE CITIZEN 31 recognition of the educational and hygienic value of play but is an expression of social responsibility. Every New York schoolhouse must now be equipped with a playground, and the laws of New York State make the estab- lishment of public baths obligatory on cities of the first-class and permissible to cities of the second-class. The newer public parks of Bos- ton, New York, Chicago, St. Paul, Indian- apolis and other cities are not merely forests and pasture lands but include playgrounds for children, open-air gymnasia, baths, boating, baseball, football, cricket and golf fields, tennis courts and other devices for free public amuse- ment; band concerts are given in the parks of the chief cities, and even in the winter concerts and organ recitals are given in Boston, Pitts- burg and elsewhere. Denver employs some of the best bands in the country to give free con- certs in the City Park. The most advanced step in the provision of democratic recreation is found in Chicago, where the seven small parks opened this year and the seven others in process of development by the South Park Commis- sioners include in-door and out-door gymna- siums and baths, play space for young and old, and a neighborhood center building for public meetings and entertainments. There may seem to be only a remote connection between public 32 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT baths, children's playgrounds and parks and the growth of fraternity, but, with the multi- plication of common meeting-places, especially in those hours of leisure when economic dis- tinctions are obliterated, there comes a freedom of opportunity for genuine human intercourse and mutual understanding which has not been provided in the past by other institutions. The educational progress of the last decade has been in the direction of advancing the inter- ests of an ideal which shall give to American youth a better preparation for occupation, citi- zenship and manhood. Under proper direction, with a conscious aim, the ideal may be at the same time attained of a riper democracy which shall mean liberty for the worker in production, equality for the citizen in government, and fra- ternity for man and woman in association. THE MAKING OF THE CITY The new civic spirit found expression not only in the training of the citizen, but in the making of the city. The training of the citizen in the making of the city takes place, first, through municipal reform. While the majority of citizens are influenced more by objective accomplishment than by the improvement of political machinery, their faith in themselves is stimulated by the reform of political method. A decade ago the average thoughtful citizen was despondent. The inner political conditions were like the external material conditions — chaotic. That complacency which is character- istic of American public life caused the citizen to acquiesce in a situation which was to his own shame, because he was accustomed to abuse the professional politician, who had come to be re- garded as a necessary evil. The increasing prosperity which gave the leisure and the culture for social reform facili- tated municipal reform. The external improve- ment of the cities became imperative, and the growth of public activities made municipal reform not only indispensable but possible. The American has always attached too much 33 34 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT importance to political machinery, and has mis- spent his time as a citizen in devising and revis- ing charters, when he would have made greater progress by trying more diligently to accom- plish public work with the imperfect machinery. He still places reliance upon automatic methods, and consequently the record of municipal reform during the last decade, while very creditable as compared with all the previous history of the country, is nevertheless an account of municipal experiments undertaken too often in ignorance of the accomplishments of other communities. From the year 1893 the activities of muni- cipal reformers begin to be consciously directed toward a goal which is determined by an ex- change of experience rather than a blind grop- ing in the dark. The seemingly spontaneous development of municipal leagues and the in- troduction of civil service reform, are really the result of the diffusion of information regarding the experiences of the different American cities. The result, however, is a movement which is spectacular in the rapidity and extent of its development. In 1893 the first good govern- ment conference was held, leading to the or- ganization of the National Municipal League. In 1894 civil service reform was introduced into New York City, an example followed by THE MAKING OF THE CITY 35 Chicago in 1895. Thus recent are the begin- nings, of a movement which it would take vol- umes to chronicle. The merit system now prevails in all the large cities of New York State and in many other states, from Massa- chusetts to California. The accomplishments of Mayor Quincy in Boston, of Mayors Strong and Low in New York, of Mayor Pingree in Detroit, Mayor Jones in Toledo, Mayor John- son in Cleveland and equally significant per- formances elsewhere, are indicative of a change in the tone of American municipal life. Even more important perhaps is such a transforma- tion as has been effected in the city council of Chicago. The second city in the union has not, hitherto, been able to boast of a mayor whose deeds would bear comparison with those of the heroes of other cities, but a small group of citi- zens, through the Municipal Voters' League, have converted a microscopic minority of hon- est aldermen into an aggressive two-thirds majority. The significance of this change as contrasted with that of New York is that the power remains in the hands of the popular representative body, and reliance is not placed upon that vain source of safety — a beneficent despot; a method which brought such dis- appointment to the metropolis in the person of Mayor Van Wyck. 36 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Recent occurrences give abundant cause for discouragement, but Minneapolis and St. Louis and Pittsburg are developing a social con- science, and municipal progress will unques- tionably result. The words of our kindly critic, James Bryce, are no longer true; municipal government is not the one political failure in America. The present position and prospects of the American cities encourage the belief that it is from the urban communities that the force will come which will make democratic govern- ment possible. No city outside of Pennsylvania is as corrupt as the rural districts of that state or Delaware or Rhode Island, and the corrup- tion of Pennsylvania cities is the product of state politics. Deplorable as is the condition of many cities, imperfect as is the government of the best cities, the record of progress in the decade is a proud one, and compels the belief that the cities will be redeemed. The chief con- firmation of this comes from the imperative demand for municipal reform, in view of the progress in the making of the city. The con- ception of city making is a newer one than that of municipal reform. While the city cannot be properly made without a clean and efficient government, the process of making it continues in spite of political imperfection. There is not always a clear ideal of the completed city to THE MAKING OF THE CITY 37 give to the builders, and many of the processes will have to be repeated; but as success is achieved in executing details, the conception will be forced upon the citizen that nothing but a complete ideal for the construction or recon- struction of the whole city will satisfy. The first thing to be done in any community is the next thing which can be done, but we are gradually learning that a knowledge of the thing which ought to be done will in time pro- duce better results. Logically the first consideration in the mak- ing of the city is topography. Commercial, residential, and aesthetic values depend upon a proper use of the topographical advantages. The seaport town has rare opportunities in which other cities are deficient. No American city has achieved the distinction of Venice in the use of its situation, but many of them show an imperfect appreciation of their location. Charleston, South Carolina, has a Battery Walk bordering its bay; Portland, Maine, has an esplanade overlooking the water approach ; Boston has within a decade reserved over five miles of ocean frontage for purposes of beauty and recreation; New York has its historic Battery reaching out into the salt-laden waters. Among the river towns, few have shown proper respect for their chief source of eco- 327138 38 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT nomic and artistic success. Detroit has pro- vided Belle Isle Park in the midst of its beautiful river, and is building its semi-circular boulevard system from river to river. St. Paul has similarly devoted Harriet Island in the Mississippi River to recreative purposes, and is developing a great boulevard system on both banks of the Father of Waters. Springfield, Massachusetts, is entering upon a new era in showing regard for the dignity and beauty of its stream. The cities built upon the hills have been less regardful of their advantages. San Francisco, with a situation unparalleled in America, has probably the maximum of un- sightly architecture to the square mile, partially redeemed by the dignified union ferry depot which makes a magnificent entrance by way of the main thoroughfare, Market Street. Two of the most beautifully situated cities in America are Cincinnati and Pittsburg, both of which disfigure the hills with hideous structures and defile the valleys with soot, while at the same time they are entirely without apprecia- tion of the importance of their river frontage, neither Pittsburg nor Cincinnati possessing a dignified dock or other beautiful water ap- proach. The cities which are located in the plain must rely on the railway company for commerce, and landscape architecture for THE MAKING OF THE CITY 39 beauty. Perhaps the most successful of such cities is Indianapolis, which is still too sub- servient to its railway companies to permit of its possessing proper terminal facilities, al- though in planting its trees and its public parks it has given promise of a fine appreciation of long vistas over a flat country. The greatest success which we have attained in the use of topographical advantages is to be found in Washington, which will receive a fuller dis- cussion in a subsequent chapter. A river approach often makes necessary and possible bridges which may adorn the city that they serve. The monumental example is the Brooklyn bridge, which, if not beautiful, is dignified as seen from the water, especially in contrast with the new and hideous iron struc- ture north of it. The high bridge over the Harlem in New York is probably the most beautiful iron bridge in the country, and en- courages the belief that if the bridge engineer were to consult the architect, many of our cities would not be so sadly disfigured. The stone bridge over the Harlem is also worthy of men- tion, although its chief function is that of carry- ing the Croton aqueduct. The Cabin John bridge in the District of Columbia is another of the notable stone structures of the country. Zanesville, Ohio, Waterloo, Iowa, Indianapolis, 40 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT and other cities equally scattered, have achieved distinction by constructing concrete bridges, giving a wider span than stone, with greater economy. Particularly in the case of the three- armed bridge at Zanesville great beauty has been added to economic achievement. Among the great cities of the country which are not yet awake to the possibilities of bridges might be mentioned Philadelphia, Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Louisville, St. Louis, St. Paul and Minneapolis, not one of which has a bridge which does not disfigure the stream it spans. All cities which are not seaports are under the necessity of attaching great importance to the railway approach. The opportunity for beauty is as great as that for utility in the union railway station. The co-ordination of railways is perhaps best accomplished in Bos- ton, in which the admirable service is very un- worthily treated from an architectural stand- point in the South Union Station, although some degree of success has been achieved in the North Union Station. The great union station of St. Louis is the most conspicuous in the country, but its architecture is as compli- cated as its service is unsatisfactory. Several of the railways in Chicago have recently united in the construction of a mas- sive and rather dignified building which imme- THE MAKING OF THE CITY 41 diately overlooks the elevated railway loop, and succeeds in retarding the possibility of even a sectional union railway station in Chicago for fifty years. Many of the suburban stations of the chief American railways, like those of the Boston & Albany, Pennsylvania, the Chi- cago & Northwestern, and the Chicago, Mil- waukee & St. Paul railways have made worthy architectural contributions to the cities through which they pass. The greatest success has, however, been achieved in the union railway station at Providence, Rhode Island. The rail- way tracks are elevated, avoiding grade cross- ings; the station stands above a great plaza, which slopes toward the city, upon which are also located, the Soldiers' Monument and the city hall. One of the chief streets, accom- modating an important car line, runs under the station, and the other trolley lines terminate in loops on the plaza. All the transportation facilities of the city are co-ordinated, and the station overlooking this great open space has as a background the beautiful capitol building of the state of Rhode Island. No department of city making has wit- nessed such marked progress during the decade as the functions connected with the streets. Ten years ago few American streets were well paved, and fewer were clean. The typical 42 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT street of the progressive city today is broad, well paved, frequently cleaned, free from poles, well lighted, tree-lined in the residence dis- tricts, and provided with underground systems of conduits, water and sewage pipes. The newer streets of the older cities are commonly as broad as all the streets of the newer cities. Thus provision is made for abundant light, and, if need be, shade trees and lawns. Several cities, such as Columbus, Ohio, Denver, and Indianapolis, in paving these wide streets, have reduced the area devoted to traffic and increased that reserved for planting, so that a consider- able amount of parking is found on either side of the street. The increase in the area of paved streets is the most striking improvement of the decade, eclipsing even the great change due to electric traction. A visit to a city from which one has been absent for ten years furnishes the most convincing evidence that this is the first civicj advance in the majority of American cities. Many communities, of course, have indulged in miles of paving which has proved worthless, so that long before the close of the decade they are compelled to repave or endure a condition which is worse than the primitive one. Chi- cago, Detroit and other cities which have freely used cedar blocks laid on boards have been the THE MAKING OF THE CITY 43 most recklessly indulgent in useless paving. These cities are now mending their ways, following the example of New York, Phila- delphia, Washington, Buffalo, Indianapolis, and other places, where, chiefly through the use of asphalt, a substantial and easily cleaned pavement has been extensively laid. The ex- perience of the decade indicates that while the surface must be varied to suit the traffic, it is a matter of less importance than was at first sup- posed. The twofold principle finds universal acceptance now, that a solid foundation covered by a surface kept constantly in repair, gives not only a practical but an ideal pavement. A marked improvement has also been effected in the character of sidewalks, the brick of the East and the boards of the West both yielding to cement, to the great advantage of the street in both convenience and appearance. The substantially paved street demands other material improvements. The advantage, even the necessity, of trees, may be illustrated by a journey from New York to New Haven. The treeless monotony of the New York tene- ment and apartment house districts suggests inevitably a different kind of life than that which may be enjoyed on the beautiful streets of the " Elm City." The example of Washing- ton, Louisville and minor cities in entrusting 44 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT the care of the street from building line to building line to the public authorities may well be followed by American cities generally. Too often, however, the American city, forgetful that great haste may mean less speed, sup- plants the trees by telephone and trolley poles, contributing to the scenery in the absence of foliage the exasperating and superfluous bill- board. These are reactionary steps incon- sistent with the progress to be seen in other public activities, and endured only under the guise of commercial prosperity. The trolley was perhaps inevitable, but it will undoubtedly yield to a superior mode of transit, as we come to have a higher regard for the beauty of the thoroughfare. The electric light, telegraph, telephone and other poles, are made unneces- sary by the perfection of the conduit, which is being introduced even in the smaller cities. If the bill-board does not defeat itself by bank- rupting the advertiser, it will certainly sooner or later convince the consumer that it is an unnecessary extravagance. The legislation of Boston and Chicago is already menacing the bill-board companies, and in Boston, by the Copley Square decision, with regard to sky- line, the courts have actually taken cognizance of aesthetic matters, and it will not be much longer necessary to prove that bill-boards may MM p J 9 5 • .J^^M Hb' "ill m ■i *" ^ — ■** 9 fi fi£~ N THE MAKING OF THE CITY 45 damage life or property, in order to eliminate them. While these superstructures in the streets are being found unnecessary, there is a con- stant development of substructures. Some of the wires are being carried in conduits in- several hundred American cities. The under- ground trolley is in successful operation in New York and Washington. Water and gas pipes and sewers are found under most of the streets in the well-constructed cities, and occa- sionally subways suggest the correlation of such functions in galleries, the logical method of the future. With the multiplication of these subterranean structures the regulations regard- ing the breaking of pavements become more stringent, and some cities are moving toward the construction of passenger subways like those of New York or Boston, or freight tun- nels, twenty miles of which are to be found in Chicago. The housing of the people in American cities has received little attention as a social question, although a great improvement has been made in domestic architecture during the last ten years. While the standard has risen gradually in the houses of both rich and poor, the more beautiful buildings of the better resi- dence streets often lose much of their beauty 46 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT by juxtaposition with unsightly structures. What Mr. C. R. Ashbee has called the anarchy of American architecture is in evidence on almost every residence street. Innumerable " styles " abound, a sky-line is seldom observed, a building line is difficult of enforcement, and the custom prevails in most cities of making the front of the house immoderately ornate, and treating the sides and rear as if they were invisible. The limitation of the sky-line on Copley Square in Boston, to which reference has already been made, will do much toward establishing a precedent for concerted action in American cities. Boston is also leading now in the general restriction of excessively tall buildings. Chicago enjoyed an important limitation on the height of sky-scrapers for several years, until the council yielded to the fanciful cry of shortsighted landlords, and per- mitted the renewal of the custom of erecting buildings regardless of the width of the street, so that when they are confronted by buildings of similar height the middle stories depreciate in value. In no phase of American life is the improvement more conspicuous than in do- mestic and commercial architecture, but as yet there is no* architectural tradition and no social conscience which may be relied upon to make city streets harmoniously beautiful. THE MAKING OF THE CITY 47 The lack of unity in American architecture is quite as conspicuous in public as in domestic buildings, but there have been some achieve- ments in municipal architecture in the last decade which may challenge the admiration of the world. The record is unfortunately en- cumbered with the twenty-five million dollar extravagance which Philadelphians know as their municipal buildings, and the classic muni- cipal mausoleum of San Francisco, not to men- tion innumerable instances in minor cities. The development of a historical perspective ac- counts not only for some of the most ambitious attempts, especially at colonial architecture, but also explains the preservation of such ancient and beautiful structures as Independ- ence Hall in Philadelphia, once the home of the city officials, the city hall of New York, and the delightful old Manor House which contains the municipal offices of Yonkers. That tradi- tion may be embodied in a new building is demonstrated by the beautiful colonial court- house of El Paso County at Colorado Springs. Happily the city hall is not the only muni- cipal building and the multiplication of beauti- ful libraries, art galleries, schoolhouses and even fire and police stations, is the best guaran- tee that ere long all public architecture will be beautiful. Mention was made of the increasing 4 8 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT attention being given to the architecture and decoration of school buildings in discussing " The Training of the Citizen." The most im- portant public building is the schoolhouse, be- cause each neighborhood contains one and the future citizens are consciously or unconsciously receiving there the aesthetic ideals which will guide the coming generation. The entire com- munity is educated by the possession of such high schools as grace Menomonie, Wisconsin, Duluth, New York, or Washington, but the chief importance of the schoolhouse is in its influence on a neighborhood. Some of the recent school architecture in St. Louis is su- perior to that of any building devoted to art in America, not even excepting the classic gem which adorns Buffalo's chief park, for that is exotic, while the very problem of the school almost compels such originality as has been exhibited in St. Louis. Quite tiny communities enjoy today the benediction of a beautiful schoolhouse. Ando- ver, Massachusetts, vies with Highland Park and Winnetka, Illinois, and Montecito, Cali- fornia, in such provision. Even these small places are not content any more than are the larger cities, with buildings merely utilitarian and beautiful in architecture. The interior decorations and the setting are now given con- THE MAKING OF THE CITY 49 sideration, the splendid example set years ago by the Medford, Massachusetts, high school leading to the elaborate mural paintings of some of the newer Chicago schools. A mere catalogue of public architectural accomplish- ments would serve to fire the enthusiasm of the public-spirited citizen, but even that is too long for tabulation here. One may recall, how- ever, the triumphs of the Boston Public Li- brary, the Library of Congress, the New York Appellate Court, the Baltimore courthouse, the Cincinnati city hall and the still uncom- pleted capitol buildings of Rhode Island, Penn- sylvania and Minnesota. Scarcely less important than the public buildings are the monuments and fountains which may adorn the city streets. The great- est of these antedate the decade, such, for ex- ample, as the Washington monuments in Balti- more and Washington, the Shaw memorial in Boston, St. Gaudens's " Lincoln " in Chicago, the Soldiers' Monument in Indianapolis, and the effective street decorations of the national capital. Such worthy additions as the Farragut memorial in Madison Square, New York, the Labor monument in San Francisco, the Chinese missionary memorial arch in Oberlin, and the pergola, erected by the Chicago Woman's Club 50 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT on North State Street betoken the lively inter- est manifested in municipal art. The realization of the city's plan requires not only the knowledge of the details which has been acquired during the last decade, but also concerted action toward a well-defined goal. The spectacular instances of Boston, Washington and Harrisburg will be discussed at length in subsequent chapters. There are three features of city planning which are more frequently considered : civic centers, boulevards and pleasure grounds. The beauty of public buildings may be lost and their utility to the city diminished unless they are appropriately grouped. Several American cities are begin- ning to appreciate the convenience and charm of such grouping as one finds in Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Stuttgart, and