Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1897-01-09
Copyrighted. 1896 by Frank G. Carpenter.)
Special Correspondence of the NEWS.
WASHINGTON, January 9th, is

Special Correspondent OF the NEWS.
WAsHINGToN, January 9th, 1897.
EtiiitSstI3 HAVE spent some time this
EtsX week getting Information
litgsEss}H about President McKinley's
ltHfaSf$Ss new home. have had
IHsy2s$xt S photographer with me in the
#fS'V$Ssz White House, and have gone
lEsst$a over the different rooms al
l4EHEIH most with tape line to let
IAfH&& you know how your new
ruler is to be housed. The
IttHttt- ftNJ. White House has been greatly
HGP1 ~ changed within the past few
NHs o eyears. All kinds of improve
II'}r So ments have been made, and
the white hair of John Quincy Adams
ghost must rise in holy horror as he
looks at the extravagant furnishings.
Mrs. President Harrison expended some
thing like s52. 900 on improvements, and
a number OF changes have been made
by Mrs. Cleveland. The Harrisons spent
lot on the kitchen. When they came
in the basement was full OF rats. One
kitchen floor had been laid on top OF
another, and they we're all rotten. Mrs
Harrison ordered the wooden floors
taken out and had the ground covered
with concrete. Upon the top Of this she
put porcelain tiles and walled all the
rooms Of the basement as high as your
shoulder with the same material. The
White house is now lighted with electric
lights. The chandeliers have electric
globes and the lights are kept burning
in the basement and in most OF the
rooms of the building all night long.
The electric plant cost $4,000, and this
did not include the dynamo, for the
electricity is brought to the White House
through an underground cable from the
State department engine rooms, where
it is generated.
NRw CHINA FOR MRS. MCKINLEY,
think it was Martin Van Buren, who
was denounced all over the country for
buying set OF gold spoons tor the
White House. The new china which
has been recently bought is worth al
NEST Its weight in gold. know nothing
about the late purchases of Mrs. Cleve-
land, for the president is very secrTtive
as to his domestic matters. But there is
new set of cut glass in the cupboards
of the Executive mansion which cost
SI,973, and happen to know that Mrs.
Harrison sent one order to Europe for
twenty.fou dozen china plates and five
dozen coffee cups OF special design.
Congress allows each president some
thing like $40, 900 year and more to
run the White House, and large part
of this goes into new furniture and
dishes. The linen costs small fortune.
The table cloths are OF the finest da-
mask, and the napkins used at state
dinners are as big as baby's bed quilt.
They shine like silk, and they are so
heavy that it takes some time Tor drop
OF wine to soak through them.
Mrs. Mckinley will probably buy lot
of new linen when she comes in and one
OF her pleasures may be the shopping
which she can do at government ex-
pense.
NEW WHITE HOUSE CARPETS.
New carpets are bought about every
six years, and though the ones which
found on the different parlors are good
she will probably have a chance TO select
new ones. don't believe she will care
10 re-decorate the rooms. When the
blue room was last fixed up the artists
received more than $4,000 for the Job.
,...I- a. 81 IF.tln
enc room! Isn't it awful. Yes, but the
walls of the blue room look TAR different
now than they did when Andrew Jack.
sons callers tramped around within
them sampling the Dig cheese which one
OF his admiring constituents sent him,
or at the reception which ne gave on
the day OF his inauguration when buck.
cts of orange punch were given out in
each room and both walls and carpets
ruined. The walls OF the blue room are
now padded and draped with silk as fine
as that OF the ball dresses OF the ladies
who will come here to shake hands with
President Mckinley. The silk is OF the
most delicate blue, and it is interviewer
with silver. II is the same with the red
room, which is also hung with silk and
whose furniture has been designed and
cushioned to match. The carpets OF all
The ground floor parlors are fine. That
on the east room is so soft that your loot
sinks into it as though it were bed Of
moss. 1t takes almost 500 yards OF car
pet to cover the floor, and the one now
lacked down cost $3.50 1t takes more
than a thousand yards to carpet the
White House parlors and dining rooms,
and the carpets everywhere match the
furniture and hangings.
THE WHITE HOUSE GOOD ENOUGH.
OF late it has become the fashion to
sneer at the White House. 1t is said to
be not good enough for the president
and that we ought to build great
palace for our rulers. The truth is our
presidents, as rule, have never had
anything so good before they came to
the White House. The most OF them at
the beginning OF their lives were fed on
hog and hominy. Cleveland had pro-
badly none too much to eat when his
father was a poor parson, and the biggest
ieasts. venture, were often the dona
ton parties. Mckinley had to skirmish
for bis Iaiions while he was In the army