New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1870-12-18

ding 81 as no1i 81 81 B ~ rivsr q
the world, beginning r. receive yearly
hundreds Of millions Of dollars from the
cotton and sugar crops sold at its coun-
ters-in this ep Of great railroads and Of
steamships, such poor architecture and
mean building materials will not suffice,
if New Orleans pretends to be named
in the same category of solidity and gran
deur as St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati,
Baltimore or Boston True, we have not
a quarry Of Quincy granite beside us, as
has Boston; neither had the other cities
named, and they were at first poorly con-
structed, Of frame and most homely brick,
as with us. This did not satisfy them,
and Cincinnati dug the Miami Canal, and
built herself soidly up with Dayton lime
stone; Chicago dug the Illinois Canal,
and made herself palatial city with
Athens marble; st. Louis, to keep pace
with that younger rival, initiated her by
discarding her homely brick for the buff
stone of Illinois river, and for the solid
iron of her mountain, to which she built
railroad
What shall New Orleans do to equal or
surpass these? She has no iron mountain
to draw from. True, she possesses one
large iron building-the Moresque, on
Lafayette Square almost equal in beauty
as well as solidity to any in the republic
but "one swallow does not make sum-
mer." She has a number of buildings of
granite from New York and Boston, and
numerous others whose Easements are of
this solid but expensive material, and
whose architecture is respectable. She
also has q few houses built Of Philadelphia
face brick, an elegant block of which is
now building by Morgan. on Canal and
Chartres, for which all praise should be
given to men who thus beautify the city.
Let others who possess the means have
city pride sufficient to initiate the example
of Morgan. But the demand for such
brick and for natural granite or other
stone must continue small, the original cost
thereof, added to that Of transportation,
putting it beyond the means Of the mass
of builders. New Orleans made brick are
sufficiently solid, but lack the almost equal
ly necessary quality of beauty. This has
led to the miserable make-shift of stuc-
coed fronts, the very worst substitute for
beauty in this climate that could be
adopted, soon getting the smallpox or
leprous with spots and blotches, if not
peaing off entirely and showing the
cloven hoof.
But there can be found a substitute for
granite, or brownstone, or marble, that
will build up the Crescent City with miles
of blocks of beautiful, solid, fire-proof,
and durable edi6ces, SURPRISING in size
and grandeur, the Kremlin of Moscow,
comfortably and elegantly housing half,
or a million of souls, who will one day
dwell between the Mississippi levee and
the banks of Pontchartrain. ''Where
there's will, there's a way, and if Rome,
in its grandeur, could possess itself of
cement which could build subterranean
and other walls in ancient Nismes and
Burdigala, and other places within its do
minions, that will resist the pick-axe of
the workman of to-day, more than two
thousand years after their construction, the
scientific research Of this enlightened age,
when We are 80 nearly approaching
the twentieth century can produce ce-
ment or a rocky composition that will
render New Orleans or any other city
whose location is upon alluvial soil, indie
pendent of distant States for its building
material. Already there are several sub
stances presented to builders by the en-
terprise and research of scientific and
practical men. Among these are the
Frear stone, the Ransome process, the
Union stone, of Boston, Massachusetts,
and others. ALI of these will add to our
building resources, and are sufficiently
cheap to be within the means of all We
do not profess to be judges of these build
ing articles, but from witnessing yester-
day q solid Emery wheel, at D. & J.
Edwards machine-shop. constructed after
the Union stone patent, which made four
teen hundred revolutions minute, with
out flying to pieces, We are satisfied it
must be valuable process which will
create stone that can revolye with such
speed and remain whole.
Now let our builders and architects ex-
anime these substitutes for what it is i'm
possible for our city to procure-adopt
the very best, and then give us better,
more beautiful and stranger style of build
ings At any rate, let our capitalists,
real estate owners, and citizens of enter
prise generally, make an effort to give our
city the beautiful and improved archi-
tectural appearance her geographical posi-
fi0n 0omandc Attroc fivo 90 O,1r cifv al.