precedent, and the Victorian Gothic had able advocates, especially
in Boston, where the Art Museum by Sturgis & Brigham, as well as
many stores, residences, and churches by Cummings & Sears, Peabody &
Stearns, and others, showed much vigor and originality. William A.
Potter, as supervising architect for the Government, adopted this
style, in 1875, for his buildings at Fall River, Mass., Nashville,
Tenn., and Covington, Ky., and R. M. Upjohn designed for Hartford,
Conn., the only Gothic State Capitol in this country.
R. M. Upjohn and Henry M. Congdon of New York had already done much
Gothic ecclesiastical work and, with the possible exception of
Grace Church in 1840, and St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Cathedral in
1886 by Renwick, there is no example of this style which shows such
appreciation of proportion or of form, in mass and in detail, as
Trinity Church (1843) by the first-named architect.
It was perhaps rather fortunate that just as the Queen Anne fashion,
with its multiplicity of detail, was brought to us from England, H. H.
Richardson, of Boston, called our attention to the bigness and (almost
brutal) simplicity of the Romanesque from Southern France. From the
date of the building of Trinity Church, in Boston (1876), may be
reckoned the parting of the ways. Heretofore everything we had done of
any importance had an English stamp upon it; henceforth the work that
was done showed the result of training of the Parisian _atelier_ or of
the well-filled sketch books of Continental travel.
Not only in this church, but in his libraries at Woburn, North Easton,
Quincy, Milford, Burlington, and New Orleans, did Richardson show his
grasp of the subject. Trinity is unmistakably a Christian temple, and
its bigness most conducive to the sense of awe and reverence. His
libraries leave no doubt as to their having been built for the storing
and reading of books; his stone buildings, whether the Court House and
jail in Pittsburg, the Chamber of Commerce in Cincinnati, or private
houses in Buffalo or Chicago, show their purpose and emphasize their
material; his brick buildings, whether a college building at Cambridge,
railway station at New London, or residence at Washington, tell their
story in brick; and his country houses about the suburbs of Boston, to
be what they are, could not have been other than of wood.
His influence upon the architecture of the day was therefore not
surprising, but there was a subtleness in the character of his
designs that his imitators could never acquire and even his immediate
successors could not long retain after his personality was lost to
them; and from the lack partly, perhaps, of true sympathy, partly from
the modification of conditions, his art may be said to have died with
him.
[Illustration: ST. GEORGE’S HALL, PHILADELPHIA.]
As R. M. Hunt had the last word on the cast-iron front, so he had the
first on the modern sky-scraper, a peculiarly American production; the
walls of the Tribune Building, however, carry both their own weight,
and that of the floors, being built before the days of the methods
of steel skeleton construction. Hunt was trained in Paris, as was
Richardson, and had assisted in the design of the Pavillon de Flore
under Lefnel, and he showed his appreciation of the Neo-Grec movement
in his design for the Lenox Library. It is somewhat unusual for an
artist to do his best work in his latest years, but surely no better
work of its kind has been done in modern times than the residences
which he designed for three members of the Vanderbilt family at
Newport, in New York city, and at Biltmore, N. C. The design which he
left for the Fifth Avenue front of the Metropolitan Museum, now being
carried out by his son, is a magnificent Corinthian order, whereas much
of his other work is late French Gothic.
That he was called upon to design the base for Bartholdi’s Liberty in
New York Harbor, and the Administration Building at the International
Exposition of 1893, and that a portrait bust has been erected to his
memory, all testify to the appreciation in which he was held by the
profession.
To McKim, Mead & White, of New York, we are greatly indebted for their
influence upon secular architecture, and their Casino at Newport, built
in 1880, was probably more far-reaching in its effect upon country
houses than any other building at that time. Among the other work from
their office may be mentioned the Boston Public Library, the Madison
Square Garden (reproducing in its tower the Giralda of Seville), the
Library and other buildings for Columbia College, the Metropolitan and
University Clubs, the Agricultural Building (of staff) in Chicago in
1893, now being reproduced in marble for the Brooklyn Institute, the
Tiffany, the Villard, and other city houses, and a host of country
houses at Newport, Lenox, and elsewhere.