the southern European cities generally. Mayor Low proposed a scheme for locating a great municipal building and terminal railway station on the Brooklyn bridge side of City Hall Park in New York City, and a similar but more satisfactory plan has been suggested for the borough buildings of Brook- lyn. On the initiative of the Cleveland Cham- ber of Commerce, an ambitious and beautiful lake front plan is about to be realized in the chief city of Ohio. The public library is housed in temporary quarters awaiting the con- THE MAKING OF THE CITY 51 summation of this project which includes a great "mall" lined by the chief public build- ings of the city, stretching from the business center to the lake, where it will overlook the harbor and union railway station. The new capitol buildings at St. Paul and Providence have fired the imagination of public-spirited citizens and public officials so that the new approaches are but the beginning of city reconstruction. The Municipal Art Society of Hartford has made a special study of civic centers with a view to the grouping of public buildings about the Connecticut capitol and Bushnell Park. A modest plan is suggested for Syracuse, where the completion of the Car- negie Library and the construction of the court- house at the intersection of several streets make a civic center possible. Chicago's new lake front park, which is to contain the Columbian Museum may also make provision for such a grouping of public buildings, as it already con- tains the art gallery and is bordered by the pub- lic library. One of the most promising of recent projects is the scheme of the Chautauqua authorities for beautifying the summer city by the lake, according to a co-operative plan of architect, landscape architect and sculptor. The comprehensive plan in city building, ambitious as it is, spreads with a wholesome 52 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT contagion. Philadelphia is opening up a vista of its monster city hall to Fainnount Park, giv- ing for the first time a dignified approach to one of America's most famous and beautiful pleas- ure grounds, and involving the reconstruction time various civic bodies and patriotic citizens of a portion of the heart of the city. At the same are proposing the redemption of the Schuylkill river banks and other hitherto undreamt of improvements. Pittsburg possesses in its county building one of Richardson's master- pieces, the best of the modern public buildings in Pennsylvania. It is planning now to raze the slum north of the courthouse, thus at once providing a beautiful setting for the great pub- lic building, which has been overshadowed by encroaching skyscrapers, and establishing a nucleus for the civic center of the future. The new federal building in Indianapolis has been so well located with reference to an adjoining public square and the thoroughfares and other public buildings of Indiana's capital that a new era in civic architecture is heralded. Buffalo has achieved at one stroke, through the inspiration and skill of a local architect, George Cary, one of the most spectacular pieces of city reconstruction in the new century. Its original plan was excellent, great avenues radi- ating from the harbor, but with the increasing THE MAKING OF THE CITY 53 importance of steam locomotion and the stupid or accidental location of the railway stations on undesirable sites, the business section of the city- has come to have no logical relation to the city plan. For years a futile discussion has been in progress regarding the possibility of a union railway station, petty private interests and pub- lic incompetence having conspired to produce innumerable inadequate schemes. Mr. Cary proposed the location of the station at the point where the great avenues converge, giving a connection between the water and steam ap- proaches, on the one hand, and interurban and urban transportation, on the other. At the same time the transformation of the triangle before the station into a public park, and the reconstruction of that whole area of the city, make possible a new civic center and restore the original admirable city plan. From the Atlantic to the Pacific the idea is taking root that unrelated improvements are necessary and desirable in the first civic awak- ening, but inadequate if the public can be educated to the value of correlation and com- prehensiveness. The Lewis and Clark Cen- tennial Exposition at Portland will do for the Pacific cities what other expositions have done for the East. Prophetic of the future were the civic congress, to which eastern experts con- 54 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT tributed, and the organization of a league of Pacific coast cities, in the inspiring environment of the towers and turrets, the water courses and heights of Portland. Mr. Rufus M. Steele says of San Francisco: The first practical fruits of the new feeling came on September 29, 1903, when the city voted bonds in the sum of $17,771,000 for improvements. An analysis of the amount is interesting. The items which consti- tuted it were these: $1,000,000 for a new City and County hospital ; $7,250,000 for a new sewer system ; $3,595.°°° f° r new schoolhouses and play-grounds ; $1,621,000 for repairing and improving streets; $697,- 000 for a new county jail and improving the Hall of Justice; $1,647,000 for a public library building; $741,- 000 for children's play-grounds ; $330,000 for acquiring land to connect Golden Gate park and the Presidio ; $293,000 for acquiring lands for Mission park. The Supreme Court having upheld the validity of these bonds, they are now upon the market, and their con- version into cash marks the commencement of work upon the improvements. No phase of city making speaks more elo- quently of the change in American ideals than the growth of parks, playgrounds and boule- vards. For many years such cities as Brooklyn and Philadelphia have boasted of the posses- sion of a great and beautiful park, and Chicago has been noted for its public driveways, but within the decade the idea has developed that not acreage or mileage, but distribution is the THE MAKING OF THE CITY 55 standard to guide park commissions. The park, the playground and the boulevard are now seen to be organic parts of the city — the respiratory system, perhaps we may say. The finest appreciation of this fact is found in Bos- ton, New York and Washington, which will be described in subsequent chapters. It may suffice here to give Chicago as an illustration of the city undergoing a change of heart regarding its pleasure grounds. The old park and boulevard system encircled the old city, and because of its forming a peripheral system, forty miles in extent, the facts were overlooked that since it was laid out thirty years ago the inner wards had become fright- fully congested without being relieved by even small playgrounds, the connecting avenues had been largely surrendered to trolley lines, and beyond the limits of the park system the city had more than doubled in size. The city is now trying to redeem itself by providing muni- cipal playgrounds in the congested wards, eight being already in use; by establishing a system of small parks where breathing spaces are most needed, $4,500,000 having been already appro- priated ; by extending the present park system so that the business center and other neglected districts may be served ; and by establishing an outer zone of rural parks in the suburban 56 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT regions. During the last two years Chicago has added over a thousand acres to its park sys- tem, which for thirty years had remained sta- tionary at an area which was smaller than one park of Philadelphia, Lynn, or Los Angeles. No fewer than fourteen parks and playgrounds are being established on the South Side alone this year. The achievements of other American cities in park-making during the decade are even more encouraging. Indianapolis, Louisville, Cleve- land and Kansas City have developed admir- able park systems of from 1 ,000 to 2,000 acres, fairly well distributed, and Louisville has also beautiful drives and eight playgrounds. Toledo has a park system of over eight hundred acres, which includes eight large parks and numerous small squares and triangles as integral parts of the city's plan. The parks of some of the minor cities have such rare beauty that the time cannot be far distant when the public will be so affected by their significance that the cities will be made equally beautiful. Such cities are Hartford, Connecticut, Watertown, New York, Mansfield and Youngstown, Ohio, Riverside, Illinois, Elkhart and Richmond, In- diana, Pueblo, Colorado, and San Jose, Cali- fornia. Already the delights of the parks and boulevards of Minneapolis and St. Paul have THE MAKING OF THE CITY 57 permeated the public mind until the treatment of the entire river front of the twin cities is being considered, and St. Paul proposes a union of that plan and the civic center scheme, con- necting the magnificent new capitol building and the post-office with the municipal buildings and the river. The making of the new city will mean the making of a new citizen, and the process is in no sense visionary. Almost every American city is already infected with the new ideals, while some of the leading cities are far ad- vanced in their realization. The crude con- ceptions of an earlier generation, which planned city streets with the rough precision of the ploughman's furrows, have been transformed by the experience of the decade. The compre- hensive plan of the temporary White City is the standard for the aesthetic and material re- construction of Washington, Boston, and Harrisburg, as it will be of cities generally when the newer citizenship has learned the art of city making. "THE WHITE CITY" AND AFTER The significance of expositions as models of city making is beginning to rival their im- portance as institutions for popular education in commercial and industrial processes. This was overlooked in the Centennial exposition of Philadelphia, which was a mere congeries of shelters for works of scientific and artistic ex- cellence. It has also been ignored in the suc- cessive Paris expositions, for the art of city making is in Paris an accomplished fact. Paris is not only a city of spectacles, it is itself the world's greatest modern spectacle. Hence when Paris holds an exposition it must be an integral part of the city, which would otherwise eclipse the temporary show. The exposition site is logically along the Seine, the great cen- tral artery of the city- The temporary exposi- tion buildings have as a background the per- manent and noble public buildings of the French capital, to which each exposition has contributed one or more lasting monuments. In the waters of the Seine, the verdure of the boulevards, the harmony of architectural ac- complishment; here are already the elements of the greatest and most beautiful expositions. 59 60 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Our American cities are lacking in unity of purpose and harmony of design. The desire for immediate pecuniary results, the dominance of commercial motives, the assertiveness of powerful individuals, lacking artistic education, and the scorn of public supervision have made of the typical American city a miscellany of dingy warehouses, tawdry shops, squalid tene- ments, tasteless mansions, usually monotonous but sometimes variegated streets. There is not unity, but neither is there pronounced individuality, only restlessness. The sole example of comprehensive treatment dating from an earlier period, is Washington, which possesses unparalleled opportunities, but can never quite obliterate the mistakes of nine- teenth-century ignorance. Aside from the capital city, which will be considered in a sub- sequent chapter, the epoch-making achievement in the execution of a comprehensive plan was the Chicago World's Fair of 1893. For the first time in American history a complete city, equipped with all the public utilities caring for a temporary population of thousands (on one day over three-quarters of a million), was built as a unit on a single architectural scale. The rare site by the irrides- cent waters of Lake Michigan, the wonders of science, the glories of art, the beauties of archi- " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 61 tecture, the fraternal spirit of the world's con- gresses, are all accessory to the chief signifi- cance of the Columbian Exposition as the memorial of the discovery of the New World — the making of a new city, the White City. The White City came in the fulness of time; its elements were necessarily in existence in other cities, as its executives, architects, artists, builders and engineers were success- fully plying their callings elsewhere, but no- where had they united in a common purpose for the immediate achievement of a compre- hensive result. There was nothing unique in the World's Fair but the White City itself. Previous expositions had shown great collec- tions of art. Steam and electricity, invention and discovery had been displayed to the world before, if not on so large a scale. The indus- trial, social and intellectual accomplishments of the nations were known at least to the student. The Yerkes telescope had had predecessors. The Ferris wheel was not so imposing as the Eiffel Tower. Even the architecture, in its temporary brilliancy, did not rival the great buildings of this or other countries. The talented leader of the new architectural school, who designed the very original Transportation building, had already achieved greater distinc- tion in the Chicago Auditorium and other con- 62 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT spicuous successes. The scuiptors and mural decorators had had no such opportunity before, but their talents were well known and their products legion. The excellent work of en- gineers and landscape architects was the result of the great improvements which had been going on in the various cities of the country. The White City was unique in being an epitome of the best we had done, and a prophecy of what we could do, if we were content with nothing but the best, and added to individual excellence a common purpose. The White City was the most socialistic achievement of history, the result of many minds inspired by a common aim working for the common good. There was no loss of individuality, no place for indi- vidualism. The individual was great but the collectivity was greater. Never before in our history had architects and artists so great an inspiration. Architecture, sculpture, mural decoration reached their zenith, because all was done in the name of the nation, to glorify four hundred years of public progress. More than that, the Chicago World's Fair was a miniature of the ideal city. The situation was as beautiful as that of Venice. It was in fact the realization of the possibilities of the site of Chicago. Both the Black City and the White City were lapped by " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 63 the waves of Michigan whose blue-green waters penetrated deep into the heart of each city. In the one case the waters were bordered by ugly docks and warehouses, spanned by hideous bridges, and defiled by the city's foulness, while they flowed under a murky sky. In the other, they were lined by fairy architecture, immacu- late docks and strips of verdure and crossed by graceful bridges, while the clearness of an azure sky found reflection in the pure waters. The White City was the symbol of regenera- tion. The municipality which would redeem itself must begin by a realization of its topo- graphic advantages. Chicago has been slow to learn this lesson, but the significance of the Columbian Exposi- tion, at the beginning of the decade, is being seen at its close. The South Park commis- sioners have not only treated Jackson Park as the site of the World's Fair deserves, but they are now spending two million and a half of dollars on the improvement of the lake front in the heart of the city. The day is not far dis- tant when a beautiful park will penetrate a half a mile into Lake Michigan. The trustees of the sanitary district have turned the waters of the lake into the Chicago River with the result of obvious purification. They are now adding to their achievements, in the name of com- 64 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT merce, by supplanting the old swinging center- pier bridges by vastly superior rolling lift bridges. To complete the evidence of the impression made by the White City, the Mu- nicipal Art League, city officials, commercial organizations and private citizens are gaining ground daily in the abatement of the smoke nuisance. The regard for the fundamental importance of topography was also shown in the treatment of the transportation problem. A great pier stretching out into the lake was traversed by a moving sidewalk which carried visitors to the boats plying between the city and the Fair. Electric launches and gondolas on the lagoons provided a delightful means of reaching almost any part of the Exposition, exhibiting the pos- sibilities of water transportation in cities located on waterways. Connection was also made between the pier and all other parts of the grounds, including the railway stations, by an intramural elevated railway operated by electricity. The steam and elevated railways from the outer world reached the extreme southwestern portion of the grounds with a minimum of inconvenience, and the stations were designed to be embellishments rather than the traditional disfigurements of many cities. The transportation service was efficient but " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 65 subordinate. So in all the other public func- tions nothing was done to detract from the beauty and harmony of the White City. Few American cities are as well paved and none as well cleaned as was the ephemeral city of 1893. The substantial macadamized roads were laid as though they were to serve the next genera- tion but were cleaned as though there were to be no tomorrow. The nightly cleaning was followed by the watchful care of the day sweepers, both being aided by the admirable grading of the roads, which invited the assist- ance of nature. Here was the one flaw in the sanitary arrangements of the World's Fair — the drainage was into the lake, contributing to the pollution of the water supply of Chicago and the Fair. The provision for water, both for domestic and public uses, was adequate to the needs of the various buildings, the numer- ous restaurants, the public comfort stations, and the street cleaning and fire departments. There was even a concession let for the supply of Waukesha water by a pipe line, which challenged the faith of the incredulous. The electric light, telephone and telegraph wires were carried in conduits, and the other subter- ranean constructions were so laid that the street paving remained undisturbed subsequently. The disposition of the wastes of the Exposition 66 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT would have satisfied the officials of Glasgow, while the police, fire and ambulance stations were like the services they made possible, ac- cording to the best American methods. These municipal functions were so organized that while the public was served the methods were inconspicuous. The utilities were never neg- lected, indeed they were better cared for than in any city, but the dominant note of the Expo- sition was constantly the aesthetic. There never was a better demonstration of the fact that proper regard for the utilitarian is the best guarantee of the beautiful. The positive elements which united to make the White City an imperishable memory con- sisted of two natural features and the dual contribution of man's hand ; water and verdure, architecture and sculpture. Even in the case of the former there was the happy demonstra- tion that man may add to the beauties of nature as he did in the graceful road bordering the lake, the walls about the lagoons, and the judi- cious landscape architecture of the grounds. It was an inspiration which led to the retention of the wooded isle in the midst of the spaciousness of the Fair, where on the lawns, under the trees, and beside the still waters of the lagoons one might find rest from the kaleidoscopic interests of the Exposition. " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 67 There was great and discriminating beauty- given to the grounds by the sculptural deco- rations. Not only the massive statue of the republic, the MacMonnies fountain and the great figures on the Administration building, but also the heroic animals guarding the ap- proaches to the bridges and other minor works of art gave a satisfaction which the most skil- fully adorned cities of the Old World could not excel. Yet the grand triumph of the White City was the Court of Honor, where the great- est ideal of modern city making received its unrivaled demonstration — architecture and water, great buildings on a single scale grouped about a lagoon, massive sculptural embellish- ments entirely subordinate to the main features. The focus of the White City was, quite properly, the Administration building, sug- gestive once more of a cardinal principle in city making. The structure's great dome over- looked an ample plaza facing the lagoon, with the MacMonnies fountain in the foreground, and beyond was balanced by the Peristyle, the gateway of the city, before which stood the giant statue of the republic. The lagoon was flanked by the greatest buildings of the Fair, which with their differing architecture and varying size, including the huge Manufactures building and its dominating roof, nevertheless 68 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT were constructed on a single scale and pre- sented a marvelous harmony. Whether by day or by night the Court of Honor was a model for the guidance of all cities. In the glare of the sun the great white buildings still kept their irresistible fascination, for the coolness of the lagoon and fountains relieved their brilliancy; under the light of the moon one could feel him- self transplanted to the world of romance ; but it was when illuminated by electricity that the Court of Honor became the apotheosis of man's ingenuity. As Mrs. Schuyler Van Rensselaer has said : At Chicago we realized for the first time what im- pressive poetic, witching beauty may be created by the use of artificial light. In one sense it is not an artistic beauty; in another it is; for it is created by the hand of man, although with one of nature's agencies and can- not fully reveal itself except upon an elaborate archi- tectural background. And it is the one kind of beauty that modern men have evolved without any help from tradition or precedent. It is the one kind of beauty that we possess and that the ancients, so greatly our superiors in the production of many other kinds, knew nothing whatever about. The full majesty of the Court of Honor and its greatest revelation to the makers of cities came on Monday, the 9th of October, 1893, when in celebration of the twenty-third anni- versary of the burning of Chicago, 761,942 people paid admission to the grounds and " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 69 nearly half a million souls must have been at one time within view of this great central area of the Fair — many more than the entire popu- lation of Chicago at the time of the fire. Then the human mass gave life to the beautiful court with its background of majestic architecture, and man's latest civic triumph had been achieved. But the end of the Court of Honor was as humiliating, if not as ghastly, as the conflagration of Chicago. It was consumed by fire, but may it not have been a purifying fire, destroying the dross of staff and wood, that in the foundations of this great human achieve- ment may be founded the art of permanent city making? The influence of the Columbian Exposition has been felt not only in new architectural and constructive efforts in public buildings, parks, and streets, but also in subsequent expositions. The idea of unity through the harmonious grouping of buildings constructed on a single scale has been realized in every exposition since 1893, notably at Omaha and Charleston. The success of this method is apparent to every ob- server, although he may not understand its cause or purpose. It has been explained from the architect's standpoint, in writing of the Pan-American Exposition, by Mr. John M. Carrere, chairman of the Board of Architects : 70 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT One of the most important factors in the harmony of the entire artistic composition, which are generally felt but not understood by the layman, is what the artist calls scale, by which is meant the proper propor- tion of detail to the masses, and the proper relation of these masses to each other and of the whole to the human stature, so that each building may look its actual size, and each part of the building may in turn bear its proper relation to that size. It must be apparent to any one that to maintain the scale in a composition of this character, conceived, studied, and executed in a very short space of time, under the most difficult conditions and by different architects, constitutes a real difficulty, and yet the entire harmony of the composition, from the artistic point of view, would suffer in no case more than in the lack of scale. For this reason the main effort of the Board of Architects has been to maintain this scale in every part of the composition, whether in the buildings, the