Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1889-01-10
THE HOME OF HARRISON
Indianapolis and Her People Viewed
Through Strangers Spectacles.
correspondence OF the New York Maill

/
Indianapolis is distinctly provincial.
| The old railroad depot resembles loco
motive barn, vito q general air of want
| of sweeping and paiRt about it. The street
/ cars trundle along in a lazy sort of way,
ana look as if they had been swept in.
| The principal business thoroughfare is
busy enough, with conservative kind of
| look, which seems to say, 81 do not care
to be any buster" Wsen you leave the
| business streets you are immediately
| driven by your cicerone-everybody who
is anybody drives in Indianapolls-aIon
the avenue fringed with private residen-
ces. ''Whst homelike city!n you exclaim
| involuntarily as your eye rests on hand
some houses with oriel windows, smo' th-
shaver lawns and to tefully shampooed
terraces. There ere miles of such av-
enues.
Everybody seems to own or rent
home in Indianapolis. There are no
| blocss to speak OF, no long rows of IN
hospitable looking straight up-and-d do WI
bricks and brown-stones, such as sadd N
the eye of the homeless wanderer in New
York and Brooklyn. There is no hud
| ding together as with us-the family in
the first floor turning Up its nose at the
| family in the second, and both looking
up With sublime contempt Don the fam
| lily upon the third. In New York or
Brooklyn you can tell by glance at the
| faded curtains and the unkept doorsteps
that house is devoted to the housing of
boarders, In Indianapolis g real bona
ide boarding house looks like molder-
ing frst-famlly residence.
| There is q suggestion of homemade
| pies about the villas of the middle classes
and the cottages of the toilers. I men
ton middle classes advisedly, because
| have never encountered a city which
boosted so many first families as Indian
apolis. So far as anti9 uity of lineage
and dignity of department are concerned,
! Indianapolis might sit for the portrait of
an American Toledo, Saragossa or Ma.
drid. First families meet you at evert
| turn of the roads, in carriages, buggies
rockaways, on horseback or on foot. Ths
/ gentleman who did me the honor to show
me the sights belongs himself TO the very
/ first families. L have reason TO sus poet
that his family was seated IN the center
of the forests when tue city was laid out
Riding ia his company along fashion
able avenue, observed that ne bowed In
a solemn and digniied manner to many
persons when we passed upon the road
The Indianapolis man, 80 far as L haze
seen him, is soleEln. He has dignity to
sustain, and it weighs upon his mind
There is none of the we'll dressed frivo,ity
of the giddy Gothamite, or the bressy
! self assurance of the Chicago man at out
the Indianapeiitan. The affairs of the
nation sat upoa him weightiy. He does
net laugh much. When he does indulge
in that weaks ess his laugh is loud and
4 a0nn Whep If caaSaa bis faoe
| it's natural solemnity of expression. I
have an idee that @ ainine has something
| to do with the characteristic male de-
naearor in the capital Of Indiana. 1t may
| be an overpressQre OF religious zeal.
am pot prepared to swear to is. He may
have mmitted some terrible criEle in
! past ages, ecoloniz I'd q district or bribed a
/ voter, or-done something dread ful 81 that
kind. The Indiana eelitau is terribly in
earnest, and is to be trusted aot to turn
the government of this OR ally other
coun5ryEnto ridicuie, OR to joke upon af-
| fairs of state.
IF the men of Indianapolis are some
what grave of aspect striking reatrast
| is presented by the ladies. lac luspolis
girls are pretty, rosy and jolly Yea fall
! III love with several of them 81 frstsight.
| Ehey have way, an told, Of creeping
into fellows heart, a soft 5nsinu2ting
sGy which is very catching. Endiaaap-
otis girls all drive. They patsonize Sc ~
ing circles, literary aad musicai societies,
snd are very, very good. They aearlg all
sing, and those who do not sing whistle.
They ere frank, unsGected, intelligent,
we'll reed and witty, and have the pretti-
est, rosiest moaths in the world. I h&ve
no hesitation in saying that the capital of
Roosierdom is not quite safe place for
a New York married man to GO to. 1t
makes him dissatisfied with his hozae.
Under the coming administration there
will be DO lack of fascination in the
drawing room. Should Mrs. Harrison
surround herself with a bevy of pretty
Ill eosieresses there will bs no bachelor left
to see the unmarried girls home. Mar
riage will not be failure under the Har-
rls0n adDi nistration.