The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-12-08

q
explaining the elevator and hosting machinery.
"A crowbar fell from the top year ago, but hit
nothing but the wooden floor below. One of
these elevator sleeves fell, striking from one
brace of the elevator to another one barely
missed a lady in IA party waiting TO come up.
We stretched a net around the top to catch any
of the workmen who might fall, and twice it has
saved life. Our men take all the chances up
there, five hundred feet above the ground, that
your brick mason would ten feetfron the ground.
Admiral Rogers climbed up to the highest course
the other day and found a man walking along
the narrow edge of stone as unconcerned as If
1t were on the ground. The men seemed to
have no thought Of the height-work, chat, joke,
and laugh as if they were on the ground. Some
times stone-laying goes on when the clouds and
fogs obscure the city below
EVERY foot Of this interior is familiar to us
who have worked here so long. You can easily
tell how high you are at any time by noticing
the numbers on the iron beams of the elevator
We are passing No. y and are 800 feet from the
ground. The beams are ten feet apart. The
masonry on the lower part of the monument was
q coarse rubble. Some of the stones are ridicu
lousy small-not four inches thick or foot long
sometimes In order to make that wall look
decent we shall plaster it. This will keep the
moisture that collects from running into the
masonry, and so will protect the work From
where began the whole interior wall is as nicely
faced as the exterior, and the same marble was
for the most part used Some granite was used
lone of the most interesting things we have
done has been to keep accurate data every
morning and night since began of any dis
placement in the walls of the monument We
SUSPENDED from various heights-l30, $40, 800
and 400 feet-cords with plumb weights at the
lower end. These weights hang in some slowly
resisting substance like molasses or glycerine
With a straight-edge at night we note where the
cord is and again in the morning. Thus for SIX
years we have kept data in books for the pur-
pose, of the movement of the monument. The
only cause of displacement is the expansion and
contraction of the walls under the heat of the
sun In the winter, for instance, the south wall
shows greater movement than the other sides.
You can see that there has been
good stone-cutting throughout, from the
fine joints and perfectly mathematical fitting
of these interior stones The bond, as the
masons call it, by which the inner and outer
face of the walls are held together, is what is
called in the books the Flemish bond-one stone
length wise in the face of the wall, and then one
stone running back through the wall, binding it
all together This bond runs through the whole
monument, and the result is the strongest ma
sonry attainable"
1--WE mark every stone" said Captain Davis,
the assistant engineer, 80 we know just where
it is to go. For instance, the courses in the cap
are lettered, and we are now laying ii. The
capstone is n. So we have ], K, l., and NJ yet
to lay. In H there are two stones on each side
of the square-eight in ali. This one is the Sec
ond to be laid in that 1t is cut to fit the
corner, and is beveled, you see. There are forty
four stones more to lay. If we have good
weather and are ordinarily successful
we lay four stones in a day think
that unless we have more difficulty chan | fore
see in laying the capstone shall lay every
stone in ten days. Everything is ready to put
the cap in place. We shall put quadriped
with legs sixty feet long, of timbers ten inches
square, on the cap each leg running down over
the face of one of the pyrImidal Sides Meeting
at the top, they will form very strong support,
with which we can hoist the cap into place. We
shall suspend the capstone, lay all the courses
below, and then let tho cap down into place to
bind the whole together There will be slight
scaffolding around the cap, which we shall cut
away and take in through the windows below.
The only way to remove the heavy timbers we
have used at the top of the monument is to saw
them up and take them down the elevator"
Colonel Casey showed how he should finish
the windows: That doorway there for the
stones to pass out on the scaffold will not be
there when we finish up. We shall set a stone
in there. These windows on each side will be
ehiseied off smoothly, and put in the wall at the
side. l shall set strong iron bar, swinging in
! a socket like the old-fashioned cranes in our
srandfathers' fre-places At the outer end OF
the iron bar will hang marble slab, nicely fin
| ished, to fit into these windows. The slab will
swing around, and shut snugly in, and close the
! window rain tight These windows are two feet
wide by eighteen inches high. The sides, you
see are about five inches thick, so You can
| look out easily. 1t is not like reaching out
| Let me show you how we make joints con
tinued the Colonel. Here are two stones joining
! on the perpendicular edges, with about eighth
| Of an inch space between Down the edges OF
| each is groove, an inch and half deep and
| three quarters Of an inch wide When the tive
stones are put in place the grooves are exactly
| opposite. and form one channel down into the
wall Now we slip n tongue of phosphor bronze
down into this double groove, and then calk il
| back of it with Portland cement. The bronze
win not corrode, turns water perfectly, and the
| cement binds the stones together firmly. The
| stones on the face of the monument are five
! inches thick at the thinnest edge AT the
| lower edge they are thicker, in order to be-
are beyeled and grooved so as to sit firmly or
each other They are laid in type metal, which
as you know, is not affected by water
There is abundant room at the top Of the mon
ument. The shaft is thirty five feet square on
the outside and about thirty square the in
side. Beginning thirty feet below the floor are
| huge stone braces running up eighty feet ane
meeting in key stone up in the pyramidal cap
| These braces are eighteen inches thick anG
! swing upward in graceful curve At the widest
| place in the brace it is six feet from the inner
| face to the wall of the monument There are
three braces on each side of the shaft, and those
next the corners form four snug little foursided
rooms.
| At one time there were 100 marblecutters
and laboreIs of all kinds at work on the monu
ment year ago the payroll monthly fol
! labor on the monument was about $1,000 A
| three-story building adjoining the Windsor
building. used by the War Department, is used
| by the monument officers. Here are models Of
all sorts showing comparative heights of the
tallest structures in the world, Our monument
will be 555 feet high; Strasburg Cathedral is
46s; Cologne Cathedral, oil, St Peters, al
Rome. AS, The pyramids are 100 feet lower.
| One of the most remarkable things about the
monument is the fact that Colonel Casey put
new foundation under the pile when 1t was ia
! feet high, before he would begin stoue-laying al
| the top. The earth was taken away and the OLD
foundation, eighty feet square. was removed.
| Had the monument been built on it the only re
suit would have been that it would have sunk
down into the soft earth underneath Digging
down, Colonel Casey took ont everything but 8
core of earth forty four feet square under the
monument, having put timbers to hold the
weight above. He then built foundation III
feet square and thirteen feet deep. The whole
weight on that foundation now is 81, $50 TONS II
is wonderful piece of engineering, that few