grounds, the sculpture, or the color. This is the achievement in exposition mak- ing- which is of the first importance in its influence on city making. One cannot, how- ever, overlook the fact that the freer use of sculpture and fountains in our American cities, the improvement of parks, especially formal squares in the heart of the cities, and the great development of mural decoration, in the last decade, received a marvelous impetus from the successful treatment of all these arts in the White City. If the World's Fair of 1893 taught unity, " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 71 the Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo in 1901 exemplified the possibility of variety in unity. Not only was there greater individual- ity and picturesqueness in the architecture, but there were added to the scheme the forces of color and light, partly to differentiate it from the Columbian Exposition, and partly to carry out the idea which was also expressed in the sculptural decorations — all indicating, at once, the local significance of Buffalo and the co- operation of the Pan-American nations. Never before in the history of the arts in America has there been such a free use of symbolism. In all of these distinctive features of the Buffalo Exposition, it will be seen that while the influ- ence of Chicago was pronounced, the authori- ties were unusually successful in departing from the Chicago tradition and contributing valuable original elements which may prove just as useful in the art of city making as the fundamental contribution of Chicago. If they did not quite achieve the harmony of the World's Fair, they at least avoided the mo- notony of the typical city. At the same time they expressed most happily the significant ideas of the Pan-American Exposition — the " Summer City," designed superficially for the temporary entertainment of visitors, and seri- ously to emphasize the significance of Buffalo 72 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT with its dependence upon the waters of Lake Erie and Niagara, but above all the value of commercial federation of the nations of the two continents. In the realization of these conceptions the practical work of engineer, architect, sculptor, painter, and landscape-architect, was most sig- nificant for the guidance of the makers of cities. The location of the Exposition on the edge of the park, upon a piece of bare ground, unre- lieved and unadorned, without help or hin- drance from nature except by the use of the park as a beautiful approach, suggests the possibility of the " city beautiful " on any site, however forbidding, if it is designed on a com- prehensive plan. The board of eight architects agreed " that the exposition should be formal in plan and picturesque in development, and that the style of the buildings should be of the Free Renaissance; that apparent roofs with overhanging eaves should be used in preference to flat roofs with cornices and balustrades ; that color and decorative sculpture should be intro- duced freely into the treatment of the build- ings, and that the character of the Exposition should be as gay and festive as possible, so that it would be a holiday affair." While there were several entrances to the grounds, as is the case with every city, empha- " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 73 sis was laid upon a chief and a secondary entrance. The majority of visitors by street car or boat reached the central avenue of the Exposition over the Triumphal Bridge; so that, as the spectator approached, the plan de- veloped gradually, until on reaching the bridge he gained a view of the complete picture, the symbolic sculpture in the foreground, the build- ings to the right or left of the Esplanade, also full of hidden meaning, and the whole con- verging toward the Electric Tower at the apex of the composition. No feature was more sig- nificant for the municipal architect or engineer than the dominance of the Exposition grounds by the Electric Tower, the result of a complete triumph over natural obstacles. The entrance to the grounds was conditioned by the relation of the city to the park approach. There was, therefore, only one possible location for the crowning feature of the Exposition, whereas it was found from the survey that the base of the Electric Tower was two feet lower than the grade level of the Esplanade. In order to lead up gradually to the most impressive element in the composition, it was necessary to fill in the grade, to produce a gradual incline from the Esplanade to the rear of the tower, giving a rise of ten feet in a distance of one thousand feet. The difficulty of this was increased by 74 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT the well-known fact that such a tower seems to depress the ground on which it stands. The care given to the execution of the general scheme was no greater than that bestowed upon all the details; so that every element from the most heroic sculpture to the minor flower beds proved to be consistent with the general scheme, in spite of the greatest variety and individuality. The scheme of sculptural decoration was not merely to have beautiful figures at con- venient points for the relief of monotony or the emphasis of bridge approach or formal garden, but was primarily symbolic. The architectural completeness of the Columbian Exposition was rivaled in the complete harmony of the Pan- American scheme of sculpture. On the left of the Esplanade were buildings housing exhibits of natural resources — forestry, mining and horticulture; on the other side government buildings, suggesting our people and our insti- tutions. The farther group was devoted to machinery and transportation, electricity, manufacture, and the liberal arts — buildings in which the genius of man found expression with the aid of the two previous elements, nature and the institutions of the country; in- vention, industry, and ingenuity were here the motives for the painter and the sculptor. Be- " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 75 yond these buildings were found the entrances to the Stadium and the Midway — suggesting the lighter side of life — sports and amuse- ments. The Electric Tower, with the display of water and its influences, suggested an alle- gorical representation of the " Great Waters." Second only in importance to> the sculptural decoration, and more significant to' the average visitor, was the use of color. Here was achieved the great differentiation between the Columbian Exposition and the Pan-American. The style of architecture being the Free Renais- sance, gave a suggestion of gaiety and vivacity impossible in the classic lines of the World's Fair, and made easy the use of color, which was especially consistent with the recognition of the various nations contributing to the Expo- sition. The color scheme followed the general plan of treatment observed in architecture and sculpture, which began with the elemental forces of nature and the activities of primitive man. At the entrance to the grounds, there- fore, primary colors were used, and the colors became more refined, until they reached a cli- max in the ivory-white, green, and gold of the Tower, which dominated the color scheme as it did the architectural, suggesting the break of the emerald-green waters over the crest of Niagara Falls. 76 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Not content with this rare combination of architecture, sculpture and color, the Exposi- tion authorities achieved another great success in the use of electricity. Again there is a suggestion for the practical work of the mod- ern city. The unparalleled beauty of the Expo- sition illuminated was in no way inconsistent with the successful lighting of the roadways for the sake of facilitating traffic. Although the most novel feature of the illumination was the use of eight-candle power electric lamps, giving an unusual diffusion of light, brilliant but not dazzling, nevertheless the arrangement of lights in clusters near the roadways gave ample illumination for practical purposes. By an ingenious mechanical arrangement, the lighting was so manipulated that the current was applied gradually; so that the process of illumination was as fascinating as the complete result. The harmonious use of water in the fountains and especially in the Electric Tower completed this marvelous application of mod- ern science to artistic achievement. There was nothing at the Pan-American Exposition comparable to the majesty of the Court of Honor of the " White City;" but for both practical and artistic purposes the Expo- sition at Buffalo had many unusual excellences. It was compact, it possessed a variety in its " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 77 architecture and sculpture more consistent with the diversified elements of the actual city. It employed a symbolism more refined, while it inaugurated an illuminating system more suc- cessful, than that at Chicago. It was indi- vidual, picturesque, often even startling. Yet it was entirely harmonious and practical. It demonstrated that there need be no loss of individuality in collective activity. It is inevitable that comparison should be made between succeeding expositions, and the task of each new group of exposition makers is increasingly difficult, if their aim be chiefly differentiation, although the problems are greatly simplified by the experiences of their predecessors. The eyes of the country, indeed of the world, last year turned toward St. Louis. The area of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition was greater than that of Chicago ; more money was appropriated for it; a fuller representa- tion of foreign nations in its exhibits was secured; some new features were added, such as a great building devoted to education and social economy and a "Model Street;" the topography, with the beautiful background of bluffs, facilitating the cascades which gave the chief decorative effect, and the entrance through the beautiful Forest Park — all made great possibilities for the St. Louis World's ;8 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Fair. To those who' had not seen the exposi- tions at Chicago or Buffalo', the use of the topo- graphical advantages, the grouping of the buildings, and the rare municipal exhibits, scattered though they were, gave valuable sug- gestions in city making : but there was nothing comparable to the Court of Honor at Chicago or the Esplanade at Buffalo; there was nothing unique, like the harmony of the buildings at Chicago, or the color, light, and symbolism of Buffalo. The fan-shaped plan of the main group of buildings gave an opportunity for curved streets not found in other expositions and unfortunately absent from most American cities. The focus of this plan in the cascades was a brilliant success, particularly at night, but the arrangement lacked balance. There was no complementary feature opposite the cascades, where the grand entrance made a glorious lost chance, meanly supplanted by a private concession, the Tyrolean Alps. The intrusion of private interest, or unwarranted public influence, was also apparent where the intrinsically beautiful Deutsches Haus ob- truded upon the harmony of the general archi- tectural plan. Indeed, one found it easy to accept the doubtless unjust insinuations of the hypercritical that the influence of concession- " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 79 aires and possible political preferment played a larger part than patriotic ambition. The loose- ness with which the Exposition authorities managed the affairs is well illustrated by the plans for the Model City. The idea of a "model city," proposed by Mr. Albert Kelsey, of Philadelphia, to whom the work was intrusted, was the most unique suggested to the Exposition authorities, and gave the Fair a fuller advertisement than any other idea advanced. Yet it was treated with a niggardliness which was not only ungenerous but stupid, since it might have been the most instructive feature in the Exposition, as well as a distinctly remunerative one. Certainly its groupings of buildings about a typical city square, with the graphic representation of methods of street and subterranean construc- tion, and the handling of municipal services, promised to guide the student not only to an appreciation of the Model City itself, but of the larger exposition in which the same principles were exemplified. After much buffeting at the hands of Philistine directors and brutal interference from the burly contractor who supervised the architecture of the Exposition, Mr. Kelsey and his associates succeeded in grouping half a dozen buildings representing the contributions 8o A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT of as many cities, along a "Model Street" which satisfied so incompletely the ideal of the "Model City" which he had projected that it was satirically dubbed " the muddled street." This might seem symbolic of American muni- cipal accomplishment, but happily a little group of people gathered inspiration from their at- tempted epitome of city construction and the valuable municipal exhibits of Germany and other countries, unsystematically distributed throughout the Exposition, to propose the res- cue of the best of these things from the fiasco of the Model City for the establishment of the Municipal Museum of Chicago, the most ad- vanced step thus far taken in the graphic demonstration of the art of city making. It is entirely possible to conduct an exposi- tion giving chief emphasis to the triumphs of commerce and industry, as was amply demon- strated at Chicago and Buffalo, but when the motives are exclusively mercenary, the intel- lectual and social interests will either be tinged by sordidness or neglected. As has been said, the ideas of comprehensive planning, designing buildings on a single scale, effective grouping and well-advised street construction and super- vision, all proved instructive to the visitor to St. Louis who failed to see the Columbian or Pan-American Exposition. The accomplish- " THE WHITE CITY " AND AFTER 81 ments of Chicago and Buffalo have been so great that it is difficult even for the cupidity of exposition officials to cause absolute failure. Inevitably many able men are employed as architects, sculptors, engineers, and executives, and each new exposition contributes to the edu- cation of the citizen in the science and art of city making. Each exposition has its special spectacles, some transitory, some permanent. Philadel- phia gained an art gallery and a horticultural building; Chicago, the Art Institute, the Co- lumbian Museum and various minor buildings of more than passing value; Buffalo its his- torical building and art gallery, the most beautiful public buildings in the city, and St. Louis has been enriched by notable additions to the embellishment and equipment of the new campus of Washington University and an art gallery in Forest Park. Yet all of these per- manent perquisities of the city are eclipsed by the education the citizens are receiving in the art of city making, through the admirable con- struction and management of these successive expositions. If emphasis has been laid upon the mean- ing of the objective features of expositions, it is not with the intention of ignoring the educa- tional value of the commercial and industrial 82 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT exhibits and the interchange of ideas in the congresses. The external aspects of the expo- sitions are, it is true, incidental, but so is municipal life as compared with the industrial world. It is the art of living after the means have been provided, but it is also the need of the moment. In commerce and industry we have triumphed. We enjoy national pros- perity; we have an increase of individual leisure ; we have a multiplication of communal wants. Life is fuller, but we need a back- ground. We are tired of polluted air and water, dirty streets, grimy buildings and dis- ordered cities. From the " White City " to the " Ivory City " the lesson has been impressed that ugliness and inconvenience for the present and the future, will yield to the magic power of the comprehensive plan. The individual gains comfort and the community beauty by uninter- rupted co-operation. METROPOLITAN BOSTON The spectacular attempts to secure con- certed action in the realization of a common plan in city making are those of Boston, New York, Harrisburg and Washington, which will be considered in this and the three succeeding chapters. By one of those coincidences which mark the crystallization into material results of ideas which have been in common circulation, the Metropolitan Park Commission, of Boston, was appointed in the same year that the World's Fair of Chicago was exercising its beneficent influence in the demonstration of the value of a comprehensive plan. The following year the Metropolitan Transit Commission was created. The metropolitan park and transit systems represented the solution of problems more complicated in several respects than those solved by the World's Fair. They were applied not to one community but to many, were ap- plied permanently instead of temporarily, and were but the extension of a movement for municipal co-operation which had already taken form in the Metropolitan Sewerage Com- mission. The sewerage and transit commis- 83 84 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT sions were born of necessity, but the park sys- tem was the result of an inspiration. All three, as well as the subsequent Metropolitan Water Commission, mark a significant step in advance in the recognition of the value of holding be- fore the modern municipality a great and even remote ideal, which shall serve, however, in the guidance of the municipal authorities in minor and immediate details. The Metropolitan Sewerage Commission, a body appointed by the governor of Mas- sachusetts, was a product of the peculiar condi- tions of Boston and its suburbs which have per- petuated the independent government of the towns about Boston because of the strong local spirit in the traditional town organization. Absorption has taken place in the case of some of the nearer communities which were neces- sarily and inevitably integral parts of the Bos- ton district. But the outlying towns, separated by natural barriers, or strong enough to be self-sufficient, like Cambridge and Brookline, have clung with tenacity and pride to their independent municipal governments. That they should feel a superiority to Boston, based upon actual excellence in municipal adminis- tration, makes the metropolitan organization all the more significant. It is a compromise of METROPOLITAN BOSTON 85 local and central governmental authority in the interest of co-operation. The population of these towns has grown at a more rapid rate than that of Boston, while the entire urban community has increased so rapidly in population in the last two decades that questions of sewage disposal and water supply have grown difficult in an accelerating ratio. Like all the other large cities of the world, Boston's outer zone has increased at a rate far beyond that of the old city. It is quite possible, and perhaps desirable, to satisfy the local needs of street paving and cleaning, schools and libraries, and to some extent recre- ative institutions by local effort, but the wants which are common to the district and are de- pendent upon topographical and geographical conditions become impossible of local solution in some of the less favorably situated com- munities. In any case a common satisfaction of the public needs is economical, even for the more fortunate towns, because of the uniform difficulties of the problems and the greater power derived from co-operation. This is the compensation enjoyed by the great city of today with its complicated tasks — that with the increasing magnitude of public problems comes an added power of solution, both pecu- niary and scientific. 86 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT It was appropriate, therefore, that the plans of municipal co-operation which have proved so successful in Boston should originate in the necessity for a better system for the disposal of sewage. The streams which abound in the metropolitan district have both utilitarian and aesthetic values of growing importance on ac- count of the annual additions to the population. The only completely successful method of pro- tecting them is by a united effort of the inhabi- tants of the whole district in the prevention of pollution. The recommendation for a metro- politan sewerage system came in 1887 from the Massachusetts Board of Health, a fact which may have determined the character of the organization of this and subsequent metro- politan commissions. The plan of creating state boards, while it has been superior to the unrelated efforts of the individual communities, has not proved entirely acceptable. The feel- ing prevailing among these communities, with a long and successful experience in local self- government, tends to the belief that frequent appeals to the legislature for the solution of local problems is undesirable. But no ade- quate method has been suggested as yet for the organization of independent municipal authori- ties for the conduct of the affairs of the entire metropolitan district. METROPOLITAN BOSTON 87 The State Board of Health reported its plan for the treatment of the sewage of the Boston district in 1889, and the same year the Board of Metropolitan Sewerage Commis- sioners was created. Within the next ten years the main features of this great project were accomplished. Three related systems of sewers for the collection of the sewage of the district connect with two outfalls into the waters of the Atlantic Ocean, providing for the needs of twenty-two cities and towns. The three systems follow the valleys of three rivers of this great urban community — the Mystic on the north, the Neponset on the south, and the chief river of the region, the Charles, in the intermediate area. The Mystic and Charles river systems were constructed simultaneously, but the latter was completed by 1891, it being only eight miles in length, whereas the former, known as the North Metropolitan System, em- bracing all of the territory north of the Charles River and having a total length of nearly fifty miles, requiring the operation of four pumping plants, was not completed until 1896. In that year the construction of the Neponset Valley system was begun, which was put in operation over its total length of eleven miles in 1898. The total cost of these great public improve- ments, including the surmounting of many 88 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT engineering and legal difficulties in the thickly settled districts, was less than $7,000,000. When it is remembered that provision is thus made not only for the population of one mil- lion included in the towns of metropolitan Boston, but that connections can easily be made for the increasing population of subsequent years, and that the area is as great as that of the city of Chicago, this expenditure seems small for an adequate system of sewage dis- posal, in comparison with the forty millions Chicago has put into its drainage canal, with millions yet to be added before the problem will be solved as successfully as it is done in Boston. The idea of a comprehensive treatment of the problems of an urban district continued to grow in favor with the population of the met- ropolitan area until it took form in the appoint- ment of the Rapid Transit Commission in 1 89 1, the Metropolitan Park Commission in 1892, and the Metropolitan Water Commission in 1895. The first commissions dealing with the questions of parks and rapid transit were purely for purposes of investigation, the com- missions having the authority for the execution of these plans being appointed in 1893 and 1894 respectively. The investigations of the Rapid Transit Commission not only resulted METROPOLITAN BOSTON 89 in the co-ordination of all the transportation facilities of Boston and suburbs, but revealed the conditions of the population and the char- acter of the topography which was of inesti- mable value in dealing with the subsequent metropolitan problems. The inquiries of the commission covered the growth of the urban population in the past and its probable growth in the future, the harbor facilities, railway ter- minals, surface, underground and overhead rapid transit. The report was a model of scien- tific vision and accuracy, and naturally sug- gested that with a solution of the transportation problems the meeting of other communal wants would be made easier. The congestion which was revealed in the surface cars of Tremont street and the lack of co-ordination of the steam and electric lines bore testimony to the fact that the population was outgrowing the facilities for living. The Rapid Transit Commission performed not only an economic but a sociological func- tion. It convinced the dreamers as well as the practical men that the life of Boston was metropolitan. It had come to be a fact of seemingly prophetic significance that Boston's traffic doubled every decade. The steam rail- ways had reached the limit of capacity in suburban service, and while the electric lines 90 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT were extended into the outlying districts their increasing patronage only served to intensify the congestion in the narrow, tortuous thoroughfares of Boston. Rapid transit was a misnomer when the multitudes brought within the city limits by improved steam and electric facilities found these same facilities