PUBLIC AND SEMIPUBLIC BUILDINGS
THE CAPITOL
The site for the Capitol, or the Federal House, as selected by
L’Enfant, is on what was then known as Jenkin’s Hill, 88 feet above the
level of the Potomac River.
The northwest cornerstone of the main building was laid on September
18, 1793, by President Washington with Masonic ceremonies. The building
is of Virginia sandstone from quarries on Aquia Creek.
The north wing was finished in 1800 and the south wing in 1811. A
wooden passageway connected them. Congress convened there for the first
time at the second session of the Sixth Congress, which began November
17, 1800, and ended March 3, 1801.
The original designs were prepared by Dr. William Thornton, and the
work was done under the direction of Stephen H. Hallet, James Hoban,
and George Hadfield. Benjamin H. Latrobe was the architect. Washington
and Jefferson favored the classical type of architecture for the
building, and it was adopted.
On August 24, 1814, the interior of both wings was destroyed by fire
set by the British. Many books of the small Library of Congress housed
in the building at that time were burned, whereupon Congress purchased
the library of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello. The damage to the
Capitol was immediately repaired.
In 1818 the central portion of the building was commenced under the
architectural superintendence of Charles Bulfinch, architect, of
Boston. The original building was finally completed in 1827. Its cost,
including the grading of the grounds, alterations, and repairs, up to
1827, was $2,433,844.13.
Because of the growth of the Republic, after half a century it became
necessary to build a Senate Chamber on the north and a House of
Representatives Chamber on the south. The cornerstone of the extensions
to the Capitol which increased it to its present size was laid on
July 4, 1851, by President Fillmore. Daniel Webster was the orator of
the day. This work was prosecuted under the direction of Thomas U.
Walter, Architect of the Capitol until 1865, when he resigned, and was
completed under the supervision of Edward Clark. The House extension
was first occupied for legislative purposes December 16, 1857, and the
Senate extension January 4, 1859.
The white marble used in the walls is from Massachusetts and that in
the columns from Maryland.
[Illustration: _Courtesy of Commercial Photo Co._
THE CAPITOL]
The entire length of the building from north to south is 751 feet 4
inches and its greatest dimension from east to west is 350 feet. The
area covered by the building is 3¹⁄₂ acres.
The Dome of the original central building was constructed of wood,
covered with copper. The present structure of cast iron was commenced
in 1856, and completed in 1865. The entire weight of iron used is
8,909,200 pounds.
The Dome is crowned by the bronze Statue of Freedom, 19 feet 6 inches
high and weighing 14,985 pounds. It was modeled by the sculptor Thomas
Crawford. The height of the Dome above the base line of the east front
is 287 feet 5 inches. The height from the top of the balustrade of the
building is 217 feet 11 inches. The greatest diameter at the base is
135 feet 5 inches.
The Rotunda is 97 feet 6 inches in diameter, and its height from
the floor to the top of the canopy is 180 feet 3 inches. The canopy
overhanging the Dome, portraying the Apotheosis of Washington, was
painted by Brumidi.
The Rotunda frieze, 65 feet above the floor, making a circle 300 feet
in length around the walls, illustrates important periods in American
history.
Paintings in the Rotunda are as follows:
The Landing of Columbus on San Salvador, October 12, 1492, by
Vanderlyn.
The Discovery of the Mississippi by De Soto, 1541, by W. H. Powell.
The Baptism of Pocahontas, Jamestown, Va., 1613, by John G. Chapman.
The Embarkation of the Pilgrims from Delft-Haven, July 22, 1620, by
Robert W. Weir.
The Signing of the Declaration of Independence, Philadelphia, July 4,
1776, by John Trumbull.
The Surrender of Burgoyne, Saratoga, October 17, 1777, by John
Trumbull.
The Surrender of Cornwallis, Yorktown, Va., October 19, 1781, by John
Trumbull.
The Resignation of General Washington, December 23, 1783, by John
Trumbull.
The Senate Chamber is 113 feet 3 inches in length by 80 feet 3 inches
in width and 36 feet in height. The galleries will accommodate 682
persons. The House of Representatives Chamber is 139 feet in length
by 93 feet in width and 36 feet in height. In 1800 the Chambers were
lighted by lamps and tallow candles, and the 142 Representatives
were seated in chairs. To-day there are 435 Members of the House
of Representatives, in addition to 2 Delegates and 2 Resident
Commissioners, who are seated on benches, which are arranged in a
semicircle like those of the theater of Dionysius. To-day the Capitol
is lighted by electricity and equipped with a modern ventilating system.
The room later occupied by the Supreme Court of the United States was
the Senate Chamber until 1859. Previous to that time the court occupied
the room immediately beneath, now used as a law library.
Beautiful paintings by Brumidi, Trumbull, and others adorn the Capitol,
and many statues, gift of the States, may be seen in Statuary Hall,
set apart as such in 1864, being formerly the House of Representatives
Chamber.
[Illustration: THE CAPITOL AT NIGHT]
[Illustration: STATUE OF FREEDOM]
Massive bronze doors by Rogers, depicting scenes from the life of
Christopher Columbus, are at the main entrance, the east, and open from
the portico to the Rotunda. They call to mind the Ghiberti doors in
Florence.
There are 24 columns of Maryland sandstone, 30 feet high, in the
central portico. Statues by Greenough and Persico flank the steps.
The Capitol is to-day the most significant building in this country.
Its assessed value in 1930 for building and grounds was $45,000,000.
On the east portico of the Capitol newly elected Presidents of the
United States take the oath of office.
STATUE OF FREEDOM
As has been stated, the Statue of Freedom surmounting the Dome of the
Capitol is the work of one of America’s great artists, Thomas Crawford.
The modeling was done in Rome, and at the time of his death, in 1857,
he was endeavoring to secure the necessary funds for the casting of
it at the Royal Foundry at Munich. On April 19, 1858, the plaster
model was shipped from Leghorn, Italy, and after a perilous voyage to
New York it arrived in Washington in April, 1859. At that time work
on completion of the Capitol was proceeding under the supervision of
Thomas U. Walter, architect.
On May 24, 1860, the Secretary of War, in a statement concerning the
casting of the statue stated that--
it will be cast by Clark Mills and he will be paid for his services
and for the rent of his foundry [at Mills Avenue toward Bladensburg,
where the Andrew Jackson equestrian was cast in 1853] and necessary
expenses at the rate of $400 per month and that the material, fuel,
labor, etc., will be paid for by the Government.
This arrangement had been entered into and the work had progressed to
quite an extent, when Captain Meigs, who had returned to duty at the
Capitol, issued a formal statement of the existence of war, on May
15, 1861, suspending work on the Capitol extension and the new Dome.
But subsequently, even though the existence of war between the States
handicapped the Government, the necessary arrangements for completing
the Dome and for casting the statue were made. The statue was hoisted
in place on the Dome amid a salute of 35 guns on December 2, 1863.
The original model of the statue may be seen to-day in the rotunda of
the Museum of History Building of the Smithsonian Institution.
BRONZE DOORS OF THE CAPITOL
These bronze doors, the central and most elaborate of the Capitol,
were modeled by Randolph Rogers at Rome in 1858, and cast at the Royal
Bavarian Foundry in Munich by Ferdinand von Muller, director, at a cost
of $17,000. Each of the doors is 19 feet high and 5 feet wide. They are
surmounted by a semicircular transom-panel or lunette representing the
landing of Columbus in the New World on October 12, 1492. The casing
border is a decorative scheme composed of anchors, rudders, and armor;
four figures in low relief typify Asia, Africa, Europe, and America. At
the top of the casing arch is a bust of Columbus.
[Illustration: BRONZE DOORS AT MAIN ENTRANCE TO THE CAPITOL, BY ROGERS]
Each of the doors is separated into four panels, portraying scenes in
alto-relief from life of Columbus.
The lowest panel on the left-hand door pictures Columbus before the
Council of Salamanca. Then follows his departure from the Convent of La
Rabida for the Spanish Court. The next is the audience before Ferdinand
and Isabella, and the last the sailing from Palos on the first voyage.
The top panel on the right-hand door represents the first encounter
with the Indians. The next the triumphal entry into Barcelona. Then
follows Columbus in chains, and the last depicts the death of the
discoverer.
The borders of the separate doors each contain eight figures
representing prominent personages of the fifteenth century who played
important parts in the events connected with the discovery of America.
BRONZE DOORS OF THE SENATE WING
The bronze doors of the Senate wing were designed by Thomas Crawford,
sculptor, though the actual work of executing the plaster models was
done by William H. Rinehart. They represent Crawford’s last work as a
sculptor. It was first contemplated that one of the doors should be
cast at the Royal Bavarian Foundry in Munich and that the other door
should be cast in this country. The death of Thomas Crawford in 1857
and the subsequent occurrence of the Civil War caused many of the plans
to be changed. The doors, the first of that kind in America, were
finally cast in 1868 at Chicopee, Mass., by James T. Ames, and the
expense, $50,000, was far greater than was anticipated at the time when
it was planned to have the work done in this country. They weigh 14,000
pounds. The sculptor, Rinehart, received about $9,000.
Each of the doors consists of three panels and a medallion picturing
events of the Revolutionary War.
The upper panel of the right-hand door contains a representation of
the death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17,
1775; the center panel shows General Washington rebuking Gen. Charles
Lee at the Battle of Monmouth, N. J., on June 28, 1778; the lower panel
pictures the storming of a redoubt at Yorktown, Va., led by Alexander
Hamilton, on October 14, 1781; the medallion at the bottom represents a
conflict between a Hessian soldier and a New Jersey farmer.
The medallion at the bottom of the left-hand door represents Peace
and Agriculture. Above is a panel showing General Washington passing
underneath an arch of flowers at Trenton, N. J., while on his way to
New York City to be inaugurated as the first President of the United
States; the middle panel represents Washington taking the oath of
office as President, which was administered by Chancellor Livingston
on April 30, 1789--the United States Supreme Court had not as yet been
organized, so that the oath could not be administered by the Chief
Justice. The top panel represents President Washington laying the
corner stone of the Capitol on September 18, 1793.
[Illustration: BRONZE DOORS AT THE SENATE WING, BY CRAWFORD]
BRONZE DOORS OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES WING
The bronze doors of the House of Representatives resemble in general
outline and arrangement the bronze doors of the Senate. Each door
consists of three panels and a medallion picturing events in American
history. The design is that of Thomas Crawford, sculptor, but the
modeling and completion was that of William H. Rinehart. The models
after being transported to this country remained for a long time in
storage and were finally cast by M. H. Mosman, at Chicopee, Mass., who
had succeeded to or continued the business organization of James T.
Ames, by whom the Senate doors were cast.
The doors were installed in the autumn of 1905, the cost to the
Government being $45,000.
The upper panel of the left-hand door portrays the Massacre of Wyoming,
July 17, 1778; the center panel the Battle of Lexington, April 19,
1775; the lower panel presentation of flag to Gen. William Moultrie for
his defense of Sullivans Island, Charleston Harbor, June 28, 1776; and
the medallion at the bottom shows the death of General Montgomery in
the attack on Quebec, December 31, 1775.
The upper panel of the right-hand door depicts the reading of the
Declaration of Independence; the center panel the signing of the Paris
treaty of peace between the United States and Great Britain, September
3, 1783; the lower panel Washington’s farewell to his officers at New
York, December 4, 1783; and the medallion at the bottom contains a
seated figure of Franklin in his study.
THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES
Congress is one of the three coordinate branches of the United States
Government. It is the legislative branch and consists of a Senate,
to which the Members, two from each State, are elected for a term of
six years; and the House of Representatives, to which the Members
are elected for a term of two years. The membership is based on the
population of the United States, and in January, 1939, numbered 435
Members. The apportionment is made among the several States in the
ratio that the whole number of persons in each State bears to the total
population of the country. States arrange for their own congressional
districts after the number of Members of the House of Representatives
from each State has been determined upon. There are in the House, also,
2 Territorial Delegates--1 each from Alaska and Hawaii--and 2 Resident
Commissioners--1 from the Commonwealth of the Philippines and 1 from
Puerto Rico. They have the right to debate but not to vote.
[Illustration: BRONZE DOORS AT THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES WING, BY
CRAWFORD]
[Illustration: SENATE CHAMBER]
[Illustration: HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES CHAMBER]
The Constitution provides that Congress shall assemble on January 3 of
each year (20th amendment); and each Congress usually consists of two
sessions.
[Illustration: SENATE OFFICE BUILDING]
The powers of Congress are set forth in Article I, section 8 of the
Constitution, which is divided into 18 clauses. The power to raise
revenue originates in the House of Representatives, which carries
the burden in providing necessary appropriations; the Senate has the
power of confirming or rejecting appointments made by the President
and to ratify treaties. Measures are originated in the form of bills
or resolutions, which are thereupon referred to committees for report
before being introduced in the Senate or House of Representatives.
The age requirement for eligibility as a Member of the House of
Representatives is 25 years, and for the Senate 30 years; each person
must have been a citizen of the United States for seven years and a
citizen of the State from which elected.
Members of Congress are by the Constitution granted exemption from
arrest under certain conditions while attending the sessions of their
respective Houses and in going to and returning from such sessions,
“and for any speech or debate in either House, they shall not be
questioned in any other place.”
The proceedings and debates in Congress are published in the
Congressional Record, which is printed daily at the Government Printing
Office with such rapidity that even though a session of Congress may
continue until late in the night a copy of the Record is at hand for
each Member the following morning.
[Illustration: OLD HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OFFICE BUILDING]
[Illustration: NEW HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OFFICE BUILDING]
A bill or resolution, to become a law, must be passed by both the
House of Representatives and the Senate and approved by the President.
If there are points of disagreement in the Senate or House of
Representatives in the enactment of legislation, each body appoints
conferees to settle the points in dispute. The President has the
power to veto a bill, but the measure can become law if reconsidered
and passed by both the Senate and the House of Representatives by
a two-thirds majority. Occasionally the President makes use of the
“pocket veto”; that is, if the bill was passed within 10 days (Sundays
excepted) of the adjournment of Congress, the President may retain
(pocket) the bill, which is thus killed at the end of the session
without the interposition of a direct veto, and without risking the
chances of its passage over the veto. If the President does not
interpose the ordinary veto, a bill becomes law at the expiration of 10
days.
[Illustration: UNION STATION]
The President is given authority by the Constitution to convene either
or both Houses of Congress in extraordinary session.
SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OFFICE BUILDINGS
The Senate and House Office Buildings, the former flanking the Capitol
to the north and the latter to the south, were designed by Carrere &
Hastings, architects, and are in the classical style of architecture.
A new House Office Building, designed by the Allied Architects, Inc.,
of Washington, has recently been completed, and also the East Wing of
the Senate Office Building, designed by Wyeth & Sullivan, architects of
Washington. Each Senator is provided with offices of from two to three
rooms, and likewise each Representative, excepting a few whose offices
are in the Capitol.
UNION STATION
In the design of the station much thought was given to the
architectural features. Since Greece and Rome have furnished
architectural inspiration for so many of the public buildings of
Washington, a freely interpreted classic may be considered as the
recognized architecture of these structures; and as the new station was
to be the monumental gateway to the National Capital, it seemed fitting
that the architectural motives should be drawn from the triumphal
arches of Rome. They inspired Mr. Burnham to design the Union Station
as he did. Construction work was begun in August, 1902, the terminal
opened October 27, 1907, and was completed in April, 1908.
Some of the elements entering into the design of the terminal were
unique. In most cities the probable future growth and nature of
the traffic plays an important part in the planning of a passenger
terminal. Washington has very little suburban traffic; and as it will
never become a commercial center, the question of providing for future
growth was of minor importance. The main problem was how to care for
and provide against abnormal conditions, which arise at least once
every four years. The handling of inauguration crowds had always been
a heavy expense to the railroads, because they had to provide such
elaborate temporary facilities. On the other hand, to provide adequate
permanent facilities meant a large expenditure, with the attendant
heavy carrying charges. On account of the dilapidated condition of the
passenger facilities owned by the companies, and the urgent need of
larger and better terminals, a union terminal seemed to show advantages
over the separate stations provided for in the acts of 1901.
[Illustration: _Courtesy of Commercial Photo Co._
UNION STATION--CONCOURSE]
The layout embraces every feature and facility involved in the
construction of a first-class terminal, including a depot building
planned and constructed after the most modern lines, and containing
every feature for the convenience, comfort, and pleasure of the
traveling public; the most complete and up-to-date facilities for
conducting the business of a large railroad station; a main power
plant for furnishing power of every kind required for the successful
operation of the station and yards; a large and completely equipped
express terminal for caring for the express business handled by the
companies; a modern commodious roundhouse and shop layout for caring
for repairs to equipment; the most complete interlocking layout and
intercommunication system ever constructed; one of the most complete
passenger-equipment yards ever built; and a track system covering yards
and main tracks within the passenger-terminal zone aggregating about 60
miles of single track.
The station building proper is 626 feet 10 inches long and 210 feet 9
inches wide, exclusive of the space taken up by the columns in front of
the central pavilion or main portico. The front and ends are made up of
groups of semicircular arches characteristic of Roman architecture. The
main portico or central pavilion consists of 3 arches, each 29 feet 6
inches wide and 48 feet 9 inches high. Flanking it on either side are 7
arches, each 12 feet 4 inches wide and 24 feet 8 inches high, while the
end pavilions are composed of arches 22 feet wide and 38 feet 6 inches
high.
The west end is made up of 5 arches 19 feet 2 inches wide and 37 feet
7 inches high, and 1 arch 12 feet 4 inches wide and 24 feet 8 inches
high. The former are used as exits for carriages from the carriage
porch, the latter to carry out the open portico treatment across the
front. At the east end leading to the open portico are 2 windows with
arch treatment, and there are 5 arches 12 feet 6 inches wide and 24
feet 8 inches high, 1 arch 22 feet wide and 38 feet 6 inches high,
leading to a carriage pavilion.
The east pavilion leads to a suite of rooms for the use of the
President and the guests of the Nation, the west pavilion to the
carriage porch at the west end of the ticket lobby. The central and end
pavilions are connected by a portico or loggia from 14 feet 6 inches to
16 feet 6 inches wide, the portico and pavilions forming a continuous
covered porch the entire length of the structure, and affording
protection from the elements. The east and west wings of the building
are 69 feet 7¹⁄₂ inches above the floor level, and the domes over the
carriage entrances are 78 feet 3¹⁄₂ inches above the same point. The
dome over the main waiting room is 122 feet 10 inches high.
[Illustration: UNION STATION--WAITING ROOM]
The concourse in the rear of the main building is 760 feet long and 130
feet wide, exceeding by nearly nine feet the length of the Capitol. It
is covered by a segmental arched ceiling 45 feet high in the center and
22 feet at the springing line above the main floor. About 40 per cent
of the ceiling area is of glass, the remainder is artistically coffered
ornamental plaster. The concourse is divided by the usual train fence
into two sections, that on the station side being 83 feet and that on
the track side 47 feet wide.
There are 32 tracks leading to the station--20 on the level of the
waiting rooms and 12 depressed below the street level a distance of 20
feet. Two tubes of the Pennsylvania Railroad Co. and Southern Railway
Co., each 16 feet wide, run from the station south along First Street
between the Library of Congress and the Capitol for about a mile.
At the Fountain of Neptune the tunnel is 40 feet below the surface.
Approximately 285 trains enter and leave the railway station each day;
the daily number of passengers is approximately 30,000.
The general waiting room has a clear width of 120 feet, is 219
feet long, exclusive of the colonnades, and is covered by a Roman
barrel-vaulted ceiling, its highest point, exclusive of coffers,
being 96 feet above the floor level. The decorations are sunken
panels patterned after the baths of Diocletian. It is lighted by a
semicircular window 72¹⁄₂ feet in diameter at the east end, by three
semicircular windows in the south side and five on the north side, each
27¹⁄₂ feet in diameter, and by the glass roof over the ticket lobby at
the west end. Imperial Rome at her greatest did not possess a hall of
such proportions.
The Union Station is built of Vermont white granite. In the
construction of this massive building Mr. Burnham set a standard for
civic improvement for the construction of railroad terminals in this
country.
The complete architectural treatment of the front elevation of the
station includes six stone statues and four eagles, the former over
the central pavilion, and the latter over the carriage entrances at
the east and west ends. This statuary is placed in front of the great
friezes over the main entrance arches and over the carriage archways
and, with the inscriptions in the panels between, have been made a
special architectural feature.
Before the adoption of the scheme a number of suggestions for the
subjects of the statues and inscriptions were secured, ranging from
the explorers and discoverers of this country to the various inventors
who have had most to do with the development of transportation. The
general architectural treatment of the building, however, was such
as to preclude the usual portrait statues. To make them take their
place as part of the architecture required that they be limited to
allegorical draped figures, forming simple, massive silhouettes against
the vast frieze. In the development of the complete scheme, embracing
the subjects for the statuary, with appropriate inscriptions in the
intervening panels, the late Charles W. Eliot, former president of
Harvard University, was consulted. The result is an appropriate and
adequate treatment of the decorative frieze over the doorway of the
vestibule to the Capital of the Nation.
The general decorative features of the main entrance to the building
consist of six massive stone columns, two on each side and one in front
of each pier supporting the main arches. Upon pedestals on the tops
of these columns the granite statues, about 18 feet high, are placed,
those on the west side of the entrance representing Prometheus and
Thales, typifying Fire and Electricity, those on the east side Ceres
and Archimedes, typifying Agriculture and Mechanics, while Freedom and
Imagination are depicted by the central figures. Those on the west
side represent two of the great forces connected with the operation of
railroads, while those on the east owe much of their development and
wealth to the railroads. The central figures typify the atmosphere of
freedom in which the inventive imagination has been able to accomplish
such great results. The columns flanking the carriage entrances are
surmounted by stone eagles about 8 feet high.
