Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1871-12-02
IncOmbustible Houses.
From the New York Evening Post.

| The fire at Chicago has shown the
great need there is of some incombusti.
BILE material of sufficient durability and
cheapness to be used generally for con-
structing buildings in cities. Isolated
tire-proof blocks, so-called, cannot with.
stand the tremendous heat of great
fire when driven on by strong wind.
We must have something which will not
burn, from which to make our ware.
| houses, stores, shops, and houses, or
every large city will be in continual
danger of a fate like to that which has
has overtaken the great city of the
Northwest.
+ 1t has been suggested that buildings
made OF concrete possess the desired
qualities. The artificial stone known as
concrete is generally made of six parts
of small gravel, broken bricks or fints,
one part of sand and one part of
cement. The first two ingredients are
to be found everywhere. V The cement,
when made artiticially, consists of from
twenty to twenty-five per cent. OF silica,
with eighty to seventy y-ive per cent. of
lime or OF chalk, pure clay and fine
sand. The United States is the only
country where nature has compounded
the materials herself furnishing the
cement ready for use. 1t is found in
large quantities in New York, Massa.
chusetts, Connecticut, Kentucky, Vir-
ginia and Ohio
The buildings proposed are to be of
concrete throughout. The floors are to
be an artificial stone. made of cement
and sand Iron is to be used alone for
supporting the floors and roof, and for
bracing the building.
Concrete buildings already have had
their capabilities fully tested by use.
The public buildings at Cherbourg,
Marseilles, Toulon, Woolwich, Dover,
Alderney, and Eddystone, together with
several on our own coast, are built of
concrete. 1t is frequently used in Eng
| land for foundation walls. The i'm
mense sheds of the Metropolitan Rail-
way Company at West Brampton, the
College of Surgeons, and Wellington
Barracks, and many houses in Pail Mall,
Iincoln's Inn Field, St. James Park,
and elsewhere in London, are built of
it. In Spain and in the south of France
it is used in the construction OF COM
mon houses. In Sweden and Northern
Germany it is largely used for building
purposes, the dwelling houses built of it
having double walls, which protect the
inmates from vermin and produce a
more equable lnsid,, temperature.
Many advantages are claimed for CON
crete buildings over those made of brick
and stone. People who have lived in
them think them stronger, more even
in temperature and more quiet (because
ha iy Of
and of sound), and cheaper than ordi-
nary houses. Above all, they are in
combustible-a fire which would DIES.
troy the furniture in one room not
affecting the contents OF the next. A
concrete house, in short, is building
of fire proof compartments, which is
said to be fully equal in every other re-
spect to buildings made of ordinary
materials.
The time must come when the kind
of buildings now i'll vogue will give way
to something better. Especially from
the danger of fire better safeguards are
needed. A block of concrete houses in
Chicago, placed where the fire begun,
might have saved the city. A multi
tude of such buildings, scattered through
the business portion of city, would al
most certainly prevent a fire of wide
extent.
The importance of the subject is ap-
parent. Americans have devised many
| witty inventions. Cannot some of
| them, in view of the catastrophe at Chi
cago and the danger of similar fate
which hangs over all our large cities,
hit upon some method-by adopting
concrete for building purposes, or find.
ing out some other incombustible, cheap
and abundant material-which may
preserve our property, our precious
things, and our lives from destruction
by fire? FL.
Mr.. ALEXANDER c. WILSON, for many
years the agent of the New York Asso-
ciated Press in London, has resigned his
position and returned to the United
States, on account of ill-health. Mr..
Aplin, who has been Mr.. Wilson's assis-
tant, succeeds to the duties.