defeating' their own ends by unsatisfactory termini. The Transit Commission provided for the co- ordination of the steam railways into two ter- minals, connected with each other and with the business district by improved surface lines and an elevated road. To aid these connections and at the same time unify the trolley lines from all parts of the metropolitan district, while relieving rather than adding to the congestion of the downtown streets, the municipal subway was devised. Not only was this the first American attempt at underground urban trans- portation, but it was unlike any of the Euro- pean subways in that its aim was not to' provide rapid transit by tunnel but to focus the exist- ing surface lines in the business area, besides relieving from street railway tracks the chief business thoroughfare, Tremont Street. The original subway was only a mile and a half in extent, but it served, within one year of its opening, the needs of one out of four of the patrons of the electric railways. METROPOLITAN BOSTON 91 When the elevated railway was added to the equipment of Boston's transit system the subway became severely taxed. Meanwhile there had been such an increase of traffic that, to relieve the congestion of Washington Street, the railway company which leased the subway from the city proposed that tracks be again laid in Tremont Street and that it be given per- mission to build another subway. Happily the education of the citizens by experience had proceeded so far that, in spite of the under- handed methods of the West End Railway Company, the public insisted that municipal ownership which had proved so successful in the first subway be applied to the second, and that the beauty of Tremont Street be undis- turbed. With the addition of the new subway and the East Boston tunnel, now in operation, fur- ther steps have been taken in the solution of the traction problem in Boston, but the task is never-ending. The growth of population in- evitably keeps ahead of the provisions for transportation. Nevertheless, Boston has es- tablished some principles of great value to other communities : the municipal ownership of subways, the removal of street-car tracks from the main business streets, the substitution of through trolley routes from every portion of 92 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT the city to every other for the antiquated method of downtown terminals, and the co- ordination of the chief lines by a system of universal transfers. The forces which made possible the metro- politan park system of Boston were the success of the activities of the Metropolitan Sewerage Commission, the establishment of the Massa- chusetts Trustees of Public Reservations, the revelations of the census of 1900 and statistics of the Rapid Transit Commission, the growing sense of unity due to the subordination of local differences for the sake of metropolitan advan- tages, and the vision of Sylvester Baxter and Charles Eliot. It is not often that such a suc- cessful administrative plan can be applied to material conditions so promising, under the guidance of a municipal statesman as far- seeing as Baxter and a technical expert with the combination of practical and imaginative qualities possessed by Charles Eliot. The plan of organization had been perfected, the men to execute it were available, and the topography was ideal in its possibilities. The conditions were made still more auspicious by the fact that the metropolitan organization of sewage dis- posal, rapid transit and water supply directly facilitated die work of park extension. Some of the most notable areas to be reserved were METROPOLITAN BOSTON 93 those bordering on streams that it was to the interest of the water commission to preserve, and in the preservation of which they were aided by the sewerage commission. At the same time the distribution of the population by the activity of the transit commission made a larger area available. The United States census of 1880 was able to credit Boston with but 106 acres of park space for a population of 363,000, or one acre for each 3,424 inhabitants. Metropolitan Bos- ton today, with a population of a million, re- joices in the most extensive park system in the country, including not fewer than 17,000 acres, twice as many as New York with a larger area and over three times as many inhabitants, and five times as great a park acreage as Chicago, with a similar area and twice as many inhabi- tants. Chicago's ratio of population to park acreage has increased from 281 in 1880 to 571 in 1903, Boston has reduced the number of people to each acre from 3,424 in 1880 to 58. This greatest of municipal accomplish- ments of the decade is largely due to the imag- ination, the enthusiasm, and the persistence of one man, Charles Eliot, in suggesting the organization of the Trustees of Public Reser- vations. He wrote a letter to Garden and Forest (February 22, 1890), in which he said: 94 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Within ten miles of the State House there still remain several bits of scenery which possess uncommon beauty and more than usual refreshing power The end to be held in view in securing reservations of this class is wholly different from that which should guide the state commission already suggested, and the writer believes this different end might better be attained by an incorporated association, composed of citizens of all the Boston towns, and empowered by the state to hold small and well distributed parcels of land free of taxes, just as the public library holds books, and the art museum pictures for the use and the enjoyment of the public With amazing rapidity the idea grew in popular favor, the legislature authorized the preliminary investigation commission, the sur- veys were completed, the lands acquired, and, within a decade, not only the broad plans but the chief details had been more than realized. On October 6, 1892, Charles Eliot wrote: As I conceive it the scientific " park system " for a district such as ours would include (1) spaces on the ocean front, (2) as much as possible of the shores and islands of the bay, (3) the courses of the larger tidal estuaries, .... (4) two or three larger areas of wild forest on the outer rim of the inhabited area, (5) numer- ous small squares, play-grounds, and parks in the midst of the dense populations. To the general principles thus laid down, Charles Eliot added specific suggestions, as landscape architect of the Metropolitan Park METROPOLITAN BOSTON 95 Commission. His proposals included the ac- quisition of five miles of ocean frontage, both banks of the Neponset, Charles, and Mystic Rivers within the district (as far as they had not already been appropriated for commercial purposes), the Middlesex Fells on the north, Stony Brook Reservation on the west, and the Blue Hills on the south. These, together with the connecting boulevards and the Lynn Woods on the north, the property of the city of Lynn, would make a girdle of parks and park- ways about Boston. Within seven years, by the expenditure of ten million dollars, these areas, to the extent of 10,000 acres, had all been added to the pleasure grounds of the Boston metropolitan district. They include, in the river reservations, the most extensive inland boating privileges enjoyed by any American community; in the 5,000 acres of the Blue Hills, the highest point of land within view of the Atlantic Ocean, from Maine to Florida, and the largest municipal pleasure ground in America; and in Revere Beach, the greatest public bathing facilities in the United States. These metropolitan parks have not pre- cluded the establishment of parks and play- grounds by the local communities. Boston possesses the athletic fields, beautiful drives 96 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT and sylvan retreats of Franklin Park, and the playgrounds of Copps Hill, Wood Island, and the Charlesbank, as well as the historic Com- mon and Public Garden, the most centrally located of American open spaces. Cambridge has undertaken extensive river front improve- ments; Lynn continues to enlarge its woods; and other suburbs testify by local expenditures that their treasuries and enthusiasm are not exhausted by the labors of the Metropolitan Park Commission. The provision of a metropolitan water supply was no less significant than the other co-operative accomplishments of the Boston district. Its importance was twofold; it gave further illustration of the possibility of realiz- ing a comprehensive plan, and it facilitated the work of the other commissions. According to the Massachusetts Board of Health : The average daily consumption of water in the metropolitan district for the year 1894 was 79,045,000 gallons, the average daily capacity of the sources now in existence for the supply of the district is only 83,700,000 gallons ; that is to say the average supply is only 4,655,- 000 in excess of the actual needs. The supply was not only near exhaustion, but the population was rapidly growing. It was necessary for the authorities to anticipate not only the growth of those cities which found METROPOLITAN BOSTON 97 it immediately convenient to co-operate with the commission, but also the needs of Cam- bridge, Brookline, and some minor cities which felt satisfied with their local supplies, but which would inevitably find advantage in drawing from the metropolitan sources. It was neces- sary, therefore, to secure a water-shed which would supply the needs of a population of from one to two millions for a decade or two, with a possibility of extending the facilities as the needs became greater. Looking far into the future and considering the desirability of se- curing uncontaminated sources of supply, re- moving the necessity of filtration, the board of health recommended the extension of the Nashua, Sudbury, and Cochituate systems by the construction of a great reservoir having a capacity of 63,000,000,000 gallons, which would make a total supply of 173,000,000 gallons a day, and thus double the capacity of the existing sources in the metropolitan district. The Board of Health has so well anticipated the needs of the district and the character of the supply that even those towns which had been quite content with their local systems are uniting with the metropolitan district. Thus the Massachusetts metropolis secures not only an admirable supply of water in sufficient quantities for the needs of its growing popula- 98 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT tion for many years to come, but in the protec- tion of the contributing streams provides for the enjoyment of the population some of the most beautiful watercourses in the country. One has not exhausted the accomplish- ments of metropolitan Boston in speaking of those services which are performed co- operatively for the benefit of the entire district. The people of the metropolitan area share the benefits which come from an enlightened public spirit, making a comparison of public institu- tions easy and facilitating the borrowing of ideas. Thus the excellent school system of Brookline exerts a beneficial influence on the schools of Boston, which have also profited by the initiative taken by Brookline in the estab- lishment of children's playgrounds in 1872, and a public bath-house in 1895. The first proposal for a vacation school was at Cam- bridge in 1872. In the words of the report of the Board of Education : For two months in the summer the schools are closed ; the children who are taken into the country profit by the vacation, but it is a time of idleness, even of crime, with many who are left to roam the streets. Our system seems to need vacation schools in which the hours and method of study should be adapted to the season. The first vacation school in Massachusetts METROPOLITAN BOSTON 99 and the second in the United States was estab- lished in Newton in 1888, and again Cam- bridge contributed to the progressive affairs of the metropolitan area, when, in 1900, there was secured from the city council an appropriation of two thousand dollars for the maintenance of the vacation schools. Boston has profited by these experiences and now provides a mu- nicipal subsidy for vacation schools. In the architecture and decoration of public-school buildings, and in the treatment of their grounds, Boston has also been the beneficiary of the suburban districts. All of these, as well as many other forces, have found subsequent ex- pression in Boston, where they are enjoyed not only by the local inhabitants but are available for the suburbanites as well. Boston now has under the supervision of its unique Bath Department public baths and gym- nasiums, including the most extensive summer provision of any city in the country. In the report for 1901-2 the bath trustees say: The Institutions Registration Department of the city has shown that, during the past ten years, there has been a decrease in the number of juvenile arrests of from 12 to 20 per cent. The report ascribes this marked change in a considerable degree to the manifold efforts which are made throughout the city to turn youthful energy and spirits into healthful channels. It cannot be doubted that the most important agency in this direction is the work done by this department through the various ioo A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT bathing beaches, floating baths, play grounds, the Dover Street bath-house, open for use all the year round, and the gymnasia with their systematic class work lasting throughout the winter season. The equipment of the Bath Department in- cludes three great bathing beaches, that at L Street stretching for 900 feet along the beach and containing a thousand dressing-rooms, with three separate divisions, one for women and girls, one for men, and one for boys, open day and night every day in the year. This bath is not only unique in providing facilities every hour in the year, but it has the distinc- tion of being the first of America's public bathing beaches, having been opened in 1866. In addition to these beaches there are fourteen pools and floating baths and five gymnasia, provided with winter bathing facilities, besides the large Dover Street bath-house. The patronage of all these institutions reaches a total of over two and a half million men, women and children. It is not surprising that a community which has solved so many local problems well should have been a pioneer in other directions in the extension of public advantages. The citizens of Boston enjoy an exceptionally well-adminis- tered system of compulsory education, includ- ing excellent parental schools. While the methods of teaching still suffer from the in- METROPOLITAN BOSTON 101 cubus of New England tradition the equipment of schools compares favorably with the best schools elsewhere. Several schoolhouses are now provided with gymnasia and bathing facilities; the decoration of the buildings and the cultivation of the grounds receive increas- ing attention; playgrounds are in general use; and the number of school gardens has grown to twenty. It will not be forgotten that Boston pos- sesses the chief American municipal library, nor that the magnificent building which houses this extensive collection of books is decorated with the best specimens of mural painting we possess. The treatment of Copley Square, on which the library faces, is the best evidence of the quality of that public life which has given Boston the most democratic administration of the larger American cities. It is a centrally located, triangular square, bounded by three of the chief thoroughfares, and faced by the public library, the New Old South Church, Richard- son's masterpiece, Trinity Church, the art gal- lery, and a number of dignified private struc- tures. One of the last, an apartment house, was constructed in violation of the sky-line established for Copley Square, and while tedi- ous litigation was necessary for the protection of the aesthetic standards established by the 102 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Boston authorities, the public interests have finally triumphed. It was no mere quibble which led to the prosecution of a landlord, who by virtue of a doubtful public document, undertook to carry out the caprice of erecting a building which should by a few feet of elevation do violence to good taste and the public will. It was stern insistence on the superior importance of the public good and merited rebuke of the typical impertinence of private interests. It was the same spirit which asserted by peaceful legal methods that the function of the railways was to serve the traveling public, and that the inter- ests of the community demanded the municipal ownership of the subway; the spirit which ignored the town boundaries and local jeal- ousies and provided water and sewerage sys- tems which would satisfy the needs of the metropolitan district; the spirit which inter- rupted the private vandalism that was desecrat- ing Boston's natural environment and conse- crated for all time great areas of natural beauty for the promotion of life and happiness ; it was the spirit which preserved the democracy of the old town meeting while it developed the latent power of co-operation in the modern metrop- olis. This civic spirit has made metropolitan Boston the most progressive of the greater American communities. GREATER NEW YORK " Splendid isolation," a phrase which has been used to characterize Great Britain, is descriptive of old New York City. It is as true of the civic and social life of the metropolis as it is of the topography of Manhattan Island. The waterways which have made New York the commercial center of the country have also caused it to be the most congested city in the world. The self-satisfied pre-eminence, due to its metropolitan character, has also produced the provincialism of New York. If it has grown rich because the world has thrust upon it the bulk of American commerce, it has grown great in ignorance and disdain of the world. Greater New York is doubtless due in part to the rivalry in growth of population of Chi- cago, but the greatness of Greater New York has been attained without the assistance of the example of other American cities, and indeed in spite of overlooking their experience. The achievements of the American metropolis, whose name is legion, are the results of methods which would have crippled or bank- rupted any other American city — a charter the most cumbersome and ridiculous in the United 103 104 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT States; the repeated domination of Tammany, reversing- for a time all the progressive cur- rents of the community, and a budget larger than that of London or Paris. The experience of New York is the greatest refutation of the fallacy that expenditure through taxation is only depriving the citizens of the benefits of private expenditure. Each succeeding admin- istration in New York has left the city with assets in the form of public improvements which citizens in their private capacity could never have secured, and which in spite of reck- less and unpardonable extravagance are the mile-stones of municipal progress. New York has long been the Mecca of the pleasure-seeker. It has also, through the machinations of Tam- many, served as a warning to other munici- palities. It must now be visited by the pro- gressive citizen who would see, in spite of methods which are to be condemned, that New York is one of America's most progressive municipalities. The crucial problem of New York is trans- portation. The topography of Manhattan Island makes an initial and almost insurmount- able difficulty. The transportation from the city to the residence districts was of necessity chiefly in one direction until methods superior to those of the ferry-boat and the bridge were GREATER NEW YORK 105 devised. This difficulty was intensified by the fact that New York is a commercial center and the people are seeking a single business district, instead of finding their way to factories in all directions, as is the case in the industrial city. Further difficulties were added by the cor- rupt methods of granting franchises to indi- viduals who had no purpose of improving the transportation service, but were gambling on the necessities of the population. The final obstacle in the way of rapid transit has come from the fact that there is a greater travel per capita in New York than in any other city of the world. Each year the surface and elevated railways of Greater New York carry more people than all the steam railroads of North and South America. The number of rides per capita has grown from 47 in i860, 1 18 in 1870, 182 in 1880, 283 in 1890 to 388 in 1900. The transportation difficulties are greater than in any other city, but the receipts are larger. Chi- cago has 518 miles of track, as compared with 300 in Manhattan, but the receipts per mile of track in Chicago are only $25,784, as compared with $65,983 in Manhattan. In spite of the magnitude of the problems and the fact that many of them fail of solution, there is the wealth with which they may be solved when the right methods are applied. 106 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Since the construction of the elevated rail- ways in Manhattan and Brooklyn and the East River Bridge, there had been no significant addition to New York's transportation facili- ties in a quarter-century. There have been im- proved methods, such as the substitution of electricity for steam on the elevated railways, the substitution of electricity for horses on the street railways, and the double deck ferry- boats of the Pennsylvania Company, but the addition of actually new transportation services is a twentieth-century accomplishment. How desperately New York needs these things may be seen by passing from the crowded East Side tenement district over the East River to the ample fields of Long Island, or by contrasting with the insufficient and inadequate horse-cars of lower Manhattan the plans for new East and North River bridges, subway tunnels to Brooklyn and Staten Island, and the great ter- minal facilities projected by the Pennsylvania Railway in the heart of Manhattan. The need of bridges and tunnels is shown by the fact that 540,000 people reach Manhattan Island by ferry every day, while the inadequacy of the original Brooklyn bridge is evidenced by its 150,000 patrons, each way daily, compared with the 142,000 who travel northward by the surface and elevated lines of Manhattan at one GREATER NEW YORK 107 hour in the evening, as estimated by Mr. W. W. Wheatley. New York has been very slow in recog- nizing the need of introducing entirely new transportation methods, and has been retarded by being oblivious to the progress of other cities, but, as is repeatedly the case, it is now about to grapple with the problem more vigor- ously than has been done elsewhere. It took ten years to persuade New York capitalists to embark in the elevated railway enterprises, which have proved so fabulously remunerative ; it took twenty years to persuade the authorities to begin the construction of a second Brooklyn bridge ; it required seven or eight years to con- vince unprogressive elevated railway executives that electricity was superior to steam. Yet Manhattan Island has a peer only in Washing- ton in the use of the underground electric con- duit in place of the overhead trolley, and the addition to the transportation services in the next ten years will be nothing short of marvel- ous. The new East River bridge adds eight tracks to the four on the present bridge, the third and fourth East River bridges will con- tribute twelve new tracks, the municipal rapid transit tunnel is to contain two tracks, and the Pennsylvania-Long Island Railway tunnel under the East River four tracks, making a 108 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT total of twenty-six new tracks under or over the East River, while under the Hudson River four tracks will be provided by the Pennsyl- vania-Long - Island Railroad tunnel and the New York and New Jersey tunnel. Thus the water boundaries of Manhattan will be tem- porarily obliterated. Before even the con- summation of these plans the new subway has provided underground communication to Har- lem, the beginning of a very elaborate system of subways enlarging New York's means of transportation so that now the population is carried at three levels, under and above the surface as well as on it. These great extensions, which for the first time give promise of relieving the frightful congestion of the tenement-house districts, are undoubtedly due to the stimulus afforded by the organization of Greater New York. The old-time inhabitant of Manhattan is still scorn- ful of the residents in Brooklyn and the other boroughs; but the citizenship of Greater New York is becoming conscious of the needs and possibilities of the larger city. The administra- tion of such a great territory and so vast a population is exceedingly difficult, and has not yet been successfully accomplished, but the in- centive is so great that administrative diffi- culties will be overcome. While Tammany may GREATER NEW YORK 109 assess these great bond issues for its private benefit, it will not prevent the realization of the magnificent plans due to the new civic spirit of Greater New York. If the commercial capital of the country- has surrendered its thoroughfares to street rail- way companies without regard to the welfare of its inhabitants, it has been more scrupulous in the paving and cleaning of its streets. New York has long been one of the most substan- tially paved cities in the country, and since the administration