There is another architect whose talents should be acknowledged; for
about 1880, when the shingle house had just begun to take shape, there
was none more clever at that sort of thing than W. R. Emerson, of
Boston, and his resources seemed endless in harmonizing form and color
with conditions of seashore or mountain, as shown in his houses at Bar
Harbor, Milton, Newport, and many other summer resorts.
Philadelphia, which had hitherto always been extremely conservative
in architecture, soon began to erect some of the most singular and
fantastic structures that could well be imagined; but fortunately the
refined simplicity and fertile originality of such men as Wilson Eyre,
Frank Miles Day & Bro., and Cope & Stewardson have prevailed, and in
both city and suburban work they and certain others have done and
are doing much to counterbalance the character of the eccentricities
of their predecessors, as shown in buildings for the University of
Pennsylvania and the Academy of Arts and Sciences.
But the restless activity of Eastern loom and machine shop, and of
Western farm and mine, seemed to meet and concentrate in Chicago—the
_entrepôt_ for the raw material of the West and the finished product of
the East. The unprecedented increase in value of land, the low price of
iron and steel, with the introduction of high-speed elevators, combined
to develop a new type of sky-scraper; and as the nature of the soil
was entirely unlike that of other cities, the foundations of these
buildings presented problems which were solved by Chicago architects in
various ways hitherto untried. The Rookery by Burnham & Root, Pullman
Building by S. S. Beman, and the Auditorium (opera house, hotel, and
office building in one) by Adler & Sullivan, at the time of their
completion were most notable examples of architectural engineering,
and were soon followed by many others more or less similar, designed
by W. L. B. Jenny, Holabird & Roche, Henry Ives Cobb, and others.
The buildings for the Chicago University, the Athletic Club, and
Newbury Library, by the last-named architect, show a high degree of
ability; the peculiarly rich arabesque ornamentation designed by Louis
H. Sullivan, and the direct and rational handling of the buildings
upon which it was used, are certainly indicative of the spirit of
enthusiasm and conscientiousness of a well-trained mind. It is by such
characteristics that John W. Root was able to accomplish so much for
the advancement of architecture in the West.
What Krupp and Stumm had done for the employees in their works in
Germany, Pullman determined to do for his men and their families here;
and a town, with dwellings, schools, churches, water-works, etc., for
many thousand inhabitants was designed and built by S. S. Beman, which
has been reported by experts to be the best of its kind.
In Chicago, in 1893, was held our second international Exposition; and
that the exhibits should be suitably housed, some of the most prominent
architects of the country were called together, buildings were assigned
to each of them, and Frederick Law Olmsted was appointed to lay out the
grounds, waterways, and bridges.
[Illustration: TRINITY CHURCH, BOSTON.]
Except for the difference in material, never did Rome in the days of
Augustan magnificence show buildings similar to those grouped about the
Court of Honor. A Greek would surely have been proud to walk through
the Peristyle, or to have visited the Art Galleries, and a Roman to
have sauntered about the Terminal Station or the triumphal arches of
the Manufactures Building. Right nobly was the Spanish aid to Columbus
acknowledged in the design of Machinery Hall; but to France, whose
generosity had trained so many of our architects, sculptors, and
painters to do such things, was the greatest triumph in the unanimity
with which they had all worked and the success which crowned their
labors.
The building occupied by the Federal Government was one of the few
unworthy of its location or of the occasion. While the architecture of
the people had been advancing steadily for fifty years, that provided
by the Treasury Department in Washington had been quite as steadily
retrograding. The Custom House, Boston; Sub-Treasury, New York;
the Mint, in Philadelphia; the Treasury, Post Office, and Interior
Department buildings, in Washington, have stood almost alone since the
middle of the century. The few Gothic buildings referred to previously
were honest and intelligent attempts to improve the quality of design
for the government, but the politicians decided that artistic ability
was not a prerequisite for the office of Supervising Architect.