The following inscriptions are cut in the granite panels over the main
entrance:
_West_ (_Prometheus and Thales_)
FIRE--GREATEST OF DISCOVERIES
ENABLING MAN TO LIVE IN VARIOUS CLIMATES
USE MANY FOODS--AND COMPEL
THE FORCES OF NATURE TO DO HIS WORK
ELECTRICITY--CARRIER OF LIGHT AND POWER
DEVOURER OF TIME AND SPACE--BEARER
OF HUMAN SPEECH OVER LAND AND SEA
GREAT SERVANT OF MAN--ITSELF UNKNOWN
THOU HAST PUT ALL THINGS UNDER HIS FEET
_Central_ (_Freedom and Imagination_)
SWEETENER OF HUT AND OF HALL
BRINGER OF LIFE OUT OF NAUGHT
FREEDOM O FAIREST OF ALL
THE DAUGHTERS OF TIME AND THOUGHT
MAN’S IMAGINATION HAS CONCEIVED ALL
NUMBERS AND LETTERS--ALL TOOLS, VESSELS
AND SHELTERS--EVERY ART AND TRADE--ALL
PHILOSOPHY AND POETRY--AND ALL POLITIES
THE TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU FREE
_East_ (_Ceres and Archimedes_)
THE FARM--BEST HOME OF THE FAMILY--MAIN
SOURCE OF NATIONAL WEALTH--FOUNDATION OF
CIVILIZED SOCIETY--THE NATURAL PROVIDENCE
THE OLD MECHANIC ARTS--CONTROLLING NEW
FORCES--BUILD NEW HIGHWAYS FOR GOODS
AND MEN--OVERRIDE THE OCEAN--AND MAKE
THE VERY ETHER CARRY HUMAN THOUGHT
THE DESERT SHALL REJOICE AND BLOSSOM
AS THE ROSE
In the panels over the entrances to the carriage porch and state
apartment the following inscriptions are cut:
_Carriage Porch_ (_south elevation_)
HE THAT WOULD BRING HOME THE
WEALTH OF THE INDIES MUST CARRY
THE WEALTH OF THE INDIES WITH HIM
SO IT IS IN TRAVELLING--A MAN
MUST CARRY KNOWLEDGE WITH HIM
IF HE WOULD BRING HOME KNOWLEDGE
_State Apartment_ (_south elevation_)
LET ALL THE ENDS THOU AIMEST AT BE
THY COUNTRY’S, THY GOD’S, AND TRUTH’S,
BE NOBLE, AND THE NOBLENESS THAT
LIES IN OTHER MEN--SLEEPING BUT
NEVER DEAD--WILL RISE IN MAJESTY
TO MEET THINE OWN
_State Apartment_ (_east elevation_)
WELCOME THE COMING
SPEED THE PARTING GUEST
VIRTUE ALONE IS SWEET SOCIETY
IT KEEPS THE KEY TO ALL
HEROIC HEARTS AND OPENS YOU
A WELCOME IN THEM ALL
The decorations immediately in front of and along the sides of the east
and west entrances consist of stone balustrades upon which at proper
intervals are ornamental lamp posts.
Immediately in front of the main entrance to the Union Station there
are three ornamental iron flagstaffs 110 feet in height, the ornamental
base and decorative portions of which are in bronze. These were
designed by D. H. Burnham & Co., architects of the Union Station.
Since the completion of the Union Station in 1908 there have also been
placed on the Plaza the Columbus Memorial Fountain in front of the main
entrance, and two large fountains, one on each side of the memorial.
All stone used in the decoration of the Plaza, except that in the bowls
of the fountains, is Vermont white granite, from the same quarry as
that used in the station building. The fountain bowls are of Maine
green granite. The upper bowls are 13 feet in diameter and cut from
a single piece of stone; the lower bowls are 22 feet 6 inches in
diameter, the rims being made from eight separate pieces of granite.
The bottoms of these bowls are of reinforced concrete and are lined
with sheet lead.
WASHINGTON CITY POST OFFICE
The Washington City Post Office moved into its present quarters on
September 5, 1914. The building faces on Massachusetts Avenue and
extends from North Capitol Street to First Street NE.
At the time of occupancy it was considered the model post office
for the rest of the country, being provided with the most modern
mail-handling equipment that human ingenuity could devise. There are
conveyor belts through a tunnel under the streets for bringing the
enormous amount of Government mail from the Government Printing Office
directly into the post office, where it is made up for dispatch to
trains; other belts for conveying mail from one section of the office
to another; bucket lifts for raising mail from a lower to a higher
floor; gravity chutes to send mail from an upper to a lower level;
miniature trolley systems to carry smaller amounts of mail, or even
single important letters, from one section of the workroom floor to
another; and other devices to save footsteps of the employees and
conserve their time.
The building is three stories above the ground level and two stories
below. The two upper floors and one of the lower ones are given over to
Post Office Department activities, such as the Postal Savings Division,
the Division of Stamps, the Division of Equipment and Supplies, and
others. The building is so constructed that the maximum of natural
daylight is permitted to enter. It has no heating plant of its own,
being supplied with heat from the plant located at First and E Streets
SE. that supplies the Capitol, Senate and House Office Buildings, and
the Government Printing Office. The necessary pipes are brought into
the building through underground tunnels.
[Illustration: WASHINGTON CITY POST OFFICE]
There are approximately 6 acres of floor space available for the
Washington Post Office. This additional space was secured by a new
addition. It was thought at the time the post office moved into its new
quarters that the floor space provided would be ample to take care of
all increases in the volume of mail for a period of 50 years. In a few
years the office far outgrew this space, and Congress appropriated for
an addition to the building about equal in size to the original one.
The construction of this addition cost $4,000,000.
The original building cost $3,028,000, and the general style of the
architecture is that of the monumental work of Roman times and was
designed by Peirce Anderson, architect, to harmonize with the Union
Station, which adjoins, and to which it is connected by a covered
bridge, over which mail to and from the trains is trucked.
The main exterior motive consists of an Ionic colonnade flanked by
corner pavilions treated with round arches, inclosed in a strong frame
of columns and pilasters and surmounted by solid attics carrying
inscriptions as follows:
MESSENGER OF SYMPATHY AND LOVE
SERVANT OF PARTED FRIENDS
CONSOLER OF THE LONELY
BOND OF THE SCATTERED FAMILY
ENLARGER OF THE COMMON LIFE
CARRIER OF NEWS AND KNOWLEDGE
INSTRUMENT OF TRADE AND INDUSTRY
PROMOTER OF MUTUAL ACQUAINTANCE
OF PEACE AND OF GOOD WILL
AMONG MEN AND NATIONS
Many visitors to Washington will stop and read these inscriptions
and, being interested in the authorship thereof, will make inquiry
concerning it. Research shows that the originals were prepared by Dr.
Charles W. Eliot, at that time president of Harvard University, but
that some slight changes were made in the text by the late President
Wilson to the extent of the alteration of some three or four words. It
is this revision that appears on the building.
The material of the exterior of the building is Vermont white granite
and is the same as that used in the construction of the Union Station.
The general treatment of the main lobby, which is 250 feet in length,
is that of a high cella, 30 feet wide and 53 feet high, and surrounded
by an order of pilasters in Tavernelle marble. The adjoining vestibules
are ornamented by 24 monolithic columns of gray-green granite from
New Hampshire. These columns are 2 feet and 4 inches in diameter and
20 feet in height. The floor is of Tennessee marble, laid in patterns
of pinks and grays. The main lobby ceiling has an elaborate coffered
design inspired from the best period of the Italian Renaissance.
[Illustration: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS]
The gross receipts of the Washington Post Office have increased from
$1,792,917 in 1914 to nearly $7,000,000 in 1938.
In order to make postal facilities as easily accessible as possible,
there are located throughout the city 31 classified and 41 contract
stations.
To properly transport mail from the main office to the various
stations, electric-line terminals, steamboat wharves, and aviation
fields, and to make collections from the street letter boxes and
deliver parcel-post packages, the office operates a fleet of fully 100
Government-owned automobile trucks.
Designed by Graham Anderson, Probst & White and built of white Vermont
granite, the addition was completed in 1937 and it doubled the size of
the city post office.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
The Library of Congress, the world’s largest and most elaborate
building devoted wholly to library uses, occupies two city squares east
of and facing the Capitol Grounds, also an addition recently completed.
The architecture is of the Italian Renaissance order, from plans made
by J. J. Smithmeyer and Paul Pelz, and modified by Edward P. Casey. The
exterior walls are of New Hampshire granite. Fifty masters of painting
and sculpture worked together to make it a treasure house of the best
contemporary American art, fit to shelter one of the greatest libraries
of the world. Army engineers superintended its construction.
Begun in 1886, completed in 1897, the building measures 340 feet
by 470 feet and covers about 3¹⁄₂ acres. Its cost to date has been
$7,868,951. The addition was designed by Pierson & Wilson, architects
of Washington, and built of Georgia marble.
In front of the Library is a bronze fountain by Hinton Perry, sculptor,
representing the Court of Neptune.
The grand stair hall of the entrance pavilion is of Italian white
marble, is particularly beautiful at night, when visitors delight to
see it. It leads to the great rotunda, which is the reading room. To
the right are the library rooms of Senators and Representatives and
the periodical room. To the left are the rooms for the blind and the
conservatory of music.
On the second floor at the head of the staircase is Elihu Vedder’s
famous mosaic, Minerva. On this floor also are on exhibition the
original Declaration of Independence, the original Constitution of the
United States, and the Gutenberg Bible. To the right is the prints
division, now called the division of fine arts, and to the left the
manuscripts division.
[Illustration: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS--GRAND STAIRCASE]
The reading room contains the card-index catalogue of the books in
the Library, will accommodate 1,000 readers at a time, and is free to
any reader over 16 years of age. The alcoves are devoted to books on
particular subjects.
The reading room is under the dome, which is 100 feet in diameter
and 195 feet high to the lantern. In the lantern of the dome is a
female figure indicating Human Understanding, and on the collar
surrounding the lantern, 150 feet in circumference, is the Evolution
of Civilization, symbolic of the 12 nations and epochs which have
contributed to the world’s advance--both great works of art by Edwin
Howland Blashfield. The dome is beautifully decorated, and the series
of statues in bronze by famous American sculptors at intervals on the
balustrade encircling the rotunda make the scene impressive.
The pillars in the rotunda are 40 feet high, the windows 32 feet wide.
There are 16 bronze statues surrounding the railing of the gallery
under the dome, representing leaders in great fields of learning, as
follows:
_Religion_: Moses the great lawgiver, holding the Tables of the Law,
given at Mount Sinai, by Charles Henry Niehaus; St. Paul, with sword
and scroll, by John Donoghue.
_Commerce_: Christopher Columbus, by Paul Bartlett; Robert Fulton,
holding a model of his first steamboat, Clermont, by Lewis Potter.
_History_: Herodotus, the “Father of History,” by Daniel Chester
French; Edward Gibbon, author of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire, by C. H. Niehaus.
_Art_: Michelangelo, by Paul Bartlett; Beethoven, by Theodor Bauer.
_Philosophy_: Plato, by John J. Boyle; Francis Bacon, by John J.
Boyle.
_Poetry_: Homer, by Augustus Saint-Gaudens; Shakespeare, by Frederick
W. MacMonnies.
_Law_: Solon, by F. Wellington Ruckstuhl; James Kent, by George E.
Bissell.
_Science_: Newton, by Cyrus E. Dallin; Joseph Henry, by Herbert Adams.
Numerous paintings, mosaics, and inscriptions adorn the interior walls.
The dark Tennessee, the red Numidia, and the shades of yellow Sienna
marble give the room a rich color effect.
When the collection of a million books was moved from the crowded
Capitol it was believed that the increase for the next hundred years
had been amply provided for; but before 15 years had passed it had been
found necessary to roof over one of the four great open courts (more
than a quarter of an acre in extent) and fill it with a 10-story steel
bookstack to hold 1,500,000 volumes. By 1927 another court had been
filled with a 14-story stack. Two years later four levels were added to
the first of these court stacks, making the two equal.
To meet the great increase in the future, Congress appropriated for
the purchase of a square and a half of land to the eastward and the
construction of an annex building costing $9,300,000. To the annex will
be transferred the copyright office, card division, printery, and
bindery, but leaving room in it for eight or ten million volumes of
less active material, such, for example, as the 97,000 volumes of bound
newspapers. There are 20 acres of floor space in the new building.