of Mayor Strong the cleanest of the larger cities. This reform mayor of New York had the wisdom to choose as the head of the street cleaning department a great Ameri- can soldier, skilled in military organization, while he was also an expert sanitary authority. Not only New York but all the other cities of the country have benefited from the scientific services of Colonel Waring. He substituted military discipline for the unregulated and un- productive efforts of Tammany's dependents. He introduced better methods of collecting and disposing of the city's wastes. He infused a new spirit into the men and changed the pub- lic's attitude toward them by the inspiration of improved processes and better results, not the least significant device being the spectacular one of putting the street-cleaning force into no A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT white duck uniforms. Whenever the white duck suit is seen in a city street today it is the symbol not only of municipal cleanliness but also of that city's obligations to the pioneer work of New York. The prerequisite of clean streets is good paving, and this New York possesses. The cobblestones which once disgraced it are gradu- ally being removed. It has more asphalt and more granite block than any other American city, and has them judiciously distributed. The great thoroughfares are well paved, but so are many miles of streets in the tenement districts, contributing not a little to the health and happi- ness of the slums. Manhattan is better cared for than the outlying boroughs, partly on account of tradition and partly because of the borough organization, which tends to restrict the diffu- sion of municipal benefits. Nevertheless the cleaning of the improved streets is carried over a greater area than elsewhere in America and the frequent cleaning of the business streets is almost unique. One of the fruits of Greater New York, it may be hoped, will be the extension to the other boroughs of the wide-spread movement on Manhattan Island for the removal of poles and wires from the streets. No trolley pole, and scarcely a wire, disfigures Manhattan ; the elec- GREATER NEW YORK in trie light, telephone and telegraph wires have been, for the most part, buried in conduits, and, in addition to the gas and water pipes, there are now subterranean constructions for the trans- mission of heat to the office buildings and pneu- matic service of the post-office. With the addi- tion of the subways beneath the streets the time cannot be far distant when there will be unifica- tion of the public underground utilities with great economy in construction and maintenance of both the services themselves and the street paving. In its water system Manhattan is also far ahead of the other boroughs. From the Croton watershed Manhattan has received by gravity a satisfactory supply of water for sixty years. The area under control has been enlarged several times, a second aqueduct has been built and a huge dam is nearing completion which will store all the available supply of that region. Still the population grows, and a few years ago it seemed necessary to look farther afield for subsequent supplies. The infamous Ramapo Company, which had secured from the legis- lature the control of the next natural sources, had nearly made a contract with corrupt Tam- many officials to furnish New York with more water than it needed at twice the cost of the municipal service, when Comptroller Bird H2 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Coler and the Merchants' Association inter- rupted the proceedings. The results of the agitation of this vigorous municipal officer and this unusually public-spirited organization have been great economies in the distribution of the present supply and extensive plans for enlarging New York's water system so as to serve all of the boroughs if necessary. The Merchants' Association set a noble example to organizations of private citizens elsewhere by subsidizing an investigation by experts at a cost of $25,000. It found that nearly half the water is wasted, and with better connections and meters it will be possible, from the present sources, to satisfy Manhattan's needs for some years. There remains, however, the problem of Brooklyn and the other boroughs. The Long Island areas tapped by Brooklyn are virtually exhausted, and in the future the Cro- ton system will have to be drawn upon. No- where will the consolidation of these munici- palities demonstrate the value of co-operation better than in the economy and excellence of the future water supply. In addition to an admirable water supply, New York enjoys supreme hygienic advan- tages in the salt waters which surround it and the sea breezes which refresh it. Nevertheless, the congestion of population and the large per- GREATER NEW YORK 113 centage of ignorant immigrants require an exceptionally efficient health department to keep the death rate down. This Greater New York enjoyed during the Low administration. Under Dr. Lederle's watchful supervision both the great and the minor conditions of public health were made more favorable. Mr. Had- den says: In 1901 the number of vaccinations in the city were 373,636; in 1902 there were 810,280. During the first six months of 1903 the cases of smallpox reported were 44 ... . the total number of deaths was 3 ; during 1901 the cases reported were 1,964 and the deaths 410. From the inspection of milk to that of school children's heads the activities of the department have been so energetic that while the death rate has been reduced to the lowest ever known the unpopularity of the health offi- cers has steadily increased. It will take some time to teach the people of Greater New York that the publicity given to vermin is the same which reduces the death rate from consumption by forty per cent. One of the most significant features of the health department of Greater New York is its successful co-operation with the other munici- pal departments. Perhaps no other city profits by such a co-operation of the work of police, street-cleaning and health officials, and cer- ii4 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT tainly no other enjoys, in addition, the newest of New York's progressive institutions, the tenement-house department. Although not so fundamental as the transportation problem, on which it depends, the housing of New York's population has been its greatest embarrassment and failure. In Greater New York 2,273,079 people out of a total population of 3,437,202 live in tenements. Some of the smaller areas of Manhattan contain the most congested spots on the planet. The problem seems almost in- soluble, yet the results of tenement-house com- missions, private and public investigations and exposures, are at last crystallized in a city de- partment, the first head of which has been one of the chief tenement-house reformers, Mr. Robert W. DeForest. What has already been accomplished in fire protection, sanitary regu- lations, moral control, and, best of all, plans for improved transportation, holds out the hope that vast improvements are within sight. The law has already been modified in favor of Brooklyn landlords and builders, Tammany is back in power, and brothels may again flourish in the tenements, but a new standard of health has been established, and those will fare ill who threaten it. All of New York's tasks are of such great magnitude that one may find both the best and GREATER NEW YORK 115 the worst conditions side by side. The neglect of years cannot be atoned for in one adminis- tration. This is nowhere truer than in the public-school system. It is a strictly modern obligation for a city to be responsible for the education of over half a million children. Only London has a task of equal magnitude. Conse- quently one finds in Greater New York anti- quated, foul, unsanitary schoolhouses, incom- petent school-teachers, illiterate children and indifferent citizens. But one also finds some of the finest school buildings in the world, the best paid staff of teachers, many of them of high abilities, new methods and equipment in many schools, manual training, physical cul- ture, kindergartens, vacation schools, free lec- tures, a commercial high school and a univer- sity, to name but a few of the progressive features. Among the distinctive features com- manding the attention of other communities are the universal provisions for play, required by law ; the play-schools in the summer time for which larger appropriations are made than in any other city; the commercial high school, the third in order of establishment and the most complete in the country; the ungraded classes for deficient pupils ; the evening classes, the recreation centers, the free lectures. Education must not be befogged with figures, but it cer- n6 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT tainly helps to state the problem to observe that there are enrolled in the New York schools nearly six hundred thousand children ; there is an attendance at the free lectures of over a million adults ; there was expended by the Board of Education in 1903 the sum of $23,- 000,000. The newer educational methods are subsidized, a great educator is the chief exec- utive, a minimum salary of six hundred dol- lars is established for primary teachers, but the incompetent teacher and the over-crowded classroom are still in constant evidence. It is not surprising that New York's schools are still defective and that some of the best features have recently been curtailed. Progress is diffi- cult with alternations of Tammany tyranny and Reform refinements. Under the circum- stances the system is astonishingly good. The New York schoolhouses are oi more service to the public than those of any other city. In the old buildings the newer equipment, such as laboratories, libraries, playrooms, gym- nasiums and auditoriums are improvised ; in the new buildings they are included in the architect's plans, but in all of the buildings they are found. Sometimes a basement playroom will be temporarily transformed into an audi- torium, occasionally a hallway will be so used, sometimes the playground will be on the roof, GREATER NEW YORK 117 when it may also serve as a roof-garden on summer evenings. The newer buildings, how- ever, make almost ideal provision for these necessities of the new education. The audi- torium is on the ground floor, with separate entrances for use in the evenings, the play- grounds are ample for boys and girls, the gym- nasiums are large, airy rooms with adequate apparatus and accompanying baths, the sani- tary devices are scientific, and the architecture and decorations artistic. One has not exhausted the popular educa- tional advantages of Greater New York in speaking of the public schools. The crown of the public-school system is the College of the City of New York, which makes such an auspi- cious advance in its new location in Harlem with its new and progressive president, Dr. John H. Finley. Two other universities of note, Columbia and the University of New York, are making more popular appeals under the stimulus of the City College. Columbia contributes to the common-school system in its Horace Mann training school and seeks a wider hearing among the public through its new university extension department. The Uni- versity of New York teaches practical patriot- ism through its widely celebrated Hall of Fame. A school system of the most progress- nS A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT ive kind is found in Dr. Felix Adler's ethical schools, providing from kindergarten to high school the most advanced facilities to be found in the East. Brooklyn adds to the educational endowment of the metropolis Pratt Institute and the Brooklyn Institute, the former furnish- ing the best training in industrial art in the country and the latter giving an array of popu- lar educational attractions to its patrons in the winter which is scarcely rivaled by the summer program of Chautauqua. * In Cooper Union New York has a public institution unique in America. At other places there are thousands of young people securing education at night in as many branches as are taught at Cooper Union. At other places popu- lar lectures are attended by great audiences and musical and dramatic recitals of the highest class are offered for small admission fees. But nowhere else is there a forum where the public questions are discussed as freely, the verdict given as fairly, and the multitudinous voice of the people registered as effectively as in the meetings of the People's Institute at Cooper Union. Little wonder is it then that Mr. Charles Sprague Smith's plan of a Hall of the People of great magnitude and convenience seems attainable. Walter Besant's dream of a Palace of Delight, which was so inadequately GREATER NEW YORK 119 expressed in the People's Palace in London, has promise of realization in Greater New York. Tammany may spurn the silk-stocking " Goo goo's," but as the great dumb wants of the people are vocalized with such increasing effectiveness the thunders of popular dis- approval may finally awe the Tiger. Under the joint patronage of state and municipality there is growing west of Central Park an enormous many-winged structure which houses the American Museum of Natural History. In addition to an excellent and elaborate collection of specimens from the ends of the earth, a great popular movement for scientific instruction is in progress there. The state provides a fund of $38,000 a year for illustrative materials, which are loaned to the schools of New York City and state. At the museum there are several auditoriums, used throughout the year, for the delivery of popu- lar science lectures, usually illustrated by the stereopticon. On the other side of the park is the Metropolitan Art Museum, containing the greatest of American art collections, and yet but one of the centers of art influence in New York. The latest and one of the greatest of New York's educational institutions is the united free library. Before the days of Greater New i jo A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT York the metropolis was very imperfectly equipped with libraries. It is now on the eve of opening to its inhabitants the most extensive library facilities in the world. The great classic structure which will hold the combined collec- tions of the Astor-Lenox-Tilden foundations is in process of erection at Forty-second Street and Fifth Avenue, on the site of the old reser- voir, overlooking Bryant Park. The sixty-five branches scattered at convenient intervals over Greater New York, made possible by the $5,- 200,000 given by Andrew Carnegie, complete the equipment of this enormous enterprise which is of course supplemented by the numer- ous smaller libraries of the other educational institutions. Already nearly two million books are accessible to the public without charge, and the circulation in the homes amounts to over four million volumes a year. New York is so huge that its expressions of civic art are almost necessarily diffuse or sporadic. Some of its most beautiful struc- tures, such as the old Tombs and the Fifth Avenue reservoir, have already disappeared. It still enjoys distinction from historic buildings, like the century-old city hall or the relics of the colonial quadrangle about Washington Square. But it has also notable new buildings and monuments, and no other city exhibits greater GREATER NEW YORK 121 ferment in municipal art. In addition to beau- tiful statues and monuments, too many of which are congested in Central Park, there are the dignified arches at the beginning of Fifth Avenue and the entrance to Prospect Park, Brooklyn, the appropriately decorated Appel- late Court House, which contains some excel- lent mural paintings, the beautiful bridges over the Harlem River, and the chaos of seemly structures, unfortunately unrelated, on Morn- ingside Heights. In spite of the difficulty of New York's problems, organizations of sculptors and archi- tects, national and local, the Municipal Art Society, the National Arts Club, the Municipal Art Commission and other groups are zeal- ously at work for the beautification of the metropolis. Perhaps no movement is so far- reaching in its possibilities as that for civic centers. The old city hall is one of New York's architectural treasures overlooking a delightful open space, City Hall Park. Plans for improv- ing the appearance of this area, while making adequate provisions for the municipal offices now largely located in rented quarters, include the removal of other buildings from the park and the erection of a great municipal building, which will not only provide all the office room needed but rival in height and dignity the sur- 122 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT rounding sky-scrapers. A similar plan for a civic center in Brooklyn, proposes a treatment of the borough buildings with reference to the bridge approaches, so that vistas of the chief public buildings would be enjoyed along the principal thoroughfares. There are very beautiful parks in Greater New York and there are a number of delightful open spaces even in the congested business dis- trict, but the total acreage is still inadequate and the distribution of the parks leaves crowded tenement regions parkless. Metropolitan Bos- ton has twice the park acreage of Greater New York, and has fifty-seven people to the acre compared with 440 to the acre in New York. There are three great natural parks in the borough of the Bronx, and Central Park and Prospect Park compare favorably in area with parks in other cities. New York needs, how- ever, larger rural areas on Long Island and Staten Island. Plans are now on foot to re- deem by public ownership portions of the sea- shore after the precedent established in Revere Beach, Boston. Jacob Riis has made the happy suggestion that Blackwell's Island be devoted to the recreation of New York's normal popu- lation instead of being used to imprison its defectives. This would give the metropolis one of the most beautiful parks in the world GREATER NEW YORK 123 in a location almost as central in Greater New York as the park of that name is in Manhattan. The neglect of earlier generations is par- tially atoned for, at enormous expense, in the playgrounds and small parks being established among the tenements. The most satisfactory of these, Seward Park, was completed in 1903, after being used tentatively since 1899 by the Outdoor Recreation League. After ten years of agitation the tenements were torn down to make room for this open space in the over- crowded Jewish quarter. Twelve months of inactivity then preceded its use by private phil- anthropy, which equipped part of the area as a playground and open-air gymnasium, fighting every year to prevent the Park Commissioners' turning it into a pasture. Finally Mayor Low authorized the use of half a million dollars, unexpended from the 1902 budget, to com- plete the park and playground. Including the expense of the purchase and destruction of the tenements, it has cost New York two million dollars for this recreation ground. This is no more than was spent for the Harlem speedway, and doubtless the experience with Central Park will be repeated, at least in a more modest way, the enhanced value of the surrounding property paying for the improvement. In addition to the parks and playgrounds, 124 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT New York provides out-door recreation for its population by recreation piers and public baths. The most economical, but one of the most satis- factory, of recreative institutions in a populous city on a waterway, is made by the construction of a second story to a steamship pier and equip- ping it for the shelter and amusement of the people of the neighborhood. At several points the refreshing breezes blowing over the North and East Rivers are thus made to serve the authorities in the entertainment of the public. The river baths of New York are patronized by millions, and ocean bathing will be one of the future provisions of the municipality, but the metropolis is just beginning to furnish bathing establishments open all the year. Nothing is more needed by the tenement popu- lation, and in few things has Greater New York been more deficient. New standards of hygiene and recreation are nevertheless so firmly established that the metropolis may be expected to forge ahead now that the way has been discovered. In Greater New York traditions are im- perious, innovations are scouted, public officials are presumptuous, and the people are patient. While Reform is still too attenuated to support an unpopular, though scrupulous, egotist as chief executive, New York always has a place GREATER NEW YORK 125 for the courageous and far-seeing reformer. Some of the funds of the hundred-million- dollar-budget will inevitably be spent by men of integrity and imagination who secure a pub- lic response, which neither corruptionists bent on graft, nor reformers intent on economy, can ignore. Superintendent Maxwell survives changing administrations and the public schools make new advances continually. Dr. Henry M. Leipziger's magnificent work of adult edu- cation is still heavily, if inadequately, subsi- dized. Mr. Charles B. Stover's heroic fight for the children against the criminals in the City Hall and the farmers on the Park Commission, has been won at Seward Park playground. Jacob Riis and others secured the destruction of the tenements where Mulberry Bend Park and Seward Park are, and will undoubtedly triumph in the effort to make Blackwell's Is- land a park. The Merchants' Association ham- mers away at abuses in the water supply, trans- portation and lighting functions, and municipal service advances while municipal spoils dimin- ish. Progress is slow and costly, but the seeds of a higher civic life are maturing in Greater New York. THE HARRISBURG PLAN Can any good thing come out of Nazareth? What can be learned from Harrisburg, the capital of the state so long bossed by Matthew Stanley Quay in the interest of the Pennsyl- vania Railway Company? Can any good thing come from under the shadow of the new state house, the disgraceful monument to collusion between corrupt legislators and a discredited Chicago architect? Can any good thing come from the city which has been the scene of the most flagrant interference with the right of local self-government that has ever been wit- nessed in America? In spite of the presence and influence of corrupt practices by corrupt bosses and corrupt corporations, Harrisburg is being regenerated and reconstructed with a promise of thoroughness which other cities must envy. After years of civic inactivity and bearing the burdens of a dishonored state, more than ten righteous men were found, chiefly as the result of the persistent and undismayed activities of a woman. Harrisburg is a typical American city, with the advantages and disadvantages of age. It is located on the banks of the Susquehanna, at 127 128 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT this point a great body of water a mile in width, dotted with islands, and flowing from the hills which are visible from Harrisburg. The city also possesses a creek which wanders through pleasant meadows and woods until it reaches the inhabited portion of the town. A range of low hills makes a happy background to this beautifully situated capital city. Bygone gen- erations have left some delightful old houses on quaintly pretty streets. Until quite recently there stood on an elevation in the midst of the city the fine old colonial capitol building, which, destroyed by fire, has now given place to the half-million-dollar mass of brick and mortar which Henry Ives Cobb erected in fulfilment of his agreement to furnish the second state in the union with an appropriate legislative hall. The passing generations have unfortunately left Harrisburg with something besides a beautiful natural environment and historic buildings. The river and the creek have been turned into open sewers; their banks have been used as dumping-grounds. The waters of the Susque- hanna, polluted by the sewage of half a million people above Harrisburg, have been served to the inhabitants through the public water sys- tem. The typhoid-laden water supply has too often come into houses already possessing im- perfect sanitary appliances and congested in THE HARRISBURG PLAN 129 their construction in a way unpardonable for a city of only fifty thousand inhabitants. The streets have been badly paved and consequently imperfectly cleaned. Parks and playgrounds for both health and recreation have been con- spicuously deficient. In fact, as has been said, Harrisburg presents the problems of the typical American city. The methods, unhappily not so typical, by which it is making amends for those sins of omission and commission, will be found appropriate in other cities. Miss Mira Lloyd Dock, a member of the State Forestry Commission and of the Harris- burg Civic Club, having spent seemingly fruit- less years in enlightening" her fellow-citizens, privately and publicly, on the progress of civic improvement, on which she has come to be regarded as a national authority, finally found the time ripe in the last month of the old cen- tury. Her illustrated presentation of the " City Beautiful " impressed the slowly awakening Harrisburg citizens with the deficiencies of their own city and the accomplishments of others. The search for the ten righteous men began. One of them presented a sketch in the Harrisburg Telegraph, portraying the possibili- ties of improving the river bank. Another, Mr. J. V. W. Reynders, proposed in the same paper, May 