Idaho County free press. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho Territory) 1886-current, 1892-06-17
OUR ST. LOUIS LETTER.
"ossip About Secretary EIkins-Tho
AutumnaI Festivities Planned for
beautiful Results Promised-Summer
Evening Pleasures. Etc.

!
Evening Pleasures, Etc.
stephen Il. Ellsins the Secretary Of
war; Is u Missourian and has man,
warm personal friends in st. Louis
for this reason everybody believes he
is In earnest when he says that before
lie goes out of the cabinet he will Ret
enough money appropriated to make
JEFFERSON barracks one of the largest
ana handsomest military posts in the
/ u lted states. More than quarter OF
a million dollars will be spent on the
post II the plans for the improvement
are carried out, and considerably over
a million dollars will be added to the
volume of business in the city. Real
estate men, too, say that the new pos
VIII make property values rapidly in
crease in the southern part of town,
winch lies adjacent to the reser-
vation.
Very few people, even artists, know
mat when Robert Bringhurst, the
sculptor, modelled that statue of Grant
on Twelfth street he had posing for
MN Paul Cornoyer, the young Ameri-
can painter who has recently achieved
distlnction in Paris. The booted legs
OF Ten. Grant are Cornoryer's legs, and
the leld glass in the hero's hand was
modelled from the glass taken from
zen John ). MarmadulSe when n
prisoner by Councilman Nelson Cole Of
this city. These little things were
brought out the other night by a con-
Versatlon between two gentlemen who
were having n taste of the glories of
the faIl entertainment to be set before
us by the committees in charge of the
festivities. IL was at a private exhibit
ton of miniature St Louis, lighted
hn IN. f.
John C. Wilkinson, whose committee
manages the illumination, will make
the Grant statue and the statue of Lib
erty, which face each other on Twelfth
street, the central figures OF a splendid
Coium bian tableau. A third statue
VIII be put up between Liberty and
the Union depot, and the three will be
linked together and flanked by many
colored electrical devices. The whole
SIX blocks between the site of the new
City hall and Washington avenue will
be brilliant promenade overhung by
pictures in light, half historical and
partly allegorlcal. The suggestion of
Columbus and his time will be pre-
served, too, in the Examinations on the
down town streets.
The warm weather is leading to the
annual revival of very popular city
custom. Only st. Louis people know
how to sit gracefully on their front
steps summer afternoons. The girls
Drlng out cushions, as soon as supper
is done, while it is yet light, and pose
on the steps, with books in their hands
The men follow, the older with cigars.
and the younger with banjo or man
dolin, and unless walk to an opera
garden or a fountain where there is
ice cream soda interferes, there they
sit all the evening. Neighbors come over
to see each other, and plans for picnics
and excursions are laid. Take a walk
just now along Pine, Washington.
Locust-any of the streets lined with
homes, out in the western part of the
city, and you will see the groups and
hear the tinlSle of the music, the chat
ter and laughter now and then rising
above it. Many St. Louis family,
lured away from home by the summer
resort fashion, men and women stified |
in small hotel rooms, look back with |
longing to the cool evenings on their |
front steps, and hasten their return. |
Boston is the only other city in the |
where this fashion obtains of |
making the front steps the reception |
room on summer evenings. In New |
Y ork 1t is held to be bad form.
With their front steps, and an occa-
sional day on the river or at one of the /
neighboring resorts, st. Louis folk
who do not want to enrich seaside or
hotel men will get along
cry well this summer. There are
welve summering places within two
lours' ride of the city, bv rail and boat
All of these places make money four
months in the year. Then there are
he innumerable suburban spots which
re high and cool, all of them reached
y fast street car lines. In conse-
uence of these surroundings, the city
DOSES but small part of its population
uring the summer, and even in the
og- days there is no exodus of the bust
ess men such as one sees in the large
astern cities.