Crawford avalanche. (Grayling, Mich.) 1879-19??, 1897-03-18
THE WHITE HOUSE.
ARRANGEMENT OF THE OFFICIAL
QUARTERS or THE EXECUTIVE.

IT
The Hall Of the Dlsappo TeIe-
phone 10 Almost the Only Modern I'm
provemsnt In the Building.
In the Century Mr.. c. c. Buel writes
a paper on Our Fellow Citizens of the
White House." devoted to the ofiicial
cares and duties OF the President, In the
course Of which he says:
At ten o'clock a hardly discernible
sign against the glass barrier an
nounces to the citizen who has arrived
under the grand portals that the exc
cutive mansion is "open" to visitors;
at two O'Clock the sign Is changed to
closed" The doorkeepers swing the
doors open to everybody. Within the
large vestibule nothing is seen which
indicates the arrangement and pur-
poses Of the different parts of the man.
sion. 1t is not always SO, for original
ly the now concealed corridors. or mid
die hall, with the staircase on the right,
was part of the entrance hall; now
the spaces between the middle columns
are closed with colored glass partitions,
and the vestibule is simply a large,
square room pleasant to get out OF. No
way appears to open to the state apart
ments in the centre, or to the west
wing, which is devoted to the private
apartments; yet glass doors are there,
though as imperceptible to the stranger
as a swinging panel. To the left there
is door which Is always open. 1t adj
mits to a small hall across which
similar door is the side entrance to the
great East Room. About this splendid
room, comprising the whole east end
OF the mansion, the visitors may wan
der at will before the portraits, or en-
Joy from the windows the beauty OF the
Treasury building to the east or the
impressive landscape to the south, in
Guiding the towering shafts of the
Washington monument, and, beyond,
the ever-changing Potomac spreading
with enlarging curves toward Mount
Vernon; and in the private garden un-
der the windows he may chance to see
a merry band Of little ones, two of them
the Presidents Oldest daughters, with
a few playmates belonging to a kim
dergarten class.
From the small hall between the YES
thule and the East Room a stairway
ascends toward the medal line Of the
building to wioe middle hall, on each
side Of which are the Offices Of the Pres
ident. The arrangement is simple, and
in the floor plan covers the space oc-
cupied below by the East Room and
counterpart of the small hall with the
public stairway, just mentioned. At
the head of these stairs, over the Green
Room, is the Cabinet Room, which is
the first apartment in the south side OF
the hall; jog of two steps, at the
marking the raised ceiling of the East
Room below. The President reaches
his Office through the Cabinet Room,
entering the latter from the library,
which corresponds on the second floor
with the Blue Room of the State apart
the library as his Office and the cabinet
chamber for an anteroom, while his
private secretary was domiciled in the
traditional Office of the President
During the first term Mr.. Cleveland
preserved the same arrangements; but
General Harrison went back to the Of
flee hallowed by Lincoln's occupancy,
and Mr.. Cleveland on his return, found
the arrangement so satisfactory that he
continued it.
Beyond the Presidents large square
office Is the corner room where Private
Secretary Thurber is always either
wrestling with the details OF executive
business or standing with his shoulder
braced against the crowd struggling to
see the President, It is narrow apart
ment, and might be called appropriate
ly the Hall of the Disappointed, the
suggestion being emphasized by por-
traits of the greatest presidential as
pirants, Clay and Webster, to which
Mr.. Thurber has added, as his private
property, an engraving of the closest
den.
On the north side of the hall there are
two rooms which correspond to those
on the south side just described, the
smaller one being occupied by Mr.. o. l..
Pruden, the assistant secretary since
General Grants time, and the custo-
dian of the Office books as well as of
the traditions which govern the public
social routine of the executive man
sion; in his room sits the telegraph
clerk at his instrument, and by the win
dow is a telephone, which saves a great
amount Of messenger service between
the President and the departments.
Occasionally a Congressman, with less
ceremony than discretion, attempts to
get an appointment with the ear of the
President over the telephone, and there
is record of stage earthquake pro-
duced in the private secretary's room
by furious Congressman who found
the telephone ineffective, and his Olym-
plan style even less so. Notwithstand-
ing that ii is almost the sole modern
improvement in the White House, the
President has been seen at the tele-
phone but once, and then, needless to
say, not on call.
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