3, 1901, that a fund of $5,000 be 130 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT subscribed for an expert inquiry into the prob- lems of water supply, sewerage and parks. In ten days the fund begun by Mr. Reynders was secured. Ten times ten righteous men and women had been found. A meeting of the subscribers resulted in the organization of the Harrisburg League for Municipal Improvements, which chose an executive committee empowered to co-operate with the mayor, the city engineer and a repre- sentative from each councilmanic body, to em- ploy experts. This committee secured the services of Mr. James H. Fuertes, sanitary engineer; Mr. Warren H. Manning, landscape architect, and Mr. M. R. Scherrerd, paving expert. Within six months the reports were presented and printed. It remained necessary to subscribe an additional sum of money for the purpose of conducting a campaign to secure the approval of the citizens to the issue of bonds necessary to carry out the suggestions of the report and to elect officials who could be trusted to execute the plans. In less than a year from the time of taking the first practical step of subscribing for an expert investigation, the entire government of the city was reorgan- ized and the legislation secured to carry for- ward the most spectacular and comprehensive THE HARRISBURG PLAN 131 scheme of civic improvement since the building of Washington a century before. The document published on November 21, 1901, entitled " Proposed Municipal Improve- ments for Harrisburg, Pennsylvania," is as significant for the guidance of other cities as are the methods by which it was secured. The sanitary engineer presented a report which treated, " First, of the improvement of the sanitary condition of and the prevention of floods in Paxton Creek; second, the improve- ment of the water supply of the city; third, the improvement of the sanitary condition of the Susquehanna River front, and fourth, the im- provement of the sewerage system with recom- mendations as to the proper policy to be fol- lowed in future extensions." Two-thirds of the sewage of the city found its way into Pax- ton Creek which flowed through the heart of Harrisburg, and the question arose as to whether the stream should be eliminated by diverting its source of supply, or whether the crude sewage should be carried off, leaving the creek to dispose of the natural drainage. The latter plan was decided upon as not only more natural and more beautiful, but also as sim- plifying the work of sanitary engineer and landscape architect. An intercepting sewer was proposed to divert the dry weather flow, 132 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT and the bed of the creek was to be deepened while its slope was steepened, reducing - the dan- ger from floods and making it the chief adorn- ment of the sections of the city through which it flows. The water supply, often turbid and always polluted, was to be improved by filtra- tion. That portion of the city draining toward the Susquehanna River was to benefit by recon- structed sewers, while the river front itself was to be protected by a dam which would maintain a level of water covering the sewer outlets and preventing the exposure of offensive areas in midsummer. The report of the landscape architect con- tained recommendations for a comprehensive system of parks, playgrounds and drives. He indicated how fortunate the city was in pos- sessing a river front unobstructed by railroads or manufactories, and proposed a drive which should begin by redeeming the water-front and end by encircling the city. The park areas should include the islands in the river, a portion of the wooded creek valley below the city, the extension of Reservoir Park back of the city, the wooded bluff's of Paxton Creek Valley, enough of the banks of the creek to preserve the trees, and, as a crowning feature of the park system, the beautiful area burdened with THE HARRISBURG PLAN 133 the designation of " Wetzel's Swamp." In Mr. Manning's own words : The opportunity for a great country park at Harris- burg lies to the north of the city in the tract known as Wetzel's Swamp, which includes about five hundred acres of swampy and dry land, framed in with wooded bluffs on the one side, and a line of fine old willows along the canal on the other. As it stands today it is a natural park with beautiful passages of landscape, and fine vistas, over great stretches of meadow land to dis- tant hills beyond. It is rare, indeed, that a city can secure a property having all the elements of a park landscape, its border planting of fine trees, splendid individual specimens, and woodlands carpeted in spring with numerous wild flowers. Here, also, there is a comparatively level and per- fectly dry upland, that, with but little clearing and the removal of pens and sheds, can be made available for picnics and games. In the meadows masses of brilliantly colored flowering plants, which the uplands cannot pro- duce, are found, giving color effects, at different seasons of the year. This region is quite accessible by steam and electric cars, and there are roads at several points across the meadow and for a long distance along the boundaries. The swampy condition which prevails upon much of this land can be remedied, for there is abundant fall for all drainage through Fox's Run and Paxton Creek. The report on paving dealt primarily with the respective merits of different paving ma- terials for streets of varying traffic and grade, advising also that the city bear a larger share 134 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT of the expense on those streets where traffic is heavy. To carry out the recommendations of these experts, it was essential to draft a series of ordinances, to secure their passage, and to issue the necessary bonds. It was found that within Harrisburg's debt limit it was still possible to spend over a million dollars, and this amount would cover all the work which could be done before more money was available. The signifi- cance of the movement which led to this bond issue may be better appreciated if it is observed that for a city the size of Harrisburg (popula- tion 50,000) to spend a million dollars in public improvements is equivalent to the expenditure of twenty-five millions by Philadelphia, seventy millions by New York, and eleven millions by Boston. Indeed, it is equivalent to more than those sums, because those are only the pro rata amounts, whereas the larger city, with its greater property valuation, can invariably afford to spend proportionately more than a smaller city. A still better indication of the meaning and strength of this movement is evi- denced by the fact that in addition to the $5,000 subscribed by a few citizens for the employ- ment of the experts, a still larger sum was secured by popular subscription to carry on the campaign. The total amount provided by vol- THE HARRISBURG PLAN 135 untary contribution was $10,221.55. If those larger cities were to subsidize a citizens' move- ment to a similar extent, it would mean that Philadelphians should give $250,000, New Yorkers $700,000, or Bostonians $110,000. The deepest significance of this citizens' move- ment lies in the fact, however, that the improve- ment plans are intrusted to a body of reliable officials, chosen under the direction of the same group of public-spirited citizens. This end was attained by a campaign, the methods of which were as instructive as the goal is alluring. The League for Municipal Improvements opened headquarters on the main business street, where meetings of the organization were held and the plans for the improvement ex- hibited. The official report was soon ex- hausted, but there was printed an abridged report entitled " The Plain Truth about the Harrisburg Improvements," and by the aid of high-school boys every householder received a copy. Twice a week during the campaign these same young citizens, one from each voting pre- cinct, distributed literature to the homes of Harrisburg. Modern methods of advertising were employed to assist the movement, embrac- ing newspaper cartoons, bill-board posters, and, on election day, trolley cars completely covered with advice to the voters. The League 136 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT secured the co-operation of business and pro- fessional men, labor leaders, club women and the clergy. It was necessary, however, to overcome the apathy of the majority and to antagonize the opposition which came from some landlords and the corrupt politicians. The work of public agitation was launched in the courthouse, and from there carried to all parts of the city, culminating in the sermons preached from three-fourths of the pulpits the Sunday before election day. The propaganda was greatly facilitated by the employment of lantern slides, especially as used by Mr. J. Horace McFarland, secretary of the local league and now president of the American Civic Association. One of the most effective means of overcoming prejudice and bringing enlight- enment was the presentation of the subject by the women of the Civic Club in every school- house in the city. Enthusiastic children made converts of apathetic parents. The inexperience of Harrisburg was not unlike that of every other city. The majority of the people were astounded by the exhibition of familiar scenes in all their hideousness. The defilement of the river bank and the creek, the encroachment of the obnoxious bill-board, the graphic evidences of the pollution of the water supply were contrasted with the relief to the THE HARRISBURG PLAN 137 river from the construction of the proposed dam, the beauty of the Norway maples along the river front, the fascination of the area known as Wetzel's Swamp, and the delight of well-equipped playgrounds in the school yards and parks. The process of educating the citi- zen was carried into his very street and home, by showing the encroachment of the telegraph and telephone pole, the butchery of the trees, and the barrenness of back yards. The remoter possibilities of the execution of these public works which might come in the more dignified and appropriate treatment of the Capitol Park by the state authorities and the provision of summer bathing in the Susquehanna, indicated how far-reaching would be the effect of these improvements. The League was most fortu- nate in having the assistance of nature in the campaign. A winter flood raised the level of both river and creek, so that the appeals of the League's representatives were punctuated even more vividly than by the pictures. Lethargic and unimaginative citizens, who were unmoved by the reproductions on the screen, could not gainsay the evidence of the elements. Not the least of the difficulties confronting the League were those involved in the choice of city officials who should be both personally and politically satisfactory. It was desirable 138 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT to re-elect the Republican comptroller and the Democratic treasurer. The Democratic candi- date for mayor was an enthusiastic friend of the League, Mr. Vance C. McCormick, whose training, begun in a family of iron-masters, had been continued as a Yale football captain and a city councilman. He was opposed by a Republican of the familiar type, against whom neither good nor ill could be said, except that he was silent on the question of the proposed public improvements. The result of the elec- tion was more than gratifying; it was electrify- ing. In a Republican city the Democratic candidate for mayor was elected by a majority of 2,566, out of a total vote of 11,039. The Republican city comptroller was re-elected by very similar figures, 2,542, while the Demo- cratic city treasurer received a majority of 2,789 votes. The bond issue was indorsed by an even larger vote, 3,590. The campaign of education had received most discriminating endorsement. The battle cannot be said to be entirely won. The organization must be maintained, for at each election it is necessary to continue the fight for an executive that will carry out the improvement plans. It must not be for- gotten that, as in most of the other cities of the land, tradition favors an administration by the THE HARRISBURG PLAN 139 spoils system, unmolested by a body of indiffer- ent citizens. Yet it is gratifying to record that not only are the proposed plans in process of realization, but they are being improved and other good works have been undertaken. At the annual meeting of the Municipal League, November 21, 1903, it was reported that an ordinance was to be passed providing for a paid fire department to supplant the antiquated system of volunteers which still persisted in Harrisburg. Fifteen miles of street have now been paved. All of this paving is asphalt with the exception of two blocks on one street where wood paving has been laid. Through the vigi- lance of the Municipal League and the mayor the asphalt has cost from $1.73 to $1.85 a square yard, instead of $2.53 as in the old unin- spected days. Three-fourths of the bond issue has been used for the construction of inter- cepting sewers, the cleansing of Paxton Creek, filtration of the water supply and the construc- tion of the dam in the river. Plans for the fil- tration of the water supply have been materi- ally changed from those of the original report, the plant being located on an island in the river instead of on the old reservoir site above the city, but with promise of the beneficial results which ought to be expected after a more liberal examination of the question. i 4 o A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT While the chief expenditure was necessarily for the fundamental sanitary improvements, much interest must be aroused in other cities by the proposals for park extension, as these methods of enriching - the public life are so much more obvious to the uninstructed ob- server. Here the significance of the concerted plan is seen at its best. The project involves expenditures over a considerable period of years, which shall, however, be characterized by consistency with the general plan. The city already possessed Reservoir Park of twenty- four acres, which has now been enlarged by an extension of forty-five acres. This park occu- pies an abrupt elevation above the city, giving incomparable views of the river and the hills beyond. As this park is comparatively remote, the park commission (created as a result of the League's agitations) has planned a playground of ten acres in the central valley of the city, easily accessible to two-thirds of the city's population. The most imposing feature of the scheme involves the co-operation of the state in the extension of Capitol Park and its ap- proaches. The state promises to redeem its abortive attempt at capitol construction by spending several millions more under the super- vision of a competent architect, and has in- THE HARRISBURG PLAN 141 trusted the decorations to Edwin A. Abbey. The approaches will give a vista of the Susque- hanna River on one side, which is already con- nected by a one hundred and twenty- foot street, and crossing the Pennsylvania Railway, on the other side, will connect with the encircling parkway system. The most beautiful region within access of the city is the frequently men- tioned Wetzel's Swamp, the acquisition of which promises to be facilitated by co-operation with the board of public works, which plans to create there a storage reservoir. The parkway is designed to connect these parks and others in prospect to' the east and south of the city, following the most beautiful natural features encircling Harrisburg, and including the street along the river front. A comparatively slight expense will clear this of all the structures between the street and the river, and when accompanied by the cleansing of the river banks will give Harrisburg one of the most beautiful water-fronts in the country. The logical steps by which " the Harrisburg plan " has been achieved point the way of other cities to a common-sense method, but it is not therefore a simple one. At any point it might have failed. There might not have been the original woman who kept prodding, or the man of inspiration who proposed the subscription 142 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT scheme, or the faithful citizens who supported him, or the indefatigable and efficient secretary who managed the campaign. At any point a link might have been missing, but as the chain is now complete the task of other cities is easier. It may not be without value to contrast a typi- cal experience of the historic method of civic indecision. In a city of the middle West an- nual attempts have been made for thirty years to establish a sewer system. During that time the yearly appropriation for the maintenance of a few unsanitary and entirely insufficient cesspools had been adequate to build such a length of sewers as would by this time have provided a complete system. No small city could issue bonds enough in any one year to equip itself with sewers. It must be done by following a concerted plan over a period of years, but in the city in question it has never been possible to persuade the citizens of one ward to vote to have the work begun in another ward. As a consequence of this selfishness and lack of effective leadership a generation has gone by, and the city, which has continually grown, while its problems have become more difficult, has not even begun the solution of this fundamental question. Meanwhile in less than one-tenth of that time Harrisburg laid the plans which are in process of realization to THE HARRISBURG PLAN 143 solve the questions of sewage disposal, water supply, street paving, parks, playgrounds, and boulevards. What is being done in Harrisburg may be done in any other city, large or small, in the country, with varying possibilities conditioned only by the topography. The most admirable features of "the Harrisburg plan" are that a concerted scheme may be projected without re- quiring great immediate expenditure ; that this scheme will inevitably grow to even greater and better proportions than were originally designed; that it rests upon the interest of public-spirited citizens, expressed in their sub- scription and organization ; that it proceeds by the education of a continually increasing num- ber of the population ; that it requires the choice of able public officials, who, once select- ed, will accomplish through the execution of the plans public improvements which are them- selves the best sources of education of the people. "The Harrisburg plan" is capable of indefinite extension and application, but it finally rests, as all plans, simple or great, must, upon the intelligence, interest and integrity of the citizens. WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW One of the most distinguished and useful citizens of Chicago, a woman of wealth and independence, was once asked why she did not change her residence to a more attractive place, and her reply was, " Because there are so many things here to be done over again." It is rare to find such a combination of domesticity and civic patriotism, although it is almost uni- versally in demand. The one instance in city building in America where this ought not to have been necessary is in Washington. Yet even there, having started with a clean sheet, the celebration of the centennial of the removal of the government to Washington revealed the fact that much of the proposed work of im- provement would have to be reconstruction. Nevertheless such was the vision of the city's founder and architect that even the misdeeds of carelessness or cupidity have not prevented the possibility of attaining the highest ideals of civic beauty. The World's Fair at Chicago furnished the spectacular example of the construction of a great temporary city on a single scale in accord- ance with a comprehensive plan; but it was 145 146 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT only an ephemeral city. The metropolitan organizations of Boston mark the most striking advance in municipal co-operation ever wit- nessed in America; but, while each organiza- tion deals comprehensively with its special field, they lack co-ordination. Greater New York represents in both extent and population the greatest experiment in municipal government in the history of America, but it is the result of economic and social necessity — not of de- sign. The Harrisburg Plan is the most notable of recent endeavors in city reconstruction ; but its several improvements are rather synchro- nous than comprehensive. The one peerless example of the realization, through the new civic spirit, of an original, scientific, and artistic plan is Washington. In 1790 Congress gave to President Wash- ington the power to select a federal territory not exceeding ten miles square on the river Potomac. The site of the present city was chosen by Washington in January, 1791, and Major Pierre Charles L'Enfant was selected to plan the new capital city. A happier choice could not have been made. This skilful young French engineer, utilizing the fertile sugges- tions of Thomas Jefferson and the invariable sanity of George Washington, executed the boldest and most satisfactory city plan which WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 147 it has been the privilege of modern men to design. The primary elements in the plan of the nation's capital were the result of the sugges- tion of Washington that the legislative depart- ment should be kept distant from the executive, in order that the fundamental conception of the constitution, the divorce of the legislative from the administrative, should be more easily main- tained. Recognizing this constitutional prin- ciple in the construction of the city, the plan of L' Enfant was accommodated to the purpose of the capital and the topography of the district with such success that it required a century of development to produce a class of men who could appreciate its significance. The city was located at the junction of the Potomac and its chief tributary, on the sup- position that the main approach to the city would be by water, and that it had great com- mercial possibilities. Having recognized the fundamental topographical condition, L'Enfant then selected the site of the Capitol, a central conspicuous elevation, and planned to connect it with the site of the president's house by the main street of the city and a right-angled park following the axes of these two buildings. The prejudice of the time was in favor of a gridiron plan of streets, like that of Philadel- 148 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT phia. L'Enfant adopted this, but superimposed two radiating systems, like the spokes from a hub, from the great focal points of the Capitol and president's house, providing broad avenues which should furnish direct means of com- munication and beautiful vistas. These were also to afford opportunity at their junction points for the embellishment of the city. Viewed in the perspective of a century, one is divided between admiration for the genius of L'Enfant and contempt for the authorities who allowed the least departure from this marvel- ously satisfactory plan. Yet, when one remem- bers the tedious development of the city, the poverty of the government in the earlier days, requiring gifts of property from the original owners and sales to others to provide funds for the federal buildings, the destruction of the public buildings by the British in 1812, and the modification of conditions due to the advent of railways, one is astounded that the plan re- mains so nearly intact today. Thomas Twin- ing, an Englishman, writing in 1796, says of Pennsylvania Avenue, the central thoroughfare of the city: .... A large wood through which a very imperfect road had been made, principally by removing trees, or rather the upper parts of them, in the usual manner. After some time this indistinct way assumed more the appear- WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 149 ance of a regular avenue, the trees having been cut down in a straight line. Although no habitation of any kind was visible, I had no doubt but I was now riding along one of the streets of the metropolitan city. I con- tinued in this spacious avenue for half a mile, and then came out upon a large spot, cleared of wood, in the center of which I saw two buildings on an extensive scale and some men at work upon one of them. As late as 1840, De Bacourt, the French minister, wrote that Washington was " neither a city nor a village nor the country, but a build- ing yard, placed in a desolate spot, where living is unbearable." All cities have some regard for topography, and all beautiful cities achieve distinction pri- marily by a recognition of topographical advan- tages. Paris began as an island in the Seine and grew in all directions, restricted by suc- cessive fortifications, which, being in turn de- stroyed, made provision for the concentric boulevards. The recognition of the commerce of the Seine, the governmental center, and other focal points, conditioned by elevation or convenience, determined the plan of reconstruc- tion executed by Napoleon III and Baron Haussmann. In the renascence of Vienna the first distinctive element is the river and the second the encircling boulevard or Ringstrasse, lined by great public buildings appropriately grouped. Venice is a city of the sea, deriving ISO A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT its chief beauty from a full recognition of its waterways, as was subsequently done by Amsterdam. Edinburgh is a city set upon a hill, the central point being occupied by