Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1878-07-26

ated SO low that the water has to be
pumped up. For this purpose they use
two pumps, driven by a water wheel.
The tubes OF the two pumps are not
more than four feet apart, yet one
pumps up water SO warm that it can
hardly be borne by the hand, the other
water nearly as cold as ice. The water
in both contains nearly the same char
acterlstic constituents. They differ on
ly in temperature. JED LAKE.
FROM CINCINNATI.
How the Queen City Emerged from Her En-
virOnment Of Hills--The Inclined Planes
and the Attractions Mt their TOps--Beer
and Music--Pictures from Life.
Special Correspondence Of the Bulletin.
CINCINNATI, July Is, 78.
Rome, the queen Of cities, sat on sew
en- hills Seven hills environ Cincinnati,
and l doubt if Caligula and the most
luxurious Of the Romans ever succeeded
in extracting half as much pleasure from
the bills of Rome, as the Parisians of
America get from theirs. For years
these hills were barrier that cribbed
and confined our beautiful city in the
basin at their feet, until it became the
most densely populated of all American
cities, New York not even excepted.
For awhile it looked as if they had
FENCED THE CITY IN,
and though attempts were made to scale
their heights, and to build upon their
level tops. With the exception of aris-
tocratic settlements on Walnut Hills,
Mt Auburn and Clifton Heights, the
attempts we're not prime successes.
The elegant suburbs have named be-
came the magnificent homes of our more
wealthy bankers, lawyers and manufac-
turers, who were able to keep their own
carriages and conveyances; but to the
great mass of our population, our clerks,
our younger manufacturers, our bust
ness men and our mechanics, the hill
tops and the country back of them was
a sort of
FORBIDDEN PARADISE,
to which natural obstacles forbade their
entrance.
But change came over the spirit Of
the scene. The city was too full of vir-
ility, of enterprise, of solid wealth and
of glorious future to be thus penned
up. Mechanical ingenuity was invoked
to solve the problem, ''How shall we
scale our hill-tops cheaply, speedily and
economically" and as is usual in Amer
lea, mechanical ingenuity solved this
problem as readily and satisfactorily as
it does all others with which it has to
contend.
INCLINED PLANES
were erected on the sides of the four
principal hills, with stationary steam
engines at the top to hoist and lower
street cars. The first of these inclined
planes was erected at the head of Main
St., six years ago, and it was Immediate
connected with the heart of the city by
street railway; and another railway
running back fully two miles was built
on Mt. Auburn and connected with it.
So far so good, but the projectors of
this enterprise knew that it would be
years before the population of the hill
tops would be sufficient to offer them a
remunerative passenger traffic, so they
determined to attract the people of the
city to the hills. With that object in
view, on the summit Of the hill, immedi-
ately at the head of the plane, they
erected a gigantic two-story structure,
two hundred and fifty feet long by one
hundred wide, which was fitted up as a
place of public resort, and rented to
ALIVE GERMAN,
who at once opened it as Beer Gar
ten" and restaurant. Knowing the Ger
man fondness for music as we'll as beer,
Harff (for that is the proprictor's name)
engaged a frst-class brass band, which
gave free concerts every afternoon and
evening In short time the Lookout
House, as it was called, became the
great resort of the city, especially on
Sunday, for though our statute books
contain as stringent laws on the subject
of strict Sabbatharian observances as
the most straight-laced Puritan could
desire, in consequence of the cosmopol-
itan character of our population, they
are practically ignored and treated as
if they never were. True, the "unco
guild" people did all they could to ham
per and prevent this, in their eyes, des-
ecration of the Sabbath, and on one or
two occasions actually stopped the play
ing of the bands. But the German vote
is Omnipotent here, and it demands the
freest liberty on Sunday, the privilege
to drink beer, eat Limburger cheese. to
listen to the inspiring strains of brass
band, or to dance to its dulcet music if it
so desires, and as our politicians are but
mortal, the Germanization Of Cincinna-
ii in this respect soon became fixed
fact.
The first year Lookout House was in
existence, the inclined plane leading to
it carried a quarter of million of peO-
pie, by far the larger portion Of whom
went to drink beer, listen to the music
and have a good time generally; and it
was noticeable that fully half the patron
age of the house came from the Ameri-
can portion of our population.
Stimulated by the success Of this ven
ture, three other inclined planes were
built, each with magnificent place of
public resort. An attempt was made at
Prices Hill to ignore the German ele-
ment which had made the other places
so prosperous, and no beer or spirituous
liquors were permitted to be sold there.
Every Thursday evening the Cincinnati
orchestra, a musical organization not
surpassed, on the whole, in ability even
by Theodore Thomas defunct band,
gave concerts there, which attracted the
very cream of our best society; but the
result was not flattering to the disciples
of Francis Murphy. The attendance
though eminently satisfactory and re-
munerative on Thursday evenings, fell
off to almost nothing other nights of the
week, so much SO that of all the hilltop
resorts, though more elegant in its ap
pointments and more aristocratic in
''tone," was the only one which did not
make money. Last winter Mr.. Price
died, and his sons not being so ingrained
in the principles of temperance as he
have rented the place to Germans, anG
now the festive foam of lager, and the
aroma of the seductive julep can be seer
and inhaled there at any hour of thu
day.
These resorts are daily visited by from
FIVE to twenty thousand people, and
shall | say it, too, by many Of our most
wealthy and respectable citizens. A
visit to any one Of these places on a
Sunday night would, | fear, make the
J pious readers of the BULLETIN turI
their eyes up in holy horror. The!
would see acres of buildings and plat
forms illuminated by countless gas jets
and in these buildings and on these plat