PROPOSED FAIRMOUNT PARK EXTENSION, PHILADELPHIA, PA.: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW. MESSRS. SCHERMERHORN & REINHOLD, ARCHITECTS, PHILADELPHIA, PA.

RECENTLY, efforts have been made in Philadelphia towards securing the Fairmount Park Extension, or Boulevard. Heretofore, the one great difficulty in the way of accomplishing the boulevard project has been the great expense, but the plan here illustrated removes all such claims.

Ex-Select Councilman William G. Huey of the Fifteenth Ward has been a foremost advocate of some step in this direction, and he has, time and time again, contended that any expense to which the city might go on the proposed line will be more than overcome by the increased valuation of the property in the immediate neighborhood of such improvements. In 1899, he retained Schermerhorn & Reinhold, architects, to devise a plan for a concourse extending from a point near the centre of the city to the Green-Street entrance of Fairmount Park. It is contended that in arranging this particular plan, the architects were governed by two desires: first, to select a locality which might be best adapted for the development of the scheme, and, second, to confine the expenditures to the lowest possible figure.

The plan provides for a concourse 275 feet in width from the north side of Carlton Street, the first small thoroughfare north of Wood, to the south side of Pearl, the first small thoroughfare south of Wood, and in length from Broad and Wood Streets to the GreenStreet entrance of the Park. Beginning at Broad Street, what is now known as Wood Street would form the central roadway of the concourse, having on either side, sidewalks, wide lawns and bicyclepath, the latter to occupy the roadbeds of Pearl and Carlton Streets. In this form the proposed concourse would extend in a straight line to a point just west of Twenty-first Street, where it would curve gradually to the north, and cross Spring Garden Street between Twenty-second and Twenty-fourth Streets. From this point the plan provides that the land within the triangle bounded on the south by Spring Garden, on the west by Twenty-fifth Street, and on the south-east by Pennsylvania Avenue, shall be included at the western end. The total length of the concourse is about 5,000 feet, and it is asserted that the entire cost of putting the project through to completion will be less than $3,000,000, while the old plan of the boulevard with a width of but 150 feet, extending, as the crow flies, from Broad and Filbert Streets to the Green-Street entrance, would require an expenditure of at least $25,000,000. The property in the section through which the concourse would run is nearly all of a ramshackle character, and at present it is practically an abandoned district. The proposed road would reclaim the entire neighborhood and increase the value of the land to such an extent that the old buildings would give way, the slums disappear, and in their places arise handsome dwellings and orderly surroundings. To give some idea of the probable result of the movement, the friends of the project say that it is only necessary to compare the present values on the line of the proposed concourse to those on Chestnut Street. The former is placed from $50 to $350 per foot front and property on Chestnut Street is selling at $1,000 to $7,500 per foot front. It must be admitted, say the advocates of the plan, that if the concourse plan is finally adopted, values in the surrounding territory must advance at least $5,000,000, and at the present tax-rate the city would receive annually an additional revenue of more than $150,000, or more than it would cost the city to complete the improvement, estimating that the city would do the work at about 3 per cent on the amount named, or about $90,000 per annum.

Thus it can be readily seen that the city could carry out this vast improvement at a cost which would not greatly be felt by the taxpayers.

SELECTED DESIGN FOR THE NEW SESSIONS HOUSE, OLD BAILEY, LONDON, ENG. MR. E. W. MOUNTFORD, Architect.

INTERIOR OF HALL IN THE SAME BUILDING.

A CORRECTION.-In the title of the illustration published last week of the house on East Fifty-fourth Street, New York, two blunders were made: First, the house is that of Mrs., not Mr., Young, and, second, to the name of Mr. Hiss should have been added that of his partner, Mr. Weekes, as the architects.

COMNICATIO

[The editors cannot pay attention to demands of correspondents who forget to give their names and addresses as guaranty of good faith; nor do they hold themselves responsible for opinions expressed by their correspondents.]

