Stephen Elliott Kramer

“ Here is what one sixth-grade boy wrote about his home city:
“What a beautiful city is Detroit,” says the world-wide traveler, as he passes along its broad avenues, in the shade of its magnificent trees. “Detroit has a fine commercial center,” says the enterprising manufacturer as he surveys its busy wharves. “What an excellent situation this city has,” says the farmer, as he comes trudging to town with his load of produce. “In Detroit life is worth living,” says the happy pleasure seeker, as he whiles away his time, either on the lake or in its many parks and boulevards. ”

“ As we sail up the Potomac toward the city after our visit to the home of the great man whose name it bears, the Washington Monument, the White House, the State, War, and Navy Building, the Capitol, the Library, and the post office tower above the surrounding buildings and, shining in the golden light of sunset, make a picture never to be forgotten.
This city of parks, of broad avenues, of beautiful buildings, belongs to the Americans who live in the far-distant states as well as to those who live and work in the capital itself. ”

“ As we cross North Square and see the gesticulating, dark-skinned men, the stout, gayly kerchiefed women in the doorways, and the hordes of dark-eyed children on street and sidewalk, we wonder if by mistake we have not entered some city in southern Europe. To-day the North End of Boston is the great foreign section of the city. Here live the Jews, Italians, and Russians. They tell us that more than one third of the entire population of the city are foreigners. ”

“ The city's great holiday is the Mardi Gras carnival, which is celebrated just before Lent. The keys of the city are then given over to the King of the Carnival, and all day long high revelry holds sway. Brilliant floats, representing scenes of wonderful quaintness and loveliness, parade through flower-garlanded avenues thronged with people who have come from every quarter of the globe. ”

“ When building the narrow irregular streets of their little town on lower Manhattan, the inhabitants of New Amsterdam little dreamed that they would one day be the scene of the enormous traffic of modern New York. Those old, narrow, winding streets to-day swarm with hurrying throngs from morning till night and are among the busiest and noisiest in the world.
The newer part of the city from Fourteenth Street north to the Harlem River has been laid out in wide parallel avenues running north and south. These are crossed by numbered streets running east and west from river to river. ”

“ Washington, the capital city of our nation, is the center of interest for the whole country. Every citizen of the United States thinks of the city of Washington as a place in which he has a personal pride. ”

“ Washington Street is really the main dividing line between the retail and wholesale parts of the city. The water front is the great wholesale section. Here there is a constant odor of leather in the air, and great heavy wagons laden with hides are continually passing to and from the wharves and stations. When we stop and consider that Boston and the neighboring cities of Brockton and Lynn are among the largest shoe-manufacturing cities in the world, then we do not wonder at the leather we see. ”

“ For ten years, from 1790 to 1800, Philadelphia was the capital of the United States. In this city Washington and Adams were inaugurated for their second term as president and vice-president, and here Adams was inaugurated president in 1797.
Philadelphia to-day is a great city: great in industry, great in commerce, and great in near-by resources. Every street of the old part of the town is rich in historic memories. William Penn dreamed of a magnificent city, and the City of Brotherly Love is worthy of her founder's dream. ”

“ With such advantages as a receiving and distributing center, it is small wonder that the city has become the nation's chief market place. It is without a rival as the center of the wholesale dry-goods and wholesale grocery businesses. More than half of the imports of the United States enter by way of New York's port, and its total foreign commerce is five times that of any other city in the country. ”

“ If all the people employed by the Post Office Department lived in Washington, they would fill all of the houses and leave no room for anyone else. Of course this great army of employees are not all in any one city, for the work of the post office extends to every part of the United States, and, through arrangement with other nations, to every part of the civilized world. ”

“ Unfortunately the citizens of Detroit did not have the belief in the growth of their city that Judge Woodward had, and so his scheme was only carried out in part. That part, however, gave to Detroit its Grand Circus, its broad avenues, and its down-town parks, and did much to earn for it the title of the City Beautiful.
Detroit to-day has many splendid and costly residences. It has also street after street filled with comfortable medium-priced houses where the workmen live, and its people are fond of boasting that it is a city of homes. ”

“ Though Cleveland is a beautiful city, its importance really lies in the fact of its occupying just the position that it does. Being on Lake Erie puts it in touch with the copper fields of Michigan, the iron mines of Minnesota and Michigan, and the huge forests along the Great Lakes. Through railroad connections it is also in touch with the coal, oil, and iron supplies of western Pennsylvania and Ohio. Thus, lying in the center of eastern and western commerce, Cleveland has become a great manufacturing center, and the Cleveland district is the largest ore market in the world. ”

“ Some of these trains pass through the Washington Street tunnel, from which numerous well-lighted, well-ventilated stations lead directly to the shopping and business section of the city. On this elevated road are two huge terminal stations, into which rush countless surface cars, bringing from all points north and south the immense crowds of suburbanites who come to Boston proper each day, to work or on pleasure bent. ”

“ Around the head is a circle of electric lights throwing their brilliant illumination a distance of 30 miles. To one gazing upwards, the light seems a halo of glory about the head of the beloved founder of the city.
Philadelphia has many fine schools, both public and private. The two most noted educational institutions are the University of Pennsylvania and Girard College. The University of Pennsylvania was founded largely through the efforts of Benjamin Franklin. It now occupies more than fifty buildings west of the Schuylkill River and is widely known as a center of learning. ”