the castle located on the promontory which ter- minates the two-mile ridge upon which was built the old town of Edinburgh. The public buildings and parks on remoter hills, and Prince's Garden, occupying the ravine between the old and the new town, add to its beauty, but serve chiefly to emphasize the strategic position of the castle which gives character to the old gray town. The city which bears the closest resemblance to Washington is Karls- ruhe, and this doubtless furnished a suggestion to L'Enfant, as Jefferson possessed a map of the capital of Baden. Karlsruhe is not only pre-eminently but exclusively a capital city, the chief thoroughfares radiating from the palace, in one direction providing beautiful roads through the forest, in the other determin- ing the construction of the city. American cities have frequently been plan- less, as was Boston, but the prosaic mind of William Penn, which devised the rectangular plan of Philadelphia, has cursed most of our cities. Even New York, which was con- structed a century ago, had inflicted upon it so stupid an expression of the gridiron plan, WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 151 that the streets running north and south, mak- ing the indispensable arteries of the city, are separated by blocks twice as long as the much less significant streets running east and west. The few examples of rational planning, such as Buffalo, Indianapolis, and Sandusky, are so inadequate as to bear no comparison with Washington. The plan of L'Enfant was complete in every detail, although it has been modified partly to meet new conditions and partly be- cause of the stupidity of government officials. The river has ceased to play so important a part, and the canal which L'Enfant planned to carry from the river up to the Capitol, across the Mall and then following its northern boundary back to the Potomac, has necessarily been abandoned. The original plan of the Capitol grounds is so satisfactory that nothing better can be done than to attempt its realiza- tion, even though the building has grown to proportions which he did not anticipate. The section of the city which the Capitol was de- signed to face failed to develop because of the greed of one of the chief property owners, who attempted to avail himself of his position as commissioner to grow rich out of the necessities of the population. The prohibitive prices which Daniel Carroll demanded for the land east of 152 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT the Capitol resulted in the location of the busi- ness portion of Washington between the Capi- tol and the president's house. Thus the rear of the Capitol overlooks the central portion of the city. So commanding was the conception, however, that this scarcely detracts from the beauty of the building or its situation. West of the Capitol grounds the park known as the Mall stretches for a mile along the axis of the Capitol until this crosses the axis of the presi- dent's house, when the park turns at right angles and follows the latter. At the inter- section of these axes L'Enfant proposed to locate the Washington Monument. Bordering the Mall were to be situated the other neces- sary public buildings of the federal govern- ment, and at the intersections of the diagonal streets was abundant opportunity for placing monuments and fountains. The failure of the shortsighted authorities to realize at once a plan so comprehensive may be understood if we remember that the man who executed this great design for the federal city and gave it his personal attention for many months, was rewarded by the United States government with the munificent honorarium of twenty-five hundred dollars. He was subse- quently dismissed by President Washington, for stubbornly maintaining the integrity of his WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 153 plan by promptly razing a house built by a politician in the middle of what was to be New Jersey Avenue, and died without recognition of his services, after a disappointed and deso- late old age. In spite of the preservation of the primary elements of this ambitious plan, the depar- tures from it are conspicuous and deplorable. The Washington Monument, which proved ultimately to be one of the noblest memorials ever erected, instead of being located at the intersection of the axes of the two great build- ings was placed for the sake of a more secure foundation one hundred feet south of the axis of the Capitol and five hundred feet east of the axis of the White House. Had the monu- ment been less costly and successful it might have been moved when this glaring mistake was finally recognized ; but, as it is, it has been one of the greatest sources of embarrassment in planning the improvement of Washington. The Mall, which was to provide a vista from the Capitol to the Potomac, was cut up by streets and departmental grounds, in response to the demands of various departments. The one dignified building located on it, the Smith- sonian Institution, is in marked contrast with the other insignificant or inappropriate struc- tures. The Agricultural Department is housed 154 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT in a hideous brick building- which actually turns its back upon the Mall. The most serious offense was committed in 1872, when, in order to secure competition in railway service, the Baltimore and Potomac Railway was allowed to cross the Mall from the south and establish a station on its northern edge. It must be borne in mind that for many years the Mall remained undeveloped as pasture or swamp land. It is nevertheless difficult to understand why buildings elsewhere should have been constructed in the worst possible location. Some men, with a limited sense of proportion, secured the location of the Treasury building directly east of the White House, so that it blocks the vista of Pennsylvania Avenue. Then, by way of securing symmetry in minor details, while ignoring the great original plan, the State, War, and Navy Departments build- ing was located in a corresponding position west of the Executive Mansion. The new post-office, an exceptionally hideous structure, projects sufficiently into Pennsylvania Avenue to add to the disfigurement of the chief street of Washington. The latest and greatest of the public buildings, the Library of Congress, was located with the same limited vision, anticipat- ing a symmetrical arrangement with a proposed Department of Justice building, considering WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 155 their mutual relation to the Capitol grounds, but ignoring the city plan. The result is that from several points of view its gilded dome detracts from the majesty of the dome of the Capitol, the dominant feature of Washington. Up to the time of the Civil War Washing- ton had suffered from lack of funds and popu- lation, as well as from the obscurity which was due to its being off the beaten path. Accord- ing to Rufus Rockwell Wilson : Its houses, as a rule, were built of wood, and plain to the point of ugliness. There was no regular grade throughout the city, and most of its walks and avenues were unpaved and ill-kept. The entire water supply came from pumps and springs. The sewerage system was fatally defective, and the wide, shallow canal which extended from the Potomac nearly to Capitol Hill was a disease-breeding receptacle for the city's refuse and filth. There was no street railroad, omnibuses were the only means of communication between different quar- ters of the city, and not a street was lighted except Pennsylvania Avenue. The fire department was little more than a name, the police force a mere constabulary, and the common-school system would have brought shame to any New England town. The Capitol and the present departments were unfinished or not yet begun ; weeds grew in the parks and commons ; and stables, wooden fences, and patches of bare earth surrounded the White House. The war revived its importance. Within a decade the squalid city of seventy thousand 156 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT inhabitants doubled in size, and entered upon a new era, with a reorganization of the local government. The creation of a Board of Pub- lic Works, with Alexander R. Shepherd as chairman, inaugurated a genuine municipal life. By the methods of a " boss " but with the vision of a seer, Shepherd prosecuted the work of developing the city in a manner worthy of the nation's capital. A sewerage system was constructed, partly by arching over the minor creeks, which had previously run as open sewers through the city. By the end of 1875 123 miles of sewers were in use. The public water system, which was carried by aqueduct from the falls of the Potomac fourteen miles above the city, was extended so that not only the public buildings but the private residences were served. Street illumination was begun, and the establishment of the city datum was settled, requiring the grading of many miles of streets, along which twenty-five thousand shade trees were planted. One hundred and eighty miles of streets were paved, and the admirable plan adopted of extending the lawns so that while the broader streets retained their width of from 130 to 160 feet, the paved area was reduced to a minimum. The public control of these streets, including the turfed and planted portions, accounts for much of the charm of WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 157 Washington today. In 1874 the improvement of the Capitol grounds under the direction of Frederick Law Olmsted was begun. The work of landscape architecture, together with the sewering and lighting of the grounds had con- sumed over a million and a half of dollars by 1876. The beautifying of the city was at once followed by an increase of population and of real estate values. Another revision of the form of govern- ment took place in 1878, when the District Commission was established, consisting of two civilians and a government engineer. The city is thus controlled, as are other capitals, by the central government, which bears half of the local expenses. The growth of the business and residence sections, due to the increased population, has been also accompanied by the multiplication of government buildings conse- quent upon the greater volume of government business. In 1889, after over two decades of agita- tion, Congress made provision for the National Zoological Park in Rock Creek Valley, by the purchase of 170 acres of land. This area was subsequently extended until 1,605 acres are now included in that territory. This park and the Soldiers' Home grounds constitute the chief outlying spaces devoted to recreation. The 158 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT reclamation of the Potomac flats begun in 1882 has added a considerable area still undeveloped. Including the grounds about the public build- ings and the various squares, circles and tri- angles of the city, there are more than three hundred spaces reserved for public use. These, together with the larger parks, give an acre- age of 2,882, better distributed than any other city parks in America. Not least among the municipal improve- ments of Washington is the construction of a modern street railway system, under the rigid supervision of the District Commission. The railways of the District of Columbia sell inter- changeable tickets, follow routes which usually lead from one side of the District to the other, employ grooved rails on the paved streets, and use the underground conduit system of electric propulsion, so that the streets are not dis- figured with poles or overhead wires. The surface transportation lines of Washington are probably better systematized than any others in the United States, and the service is maintained under indeterminate franchises which give Congress the power of continuous control. The celebration of the centennial of the removal of the seat of government to Wash- ington, in 1900, aroused new interest in the capital. The American Institute of Architects WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 159 availed themselves of this opportunity to hold a meeting at which the improvement of the city was discussed by representative architects, landscape architects, and sculptors. They recommended that the Senate District Com- mittee should appoint a commission to consider the improvement of the entire park system of the District of Columbia. As a result of this suggestion a commission was appointed, con- sisting of Daniel H. Burnham, architect, of Chicago; Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., land- scape architect, of Brookline; Charles F. Mc- Kim, architect, of New York; and Augustus Saint-Gaudens, sculptor, of New York, prob- ably the ablest body of men ever associated for the technical consideration of a public question in America. Mr. Burnham was Director of Works at the Chicago World's Fair, and as architect of the Pennsylvania Railway has been instrumental in introducing the greatest and most satisfactory modification of the original plan for the improvement of Washington — the removal of the railway tracks from the Mall, and the construction of a magnificent union station in harmony with the general scheme. Mr. McKim's widely known work in the Bos- ton public library and the Rhode Island capitol are sufficient to justify his position on the com- mission. Mr. Olmsted and Mr. Saint-Gaudens 160 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT stand pre-eminent in their respective profes- sions. The American Institute of Architects had considered many of the fundamental difficulties in an attempt to realize all the possibilities of the original plan of L/ Enfant ; so that the work of the commission was somewhat simplified. They have nevertheless studied the subject much more exhaustively than any unofficial body could, have made a trip to Europe, visit- ing Rome, Venice, Vienna, Budapest, Paris, London, and their suburbs, and their proposals are as appropriate and inspiring for the twenti- eth century as were those of L'Enfant for the nineteenth. In the inauguration of their plans they also had the good fortune to receive un- usual assistance from those direct representa- tives of the public, the chairman and secretary of the senate committee, the late Senator Mac- Millan of Michigan, and Mr. Charles H. Moore. If the original plan of the designer of Washington could be followed as closely as it has been, in spite of the difficulties of igno- rance and greed, there is surely promise that within the present century the plans of the commission may be fully realized. After Mr. Burnham had triumphed in his bold plan of removing the railway tracks from the Mall and bringing them by tunnel to the WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 161 great four-million-clollar union station, the granite fagade of which, longer than the Capitol itself, faces a plaza a quarter mile north of the Capitol, the most difficult problem con- fronting the commission was that of treating the vista from the Capitol so that the misplac- ing of the Washington Monument might be neutralized. Great ingenuity has been shown in the proposal for a boulevard stretching from the Capitol through the middle of the Mall and passing on both sides of the monument, thus shifting the axis of the Capitol and reaching the Potomac where it is proposed that the new memorial bridge across the river shall begin. The grounds above the monument are to be reconstructed in the form of a sunken garden, marble steps three hundred feet in width lead- ing down forty feet to a pool, the center of which is on the axis of the president's house. In the words of the commission's report : " Surrounded by terraces bearing elms, laid out with formal paths lined by hedges and adorned with small trees, enriched by fountain and temple-like structures, this garden becomes the gem of the Mall system." By the extension of the axes of the Capitol and the president's house a Latin cross is created, giving at the points of intersection of the great avenues near the river, two new i62 A DECADF OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT opportunities for dignified a'dornment of the city. Where the axis of the Capitol strikes the line of the Potomac Memorial Bridge, several streets and the Potomac driveway will also focus, giving a center of almost as great dig- nity as the site of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. Here is to be located the Lincoln Memorial on the choicest remaining site in Washington. At the end of the president's house axis is to be established a recreation ground, with gymna- siums, playgrounds and public baths. The kite-shaped area included in the lines connect- ing these outer points is to be reserved exclu- sively for public use, the public buildings of the future to be included within the triangles formed by Pennsylvania and Maryland Ave- nues. This will require the purchase of a cer- tain amount of private property and the de- struction of some not very valuable buildings, but it is essential to the achievement of a plan which shall be worthy of the Washington of the future. A question which puzzled the commission was the treatment of the Executive Mansion. It was necessary to provide more space for the offices of the president, and quite serious pro- posals were made to establish a new president's house at some distance north of the present White House. It was finally decided to recon- WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 163 struct the president's house according to the original plans, and this piece of work is already completed, with better results probably than any new plan would have made possible. Aside from the reconstruction of the Mall, the most spectacular work proposed by the commission is in the improvement of the Poto- mac River and Rock Creek banks. It is pos- sible to make on the north shore of the Potomac one of the most beautiful embankments in the world. It is proposed to have an elevated boulevard which will not interfere with the commerce on the lower level, but which will mark the beginning of a drive taking in the chief beauties of the Potomac, and then encirc- ling the city, connecting the various parks and public grounds. The extension of Rock Creek Park from its present site in the northern part of the city along the line of the creek to the point where it enters the Potomac, is a hygienic necessity as well as one of the most desirable aesthetic improvements. The possibility of a beautiful stream bordered by paths and roads and appropriately planted banks in place of a vile open sewer will certainly insure the success of this part of the commission's plan. In addi- tion to these activities of the commission for the beautification of the capitol city public works of a municipal character, including 164 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT water and sewerage systems, are being under- taken, which will cost over seventeen million dollars. Magnificent as are all these proposals, and hopeful as seems their realization, at least at a remote date, the most important immediate result of the report of the commission will be the location of all subsequent buildings in ac- cordance with the general plan. After a cen- tury of comparative indifference, this is not easy to accomplish at one stroke, as is evidenced by the fact that a new building for the Depart- ment of Agriculture has already given trouble because of its suggested relation with the old building — one of the abominations of Wash- ington. By the triumph of the plans of the commission in these first days, the future beauty of Washington is assured. Tests in abundance will be made, as, according to the senate committee, the Fifty-seventh Congress authorized the construction of eight new build- ings including the Union Railroad Station, a building for the use of the members of the house of representatives, and a municipal build- ing for the District of Columbia. In order to arouse public interest in the work of the commission and to give a graphic demonstration which should not only reveal the immediate possibilities, but also act as a guide . '■'-', •Ml SI •* LIP If WASHINGTON, OLD AND NEW 165 in all future work, the commission prepared an exhibit which was shown for a time in the Cor- coran Art Gallery, and is now located indefi- nitely in the Library of Congress. In addition to photographs and maps of Washington and other cities, at home and abroad, two huge re- lief models were prepared, one representing the Washington of today, including the minutest building of the present city ; the other indicat- ing the city of the future. These models must inevitably exert a great influence upon the citizens of Washington and the legislators of the country, but they promise to do more than that; they furnish the most necessary sugges- tion to the progressive and ambitious citizens of other communities, namely, that each city should be provided with two such relief models, representing its present deficiencies and its possible accomplishments. This will not be the only way in which Washington will assist in the improvement of American cities. The reversion at the dawn of the twentieth century to the original plan of the early days of the republic is the highest tribute the talent of today could pay to the value of a comprehensive plan. Throughout the land cities will be stimulated to follow the example of the nation's capital in devising a rational plan for the recognition of commercial 166 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT and topographical conditions, and then to en- rich the city both materially and aesthetically by sustained progress in accordance with the simplest immediate necessities and the highest ultimate ideals. THE RETURN TO NATURE In the eighteenth century "the return to nature" meant a reversion to the crudity and nudity of Eden; in the twentieth century it means a progression to the plain living and high thinking of the Promised Land. The "natural man" of the earlier period was one freed from the restraint of the privileges, con- ventions and tyranny of the state. Today he is the man who applies nature's method to the existing human society, and who recognizes that nature includes man and his power of in- vention and co-operation. Fellowship is as natural as hunger ; but while the latter may be satisfied in the impenetrable forest the former demands organized society and may even be facilitated by the concentration of population. Slums are contrary to nature, but cities are not. The artificiality of the city is both unnatural and inhuman but not more so than the monot- ony of the farm, and the remedy is present in potential fellowship and the increasing regard for nature. The city is symbolically, as well as ety- mologically, the basis of civilization. It repre- sents not so much the realization of a fuller 167 168 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT life, as the opportunity for it. It is easy to exaggerate, but it is unwise to ignore, the con- trast represented by the derivation of such words as "urbane" and "civil," "rustic" and "pagan." Indeed this invidious comparison is tempered by the fact that the Greek word for citizen is the basis of our word "idiot." It is no more absurd to suppose that all rural life is bucolic than to imagine that all municipal life is idiotic. While it will not do to' make ety- mology go on all fours, the fact remains that the city commonly signifies opportunity, and the country isolation. It is a happy feature, therefore, of our time that the rapid transit, which is socializing the rural districts, is result- ing also in the naturalization of the city. Ex- cursions bring the people into the city to shop and to be amused, and other excursions take city folk to the country for recreation and recuperation. These transitory experiences not only accomplish the temporary result of enlight- enment but also establish lasting ideals. Vastly more important, however, than the facts or visions thus acquired are the experiences which result in actual transformation of the modes of life. The conveniences of the city are being taken to the country; the expanse of the coun- try is being appropriated by the city. It is necessary that the farmer enjoy the advantages THE RETURN TO NATURE 169 of good roads, centralized schools, the trolley, the telephone, free mail delivery and the travel- ing library. It is indispensable that the city dweller have access to tree and lawn, park and boulevard. The transformation of the ideals of life is perhaps best expressing itself in the growth of the suburbs. Here there is a combination of the material conveniences and the intellectual advantages of the city with the freedom and seclusion of the country. The harmony is still so incomplete that the city " cliff dweller " looks down with scorn upon the imperfectly organ- ized subdivision. Suburban life lends itself to caricature quite as well as does that of city or country. Henry Blossom in Checkers pictures a man who goes to the city so early in the morning and returns to the suburb so late at night that he meets himself. But the true quality of suburban existence is no more repre- sented in the woes of the commuter, than the city is legitimately characterized by the bustle of the down-town business street, or the coun- try by the forlornness of the quarter-section farm. In their accustomed state of unrelation, we might denominate the limitations of city, suburb and country as provincial, parochial and rural; but in their growing interrelation each supplies a necessary element toward the com- 170 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT pletion