The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1877-10-05
mi j s. @ ella IA @ O III 8.
An EcccntrIc's Paradise.
THE COSTLY AMUSEMENT OF A VERY PECU
LIAR BosToNIAN.

Mr. VIM. Emerson Baker, q Boston gen.
tleman of middle age, made large fortune
in the sewing machine business, and is now
engaged in spending it in fashion quite
peculiar to himself The Grover g. Baker
machine ranked for a long time with the
Chickerng piano and the truncated cone
of rye bread known the world over as the
Boston brown loaf. These three products
of Puritanical ingenuity and enterprise
were held in equal esteem throughout New
England, because they were distinctively
Boston institutions. The Grover g. Baker
sewing machine is not now so prominent
in the market as it once was, but during
its day it proved a mint of money to the
proprietors of the patent. 1t enabled Mr..
William Emerson Baker to carry out, upon
a magnificent scale, some of the absurdest
ideas that ever entered the head of q sane
citizen.
"It's nobody's concern how Baker spends
his own money" said plain-spoken neigh
Dor of his this morning, "and in his way
he is benefit to the community; but I'm
afraid that if he wasn't millionaire folks
would set him down for fool"
Wellesley is a dozen or more miles from
Boston, on the line of the Albany Railroad.
Ten years ago Mr.. Baker purchased an
estate here, bordering for nearly four miles
| upon the serpentine Charles river, and in
| Guiding an area about equal to that of the
Central Park. Being a person of restless
activity, and possessed with the idea that
his sphere of usefulness in life is to amuse
people, he has succeeded in organizing the
| whimsical establishment known as Ridge
5n 80 30 "a. L.
does not exist outside of the dreams of the
gifted organizers who reside, under medi-
| cal supervision, at Taunton and at Somer-
vile.
In his business relations Mr.. Baker is
| known as smart, shrewd man. Socially,
| he is DESTROYS to please. Intellectually, he
| is celebrated as maker of very many puns,
and very poor ones. Domestically, he is
the pattern of husband and father. In
one of the acknowledgement treatises
which he has given the world he describes
himself as "a human earthquake"
The most prominent structure upon the
Baker estate is the stable. This large
building, rendered conspicuous by square
tower, sixty feet high and after the gener-
al style of the Campaniie at Florence, may
be seen for miles around. After Mr.. Baker
had built his barn and his tower, it occur
red to him that the edifice might be mis-
taken by strangers for church, and to
make impossible any such misconception
he had it painted dead black, relieved
here and there by bronze trimmings. The
effect was too sombre to please Mr.. Bakers
lively fancy. He therefore engaged q
scenic artist and had him decorate the ex-
terror of the stable with paintings of heroic
size and classical character.
On the west roof of the barn the allepor.
ical Hours are Harvesting to Phebus's
chariot gigantic steeds, each standing forty
or fifty hands high. On one wall is a
mammoth copy of Won Heyden's "Walku.
rem" the rather defective drawing of which
is partially compensated for by an abund.
ance of brilliant color. The attitude Of
the sisters, as depicted by Mr.. Bakers ar
fist, suggests performance in the ring
Brynhilde losses up her arms and looks az
one who should say "Houpla !" while the
dying hero gazes up at her with the comic
plaintiveness of clown who has tumbled
off his horse.
These and similar works of art upon thu
stable walls give it the appearance of being
plastered over with the huge advance pos
tiers of an equestrian entertainment, and eff
iectually destroys a 8 ecclesiastical expires
sion which the edihce may have had
sit is bold departure" says Mr.. Baker
"from the ordinary rules of barn architec
ture. l intended it to defantly contro
the mind of the beholder, and it docs"
Mr.. Bakers horses and mules also enio,
gallery of oil paintings inside the stables
inferior in size but not in intensity of col
or to those which adorn the exterior. TIL,
wooden tower adjacent to the barn is call
ed by the proprietor the Norino tower
from the alleged Greek n0rino, to max,
known, to impart instruction, verb sale
to have been discovered by Mr.. Baker him
self. Its successive floors constitute a sor
of combined museum, geological cabinet
and kindergarten, containing a queerl,
jumbled collection of chromos, curiosities
surgical instruments, doll babies, medieva
armor, and stuffed ducks.
On the seventh landing, or roof. is paint
ed the mystical legend, "What we see abou
us. Looking down on the peculiar world
looking up to the clear, yet dark, Be
yond."
1t is very peculiar world that one sur
veys from the top of Mr.. Bakers tower
His well-kept grounds, smooth lawns, an,
handsome flower gardens are disfgured b.
a great variety of grotesque edifices. al
gaudily painted.
The general effect is that of a world