The Library’s resources for research are unsurpassed in the Western
Hemisphere; its service as a national library is unexcelled. The
printed book collection on June 30, 1938, totaled 5,591,000, surpassed
in numbers only by that of the Bibliothèque National in Paris, and
increasing at a greater rate than those in any other library. Last year
196,000 volumes were added.
[Illustration: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS ADDITION]
Founded in 1800 by an act appropriating $5,000 for the purchase of
“books for the use of both Houses of Congress,” the Library continued,
down to the midpoint of its 139 years of history, to be no more than
its name implies--a collection for the use of the National Legislature.
By 1865 the Library had attained a growth of 82,000 volumes, which
was notable among American libraries neither in size nor in service
rendered.
The collections include the library of Thomas Jefferson (6,760 volumes,
the nucleus of the present collections, purchased for $23,950 in 1815),
the Peter Force and the Toner collections of American history, the
Smithsonian Institution’s unequaled collection of the proceedings of
learned societies of the world, the Yudin collection of Russian books
(with later additions probably the largest outside of Russia), the
collection of John Boyd Thacher (fifteenth-century books, and books
on the French Revolution, early Americana, autographs of European
notables), the Schiff-Deinard collection of Hebrew literature, and
130,000 Chinese books, understood to be one of the largest and
best-organized collections outside the Orient. Most notable among
recent accessions is the Vollbehr collection of 3,000 fifteenth-century
books (incunabula), for whose purchase Congress appropriated $1,500,000
in July, 1930. The gem of this group is the Gutenberg Bible, one of the
three extant perfect copies on vellum of the first great book printed
in Europe from movable type (A. D. 1450-1455).
[Illustration: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS--READING ROOM]
Manuscripts relating chiefly to American history are among the
Library’s greatest treasures. The reproducing by photography of
manuscript materials for American history in foreign archives and
libraries, which since 1927 has formed so significant a portion of the
division’s work, has added more than 2,000,000 pages to the resources
which students of that history can use in Washington without going to
Europe.
Chief among originals beyond all price are the Declaration of
Independence, the Constitution of the United States--both added in
1921--the personal papers of President Washington, many Presidents, and
other statesmen.
The Library is rich in music. This collection numbers over 1,194,000
pieces and volumes, surpassed only in two or three European libraries.
An auditorium of 500 seats, given and richly endowed by Mrs. Elizabeth
Sprague Coolidge, provides free concerts and lectures.
Other notable groups are 1,400,000 maps and views; 542,000 engravings
and other pictorial reproductions, including the splendid Pennell
collections; the law library (404,000 volumes). The social and
political sciences are represented by 890,500 volumes, language and
literature by 350,000, history by 420,000, and pure science by 265,500.
The most recent important development in service is the division of
aeronautics, established through a benefaction of $140,000 from the
Daniel Guggenheim Fund for Aeronautics, now supplemented by an annual
congressional appropriation.
Special facilities for serious research include some 50 individual
study rooms and (elsewhere) 125 special desks or tables. Interlibrary
loans for investigators whose work is likely to advance the boundaries
of knowledge are sent far and wide through the United States and some
abroad.
There is a service for blind readers which last year loaned 42,000
volumes in embossed type to some 3,000 readers in the United States.
Printed catalogue cards, numbering 110,000,000, prepared by the Library
for its own catalogues, are sold at cost to some 6,300 other libraries,
effecting for the subscribers prodigious savings in their cataloguing
bills but yielding a revenue to the Treasury of $328,405.
Until very recently Congress alone provided the funds to meet all the
Library’s expenses, excepting one gift of $20,000 received in 1904.
But in 1925 the Library of Congress Trust Fund Board was created by
Congress, the Secretary of the Treasury and the Librarian of Congress
being ex officio chairman and secretary of the board, respectively.
The act authorized the board to receive and invest funds for permanent
endowments, and the Librarian to receive gifts of money for immediate
disbursement. Already endowments aggregating about $2,000,000 and
gift funds of $1,415,000 for immediate expenditure have been received
and have yielded an income from 1925 to 1938 of $726,000. These new
resources add to the bibliographic apparatus and support a project
for developing an archive of American folk song. One endowment yields
$4,000 per year for the purchase of recent Hispanic literature and
employs a consultant to suggest items for purchase in this particular
field.
[Illustration: THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE AND THE CONSTITUTION]
Six consultants, men of professional rank and experience, are engaged
(without any administrative duties) in advising the maturer users of
the Library in their investigations. This unique service is to be found
nowhere else in libraries.
Notable among gifts are those of John D. Rockefeller, jr.--one of
$450,000 for the acquisition in facsimile copies of source material for
American history existing in the archives of foreign countries, and
another of $250,000 for the development of a great union catalogue of
important books in other American libraries.
The scheme of classification, covering 5,000 printed pages, has been
adopted in 80 large libraries in America and Europe.
Herbert Putnam, the Librarian, took office on April 5, 1899.
The Library staff, organized in 30 divisions, consists of 1,055
persons, of whom 585 are doing library work proper; 136 handle the
copyright business, which since 1870 has been under direction of
the Librarian; 204 constitute the building force, which guards the
building day and night, keeps it in beautiful order, attends to
heating, lighting, and ventilating the 15 acres of floor space, vacuum
cleans--the year round--the 162 miles of books, and looks after the
countless other mechanical matters. The remainder (111 persons) are
printers and bookbinders engaged on Library work, but under the Public
Printer’s direction; 19 are engaged on special projects.
FOLGER SHAKESPEARE LIBRARY
When Henry C. Folger, of New York City, decided to build the library
his first thought was to have this monument to the glory of Shakespeare
designed in harmony with the architecture of Shakespeare’s time.
However, the library being in Washington, very near the Capitol, the
House of Representatives and Senate Office Buildings, and the Library
of Congress (to which group was added the Supreme Court Building), made
it appear somewhat dangerous to introduce Elizabethan architecture in
such a classical frame.
After a conference with Dr. Paul Cret, architect, and Alexander B.
Trowbridge, consultant, Mr. Folger agreed with this view, and a white
marble structure of classic design was agreed upon. However, if the
façades of a building are part of the scenery, once the door is passed,
it is quite legitimate to harmonize the interiors with the collections
therein displayed. It was with this end in view that the general plan
was studied and adopted.
[Illustration: FOLGER SHAKESPEARE LIBRARY]
The requirements of the donor necessitated a reading room as free as
possible from disturbance, and to find, for the benefit of the public,
a room where could be displayed some selected material--books, prints,
costumes, paintings, and works of art relating to Shakespeare. An
exhibition room and theater were laid out to form a somewhat separated
unit. The location of this reading room on the courtyard side away from
the street noise is also more favorable to study. Below the reading
room are two stories of stacks fully lighted by the courtyard.
The exhibition hall and the reading room form the center of the plan.
The east wing is occupied by the lecture room-theater, which has its
own lobby, and can be used at night independently of the rest of the
building. The retiring rooms and dressing rooms are in the basement,
and stairs lead to the balcony.
The west wing is occupied by the administration. On the main floor are
the founder’s rooms and the offices of the director, his assistants,
and clerks. On the second floor are the library staff workrooms and
five private study rooms for scholars.
The over-all size of the building is 226 feet by 111 feet. It rises
to a height of 48 feet on a property 364 feet by 186 feet. Work was
started in November 1929. The façades were to harmonize in masses
and material with classic Washington. A quiet modern Georgia marble
façade, with silver grilles and balconies, was designed, using,
as principal decoration, a set of nine bas-reliefs illustrating
Shakespeare’s plays and some inscriptions emphasizing its purpose of
memorial to a great poet.
[Illustration: EXHIBITION HALL--FOLGER SHAKESPEARE LIBRARY]
The sculptural theme is based on the following plays: Macbeth, Romeo
and Juliet, King Lear, Julius Caesar, Midsummer Night’s Dream, The
Merchant of Venice, Richard the Third, Hamlet, and Henry the Fourth.
Their execution was entrusted to John Gregory of New York. They are
placed so as to have more importance than the usual frieze--below each
window of the exhibition room, at the proper height for the passer-by,
and along a marble terrace raised 3 feet above the street level.
[Illustration: SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION]
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
The Smithsonian Institution was established by act of Congress in
1846, under the terms of the will of James Smithson, an Englishman,
who in 1826 bequeathed his fortune to the United States to found,
at Washington, under the name of the “Smithsonian Institution,” an
establishment for the “increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.”
The Institution is legally an establishment, having as its members the
President of the United States, the Vice President, the Chief Justice,
and the President’s Cabinet. It is governed by a Board of Regents. The
Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution is its executive officer and
the director of its activities. The building was designed by James
Renwick, architect.
The regents are empowered to accept gifts without action of Congress,
in furtherance of the purpose of the Institution, and to administer
trusts in accordance therewith. Throughout its history, the Smithsonian
Institution has conducted and encouraged important scientific
researches, explorations, and investigations, which have contributed
largely to the advancement of knowledge, and thereby accomplishing
the “increase of knowledge.” The “diffusion of knowledge” is carried
on through several series of publications based on its researches
and collections, through its museum and art gallery exhibits, and
through an extensive correspondence. The Smithsonian issues 13 series
of scientific publications which are distributed free to libraries,
learned societies, and educational institutions throughout the world.
It also maintains a library of 876,000 volumes, which consists mainly
of transactions of learned societies and scientific periodicals.
The Institution has charge of the National Museum, the National Gallery
of Art, the National Collection of Fine Arts, the Freer Gallery of Art,
the International Exchange Service, the Bureau of American Ethnology,
the National Zoological Park, and the Astrophysical Observatory (with
several field stations).
The United States National Museum is the depository of the national
collections. It is rich in the natural history, geology, paleontology,
archeology, and ethnology of America, and has large and important
collections illustrating American history, including military and naval
material, and also valuable series relating to arts and industries.
It is an educational and research museum and issues scientific
publications. Its aeronautical collection includes the airplane _The
Spirit of St. Louis_, deposited by Col. Charles A. Lindbergh in the
spring of 1928.
The National Gallery of Art is a bureau of the Smithsonian Institution
created by joint resolution of Congress approved March 24, 1937, as
a result of the gift of Andrew W. Mellon to the Nation of his art
collection of masterpieces valued at $50,000,000 and $10,000,000 to
erect a building to house it. The above act accepting Mr. Mellon’s
gift provided that the art collections already in possession of the
Smithsonian Institution and therefore designated the National Gallery
of Art should thereafter be known as the National Collection of Fine
Arts. The National Gallery of Art is administered for the Smithsonian
Institution, in which title is vested, by a Board of Trustees. The
monumental marble building, designed by John Russell Pope, is now under
construction on the site on the north side of the Mall between Fourth
and Seventh Streets. (See p. 281 for illustration.)
The Bureau of American Ethnology is engaged particularly in the
collection of information relating to the American Indians. The
National Zoological Park has an area of 175 acres and is located
adjacent to Rock Creek Park. Its collection comprises about 3,000
animals.
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
The Government Printing Office, in which the printing and bookbinding
for the various branches of the National Government is executed, is
located on North Capitol Street between G and H Streets NW. Covering
almost a city block with its eight-story, red-brick building, this
plant is the best-equipped and is reputed to be the largest printing
office of its kind in the world.
Printing for the Government of the United States was first mentioned
during the initial session of Congress, in 1789, in the form of a
recommendation to that body that proposals be invited for “printing the
laws and other proceedings of Congress.”