Since 1895, there has been some infusion of new life into the
designing-room, and such work as the designs by William Martin Aiken,
for the Buffalo and San Francisco Post Offices and Court Houses, the
Denver and the Philadelphia Mints, and the New London Post Office, were
about being materialized, when once again the politicians, who cared
not a whit for one design more than another, interfered to oblige the
government contractor. But the good seed had been planted, and the work
of the present incumbent, James Knox Taylor, is likely to show a marked
advance over that of many previous years.
[Illustration: THE AMERICAN SURETY COMPANY’S BUILDING, NEW YORK.]
The general scheme of the Congressional Library was conceived by
Smithmeyer & Pelz, the details carried out subsequently by General
Casey and his able assistants and successors, and the building opened
to the public in 1896. The experiment of the collaboration of sculptor
and painter with the architect had resulted so favorably in Chicago,
that the artists invited to decorate this building gladly responded;
and although the remuneration was inconsiderable, their loyalty to
the country, as to Art, resulted in such mural decoration as had not
been seen since W. M. Hunt decorated the Senate Chamber in Albany, or
La Farge did the figures in Trinity Church, Boston, and St. Thomas
Church, New York. Blashfield’s dome, typifying all the nations of the
earth; Vedder’s Minerva, in mosaic; H. O. Walker’s large lunettes,
illustrating English poems, and Simmons’ small lunettes, filled with
exquisite little figures, are but a few of the many interesting works
in color. Two of the main entrance doors of bronze were modeled by Olin
L. Warner, but he did not live to complete them. The marble stairway is
by Martini, and the statues which adorn the main reading-room are by
Adams, Bartlett, Partridge, Ward, and others.
The plan of the building is that of a central octagon containing the
general reading-room, connected by wings containing the book-stacks
with a surrounding hollow square containing rooms for special
collections. There are ample reading-rooms for representatives,
senators, and the public, and a tunnel by which books are sent to
the Capitol. This is the last building of considerable importance
constructed by the government, and it was built on time and within
the appropriation of $6,000,000; it may be said to be dignified and
suitable to its purpose, and to be representative of the people at the
close of the century.
It now seems probable that New York will build the handsome library
designed by Carrère & Hastings; the Egyptian lines of the reservoir
occupying the site—emphasized by the varying hues of the ivy for so
many seasons—will give place to those of an example of modern French
Renaissance.
Among the changes incidental to the growth of this city is the recent
disappearance of the old Tombs prison, which was another building
of Egyptian architecture, good of its kind, and quite dignified and
impressive.
There are certain other buildings designed in the style of a country
almost as tropical as Egypt, and as light and airy as that is sombre
and gloomy, but which seem quite as appropriate for their different
purposes: they are the Casino Theatre and the Synagogue at Fifth
Avenue and Forty-third Street,—each an excellent example of Saracenic
architecture,—the former of brick and terra cotta, and the latter
of vari-colored sandstones. Another synagogue, by Brunner & Tryon,
further up the avenue and facing Central Park, has a decided Byzantine
flavor,—the large arch accentuating the entrance, carrying a small
arcade, and being surmounted by the traceried dome.
The largest and most expensively elaborate hotel in America is the
Waldorf-Astoria; and although certain features of the exterior may not
be justified by interior arrangements, it has certainly been planned
with a view to great comfort and luxury.
While New York has the largest and most expensive private residences,—
the chief of these is that of Cornelius Vanderbilt,—Philadelphia
has the greatest number of small houses owned by their occupants;
and of late years, there are a greater number of attractive homes in
St. Louis than anywhere else in this country. Very many of them have
been designed by Eames & Young, or by Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge; and
with much open space about them, they have an air of elegance and
hospitality that is lacking to the homes in most other cities.
New York, from its position as the commercial and financial centre of
the country, in spite of its situation on a long, narrow island, may
be accepted as the typical city. What is done here architecturally
is done (only to a different degree) elsewhere, and its growth
horizontally in the northern portion of the city has kept pace with
its perpendicular growth in the more congested business portion. This
general expansion has altogether changed the character of many streets,
the residences becoming apartment houses, and the shops becoming office
buildings from ten to twenty stories,—or even more,—the masses
becoming larger and the detail proportionately less prominent.