THE PARIS AND CHICAGO EXHIBITION BUILDINGS. THE Exposition as a spectacle is disappointing. It looks better in the photograph than in the reality. The opportunity for anything like our Court of Honor at Chicago was, of course, lacking, and it is very gratifying to realize in the face of all the crudity in America

-

which one's first visit to France reveals that we had the inspiration to turn a swamp on Lake Michigan to the purpose we did. There was so much French criticism of the fair that it is a relief to find that those critics were demanding of us the impossible that the fair was more nearly what we thought it ourselves. The French have here an opportunity with, of course, very serious limitations of site - of showing how the thing should be done; it is clever, it is original, it is everything but pleasing.

To this, of course, there are certain exceptions. The Grand and Petit Palais are wonderfully good. The detail of the Petit Palais is perhaps a trifle too fanciful for the permanent building it is, and in the somewhat absurd and illogical interior courtcertain features the detail lacks proper emphasis; but it is barring creditable to its country. - a building very

The Grand Palais, as far as the stone and stone details go, is all that could be desired. Behind the long colonnades are admirable speak. The concave corners are ingenious rather than successful, terra-cotta panels a permanent form of exterior painting, so to roof-it is of iron and glass and the slightly curved façades at the sides are also weak. But the -comes down upon the stone, and that is about all. It is not sufficiently decorated, and exhibits the very fault the French criticised at Chicago. They said that our buildings there showed no proper relation between steel roof and substructure. Here in a building, not of staffe, but stone, the same thing shows, and, to my mind, more glaringly; it would seem to prove that a criticism which rankled then was in reality somewhat unreasonable. There may be a solution, but it is not here.

Ön the interior, the structural iron has been decorated in the most ingenious and successful way, and, in spite of the novelty, it is almost

beautiful.

There is also a greater and a lesser court in the Fair in which every where the detail is of about the same character. The architects seem to have considered the Exposition as a sort of fairyland, and to have used the detail appropriate to the fantastic architecture of the settings of the ballet. But in using it it was necessary to magnify it, until from being fanciful it became monstrous. The fairies, after all, are a little people, and Titania rode in a walnut-shell behind grassforty feet high and drive dragons or ride a hippogriff. In consequence, hoppers hitched with spider-web. Here a fitting Titania would be the effect of it all is fantasy gone over to madness; one is oppressed and haunted by these misshapen forms, which on a smaller scale only would be pleasing. After all, the Chicago idea of free Classic, a temporary Olympus for the gods and demi-gods, or, rather, the Latin Olympus, wherever that was- rather than this abode of overgrown fairies, seems far more fitting, more restful and more beautiful.

This letter has grown longer than I intended, but I hope you will not think that I have done it merely to allow the eagle to scream. The comparison between our own recent fair and this is too natural to be avoided. In matters of detail, in all that results from mere training, the architects of this fair are in general ahead of us, but in more important matters we have reason to be proud of our work.

The great entrance is as bad as it is supposed to be. Its plan is as absurd as its crowning figure of "Paris." It looks rather like the gateway of a high-class Coney Island - though a trifle bigger. As a piece of coloring, it is beautiful in its greens and blues and gold; as a study and adaptation of Assyrian ornament, it is surprisingly clever ; as a whole, it is a mistake. deserve reams This letter might go on indefinitely - the French pictures alone -but I will close. -Extract from a private letter.

NOTES

CHIPPINGS

FELLING A TREE BY ELECTRICITY. - One of the chief attractions of Jacksonville, Ill., is the large trees which overarch many of the principal streets, shielding them from the sun. The grounds of the State Insane Hospital, located there, are also shaded with many trees, and recently a limb of one of the largest of the trees was broken off by the wind. As it fell it blocked the carriage-drive, and it was decided to cut away the whole tree. As the workmen found the tree too large for a crosscut saw, they were about to chop it down, when it was suggested that the electrician electrocute it. Following out the suggestion, connection was made with an arc-lamp circuit passing near. The electrician changed the circuit at the power-house so it could be thrown on to a dynamo that was operating a power circuit, and then dropped a couple of short wires from the nearest arc-lamp pole, connecting 20 feet of No. 14 iron wire between them. Putting the wire around the tree and having a couple of men hold it taut, the current was turned on, but it was found that only a 35-ampère circuit could be obtained. This was not sufficient to make any appreciable effect on the trunk of the tree. After another unsuccessful attempt with a smaller iron wire the arc-light circuit had to be put in service for the night. The following morning a pair of No. 2 weatherproof lines were run to the nearest underground feeder, and a 20-foot piece of 7-strand No. 16 galvanizediron wire was inserted in the circuit, three of the strands being taken out to give air-space and room for the products of combustion to pass. The feeder was cut out of regular duty and put on a small dynamo, which was also specially arranged for a wide regulation of voltage. The dynamo-tender was given a code of signals and told to keep his eye on a man who was placed on top of the Administration Building tower to transmit the signals from the electrician. Soon after a signal was passed the wire became uncomfortable to the touch; another signal and it soon began to smoke and the bark to blacken; another,

