The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-10-22

c,,tc feet into single street or Its cutters, In
that time; not only far more than sufficient to
All all the CUTTERS, but to overflow and wash the
streets rs we'll as to extinguish fires by night or
day. This, the first object of cleansing the
streets and subduing fire, may be accomplished
in few months at inconsiderable expense The
distribution of the water in pipes of conduit,
which may be accomplished by means of pipes
fed from the canal, and run into private cisterns
and public fountains, from which il could be
pumped by ordinary pumps will follow, of
course, ut ten per cent clear profit for IL
twenty-five hundred families or houses odly, on
an average, were supplied at five and third
dollars per house, an income of e5000 would be
produced
logged by the pecuniary hint, that on January
81, tT0S it offered the company c5O 900 for one-t
half of the water of the canal, or so much as
would pass through waterway twelve and a
half feet wide, by three and half feet deep. As
The proposal was rejected, the committee re-
ported in favor of purchasing the rights and
privileges of the company, intending to convey
the water into reservoirs or cisterns, placed in
the cellars or lower floors of houses, thence to
be pumped or carried as required. Fortunately
for the citizens of all generations, Councils had
cot clearer ideas by this time, and rejected this
project. Our citizens, however, made narrow
escape from having Broad street cut up with a
narrow ditch, and the city split into two sec
tions to make big dividend for grasping cor
poration, with penalties of hundreds of thou
sands of dollars threatened for any invasion of
the said corporate rights of the benevolent
stockholders.
Spring Mil Project.
Another committee was appointed by Councils
in 1885, to examine the subject and ascertain
whether sufficient supply could not be obtained
by water power, and whether such supply could
be secured within reasonable distance of the
city. The services of b. H. Latrobe were en-
gagged, and an examination was made of the
Schuylkill and the adjoining streams. In July
q report was made recommending the bringing
OF Spring Mill creek distance of twelve miles
by means of an aqueduct, into the centre of the
city, where it was to be raised into reservoirs by
steam power. The estimated cost of this under
taking, huge for those days. was $275 00O This
plan, however, was rejected in favor of the
Centre Square Works.
In Olden times the four meagre patches of
grass and stunted trees that now disfgure the
intersections of Broad aud Market streets were
Nnited into one goodly Centre Square; and had
not a shortsighted policy led to its bisectoz
Into quarters by the direct extension of those
two broad thoroughfdres, this city would now
u
ings unsurpassed in the country. Mr.. Latrobes
adopted plan was to supply the city with the
water of the Schuylkill by erecting II steam
engine at Chestnut street wharf and another at
Centre Square. The project was a difficult one
to put into execution as no city was supplied
by steam-pumping machinery, and as there were
then only three steam engines of any power in
the United States special loan of Sl500
was authorized by ordinance, February Z 1799
and the work was commenced May ,. After
much exertion Nicholas Roosevelt, of Soho
Works on the river Passaic. New Jersey, con-
tracted to erect two steam engines able to raise
daily three millions of gallons fifty feet high, for
$4,000 When finished, these were the largest
steam engines in the United States, and their
construction by inexperienced workmen, with
defective tools, was great undertaking.
A basin was formed on the river ISchuylkill
at the foot of Chestnut street. extending from low
water mark two hundred feet eastwardly, and
eighty-four feet wide, provided with n set of
tide-lock gates The bottom of this basin was
three feet below low water mark; from
this the water passed through a sluice to
second basin, or rather an open canal, forty feet
wide, and one hundred and sixty feet long. The
sides of both these basins were inclined, and
paved with marble. At the head of the canal
was suice gate, set in marble, which ad-
mitted the water into subterranean tunnel
of oval form, six feet in its greatest diameter,
and three hundred feet long, cut nearly its whole
distance through solid rock and emptying into
a we'll in which were placed the pumps of the
lower Schuylkill engine at old Schuylkill
Front and Chestnut streets. This shaft or well
was thirty-nine feet deep, and ten feet diameter.
From 1t the water raised into a brick tunnel
six feet in diameter, and thirty-one hundred aud
forty-four feet In length, which passed down tC
Broad and thence to Centre Square
Centre Square then surrounded by
wooden fence and contained a.fountain more
artstically designed than the mud heaped speci
mems of grotesqueness at Fairmount anothe
singular anomaly was that In those days tht
fountain used to play its streams for the gratifi
cation of passers-by but such a shocking vast
of water near the Fairmount works has sesrcel,
been tolerated by the officials for years. Tn,
Centre Square engine-house, or pepper box,
as 1t was Familiarity known, on account of it
high dome, was slightly marble building o
sixty feet square, twenty-five feet high, will
front and rear porticos having each two Dori'
columns with an inner circular building forty
feet in diameter and sixty feet high covered
by dome. rr .'..n..
These engines were very defective. the lever
beams, hy-whee shafts and arms cold waite
pumps, cisterns, and even the boilers bein,
made OF wood. These were boxes nine feet high
niue feet wide, and fifteen feet long, made O
fiVe-inch plank, bolted and braced. Inside O
these were the ire-boXes of wrought iron wit
vertical hues of cast iron: subsequently cas-
irnn hoiIar Nyaa at,bsfituted Hoiler rlata irn