The sky-line has entirely changed; the spire of Trinity is lost in
such surroundings as the Bowling Green, Empire, Washington Life, and
American Surety buildings, and in the vicinity where the Tribune tower
was once conspicuous, now the St. Paul Building rises twenty-five
stories, and the Ives Syndicate Building even higher; further and
further up Broadway, and to the right and left of it, these monster
buildings continue to rise. But among them all there is not one
which shows a more masterly handling of the problem than the Surety,
where the architect, Bruce Price, has emphasized the entrance with
a colonnade and six figures of much dignity and grace, and has
concentrated the ornament about the upper part of the building,
crowning it with a fine cornice, which is more effective from the
simplicity of the four walls beneath. This building holds its own among
such others as the Washington Life and St. James buildings, New York,
or the Ames Building, Boston, Harrison Building, Philadelphia, Schiller
Theatre, Chicago, Wainwright Building, St. Louis, or Examiner Building,
San Francisco.
It is impossible, in so brief a survey of the field, to enumerate more
than a very small fraction of the buildings illustrating the progress
of the architecture of the century; and aside from the residences,
apartments, and hotels where we live winter or summer, and commercial
buildings in which our working hours may be occupied, there are very
many examples of churches, schools, colleges, libraries, and museums,
donated, equipped, and endowed for our instruction, theatres and music
halls for our entertainment, railroad stations for transportation,
storage warehouses for the safety of valuables, and armories for the
use of our militia.
Besides these, there are engineering works of considerable importance,
such as the Eads Bridge, at St. Louis, or the Roebling Bridge, between
New York and Brooklyn, and the works of the sculptor St. Gaudens, the
Washington Arch by Stanford White, the Farragut and Lincoln statues
in New York and in Chicago, which should surely be mentioned, since
monumental works are the poetry, whereas the secular and commercial
works are but the prose of architecture.
As we review our productions, we should certainly feel encouraged to
believe that if we continue to meet and solve each problem in the same
direct, honest way that we have been doing for the last quarter of the
century, there need be no misgivings as to the future of architecture
in these United States.
THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN CHEMISTRY
BY HARVEY W. WILEY, M.D., PH.D., LL.D.,
_Chief Chemist Agricultural Department, Washington, D. C._
The science of chemistry, as it is known to-day, had its real origin
towards the end of the eighteenth century. Before and up to that
time it is true there were many great workers in chemistry, whose
names are associated with investigations in chemical science, such as
Boyle, Stahl, Black, and Scheele. Contemporary with the close of the
eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth must also be
mentioned particularly the names of Priestly (1733–1804), Cavendish
and Humphry Davy (1778–1829). All these workers had to contend, first
of all, with erroneous theories, which made it difficult to rightly
interpret the data of experiment. The old theory of phlogiston produced
an environment in which it was difficult for true scientific methods to
survive. The great investigator, who did more than any other one man to
overturn this false theory and place chemistry on a firm foundation,
was Lavoisier (1743–1794). Born near the middle of the eighteenth
century, his scientific activity began about 1770, and before he was
twenty-five he was made a member of the French Academy of Sciences. At
the age of forty he was recognized as the foremost scientist of his age.
Priestly discovered oxygen in 1774, but failed to recognize its true
relations to other bodies. It was Lavoisier who discovered oxidation
(1776), an achievement which meant more to chemistry than the discovery
of oxygen.
The observation that metals when heated in confined air increased in
weight while the volume of the confined air decreased, is the crucial
experiment upon which the whole science of chemistry rests. This
experiment was made most rigorously by Lavoisier, and the apparatus
which he used is still preserved in the Museum of L’École des Arts et
Métiers in Paris. This apparatus, simple in character and yet almost
perfect in construction, has for the chemist a peculiar significance
and sacredness, producing an impression similar to that inspired in the
devout Christian by the relics of the Cross and the Holy Sepulchre.