and the zinc whitened, while those holding the cautery began sliding it slowly back and forth. The bark sparked and smoked. The wire took a dull red color in the sunlight and a cherry hue in the crevice. Its motion was adjusted so as to give sufficient air to reduce the wood to soft charcoal after the water was evaporated, and to remove the charcoal as fast as formed. In an hour the crevice was 18 inches deep, and at this point the wire, having been considerably reduced in size by oxidization, gave way, and was replaced by another. The operation was kept up until the trunk was almost cut through, when the little bit of unburned wood in the centre of the trunk parted and the tree fell. The tree was an elm, with a large percentage of water, and was 11 feet in circumference. The current in the cautery was from 120 to 135 ampères direct, the voltage at the machine being varied from 80 to 115. The time consumed in the operation was two hours and ten minutes. Western Electrician.

LONDON'S NEW CATHOLIC CATHEDRAL. -The building of this vast and stately cathedral, undoubtedly the largest built in Great Britain since the Reformation, originated with Cardinal Manning. After 19 years of strenuous effort the present site in Ashley Gardens, Victoria Street, was secured for the purpose of its erection. Further than this, the late Cardinal was unable to proceed with the undertaking. In 1894 Cardinal Vaughan resolved to begin the erection of the cathedral. With Westminster Abbey within sight, the idea of a cathedral of Gothic style of the magnitude contemplated was not to be entertained. The style decided upon was the Early Byzantine. John Francis Bentley was the architect chosen. The plans accepted, and since carried out, embraced a noble porch, a narthex, or vestibule, a campanile, a nave and two aisles, with transepts; a baptistery and eight side chapels; a sanctuary 4 feet above the level of the nave, having on one side a spacious chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, and on the other side the Lady Chapel; beyond the sanctuary an apsidal choir, raised 13 feet above the nave, for the chanting of the divine office, with a crypt chapel beneath it; over the aisles and at the west end capacious tribunes, or galleries, and behind the Blessed Sacrament Chapel 2 large sacristies and rooms connected with them. The external dimensions are: Extreme length, 360 feet; width, 156 feet; height of nave, 117 feet; height of façade (not including the turrets), 101 feet; height of campanile, 273 feet, and to the top of the cross, 283 feet. Internally the dimensions are Length from the main entrance to the sanctuary, 232 feet; depth of the sanctuary, 62 feet, and of the raised choir beyond, 48 feet, making the total internal length 342 feet; width of nave, 60 feet; width across nave and aisles, 98 feet; across nave and aisles and side-chapels, 148 feet; height of the main arches of the nave, 90 feet, and of its three domes, 112 feet. The chief structural materials used are very hard brick and stone set in cement-mortar. The external walls, to the height of 8 feet from the ground, are of granite, and the structure above of red brick, in many parts artistically arranged, with a large amount of decorative work in Portland-stone. Internally, besides the lofty and massive piers, there will be 28 columns of marble 17 feet high in the nave, aisles and transepts, as well as many other columns of marble and granite in the sanctuary, the crypt and other parts. It is also intended to cover the lower walls and the piers to the height of 38 feet with marble. The whole of the upper part of the piers and walls and the vaults and concrete domes will be decorated with mosaic work illustrating the history of the Catholic Church. The cost of the cathedral building - that is, of the fabric simply, without the internal decoration will probably exceed £170,000. It is impossible, at this date, to form any estimate whatsoever of what the decoration and ornamentation of the interior will amount to. The opening of the cathedral is announced for June 29, 1901, the Feast of the Apostles SS. Peter and Paul, the sixth anniversary of the solemn laying of the foundationstone. - From the Pall Mall Gazette.