of the social life of the citizen. The suburb represents a happy union of urbanity and rusticity, but it would be impossible with- out those larger dominating features of national life. The rural exodus, which has sometimes depopulated the countryside, and has generally overcrowded the city, cannot be stemmed, but it is being neutralized by the reaction from urban life. This takes two forms : the growth of the suburbs and the ruralizing of the city. The suburbs of Boston constitute a population as large as that of Boston itself, and happily comprehend elements such as the rural parks, which may be enjoyed by city dweller as well as suburbanite. The outer zone of such cities as New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia is growing more rapidly than the inner zone, and at a time when the innermost zone is losing population by the encroachment of the business district and the improvement of rapid transit facilities. This great expansion of the city has taken place in spite of serious obstacles, the chief of which has been imperfect transporta- tion. The future belongs not to the city, but to the suburb. Meanwhile the reaction from urban life is affecting a larger population in the transforma- tion of the city. The improvements discussed THE RETURN TO NATURE 171 in "The Making of the City" — street paving, cleaning, sewering and other fundamental con- struction — might be appropriately considered here, as they are in the direction of a return to nature, in the sense that they are the applica- tion of nature's methods in the service of man. The filtration of water supplies and sewage and the flushing of streets are only more expedi- tious methods of doing nature's work. A more obvious regard for nature is shown in the beautifying of the city by the introduc- tion of natural features. The boulevards of Boston, Chicago, Minneapolis, and other cities provide a considerable area of park-like streets. The New England common gives a touch of nature where most needed in the heart of the city, as does the city square of New York or Savannah. Both beauty and economy are se- cured by the reduction of the street area and the extension of the lawns characteristic of Columbus and Indianapolis. Street gardens are the result of the private planting of flower beds on the parking of Dayton, while the public is admitted to the enjoyment of the beautiful residence parks of St. Louis. The water flow- ing down the streets of Salt Lake City, and the municipal supervision of the trees on all the streets of Washington and Louisville, indicate a new conception of the city street. It is not 172 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT always a thoroughfare and should never be merely a thoroughfare. Even business streets need not be barren, and no street is suitable for residence purposes which lacks a vista through the trees. One of the simplest and pleasantest phases of social aesthetics is the American ten- dency to banish the fence and leave the con- tinuous lawn, in democratic contrast to the walled grounds of the English "castle." The cultivation of the private garden, front and rear, is being stimulated by example and association and by the admirable books and magazines of today, and is being assisted by the education of the children, especially in the state of New York and in Cleveland. The extension department of Cornell University is organizing the youth of New York into Junior Naturalist Clubs. In addition to imparting knowledge, the planting of school and home gardens is encouraged. Last year over one hundred and fifty thousand envelopes of seeds were sold by the Home Gardening Association of Cleveland at a penny apiece, which makes the movement self-sustaining. Most of these found their way into the gardens of the Cleve- land school children, but a half million pack- ages were prepared this year to assist other cities in the inauguration of the same scheme. The school gardens of many American cities, THE RETURN TO NATURE 173 notably Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Menomonie, open the eyes of city-bred children to the mysteries of the farm. Nevertheless un- numbered Americans live along treeless streets and in gardenless houses, millions looking out upon blank walls and many others on vacant and unkempt lots. These hindrances to decent living are not the possession alone of the poor. As John Ruskin said : I find now that the ideal in the minds of all young people, however amiable and well-meaning, is to marry as soon as possible and then to live in the most fashion- able part of the largest town they can afford to compete with the rich inhabitants of, in the largest house they can strain their incomes to the rent of, with the water laid on at the top, the gas at the bottom, and huge plate- glass windows, out of which they look uninterruptedly at a brick wall. Trees, lawns, vines, shrubs, flowers are the touch of nature which are doing their part toward making the whole town kin. Indeed the movement beginning with the desire for natural beauty and reaching to the compre- hensive ideal of city-making is one of the finest expressions of the co-operative spirit to be found in America today. Taking root in an inhospitable time and hibernating through the period of chill skepticism it is bursting into full bloom now. The great majority of village and civic improvement organizations have origi- 174 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT natcd in the last few years, nine-tenths of them within the passing decade. Yet there still thrives to the glory of its founder and place of nativity that which may be called the parent society organized by Miss Mary G. Hopkins in Stockbridge, Mass., in 1853. This initial attempt has had many imitators and in the great majority of cases, the successor of Miss Hopkins has been a woman. According to Warren Manning (Craftsman, February, 1904, p. 427) : The first powerful impetus to village improvement was given by B. G. Northrup, secretary of the Connecti- cut State Board of Education, who, in his report of 1869, wrote upon " How to Beautify and Build Up Our Coun- try Towns," an article which he states was received with ridicule. He thereafter for years wrote much, lectured often, and before 1880 had organized not less than one hundred societies in the New England and Middle States. His writings were published by the daily papers, and the New York Tribune republished and offered for sale, in 1891, at three dollars per hundred, his " Rural Improvement Association," which he first published in 1880. It is interesting to note some of the objects espe- cially touched upon in this pamphlet ; " To cultivate public spirit and foster town pride, quicken intellectual life, promote good fellowship, public health, improve- ment of roads, roadsides and sidewalks, street lights, public parks, improvement of home and home life, orna- mental and economic tree-planting, improvement of rail- road stations, rustic roadside seats for pedestrians, bet- terment of factory surroundings." THE RETURN TO NATURE 175 The experience of more recent years has elaborated the functions of civic improvement societies, but the spirit which animates them has never been better stated. Nevertheless the time was not ripe until the new civic spirit pervaded the country in the last decade of the century, as is evidenced not only by the great multiplication of such societies, but by the variety of functions which they successfully perform. In addition to the increase in the number of local organizations the national sig- nificance of the movement found expression in the American Park and Out-door Art Associa- tion and the American League for Civic Im- provement; the former an association of nature lovers and experts, the latter a federa- tion of local societies and workers. The union of these two national bodies in the American Civic Association at the World's Fair conven- tion in St. Louis set another milestone of civic progress. The comprehensive scope of this national organization is indicated by its depart- ments, presided over by noted specialists : pub- lic recreation, arts and crafts, city making, out- door art, factory betterment, children's gar- dens, libraries, parks and public reservations, public nuisances, railroad improvements, rural improvements, school extension, social settle- ments, press. There are now two thousand, 176 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT two hundred local organizations in America. They are found not only in villages and small towns but in larger cities as well ; in the latter often as neighborhood organizations. On the south side of Chicago a succession of such small societies extends over a distance of eight or ten miles and in Cook county there is a federation of improvement societies. In St. Louis a gen- eral Civic improvement League undertakes to serve the entire city. The impulse given by one enthusiastic woman has resulted in an effi- cient society of two thousand members, who endeavored first to make the city worthy of a world's fair and now are striving to make it worthier than any world's fair. However large these organizations may of necessity be- come, the germ of village improvement is their source. Other societies may have commercial advantage or municipal reform or municipal art as their object, but civic improvement, al- though its purposes may grow very complex, is based primarily on an appreciation of the methods and beauties of nature. Hence the work which is being done in cities, towns and villages is easily linked with rural improve- ment. The country might be supposed to need no return to nature, but the destructive activi- ties of man have been so great and his con- THE RETURN TO NATURE 177 structive work so slight that the rural tasks are as difficult as those of the city. The means of communication in the city may be a source of disfigurement but they exist, indeed their chief fault is their assertiveness. In the country the problem of transportation is still in such a rudimentary stage that communication is often impossible in winter and not infrequently dis- agreeable in summer. In some parts of the country this is explained, if not excused, by the absence of road-building materials. In general, however, it is due to the great extension of railroads in the United States. Even those dis- tricts untouched by the railroad are now promised relief by the trolley, and too often at the direct expense of the highway which is virtually surrendered to the trolley company. The good roads movement, which is gaining new vigor daily, will have as one of its respon- sibilities the education of the citizen to insist that the trolley companies occupy their own right of way. Improved highways are being promoted by the National Good Roads Asso- ciation, by the experimental work of the Agri- cultural Department, which builds sections of good roads in various parts of the country, and by national, state and county expenditure. Road building in the United States began with the first appropriation for the Cumberland 178 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Road, to run from Cumberland, Maryland, to a point on the Ohio River opposite Steuben- ville. From 1810 to 1816 $680,000 were ap- propriated to be covered by a percentage from the sale of lands in Ohio. By 1838, $1,600,- 000 had been spent for various roads. From that time until the Civil War a similar amount was appropriated. Since that time the work of road building has been left with the local government, with the consequence that the characteristics of the state govern- ments and the accessibility of good materials cause most astonishing variations in the treat- ment of this public necessity in the different states. The building of roads by states began in Massachusetts, but state aid to roads has achieved the greatest success in New Jersey. Remarkable progress has been made recently in North Carolina, Georgia and other states by the building of roads with convict labor, with not only economic but humane benefits. Better roads signify not only material bene- fits to the rural population but they facilitate the advance of civilization. The results of isolation evidenced by the condition of Ken- tucky mountaineers are sufficiently impressive. One need mention only two of the forces aided by good roads to see their far-reaching influ- ence — free rural mail delivery and centralized THE RETURN TO NATURE 179 schools. The first rural free delivery route was established in West Virginia in October, 1896. The following year forty-four routes were maintained at an expense of $10,000. In 1900 the number of routes had grown to 2,551 and 1,801,524 people were benefited. Massachusetts passed a law in 1869 per- mitting the transportation of school children to a central rural school building, thus doing away with a number of small country schools, inadequately equipped and taught for a brief season by an incompetent person. Quincy availed itself of this law in 1874, and from that time its benefits have been extended in Massa- chusetts, and other states have adopted the same method. The necessity for centralized schools is illustrated by the records of Indiana, which reports, " 108 schools with fewer than 5 pupils in average daily attendance, 487 schools with fewer than 10 in attendance, 1,253 schools with fewer than 15; 2,332 schools with fewer than 20, making in all more than 4,200 schools, in each of which there is an attendance too small for vigorous and highly profitable work." The greatest success has been achieved in northern Ohio, where with greater economy superior results have been attained in the cen- tralized schools, and thus, probably the most i8o A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT efficient expedient for making- rural life worth while has been adopted. The enrichment of country life is also furthered by the free traveling library which in some form is now found in almost every state. The state of Wisconsin (as the result of the initiative of Senator J. H. Stout, of Menomonie) supports about four hundred traveling libraries, of which fifty-one are Ger- man. The libraries are provided by private subscription and then the state maintains and distributes them. A new force promises to be found in the county libraries such as Hon. J. S. Brumback established in Van Wert County, Ohio, a method which prevails in Oregon. The building is located in the county seat, but branch stations are maintained throughout the county. The redemption of the country must begin with the proper use of its natural advantages. The development of irrigation, of canals, and of water-power is of fundamental importance in furthering a return to nature as well as a return of nature. The most obvious and beautiful of the newer expressions of this old faith is an appreciation of the trees. The treeless street and road and schoolhouse will not much longer disfigure the landscape. Thanks to the Hon. J. Sterling Morton, we THE RETURN TO NATURE 181 observe throughout the country Arbor Day, which he instituted in Nebraska in 1872. We are almost ready to accept the declaration of William Morris that any one who would heed- lessly cut down a tree, especially in a large city, need make no claim to caring for art. Let us hope this new zeal has not come too late. The grim spectral forests of northern Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, the decaying lum- ber towns of the Great Lakes, the freshets of the Mississippi and its tributaries, and perhaps cyclones and drouth, all testify to man's crim- inal folly, negligence and destructiveness. Even in our national forest reserves from 1881 to 1887 it is claimed nearly thirty-seven mil- lion dollars worth of timber had been stolen, while that consumed by running fires during the same period is set at two hundred millions. These are painful facts, but we may cheer ourselves by some great accomplishments. Sixteen states now have officers for forest work, twelve of them being forestry commis- sioners. The federal government has estab- lished fifty-three reservations containing sixty- two million acres of public forests protected by five hundred public employees. This is a mag- nificent beginning, but Professor Fernew says that we need six hundred million acres to main- tain our annual consumption of three hundred i82 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT and fifty cubic feet per capita. We may, how- ever, learn to thrive with less, as England uses only fifteen cubic feet per capita. The three schools of forestry, at Yale, Cornell, and Balti- more (although that at Cornell was unfortu- nately suspended by Governor Odell's veto of its appropriation), are all virtually the product of the twentieth century. They are a tardy recog- nition of the fact that in spite of the previous destruction of forests the annual consumption of timber amounts to about a thousand million dollars, a crop exceeded among agricultural products only by corn. The reservations include a million acres of yellow pine in the Black Hills; twelve million acres of forest-covered mountains in the Rockies; "twelve and a half million acres, extending over the wild, unexplored Olympic Mountains and both flanks of the Cascade range, the wet and the dry " in Washington and Oregon; the Sierra reserves in California of four million acres "of the grandest scenery and grandest trees on the continent;" and the two-million acre tract in southern California. In addition to the forest reserves, which are comparatively recent, the national parks are worthy of special attention. The first of these was the Yellowstone. Mr. Muir says : THE RETURN TO NATURE 183 As delineated in the year 1872, the park contained about 3,344 square miles. On March 30, 1891, it was to all intents and purposes enlarged by the Yellowstone National Park Timber Reserve ; and in December, 1897, by the Teton Forest Reserve; thus nearly doubling its original area, and extending the southern boundary far enough to take in the sublime Teton range and the famous pasture-lands of the big Rocky Mountain game animals. In 1880 the government set aside 911 acres in Arkansas for the Hot Springs Reservation. In 1890 the Yosemite National Park of 1,512 square miles, the Sequoia Park of 250 square miles, and the General Grant Park, about two miles square, were established in California. In 1892 the Casa Grande Ruin, 480 acres in Arizona; in 1899 the Mount Rainier National Park in Washington, and in 1903 the Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota were added. If America is deficient in human tradi- tions and antiquities it must not be forgotten that it possesses the most magnificent inheri- tance from the remote past to be found in the world. The giant trees of the Sequoia Park, and especially those it is hoped may be saved from destruction in Calaveras County, ante- date the pyramids. They took their place in the book of Nature before the first hieroglyphic inscriptions were produced. The time ought to have arrived when an injury to one of them i&4 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT would be regarded as no less offensive than vandalism in Egypt. Rural parks of great natural beauty or areas of special historical significance have also been reserved by states and smaller politi- cal organizations. Among these are great battlefields like Gettysburg, Chattanooga and Lake George, the Massachusetts state reserva- tions, the forests and lakes of Minnesota and Wisconsin, the Niagara Falls Park in New York, and the Interstate Palisades Park. The general public has a peculiar interest in these last two achievements. The distressing condi- tions under which one was formerly compelled to see the greatest of our country's natural treasures, on account of the arrogance of the proprietors and fakirs, who were allowed to gather unholy pelf from a holy pilgrimage, are still fresh in our memory. Nor can we ever forget the brutal destruction of portions of the incomparable Palisades to enrich the in- satiable owners of quarries. Happily the state of New York has made a visit t'o Niagara Falls as delightful as it might have been to the aborigines, and the states of New York and New Jersey, stimulated by the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society and assisted by private generosity, guarantee the protection of the Palisades from further destruction. THE RETURN TO NATURE 185 Comparable to these state reserves and even more accessible to large populations and sug- gestive to other communities, are the rural parks of the Boston Metropolitan District and Essex County, New Jersey. The former were described in the chapter on "Metropolitan Boston." They constitute the most complete city park system in the world and include the largest municipal park in the United States, the Blue Hills Reservation of five thousand acres of wild mountain scenery. Perhaps the most encouraging feature in the establishment of these two great systems is the expedition with which it was accomplished. Within ten years by an expenditure of ten million dollars the Boston district had added to its park pro- visions ten thousand acres. In Essex County, New Jersey, an expenditure of five million dollars in eight years gave them a park system of 3,600 acres. According to Alonzo Church, secretary of the commission, " When the pres- ent commission came into being in 1895 there were, within a county of about ten miles square and containing a population of three hundred thousand people, only twenty-five acres of usable park land. This was comprised in the few public squares in the cities of Newark and Orange, which the foresight of the early settlers had reserved." i86 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT Two great accomplishments must be cred- ited to the Essex County Park Commissioners. They provided parks and playgrounds near the congested districts by utilizing land which was entirely suitable for recreation but was virtu- ally valueless for building purposes, thus fur- nishing parks at a minimum expense in the localities most needing them. They also ap- propriated some of the most beautiful natural scenery of their very picturesque county by re- serving hilltops, and slopes beyond the present area of settlement. One of these, Eagle Rock, the summit of one ridge of the Orange Moun- tains, rises abruptly 150 feet from the plain below, and is said to give an outlook "over more human habitations than from any other natural elevation in the world. The view in- cludes Newark and the Oranges, Elizabeth, Bayonne and Greater New York with a popu- lation of nearly six million." On the other side of this ridge, and particularly in the other mountain reservation, one may wander for miles out of sight of human habitation. The Park and Pleasure Drive Association of Madi- son, Wisconsin, has within ten years at an ex- penditure of only fifty thousand dollars, an- nexed great areas of the marvelously beautiful country surrounding Wisconsin's capital by the simple expedient of constructing twenty-five THE RETURN TO NATURE 187 miles of driveways. The co-operation of both city and state are now secured in the extension of urban and rural parks along these drives, which border lakes, wind through woods, and traverse ravines and hills. The possibilities of nature are nowhere better revealed than in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, where seem- ingly hopeless sand dunes have been trans- formed into what is, perhaps, the most beauti- ful park in America. John Burroughs says, " Nature is all things to all men." If we will enslave her, she will be our servant, although when abused she may desert and starve us. The forest may minister to our needs perennially but if one disregard nature's laws and say, " After me the deluge ! " he may find a realistic fulfilment of his folly. If we seek nature for companionship she will respond to our deepest needs. " Nature salves our worst wounds, she heals and restores us." Subtler and profounder even than the direct influence of nature, in tree or park or forest, is the indirect result of the ideal nurtured by devotion to nature's laws. The return to na- ture may be invisible and eternal as pictured by that nature prophet, Edward Carpenter. "Is it not a true instinct, therefore, of so many individuals in a time like the present, when they find their actual lives nipped and cankered 188 A DECADE OF CIVIC DEVELOPMENT oil the surface by the conditions in which they live, to hark back, not only to simpler and more natural surroundings, but also to those more primitive and universal needs of their own hearts, from which they feel a new depar- ture may be made? They go back to the ever virgin soil within themselves, and perhaps the deeper down they go, the nearer they get to the universal life." The universal life is the common life. Communion with Nature is a safe avenue to communion with God and man. Stewart Headlam says " Holy communion is only for holy communists." As the citizen's oppor- tunities for fellowship and contact with nature multiply he will learn to travel the highway of the simple and rational which leads to the common good, a highway revealed to this gen- eration by the new civic spirit. \ R e, um lh LOS angeles ' ssysyusar* V s ? S ^EUNIVB?% ^.QF-ftUFflftfe. *i.QFCAUFOR*v %133NVSOV^ v# la*. 5H ^Awaain ^UIBRARYQc. § 1 ir UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY %)Jll\OJO^ ^OKALIFOfy^ ^OJIIVD-JO^ ^OFCAIIFO/^ P fe«sr** "%3AINll3V <&l»SQV^ ^Swara^ ^M!UNIVER% ^lOS-AM ^WEUNIVER% ,A\M!VER$/a ^clOSANCn%, ■*8&BAWHtf^ ^lOS-ANKU-r^ ^OFCAIIFOR^ ^TOSOV^ "^SfflAIHfl^ ^AHWaiB^ ^•UBRARYQr ^tUBRARY^ ^\KUNIVER%. ^lOSANCEli ^0FCAIIF(% ^OFCAllFORfc, ^\\tlMlVER% ^lOSANCEl