The first specific appropriation for public printing was passed in
1794, when an expenditure of $10,000 was authorized for “firewood,
stationery, and printing.”
Between 1804 and 1814, Congress had no fixed policy in relation to
printing. A contract system by the lowest bidder was adopted. The plan
prevailed for 5 years but was very unsatisfactory, and Congress was
compelled to look for a better method. In December, 1818, both houses
passed a resolution appointing a joint committee to “consider and
report whether any further provisions of law are necessary to insure
dispatch, accuracy, and neatness in printing the documents of the two
Houses of Congress.” The inquiries by this committee led them to New
York and Philadelphia, where they studied printing costs and methods,
and upon returning to Washington they made a report declaring most
emphatically for the establishment of a national printing office as
the only means by which Congress could secure necessary printing at
reasonable costs.
No definite action was taken on the report, with the result that for
the next forty-odd years the method of handling public printing was
constantly changing. Some years there was a “Printer to the Senate”
and a “Printer to the House,” both elected by a ballot of Congress,
and in other years there was a “Superintendent of Public Printing.”
Altogether it was expensive and impractical, and by act of Congress on
June 23, 1860, a national printing office was authorized. On February
19, 1861, $135,000 was appropriated, and with this money the printing
establishment of Joseph T. Crowell, located at H and North Capitol
Streets, Washington, D. C., was purchased, upon approval of the Joint
Committee on Printing. This building had been constructed in 1856 by
Cornelius Wendell, as a private office. The building at that time was
243 by 61¹⁄₂ feet, 4 stories high, but by subsequent appropriations up
to 1876 several additions were made to the original structure.
[Illustration: THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE]
The plant, as taken over in 1861, employed between 300 and 400 persons
and evidently was, for that period, very complete. It consisted of
a drying room, pressroom, wetting room, job room, folding room,
reading room, office, bindery, machine shop, boiler house, and
stable. Among some of the items of equipment were 1 timepiece, 5
wrenches, one 40-horse engine, 104 pressboards, 2 wetting tubs, and
a large assortment of book and job type. The reading room had eight
armchairs, two pine desks, and one mahogany desk. The bindery had but
few machines, with only 2 ruling and 2 cutting machines, but the list
carried 10 pairs of shears, 4 bodkins, and other minor equipment. The
pressroom had 23 Adams presses and 3 cylinder presses. With the stable
came two horses, one wagon, and one carryall, and the boiler house had
one 60-horse boiler, 525 feet of fire hose, five buckets, etc.
On March 23, 1861, President Lincoln appointed Hon. John Defrees, of
Indiana, as the Superintendent of Public Printing. He reported that
at once the cost of work decreased at least 15 percent from the old
contract prices.
On March 3, 1873, the printing of the debates of Congress, then known
as the Congressional Globe and handled under private contract, was
taken over by the Government Printing Office and thereafter became the
Congressional Record.
In 1876, Hon. A. M. Clapp, then Congressional Printer, was designated
the first Public Printer, at a yearly salary of $3,600. Composing rooms
employed 520 persons, pressroom 209, and bindery 591; in all, 1,361
persons were on the roll. The total yearly pay roll was $786,493. It
cost $188,198 to print the Congressional Record in 1876, while binding
of all kinds cost $402,069, paper $298,251, and the total output of the
Office was charged at $1,617,469. The total purchase of machinery and
equipment in that year was only $342.50.
In 1878 the building known as the Globe Vault was purchased from the
private owner, together with the bound and unbound volumes of the
Congressional Globe and all the stereotyped plates. The price paid was
$100,000.
Fireproof extensions to the Government Printing Office were erected in
1879 and 1880. In 1882 the first fire escapes were installed, and force
pumps proved such an attraction to the public that the apparatus had to
be covered with canvas. Bows and arrows were also provided which would
enable life lines to be “shot” through the upper windows.
By the act of January 12, 1895, the Office of the Superintendent of
Documents was established in the Government Printing Office. Previously
it was a part of the Interior Department. The principal functions of
the office were the preparation of the official catalogs and indexes of
the Government and distribution and sale of Government publications.
The Office was placed under operation of the civil-service law August
1, 1895. In the same year the Annex Building, formerly used by the
Superintendent of Documents, was constructed, and in the following year
the Public Printer reported the total floor space of the entire Office
had increased to 8³⁄₄ acres.
In 1898 Congress appropriated $190,000 for the purchase of ground
occupied by the present building. In 1899 the building was started. It
was completed about 4 years thereafter, at a cost of $2,430,000.
In 1903 a small space in the Old Building was set aside as the “sick
room.” Its equipment consisted of a cot, blanket, and a small supply of
medicines contributed by the employees. This was the nucleus from which
developed the first emergency hospital in any Government establishment
and was the initial step toward scientific medical and surgical
service. In 1907 an emergency room was installed and an additional
physician and matron were assigned to that service.
The first linotype machine and the first monotype keyboard
were installed in 1904. In 1912 electric trucks displaced the
horse-and-wagon delivery. In 1915 the Government Printing Office was an
exhibitor at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition held in San
Francisco, Calif.
Between 1921 and 1934 several innovations were made. A few of the
outstanding are as follows: The eighth floor was remodeled and raised
to provide room for the Cafeteria, Harding Hall, recreation rooms,
rest rooms, and large space for productive work. The Cafeteria serves
around 2,800 meals daily, and Harding Hall, seating 1,200, is devoted
to social activities of employees and may be quickly converted into a
ballroom, a motion-picture theater, or a forum. Recreational activities
include orchestra, baseball clubs, bowling alleys, dances, moving
pictures and lectures, annual excursions, and similar affairs. The
photo-engraving plant was also added as one of the new mechanical
departments and is also located on the eighth floor. A roof garden was
built, covering practically the entire building. The emergency hospital
was enlarged, and wards for men and women were provided, with beds,
toilets, and shower baths.
Two hundred apprentices received training for occupational pursuits in
the various printing and bindery trades represented in the Office.
A testing laboratory was established in the Office for the purpose
of standardizing all materials, supplies, and stock used in the
manufacture of printing.
The boiler and generating rooms were abolished, and the purchase of
electric current and steam from the Capital Power Plant was started.
Since 1934, under the direction of Public Printer A. E. Giegengack,
the Government Printing Office has continued to grow not only in size
but also in public esteem. Under his leadership, appropriations for
a much-needed building program were granted by Congress, and the
erection of a warehouse and an eight-story, red-brick addition to
the main Printing Office building was accomplished. The cost of this
building program, which included buildings, machinery and equipment,
furnishings, the expense of moving, and other incidentals, amounted to
$7,700,000.
Among the many noteworthy improvements inaugurated for the betterment
of service to the Government, to the public, and to the 5,500 employees
of the Office, are the following:
The establishment of a department of typography, through which there
are incorporated into Government printing the accepted improvements
in the field of typography; the standardization of a type-metal alloy
for all type-casting machines; the installation of a more efficient
cost-finding and pay-roll bookkeeping system; the reestablishment of
the Government Printing Office Apprentice School; and encouragement of
greater employee participation in all social, fraternal, and welfare
activities sponsored by the Office.
Uncle Sam’s Book Shop sold 10 million copies from its list of 65,000
publications in 1937. This department is called the Office of the
Superintendent of Documents, which is located in the Government
Printing Office building, and these Government publications, covering
almost every phase of human endeavor, are for sale to the public at a
reasonable price.
THE WHITE HOUSE
The site of the White House, or the President’s House, was selected
by President Washington. It was part of the David Burnes farm, and at
the time it was chosen a cornfield extended one-half mile south to the
Potomac.
The cornerstone of the President’s House was laid on October 13, 1792,
but not by George Washington, as the records show that he and his
family were in Philadelphia at the time. The design was made by James
Hoban, an architect of Dublin, Ireland, who won a $500 prize and a lot
for the best plan. In its exterior it somewhat resembles the palace of
the Duke of Leinster in Ireland. That, however, has Corinthian columns
over a rusticated base, showing the influence of the Renaissance in
England; and there are other distinctions in their classical motives.
The White House was first occupied by President and Mrs. John Adams,
who moved in the latter part of November, 1800, the year Washington
became the seat of government. At the time it was very incomplete,
and much discomfort was experienced, particularly as to heating and
lighting. The East Room was used to dry the family wash. The White
House was not finished until 1826. Then and for many years following it
secured its water from springs a short distance to the northeast, in
the vicinity of what is now Franklin Square.
[Illustration: THE WHITE HOUSE--NORTH SIDE]
The President’s House, as it was then called, was considerably damaged
by fire by the British, who threatened the destruction of the city
in 1814. The building, except for the wings at each side, which were
used for offices and servants’ quarters, was restored by Hoban. Of
white sandstone, the building which became discolored by the fire was
thereupon painted white and has since been known as the White House.
It was first lighted by gas in 1848, and a system of heating and
ventilating was installed in 1853.
The White House was remodeled during the administration of President
Roosevelt in 1902, when the Executive Office was taken out of the
building and placed in a temporary building to the west of the main
building. This was enlarged during the administration of President Taft
in 1909 to twice its former size. It was further remodeled in 1927 by
making the building fireproof and constructing a third story out of the
attic.
In 1929 it was found necessary by President Hoover to use also the
basement for an office. In the same year the building was partially
burned, but has since been rebuilt. It is thought by some that in the
years to come the remodeled State Department Building will become the
permanent Executive Office Building, and the State Department will have
a new building on the west side of Lafayette Square.
The White House has a length of 183 feet (east and west) and a width
of 85 feet; it is 58 feet high. The portico of Ionic columns forms a
porte-cochère and measures 40 feet by 59 feet (east and west), and is
50 feet high.
The building contains many beautiful paintings and other works of art,
among them a Gilbert Stuart portrait of George Washington, called the
Lansdowne Stuart, which was saved by Dolly Madison by cutting the
picture from its frame when the White House was burned by the British
in 1814. It is now in the East Room, which is the great reception
room, 82 feet long (the width of the mansion), 40 feet wide, and 22
feet high. From the ceiling hang three massive crystal chandeliers. In
addition to numerous paintings, large vases and other articles adorn
the room.
Other interesting rooms are the State Dining Room, the scene of
brilliant State functions; the Blue Room--the President’s reception
room--the walls of which are covered with rich blue corded silk, with
window hangings of blue; the Red Room, the walls and window draperies
of which are of red velvet; and the Green Room, which has on the walls
green velvet. The wainscoting of the Green Room is of white enamel.
Large and beautiful grounds bound the White House on the south. Here
the Marine Band plays every Saturday afternoon during the summer
months. Also it is here where the annual Easter egg rolling takes
place, always a great day for the boys and girls of Washington. The
area is called the White Lot because about 1850 a board fence that
later was painted white surrounded these grounds.
[Illustration: DEPARTMENT OF STATE BUILDING AS IT WILL APPEAR WHEN
REMODELED]
Originally the main entrance to the White House was on the south side,
while the portico on the opposite side was a garden where the family
spent their evenings. This is the arrangement observed to-day at
Arlington House and at Mount Vernon, and is an indication that in the
colonial days the back yards of homes were as nicely kept as were the
front yards.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
[Illustration: DEPARTMENT OF STATE BUILDING, 1801]
In 1788 the Department of Foreign Affairs moved from Fraunce’s Tavern
to a house owned by Philip Livingston, on the west side of Broadway,
near the Battery, in New York City. Later it moved to another house on
the same street on the opposite side. The Capital having been again
located at Philadelphia, the department took up its abode first on
Market Street, then on the southeast corner of Arch and Sixth Streets,
then in North Alley, and finally at the northeast corner of Fifth and
Chestnut Streets, where it remained until it was moved to Washington,
except for an interval of three months--from August to November,
1798--when it occupied the statehouse at Trenton, N. J., the office
being moved from Philadelphia on account of an epidemic of yellow
fever.