PURE AIR IN HEATED Dwelling-ROOMS. "When a coal-fire is in use for heating and the electric-light for lighting an inhabited room, the air is purer than by any of the other plans tried for heating and lighting." Such is, perhaps, the most important conclusion arrived at in an interesting investigation on this subject by Mr. Francis Jones. Mr. Jones's investigation has led to other observations which are not less in point of interest as bearing upon the question of the healthy condition of domestic apartments. He finds, for instance, that the air of a room, however heated and lighted, is purest at the floor, less pure three feet above, and most impure at the ceiling, and that when a gas-fire is in use for heating and the electric-light for lighting, the amount of carbon-dioxide in the room rises rapidly in the first two or three hours and then remains uniform for three or four hours afterward. When a coalfire is in use and an ordinary gas-jet is burning, the air of the room is purer than when a gas-fire is in use and an ordinary gas-jet burning. The use of a gas cooking-stove with a flue connected with the chimney greatly raises the amount of carbon-dioxide in the air of the room. The humidity of the air of the room is much diminished by the use of gasfires. London Lancet.

A UNIQUE BELL-TOWER. When the first settlement was made on Commencement Bay, Puget Sound, it was simply a lumber-camp and trading post. After the Northern Pacific Railroad was completed to Commencement Bay, a city was built on the high ground above the lumber-camp southward, and that is the handsome city of Tacoma, Wash. The ancient lumber-camp is now that part of Tacoma which is called "Old Town" locally. Early in the history of Old Town an Episcopal clergyman, now Bishop Morris of Oregon, built a little wooden church in the place, alongside of a huge fir-tree that had been broken off about 40 feet above the ground. It was first the intention to build the church behind the tree and cut a doorway through the trunk, thus making the tree the entrance as well as the bell-tower, but this plan was abandoned. A belfry tipped with a cross was built upon the top of the tree, a bell placed therein, and swung. To this day the ivyclad fir is the bell-tower of the church. Chicago Times-Herald.

WHAT "YOURS SINCERELY" MEANS. - Perhaps the jerry-builders of London who construct ceilings part of which tumble into one's soup and floors which unexpectedly drop into the cellar would not be so glib to subscribe themselves " Yours sincerely" if they knew the origin of the phrase. The Stone Trades Journal, waxing classic and Vitruvius-like, gives the source of the thing, which to students is old, but which may be new to the gentry who profess to provide shelter for a great part of the community. "The extent to which marble is entering into the decoration of modern buildings is but a repetition of the history of Roman architecture. The fact is that the old Roman jerry-builders used defective slabs of marble in erecting residences to sell at reduced rates, and covered up the defects with a cement of which white wax formed the chief ingredient. They looked just as stately as the others, till an exceptionally hot sun melted the wax and revealed the fraud. Hence, a perfect building was said to be sine cera,' or 'without wax,' and a friendship perfected by the trial of adversity was said to be without wax.' The signature sine cera,' as a symbol of genuine affection and probity, has been used ever since, and is perpetuated in the English word sincerely.'"

IRON-ORE BRIQUETTES.

An electrical process for smelting iron-ore has had a trial on an extended scale in Italy, no less than $180,000 having been invested in a plant for the manufacture of 4,000 tons of iron a year: The works are at Camonica, in the north of Italy, where waterpower is very cheap, an electrical horse-power for a year, or 8,760 working hours, costing only about $10.50 to generate. The iron-ore is ground to a fine powder and intimately mixed with ground coke and limestone. The mixture is ground into small briquettes with a suitable binding material, such as tar, and heated by the electric current in suitably designed furnaces. A continuous output results, the slag and iron being drawn off from time to time. As compared with the old process, wherein the heat is supplied by burning coke in a blast-furnace, the cost is reduced nearly $12 a ton for the finished product, which is a high carbon-manganese steel of great purity. Of course the figures given are based on the cost of coke, etc., in Italy. They would be much less in this country. - The Little Chronicle.