“ There are several ways in which we can see Boston. We may climb into one of the great sight-seeing autos and ride from point to point while the man with the megaphone calls our attention to the interesting landmarks and gives their history; we can engage a guide who will [111] take us from place to place; or we can simply follow the directions of our guide book.
THE SOUTH STATION
No trip to Boston is complete without a visit to the State House, or capitol, whose gilded dome is seen glittering in the sunlight by day and sparkling with electric lights by night. ”

“ The printing-and-publishing business gives employment to thousands; so does the manufacture of paints and varnishes. In stoves, ranges, and furnaces, Detroit leads [198] every other city in the country. It is interesting to know that Detroit makes great numbers of adding machines, that it is the largest producer of overalls in the country, that it is a center of the brass industry, that it turns out more than 300,000,000 cigars each year, and that it is one of the largest producers of wrought- and malleable-iron castings.
The entire business of a city is, of course, never wholly manufacturing. ”

“ Without doubt, however, the greatest business event in the history of New York City was the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825. The canal joined the Great Lakes with the Hudson River, making a water route from the rich Northwest to the Atlantic, with New York as the natural terminus. So with nearly all of the trade of the lake region at her command, New York soon became a great commercial center, outstripping both Boston and Philadelphia, which up to this time had ranked ahead of New York. ”

“ The supplying of office and factory space is not the only use that has been made of these steel buildings. Great apartment houses from twelve to fifteen stories high provide homes for thousands. Mammoth hotels covering entire city blocks furnish temporary homes for the multitudes which visit the city each year. Fifteen of the largest of these can house more than 15,000 guests at one time—a good-sized city in itself. Thus has Manhattan become one of the most densely populated areas on the globe. ”

“ They fight to the finish as best they can. Cotton bales are piled on rafts, set afire, and floated downstream among the Union ships. Still the ships come on. At least the Northerners shall not take the valuable stores of cotton, sugar, and molasses! So the cotton ships are fired, and hogsheads of molasses and barrels of sugar are hurriedly destroyed. When the Union forces land and takes possession, the people of New Orleans, though heartbroken, know that they have done their best.
Then comes peace. The war is over, and New Orleans is once more a city of the United States. ”

“ It is America's third city in population, and it ranks third among the manufacturing cities of the United States. Philadelphia is on the Delaware River, a hundred miles from the ocean, but it has all the advantages of a seaport, for the river is deep enough to let great ocean steamers navigate to the city's docks. Philadelphia's easy access to the vast stores of iron, coal, and petroleum, for which Pennsylvania is famous, its location on two tidewater rivers,—the Delaware and the Schuylkill,—and its [70] important railroads, all have helped to make it a great industrial and commercial center. ”

“ When we have seen enough of the counting of old money, our guide takes us down into the cellar of this great building, where we walk along a narrow passageway with millions of dollars in gold and silver on either hand. All is carefully secured by massive doors and locks, and none but trusted officials may enter the vaults themselves. These gold and silver coins are made in the United States mints in Philadelphia, Denver, New Orleans, and San Francisco. ”

“ The successful building of a great city on the site of New Orleans is a triumph of engineering skill. As the city lies below the high-water mark of the Mississippi, it was necessary to build great banks of earth to hold back the water in the flood season. ”

“ Close about us is a splendid group of majestic buildings. The Capitol, upon the brow of the hill overlooking the western part of the city, is the center of the group. To the north and south of the Capitol rise the beautiful marble buildings for the use of the committees of the Senate and the House of Representatives. To the east is the Library of Congress, the most beautiful building of its kind in the world. ”

“ No city in the world has greater advantages than Buffalo in the matter of power. The Niagara Falls furnish an unlimited supply of electric power, which is a substitute for coal and, for many purposes, more convenient. Buffalo's nearness to the coal fields of Pennsylvania makes the cost of both hard and soft coal low. Natural gas and oil furnish about one fifth of the power now used in the city. Both are found near Buffalo, stored in the pores and cavities of rocks. Holes are bored into the rocks, and the petroleum or rock oil is pumped into huge tanks. ”

“ The story of Chicago includes the story of farming in the Middle West, of the great ore industry on and around the Great Lakes, and of the varied means of transportation. Cotton, sugar, and location are shown to account largely for the greatness of New Orleans. In a similar way, the stories of the other cities sum up the important geography of our country.
Enough of the history of each city is given to show its growth and development. The distinctive points of interest are described so that one feels acquainted with the things which attract the sight-seer. ”

“ The Treasury Building is one of the finest in the city. To see the splendid colonnade on the east is alone worth a journey to Washington. From this building all the money affairs of the United States government are directed. ”

“ More than fifteen thousand men find employment in this weird city. Day after day the brave miners go down into the mines, never sure that they will see the sunlight again, for many are the perils of mining. Who has not read of the terrible disasters caused by suffocation from fire damp, by flood, the falling of walls, or the explosion of coal dust? Small particles of coal dust are constantly floating in the mines, and much is stirred up by the cars used to carry the coal to the outside world. ”