On July 27, 1789, the act establishing an executive department to be
called the Department of Foreign Affairs was approved; but the Sedgwick
Act, approved September 15, 1789, changed this title to the Department
of State and that of the principal officer to the Secretary of State.
A few days later John Jay, who was Secretary of Foreign Affairs under
the Confederation, was nominated to be Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court and Thomas Jefferson to be Secretary of State, and both were
commissioned on September 26. Jay accepted at once, but continued to
discharge the duties of Secretary of State for some months. Under
date of October 13 President Washington informed Jefferson of his
appointment, and added that Mr. Jay had been so obliging as to continue
his good offices. When this letter was written Jefferson had not
returned to America from his mission to France. Upon his arrival Jay
recommended to him favorably “the young gentlemen in the office.”
Jefferson formally entered upon the discharge of his duties on March
22, 1790.
When the seat of government was established in the District of Columbia
in 1800 the archives and the seven employees of the Department of
State were crowded into the Treasury Office, a building of 30 rooms,
to the east of the White House. It was the only Government building
sufficiently completed to receive them. John Marshall was then
Secretary of State. On August 27, 1800, the Department of State was
removed to one of the Seven Buildings on Pennsylvania Avenue and
Nineteenth Street NW.
It has been interesting to determine positively the name of this
historic group of buildings, because some confusion has arisen through
there being in 1800 two groups or rows of houses, near to one another,
one called the Six Buildings and the other the Seven Buildings.
Christian Hines, in his Early Recollections of Washington City (1866),
says, when giving a list of the few houses standing in the year 1800:
One square between Pennsylvania Avenue and K and Twenty-first and
Twenty-second Streets, the Six Buildings, three stories high,
owners and occupants not recollected * * *. One square bounded by
Pennsylvania Avenue and I and Nineteenth and Twentieth Streets, 10
houses--one 3-story frame, occupied by a Mr. Middleton; one 2-Story
frame, owned and occupied by William Waters, Esq., and the Seven
Buildings, brick, 3 stories high.
Samuel C. Busey, in his Pictures of the City of Washington in the
Past (1898), refers to and confirms Hines’s statements as to these
two sets of buildings, and adds that in the Six Buildings was located
O’Neal’s famous hotel. All writers apparently agree that the first
home of the Department of State in Washington was in the house on the
northwest corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and Nineteenth Street. This row
of buildings--Nos. 1901-1913 Pennsylvania Avenue--is still standing,
though it has undergone considerable change.
From the early part of 1820 to November, 1866, the Department of State
was located at the corner of Fifteenth Street and Pennsylvania Avenue
NW., in what was known as the Executive Building. The picture shown
below was given to William McNeir, chief of the division of accounts
of that department, by Thomas Ridgate, who found it in the attic of
the old building. It will be noted from the picture, which shows the
Treasury Department Building columns at the extreme left, that it
was taken before the building was razed to make room for the north
wing of the present Treasury Department Building; the rest of the new
building had at that time been erected. Of this building Jonathan Eliot
states, in his Historical Sketches of the Ten Mile Square, describing
Washington in 1830:
At the distance of about 200 yards, on the east of the President’s
house, are situated two buildings for the Department of State and of
the Treasury; and at the same distance on the west are two others for
the War and Navy Departments. These buildings are all of the same
dimensions and construction; they are 160 feet long and 55 feet wide,
of brick, two stories in height; they are divided in their length by
a broad passage, with rooms on each side, and a spacious staircase
in the center. The two most northerly buildings are ornamented with
an Ionic portico of six columns and pediment. The grounds about
these offices have been graduated and planted of late years, and the
shrubbery begins to present a pleasing appearance.
[Illustration: EXECUTIVE BUILDING, 1820-1866]
W. K. Force, in his Picture of Washington for 1850, said, speaking of
the northeast Executive Building:
The first floor is occupied by the Fifth Auditor of the Treasury at
the east end, and the Second Comptroller of the Treasury at the west
end. On the second floor are the apartments of the Secretary of State
and his suite; also the library of the department, containing some
ten or twelve thousand volumes.
John Quincy Adams was Secretary of State when the move to this new
home was made, and thereafter followed a long list of distinguished
Secretaries, the last to occupy this building being William H. Seward,
from 1861 to 1869.
The north wing of the present Treasury Department Building bears on its
exterior wall on Fifteenth Street a tablet, erected April 30, 1929,
by the Kiwanis Club of Washington, in cooperation with the Committee
on Marking Points of Historic Interest, which contains the following
inscription:
FRIENDSHIP BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA WAS DEVELOPED AND
STRENGTHENED BY THE SIGNING OF THE WEBSTER-ASHBURTON TREATY, ON
AUGUST 9, 1842, IN THE OLD STATE DEPARTMENT BUILDING WHICH STOOD ON
THIS SITE. THIS TREATY ESTABLISHED THE NORTHEASTERN BOUNDARY BETWEEN
THE TWO COUNTRIES.
On March 3, 1871, Congress appropriated half a million dollars to start
work on the State, War, and Navy Departments Building. The act provided:
For the construction under the direction of the Secretary of State,
on the southern portion of the premises now occupied by the War and
Navy Departments, of a building which will form the south wing of a
building that, when completed, will be similar in ground plan and
dimensions to the Treasury Building and provide accommodations for
the State, War, and Navy Departments.
The original plans were drawn by Thomas U. Walter, a noted Philadelphia
architect, who designed the Dome of the Capitol and the completed
Treasury Building, but A. B. Mullett, Supervising Architect of the
Treasury, undertook the work, and finally only the interior conformed
to the original plans.
The building was erected in five different sections. The south wing
was commenced in 1871 and completed in time for the Department of
State to move in July 1, 1875. The east wing was commenced in 1872
and completed seven years later, so that on April 16, 1879, the War
and Navy Departments moved into that wing. The old War Department
Building, which had occupied the site of the north wing of the present
building, was demolished in 1879, and the new building or north wing
was completed three years later, the War Department moving into it in
December, 1882. The west and center wings were the last to be erected,
work on them commencing March 31, 1883, and being completed January
31, 1888. For a long time each wing was necessarily separated by a
solid wall--and later by an iron grill, or gates in the corridors--but
finally these disappeared, and the beauty of the long corridors as they
now are appeared. The total cost of the whole building was slightly
more than $10,000,000, and appropriations therefor spread over a period
of 17 years. Separate permanent buildings for the War and the Navy
Departments are now to be erected, these two departments being housed
at present largely in temporary buildings. The Department of State
alone remains in the building.
In 1910 a building for the Department of State was recommended for a
site along Fifteenth Street, south of Pennsylvania Avenue, where now
the Department of Commerce has been built. In 1917 it was recommended
that a Department of State Building be erected on the west side of
Lafayette Square.
In the new Federal building program Congress has provided that the
present State, War, and Navy Building be remodeled to conform in
design to the Treasury Department Building, and to be known as the
Department of State Building. The building will thus properly balance
the White House. Congress made a fund of $3,000,000 available for this
work. The Secretary of the Treasury appointed Waddy Wood, architect
of Washington, to prepare the design, which has been approved by the
Commission of Fine Arts. However, the project has been held in abeyance.
The Department of State was created as the first department of the
Government in 1789, in order to help the President in carrying on our
foreign relations. However, in the early years of our country the
Department of State not only had charge of foreign affairs, but, as
Thomas Jefferson, the first Secretary of State, once wrote, it also had
charge of all important matters of domestic government as well, except
matters of war and finance. In the early days the Secretary of State
even managed the mint. Until 1849 he had charge of the Patent Office,
until 1859 handled all copyright matters, and until 1850 the census
of the United States was taken under his direction. Before the Civil
War, United States judges, marshals, and attorneys all received their
instructions from the Department of State, but in 1870 a new Department
of Justice was established to take care of these matters, and little
by little much of the domestic work was taken from this department and
put under new departments, such as the Department of the Interior, the
Department of Labor, and the Department of Commerce. Therefore, to-day
the Department of State devotes most of its time to handling foreign
affairs, although it is still the custodian, or the keeper, of the
great seal, the official seal of the Government of the United States.
When Congress passes new laws the original copies are kept in this
department, and when there is any correspondence between the various
States of the Union and the Federal Government it is carried on through
the Department of State.
The Secretary of State has a force of some 950 people in the department
in Washington, and about 3,800 people scattered over all the world in
the Foreign Service of the United States. The department in Washington
is divided into 35 divisions and offices, each with its special work
to perform. Six divisions have charge of matters pertaining to foreign
countries--South and Central America; the Far East, as China, Japan,
and Siam; the division of Western European affairs; Eastern European
affairs; a division of the Near East; and the Mexican division.
One of the largest offices in the department is the passport division,
which issues passports to American citizens traveling in foreign
countries. Last year 134,737 Americans obtained passports so that they
might travel abroad, the fees for which amounted to nearly $1,500,000,
almost enough to pay the entire expenses of the Department of State.
[Illustration: DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY BUILDING]
When foreigners wish to come to this country they must first go to one
of our American consuls to obtain a visa or a permit. The immigration
of foreigners into this country is now restricted by law. Therefore our
consuls examine the foreigners abroad, so that they may know before
starting on their journey whether they will be allowed to remain in
this country. The visa division of the Department of State has charge
of that work.
Whenever there are expositions or meetings of various kinds abroad,
and it is decided that the United States Government shall take part
in them, such participation has to be arranged through another of the
divisions of the Department of State. As many as 150 cables are sent
every day to all parts of the world, which are taken care of in the
department’s telegraph office. In many foreign countries our Government
is now buying and constructing its own buildings for our ambassadors
and consuls, and one of the offices in the department attends to these
matters.
The Secretary of State is assisted in the direction of all these
officers and offices by an Under Secretary of State, four Assistant
Secretaries of State, and a legal adviser. The United States has an
ambassador or minister in 54 different countries of the world. There
are 314 foreign commercial cities where the United States has a consul
general, consul, vice consul, or consular agent, who, among other
duties, help steamship lines and great business establishments to
promote commerce with the United States. Our consuls protect and assist
the hundreds of American missionaries whose stations are in remote
foreign regions of the world. In addition to their many duties they
help thousands of visitors during trips abroad who seek advice. And
when an American is visiting in a foreign land, even though scenery and
ruins that recall civilizations of past ages give him pleasure, there
is nothing that gives him more joy than to see in such places the Stars
and Stripes waving over a United States consulate.
DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
The Department of the Treasury was created by act of Congress September
2, 1789. Robert Morris, of Pennsylvania, financier and statesman,
one of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence, was the first
financial officer of the Government and was Superintendent of Finance
from 1781 to 1784. Upon the resignation of Morris the powers conferred
upon him by the Continental Congress were transferred to the Board
of the Treasury. This board served until Alexander Hamilton, of New
York, the first Secretary of the Treasury, assumed office. Hamilton
served from September 11, 1789, to January 31, 1795, thus serving under
President Washington. Since the formation of the Government there
have been 50 Secretaries of the Treasury; the present incumbent, Hon.