TREASURE-TROVE IN GREAT BRITAIN. — The curious history of the dealings with the ancient Celtic ornaments discovered in Ireland in 1896 is contained in a Parliamentary paper issued recently. The grave official document forms an amusing chapter in the complicated law of treasure-trove. These early examples of goldsmiths' work had been unearthed by a farm laborer while plowing a field near Limavady, and "passed into the possession" of a jeweller at Belfast, who in turn sold them to Mr. Day, a collector of antiquities and a Member of the Royal Irish Academy. This gentleman exhibited them in London, and the measure of their archæological interest and intrinsic value was proved by the fact that shortly afterwards the Trustees of the British Museum purchased them for £600. For twelve months nothing happened. The museum plumed itself upon its new acquisition, and the vender, no doubt, looked back upon the transaction with the satisfied complacency of one who has done a good turn at the same time to his country and himself. The Royal Irish Academy suddenly awakened to a sense of the enormity which had previously escaped notice. For forty years past the Treasury has given it the refusal of all treasure-trove found in Ireland, yet here was a rival institution stepping in and taking away its birthright, while keeping suspiciously quiet about the transaction. The Irish Academy, now conscious of the injury done to the archæo. logical instinct of the Isle of Saints, demanded that the Government should forthwith bring in a bill to transfer the ornaments from Great Russell Street to Dublin. But the Trustees of the British Museum are precluded by statute from parting with any object they have once acquired no entail was ever stricter than that which guards their gloomy portals. Mr. W. Redmond, laudably anxious that Irish antiq. uities should remain in the land of their origin, and, perhaps, not altogether averse from scoring off the Saxon, brought in a little bill to legalize the transfer, but it came to nothing. Ultimately, Mr. Balfour appointed a committee - which included Lord Rathmore, Mr. Morley and Sir John Lubbock to investigate the rights of the case. decorous interval of nearly six months, the majority of these distinguished antiquaries and politicians recommended some relaxation of the law that prevents the British Museum from alienating its property. Feeling, however, that the matter had not advanced very far, the Treasury went to the Irish law-officers, who declared, without hesitation, that the ornaments were treasure-trove, and therefore Crown property, and that the Trustees were bound to hand them over upon demand. But in the matter of legal subtleties Great Russell Street was equal to the King's Inns. It pointed out that since the articles had been found in a field which, until within the last sixty years, formed part of the bed of the sea, they were not treasure-trove as defined by Blackstone. Upon this contention and by the light of some fresh data as to the circumstances of the discovery, the law-officers of the two countries came to a final conclusion that, assuming the legal establishment of these facts, the ornaments were treasure-trove and Crown property. Weighty matters of this kind must, of course, be conducted with leisured dignity, and this brought us to last March, rather more than four years after the first discovery of the relics. But still the British Museum did not move- it would give up nothing except in obedience to a judicial decision. The Solicitor to the Treasury has therefore been instructed, as Mr. Balfour has already stated in the House of Commons, to bring an action against the Trustees for the recovery of the ornaments, and a good many hundreds of pounds may be expended before judgment is delivered. Nor is it certain that this would end the matter so far as the Museum is concerned, since the law. officers have prudently declined to say whether that institution would have any remedy against Mr. Day, from whom it made the purchase. The situation bristles with entertaining legal possibilities; meanwhile the Irish members are not likely to show any falling off in their zeal for the archæological riches of their native land.-London Standard.

After a

together with full detail illustrations, may be obtained Scagliola Work.

of the Commissioner of Patents, at Washington, for five cents.1

655,082-083. SHUTTER FASTENER. Hibbs, Bristol, Pa.

Henry S.

655,107. DOOR CHECK. - Frederick H. Ogden, Newark, N. J.

655,148. SYSTEM OF COOLING AND VENTILATING. - Walter H. Dickerson, Newark, N. J. 655,182. HOT-AIR DRUM.-John F. Beck, Atlanta, Ga.

Haven, Conn.

655,185. DIVIDERS.-William A. Bernard, New 655,199. COMBINED LOCK AND LATCH. - Moses E. Collins, Brighton, Ind. 655.220. GLASS PRISM-PLATE.-Godfrey Fugman, Cleveland, O.

655,233. WATER-CLOSET VALVE. - Henry T. C. Heuck, Champaign, Ill.