In the brief space which is assigned for a discussion of the progress
of chemistry during the nineteenth century, economy of words will be
secured by briefly tracing some of the salient points in the progress
of some of the more important branches of chemical science. In the
following pages, therefore, will be found a brief statement of what has
been accomplished, of the most important character, in the science of
chemistry, under the following heads:—
Inorganic chemistry; physical chemistry; organic chemistry; analytical
chemistry; synthetical chemistry; metallurgical chemistry; agricultural
chemistry; graphic chemistry; didactic chemistry; chemistry of
fermentation; and lastly electro-chemistry.
No attempt will be made in this paper to enter upon the discussion
of the progress which has been made in medical, pharmaceutical, and
physiological chemistry. The discussion outlined under the above heads
does not by any means embrace the whole subject. It will be sufficient
to indicate only the lines of progress along which the greatest
advances have been made.
I. INORGANIC AND PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY.
[Illustration: H Davy Pres RS.]
The three propositions established by Lavoisier, which serve as the
foundation for inorganic and physical chemistry, are the following:—
1. Bodies burn only in contact with pure air.
2. The air is consumed in the combustion, and the increase in weight of
the burnt body is equal to the decrease in weight of the air.
3. In combustion the body is generally changed, by its combination with
the pure air, into an acid, and metals are changed into metal calx.
The total number of elementary bodies known at the beginning of the
century was probably less than thirty. Many had been recognized as such
since remote antiquity, but none of the non-metallic elements, except
oxygen and sulphur, was known, and even their properties were not
established with any degree of precision.
Not only did Lavoisier establish the fundamental principles of modern
chemistry, but in connection with Fourcroy (1755–1809), Berthollet
(1748–1822), and Guyton de Morveau (1737–1816), laid the foundation of
modern chemical nomenclature.
The contributions to chemical knowledge at this time were greatly
increased by the works of the Swedish chemist, Scheele (1742–1786),
and in the beginning years of the century the great work which was
accomplished by Sir Humphry Davy advanced very rapidly the general
knowledge of chemical science.
Davy’s first works served to elucidate the connection between
electricity and chemical processes, and it was through the classical
experiment with an electric current that he isolated (1807) the metals
sodium and potassium, and described their properties.
This achievement of Sir Humphry Davy’s was the second great step in the
progress of chemistry, after the one taken by Lavoisier. By means of
the metals sodium and potassium other metallic elements were separated,
notably aluminium by Wöhler (1845). Basing his work upon the above
experiment, Sainte Claire Deville developed the metallurgy of aluminium
(1854), and Bussy isolated magnesium (1830).
In 1811 iodine was discovered by Courtois, and its properties examined
simultaneously (1814) by Davy and Gay-Lussac.
The contributions made by Berzelius (1779–1848), who was a contemporary
of Davy and Gay-Lussac (1778–1850), were of the most important
character. Berzelius not only added to the knowledge of inorganic
chemistry but also established many of the important theories on which
chemical action depends. His elaboration of the employment of the
blowpipe in chemical analysis was of the greatest practical value.
In 1807 Dalton published a work entitled “New System of Chemical
Philosophy,” in which was announced for the first time the law of the
definite proportions of bodies forming a definite union. The atomic
theory of matter was also developed by Dalton, who gave it a definite
form and expression. Chemists now began to consider the elements as
definite indestructible particles of matter, forming unions among
themselves and with different kinds of atoms to form molecules, which
were considered as the units of substances. As a result of this
supposition, the development of the principle of the relative weight
with which bodies combine was the logical consequence.
Now for the first time the elements began to assume not only names
and descriptions of properties but also numbers, showing the relative
weight of their atoms or final conditions of existence. It was only
necessary, therefore, to assume the standard of comparison for any
one element, in order to determine the relative weights with which it
combined with others. Thus the system of atomic weights was developed.
As a result of the law of chemical action, that most elementary bodies
exist in a condition where two atoms are joined together to form a
molecule, it follows, that in most instances the molecular weights of
the elements are double their atomic weight. There are, however, many
notable exceptions to this rule.