Henry Morgenthau, jr., of New York, assumed office January 1, 1934. The
Secretary of the Treasury, of course, has supervision over the finances
of the Government. The annual estimates, however, since 1921 have been
transmitted to Congress by the Director of the Budget for the President
of the United States.
The first building of the Treasury Department situated at this location
east of the White House was a small wooden structure, called the
State and Treasury Departments Building. It was built at the time the
seat of government was established in the District of Columbia in
1800 and comprised 30 rooms. This original building was burned by the
British during the invasion of Washington in 1814. A second building
was erected. This was destroyed by fire in 1833. In 1836 Congress
authorized the erection of “a fireproof building of such dimensions
as may be required for the present and future accommodations.” Also
the material for the building was to be similar to that used for the
Capitol and the White House. The architect was Mr. Robert Mills, who
at the same time was designing the Patent Office Building and later
won the competition for the design of the Washington Monument. When it
came to the question of location of the new building, it is said that
President Andrew Jackson, becoming impatient at the delay, said “Here,
right here, is where I want the corner stone laid.” Thus the building
stands where it is to-day. In 1839 the department was installed in the
unfinished building.
The Treasury Building consists of a 4-story rectangle around a large
central court; this court is divided by a corridor of offices. On the
west the building faces the beautiful White House Grounds, its north
side is on Pennsylvania Avenue, its east front runs along Fifteenth
Street, and its south side overlooks a half-mile stretch of park
leading down to the Potomac River.
The building completed in 1842 included only the middle portion of
the present east wing and the central corridor and offices. The south
wing was completed in 1861, the west wing in 1864, and the north wing
in 1869. It is an imposing granite structure. In design it is pure
Grecian, furnishing what is claimed to be one of the finest examples
of this style of architecture in Washington, if not in the entire
country. There are great pediments on the north, south, and west sides.
Monolithic columns of the Ionic order adorning the façades are the
distinguishing feature of the building architecturally. There are 72 of
these columns, each 36 feet in height, 30 being set to form an unbroken
colonnade 341 feet long on the east front. Most of the granite used was
brought to Washington in sailing vessels from Maine. The building has
488 rooms and cost over $6,000,000.
The department long ago outgrew the building. The personnel in
Washington now numbers more than 22,000, with some 26 main bureaus and
divisions. At present Department of the Treasury bureaus occupy, in
addition to the main building, 9 entire buildings and part of 6 other
buildings owned by the Government and 5 rented quarters. The Treasury
Annex is an imposing building, designed by Cass Gilbert, across
Pennsylvania Avenue on the north. Congress has authorized its extension
to H Street.
The Department of the Treasury is the central agency through which the
Federal Government conducts its financial affairs. Generally speaking,
it receives and has custody of all funds paid to the Government and
disburses all moneys of the Government. At the head of the department
are the Secretary of the Treasury, the Under Secretary of the Treasury,
and three Assistant Secretaries of the Treasury, whose offices are all
located in the main building.
The receipts of the Government come chiefly from internal-revenue
collections and customs duties. The Bureau of Internal Revenue
administers and enforces the internal-revenue laws and collects all
internal-revenue taxes. The personnel of this bureau has been brought
together and now occupies a beautiful new building recently completed
as part of the development along the Mall. Import duties or customs are
collected by the Bureau of Customs.
Disbursements of Government funds can be made only on the authorization
of Congress. When any payment is authorized, a warrant signed by the
Secretary of the Treasury and countersigned by the Comptroller General
of the United States is drawn. Upon this authority payment is made. The
division of bookkeeping and warrants, under the general supervision of
the commissioner of accounts and deposits, keeps complete records of
all appropriation accounts as well as of public moneys covered into the
Treasury and of warrants authorizing disbursements.
The Treasurer of the United States is charged with responsibility for
the actual receipt and disbursement of all public moneys that may be
deposited in the United States Treasury and in all other depositaries
authorized to receive deposits of Government funds for credit in the
account of the Treasurer of the United States. He has also many other
fiscal duties.
The public-debt service handles the records and operations pertaining
to the issue and retirement of the public debt and the interest
payments thereon, under the supervision of the commissioner of the
public debt.
The Bureau of the Mint manufactures the coin circulating medium of the
country. It maintains mints at Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Denver
for the coinage of money, as well as assay offices in New York and
elsewhere. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing at Washington engraves
and prints notes, bonds, securities, stamps, checks, etc.
The Comptroller of the Currency is charged under the law with the
supervision of national banks.
[Illustration: VIEW NORTHWEST FROM THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT]
OTHER IMPORTANT BUILDINGS
Lack of space in this book makes it necessary merely to mention the
more important of the other monumental buildings in the National
Capital. Detailed information concerning them may be found in the
author’s Washington the National Capital and in other books on
Washington. They should be studied in connection with the buildings
described in this chapter.
Attention is called first to the group of monumental semipublic
buildings, classical in design, on Seventeenth Street north of
Constitution Avenue and along that Avenue from Seventeenth Street west
to the Potomac River. It has been said that nowhere else in the world
is there such a fine group of marble buildings.
THE CORCORAN GALLERY OF ART
This Gallery had its beginning in the year 1869. It ranks as one of
the great art galleries in the United States. The present building (at
New York Avenue and Seventeenth Street) was designed by Ernest Flagg,
architect, and completed in 1897. It is built of Georgia marble. It
houses rare masterpieces of painting and sculpture.
THE AMERICAN NATIONAL RED CROSS
Adjacent to the Corcoran Gallery on the south, the American National
Red Cross occupies three large buildings constructed of Vermont marble.
They were designed by Trowbridge & Livingston, architects, of New York
City. The Red Cross had its beginning during the Civil War. In 1905 the
organization was chartered by Congress along its present lines. There
are 5,500,000 adult members and 8,500,000 Junior members (as of June
30, 1938).
MEMORIAL CONTINENTAL HALL
The next building to the south is the headquarters of the National
Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. It faces
Seventeenth Street, was designed by Edward Pearce Casey, architect,
built of Vermont marble, and completed in 1905. The cornerstone was
laid April 19, 1904, the anniversary of the Battle of Lexington. On
that date the organization holds its convention in Washington each
year. It was founded October 11, 1890, and on February 1, 1938,
numbered 142,744 members, with about 2,500 chapters in all parts of the
United States.
CONSTITUTION HALL
Another of the Society’s buildings, facing Eighteenth Street, in this
square, is the leading auditorium of the city. It was designed by John
Russell Pope, architect, built of Alabama limestone, and completed in
October, 1929. The auditorium seats 4,000 persons. On page 278 there is
a picture of the building. The mural decorations of the interior are by
J. Monroe Hewlett, architect.
THE PAN AMERICAN BUILDING
This building, at the corner of Seventeenth Street and Constitution
Avenue, is considered by some to be the most beautiful in Washington.
It was designed by Albert C. Kelsey and Paul P. Cret, architects, in
the Spanish-classical style of architecture. It was built of Georgia
marble and was dedicated April 26, 1910. It is the headquarters of the
21 Republics of the Pan American Union. In it is the famous Hall of the
Americas. Andrew Carnegie contributed $850,000 toward the building, and
the United States Government contributed the 5-acre tract, on which
stood the Van Ness Mansion (1815) and the David Burnes cottage, which
stood there in the days of George Washington.
THE NEW DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR BUILDING
Designed by Waddy B. Wood, architect, the new Department of the
Interior building occupies two squares between C and E and Eighteenth
and Nineteenth Streets. It is built of Indiana limestone and is the
largest air-conditioned office building in the world.
PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE BUILDING
This building, designed by J. H. deSibour, architect, is classical in
design and built of white Georgia marble. It was completed in 1933. It
is four stories in height and houses the large and growing office of
the Surgeon General of the United States and his staff of assistants.
In its location on Constitution Avenue it forms a part of the frame for
the Lincoln Memorial.
FEDERAL RESERVE BOARD BUILDING
Completed in 1937, this building forms the center of the group
of monumental marble buildings along Constitution Avenue west of
Seventeenth Street. The design, by Paul P. Cret, architect, is based
on classical motives. It is built of white Georgia marble. It is the
headquarters building for the Federal Reserve Board. In it is a large
mosaic map of the United States by Ezra Winter, mural painter, showing
the location of the 12 Federal Reserve branch banks in the different
sections of the country.
NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES
This building, designed by Bertram G. Goodhue, architect, is
immediately east of the Federal Reserve Board building. It is classical
in design and built of white marble from Dover, N. Y. The building
was dedicated by President Coolidge in April, 1924. The interior is
decorated with paintings and decorations by Hildreth Meiere and Albert
Herter; the sculptural decorations are by Lee Lawrie.
AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF PHARMACY
Immediately north of the Lincoln Memorial stands the American Institute
of Pharmacy. It was designed by John Russell Pope, architect, and built
of white Vermont marble. It is classical in its style of architecture,
and in its location west of the National Academy of Sciences completes
the group of buildings on Constitution Avenue that form a frame for the
Lincoln Memorial. The building is the headquarters of the druggists
in the United States. More than 14,000 druggists subscribed toward
the building fund. The Pharmacopoeia of the United States, under
which prescriptions and drugs are standardized, is supervised by the
Institute.
SCOTTISH RITE TEMPLE
This building, at Sixteenth and P Streets NW., is the headquarters of
the Supreme Council of the Thirty-third Degree, of the Ancient and
Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry of the Southern Jurisdiction.
It is modeled after the tomb of Mausolus, at Halicarnassus, in Asia
Minor, which was regarded by the ancients as one of the Seven Wonders
of the World. Its 33 Ionic columns are 33 feet tall, suggesting the 33
degrees of Masonry. On each side of the main entrance is a colossal
sphinx, symbolic of Divine Wisdom and Power, executed by A. A. Weinman,
sculptor. The building was designed by John Russell Pope, architect.
CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON
At 16th and P Streets NW. is the Carnegie Institution of Washington.
The building was designed by Carrére and Hastings, and shows an
influence of the French classical style of architecture.
CHAMBER OF COMMERCE OF THE UNITED STATES
Dedicated in 1925, this building, at Connecticut Avenue and H Streets
NW., is classical in its style of architecture and is adapted to modern
office requirements. It was designed by Cass Gilbert, architect. Fully
13,000 business men representing almost 200 cities of the United States
contributed toward the building.
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY
The National Geographic Society, organized in 1888, “for the increase
and diffusion of geographic knowledge,” is the largest educational and
scientific body in the world.
In its 50 years the society has sponsored a series of notable
explorations, discoveries, and research activities of our times, and
it has developed its unique and beautifully illustrated National
Geographic Magazine as a means of disseminating geographic information
among its world-wide membership.
[Illustration: NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY]
[Illustration: CONSTITUTION HALL]
The society’s administrative and editorial offices, at Sixteenth and M
Streets NW., were enlarged by an addition which extends its handsome
and dignified headquarters along a 214-foot frontage. A commodious and
modern office building at Third Street and Randolph Place NE., is used
for mailing its magazine, maps, and communications to its world-wide
membership.
In its editorial, research, technical, photographic, and clerical
departments, and in the publishing of the National Geographic Magazine,
the society now employs more than 800 persons. It is the largest
non-Government user of the National Capital’s post office facilities.
The society’s members, numbering 1,150,000 (December, 1938), represent
every community of 100 or more persons in the United States, while its
foreign membership of 183,709 includes residents in every country,
colony, principality, and mandated area of the world which has any
semblance of a postal system.
To each member goes monthly the National Geographic Magazine, which
has been called the foremost educational periodical in the world; each
member also receives every map and panoramic illustration as issued.