655,285. AIR-PURIFYING APPARATUS. - Richard H. Thomas, Chicago, Ill.

655,288. AUTOMATIC TANK. -William O. Wayman, Chicago, Ill.

655,290. CONSTRUCTION OF WALLS AND CEILINGS. Anton Wohlgemuth, Munich, Ger.

655,303. APPARATUS FOR FLUSHING WATERCLOSETS.Adolphus La Bonté, Worcester, Mass. 655,326. LEVEL.- Sam M. Combs, Mount Sterling, Ky. 655,331-332. WINDOW. - Oliver M. Edwards, Syracuse, N. Y.

655,351. WATER-HEATING APPARATUS.-William Rochlitz, Chicago, Ill.

655,364. BARREL-SWING, George L. Edgerton, Guilford College, N. C.

655,382. LOCK MECHANISM FOR REVERSIBLE WINDOWS. William H. Talbot, San Francisco, Cal. 655,401. PRISMATIC ROLLED SHEET GLASS. Charles C. Hartung. St. Louis, Mo.

655,419. DRY CLOSET AND INCINERATOR. - Fred P. Smith, Albany, N. Y.

655,426. CENTRE FOR FIREPROOF ARCHES.-Guy B. Waite, Hoboken, N. J.

BUILDING INTELLIGENCE.

(Reported for The American Architect and Building News.)

[Although a large portion of the building intelligence is provided by their regular correspondents, the edi tors greatly desire to receive voluntary information, especially from the smaller and outlying towns.]

ADVANCE RUMORS. Baltimore, Md. - The Howard Park Improvement Co. have had plans prepared by Architects Hodges & Leach for a stone and frame hotel, to cost $60,000.

Bloomington, Ill. - Architect George H. Miller is preparing plans for a brick and stone bank building for the Livingston estate. it will be a fourstory brick and stone structure, 18' x 110', costing $20,000.

Chris. Trevert will erect a three-story brick store and effice building. 57' x 57', after plans by Architect Arthur L. Pillsbury; cost, $18,000. Bridgeport, Conn.- Architect G. W. Kramer, 1 Madison Ave., New York City, has prepared plans for a new M. E. Church to cost $6,000. Buffalo, N. Y.-Architect Chas. D. Swan is preparing plans for a three-story brick and stone school-building to be erected at Fillmore Ave. and Best St.; cost, $78.000.

Architects Buemming & Dick, Milwaukee, Wis., have been commissioned to design the Wisconsin Building at the Pan-American Exposition. Butte, Mont.- The Miner Publishing Co. has had plans prepared by H. M. Patterson for a five-story

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BUILDING INTELLIGENCE.

(Advance Rumors Continued.) fireproof building to be erected on W. Broadway; cost, $30,000. Calumet, Mich.-Architect Carl E. Nystrom, Larprim, is drawing plans for a three-story brick store and office building for Miss Corrigan; ecst, $15,000. Charlestown, N. H.-The G. S. Bond Co. will be incorporated with a capital stock of $15,000 to rebuild the Bond factory for the manufacture of musical instrument cases.

Chicago, Ill. - Several M. E. Societies contemplate the formation of an institutional church. The plan, it is said, is to effect the consolidation of several Methodist congregations, including Trinity, the First Church and others, sell present properties and employ the capital thus secured, probably $2.000,000, in building one of the largest houses of worship in the world. This institutional church will recognize no class or caste, and meetings will be conducted on week days as well as on Sundays. Jenny & Mundie have drawn plans for alterations to be made to the Adams Express Building, recently purchased by John C. McCord; cost, $50.000. Architect A. Sandegren is preparing plans for an apartment-building to cost $30,000.

Hill & Waltersdorf have drawn plans for a twostory residence to be erected on Sheridan Ave. The exterior wall will be of rough cement and brick; cost, $15,000.

Z. T. Davis is preparing plans for a packing plant to be erected at the corner of 41st St. and Emerald Ave. for Ruddy Bros.; cost, about $125,000. Cleveland, O.-Architects Steffens, Searles & Hirsh are drawing plans for a three-story stone and brick bank building to be erected on Wade Park Ave. for the Genesee Savings & Banking Co.; cost, $15,000. (Continued on page xii.)