Thus the society has distributed among its more than a million member
homes some 20,000,000 wall maps, in color, in addition to the numerous
sketch maps which accompany articles in the magazine.
The society’s weekly lectures, which are held in Constitution Hall,
have become a part of the intellectual life of the National Capital.
Since their inception more than 1,400 explorers, statesmen, and
world travelers of note have addressed the Washington meetings. Such
explorers as Rear Admiral Peary, Sir Francis Younghusband, Capt. Roald
Amundsen, Colonel Lindbergh, and Rear Admiral Byrd have related their
findings to the society’s members; also such noted travelers as the
late Viscount Bryce, former Ambassador Jusserand, the late William
Howard Taft, and Colonel Roosevelt, after his return from his African
game hunt and his Amazon expedition.
When these lectures are of general interest they are reprinted and
illustrated in the magazine for the society’s entire membership.
At its Sixteenth Street headquarters the society maintains a library of
up-to-date geographic information, comprising some 20,000 volumes, in
addition to maps, periodicals, and reports from foreign governments and
geographic societies.
The leading universities of the city, such as Georgetown University,
founded 1789; George Washington University, founded 1821; Catholic
University, founded 1889; American University, founded 1893; Howard
University, founded 1867; Columbia Institution for the Deaf, founded
1857; and Trinity College, Brookland, founded 1897; also have their
monumental buildings.
In the Triangle group are to be found: Department of Commerce Building,
York & Sawyer, architects; Department of Labor and Interstate Commerce
Commission Building, Arthur Brown, architect; Post Office Department
Building, Delano & Aldrich, architects; Department of Justice Building,
Zantzinger, Borie & Medary, architects; Internal Revenue Building,
Louis Simon, architect; National Archives Building, John Russell Pope,
architect; Federal Trade Commission (Apex) Building, Bennett, Parsons &
Frost, architects.
[Illustration: THE TRIANGLE GROUP OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS ALONG
CONSTITUTION AVENUE]
[Illustration: THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART]
[Illustration: THE NATIONAL ARCHIVES BUILDING]
[Illustration: THE MAKERS OF THE CONSTITUTION]
[Illustration: THE SIGNERS OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE]
Other buildings are: The Central Heating Plant (for heating 75
buildings), Paul P. Cret, architect; Bureau of Engraving and Printing,
W. B. Olmstead, architect; Smithsonian Institution (begun in 1846),
James Renwick, architect; National Museum Building, Hornblower
& Marshall, architects; Freer Gallery of Art, Charles A. Platt,
architect; Department of Agriculture Building, Rankin, Kellogg & Crane,
architects; Department of Agriculture South Building, the Supervising
Architect; Naval Observatory; State, War, and Navy Building, A. B.
Mullett, supervising architect; Old Pension Office Building (General
Accounting Office); Army War College, McKim, Mead & White, architects;
Walter Reed Hospital; Naval Hospital; Public Library, Ackerman & Ross,
architects; United States Bureau of Standards; National Zoological Park
(large new buildings completed in 1937); National Gallery of Art (now
under construction), John Russell Pope, architect.
IMPORTANT BRIDGES OF WASHINGTON
Arlington Memorial Bridge, McKim, Mead & White, architects; Calvert
Street Bridge, Paul P. Cret, architect; Francis Scott Key Bridge,
Nathan Wyeth, architect; Connecticut Avenue (Taft) Bridge, Edward P.
Casey, architect, lions by R. Hinton Perry; Q Street Bridge, Glenn
Brown and Bedford Brown, architects, A. Phimister Proctor, sculptor;
Klingle Ford Bridge, Connecticut Avenue, Paul P. Cret, architect; New
Chain Bridge, designed under supervision of Brig. Gen. Dan I. Sultan,
former Engineer Commissioner of the District of Columbia; John Philip
Sousa Bridge, Southeast, McKim, Mead & White, architects.
CATHEDRAL OF ST. PETER AND ST. PAUL
(WASHINGTON CATHEDRAL)
The cathedral is situated on Mount St. Alban, in the northwestern part
of the city, on a hill 400 feet in height, said to be the highest point
in the District of Columbia, giving a superb view over the National
Capital.
The cathedral, also known as the National Cathedral, was designed by
George F. Bodley, of London, and Henry Vaughn, of Boston. It is a
typical fourteenth century Gothic edifice. The cornerstone was laid in
1907, and since then a large part of the cathedral has been completed.
Its ultimate cost, it is estimated, will be $20,000,000. The central
nave is about complete, the apse and north transept are finished as are
also several of the chapels, such as the Bethlehem Chapel, the Norman
Chapel, the Chapel of St. John, and the Chapel of St. Mary. There are
costly stones in the building from many parts of the world, including a
stone from Bethlehem, which formed the cornerstone.
[Illustration: WASHINGTON CATHEDRAL]
[Illustration: WASHINGTON CATHEDRAL]
[Illustration: NATIONAL SHRINE OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION]
The building is constructed of limestone. The sculpture and beautifully
stained glass windows form the principal decorations.
The total length of the building from the exterior of the apse at
the eastern end to the main entrance at the western end will be 534
feet. The total spread of the transepts will be 215 feet, and each
of these arms of the cross will be 105 feet wide. The ground area of
the cathedral will be 71,000 square feet, and this will be ample to
provide standing room for 27,000 persons or seating space for 7,500.
The central tower will rise to a height of 262 feet and each of the two
western towers will be 195 feet high. The nave will have a span of 40
feet and its height will be 95 feet.
Within the cathedral are buried Woodrow Wilson, our World War
President; also Admiral George Dewey, General Nelson A. Miles, and
several bishops of the Episcopal Church.
The grounds comprise 67 acres, and the carefully designed Bishop’s
Garden forms an interesting feature. The National Cathedral School for
Girls and for Boys and the College of Preachers are within the grounds.
NATIONAL SHRINE OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION
This cathedral has been designed in the Roman-Byzantine style of
architecture. It is located on Michigan Avenue, Brookland, in the
Catholic University grounds. The cornerstone for the church was laid
in 1920. It is estimated that the total cost will be $50,000,000. The
architects are Maginnis & Walsh, of Boston, and Professor Frederick V.
Murphy, architect, of Washington.
The building as designed is cruciform in plan, with a triple apse,
at the focus of which is placed the central altar within a great
baldachin. The apse is of vast scale and, with the presbytery that
separates it from the transepts, will admit of important ceremonies.
The dome will be 250 feet high; the tall campanile, or bell tower,
330 feet high. The building is to take its place with such notable
memorials as Santa Maria Maggiore, of Rome, and Santa Maria del Fiore,
of Florence. It is to stand as a symbol of American Catholic devotion
to the Virgin Mary. The availability of the Byzantine tradition for the
rendering of this idea was readily perceived. The crypt, capable of
seating approximately 1,500 persons, has been completed. Here a most
interesting decorative scheme in terms of faïence has been introduced
to enrich the effect of the vaults. The central altar is of Algerian
onyx. The pavement is of Italian marble. The crypt is richly treated
with still other marbles and with mosaics.
NATIONAL CHURCHES IN WASHINGTON
There is no city in the country that has so many representative
churches as the city of Washington, which is undoubtedly due to the
fact that this is the National Capital. The leading denominations of
the country, recognizing the importance of religion in the life of the
Nation, have erected or are raising funds for the erection of great
edifices, including memorial churches, fittingly to represent them at
the seat of government.
In chapter XX attention has already been directed to the earliest
churches in Washington.
EMBASSIES AND LEGATIONS
Among the notable buildings in the National Capital that have had
a distinguished place since the early days of the Republic are the
residences, embassies, and legations of the representatives from
foreign countries. At the present time there are 53, representing the
leading countries of the world.
The legation and embassy buildings are held territory of the respective
countries to which they belong, and fly the flag of their respective
nations, excepting on state occasions, when they fly both their own
flag and that of the United States.
L’Enfant, in his plan of the city, contemplated diplomatic buildings to
line the Mall. But as the Mall was delayed in its development for over
a century, the museum type of building has been erected on the Mall
and the diplomatic establishments located elsewhere. In later years
the suggestion was offered to locate them in the vicinity of the State
Department.
At the present time the embassies and legations are located, for the
most part, in the residential section of northwest Washington. Quite
a number are on Sixteenth Street in the vicinity of Meridian Hill
Park. In more recent years several of the leading countries have built
new embassies on spacious grounds. In this Great Britain has taken
the lead, having built a large embassy on 4 acres of ground at 3100
Massachusetts Avenue, near the Naval Observatory. Three blocks beyond,
the Norwegian Legation building has recently been completed. In recent
years the Imperial Japanese Government built a new embassy at 2514
Massachusetts Avenue. The French Government recently purchased the home
of John Hays Hammond for its new embassy.
A list of the countries having embassies and legations in Washington
(with the exception of Estonia, whose representative is located in New
York City) is as follows:
[Illustration: BRITISH EMBASSY]
[Illustration: ITALIAN EMBASSY]
Albania: The Mayflower Hotel.
Argentina: 1806 Corcoran Street.
Belgium: 1777 Massachusetts Avenue.
Bolivia: Fifteenth and K Streets.
Brazil: 3007 Whitehaven Street.
Bulgaria: 2881 Woodland Drive.
Canada: 1746 Massachusetts Avenue.
Chile: 2154 Florida Avenue.
China: 2001 Nineteenth Street.
Colombia: 1520 Twentieth Street.
Costa Rica: 2128 Bancroft Place.
Cuba: 2630 Sixteenth Street.
Czechoslovakia: 2349 Massachusetts Avenue.
Denmark: 1868 Columbia Road.
Dominican Republic: 2633 Sixteenth Street.
Ecuador: Barr Building.
Egypt: 2301 Massachusetts Avenue.
El Salvador: 2400 Sixteenth Street.
Estonia: Rockefeller Plaza, New York City.
Finland: 2416 Tracy Place.
France, Chancery: 1601 V Street.
Germany: 1439 Massachusetts Avenue.
Great Britain: 3100 Massachusetts Avenue.
Greece: 2221 Massachusetts Avenue.
Guatemala: 1614 Eighteenth Street.
Haiti: 5017 Sixteenth Street.
Honduras: 2611 Woodley Place.
Hungary: 1424 Sixteenth Street.
Ireland: 2310 Tracy Place.
Italy: 2700 Sixteenth Street.
Japan: 2514 Massachusetts Avenue.
Latvia: 1715 Twenty-second Street.
Lithuania: 2622 Sixteenth Street.
Mexico: 2829 Sixteenth Street.
Netherlands: 1470 Euclid Street.
Nicaragua: 1521 New Hampshire Avenue.
Norway: 3401 Massachusetts Avenue.
Panama: 1536 Eighteenth Street.
Paraguay: Wardman Park Hotel.
Peru: 1300 Sixteenth Street.
Poland: 2640 Sixteenth Street.
Portugal: Wardman Park Hotel.
Rumania: 1601 Twenty-third Street.
Siam: 2300 Kalorama Road.
Spain: 2801 Sixteenth Street.
Sweden: 2247 R Street.
Switzerland: 2419 Massachusetts Avenue.
Turkey: 1606 Twenty-third Street.
Union of South Africa: 3101 Massachusetts Avenue.
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics: 1125 Sixteenth Street.
Uruguay: 1010 Vermont Avenue.
Venezuela: 2400 Sixteenth Street.
Yugoslavia: 1520 Sixteenth Street.