The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1902-12-24
THE BIGGEST
OF ITS KIND
1T rs THE CITY HALL IN PHILA-
DELPHIA.
After Thirty-one Years Of Work Tt
Is Just Nearing Completion-Al-
ready Too Small for It's Uses--Curi-
Gus Statistics About It and the
Bronze Statue of William Penn on
Its Tower.
from the New York Sun.

from the New York Sun.
Along with the announcement that
after thirty-one years of work the
largest building in America is nearing
completion comes another to the effect
that the big pile Is so overcrowded that
it's 4,500 tenants are beginning to call
for the addition of another story This
despite the fact that the structure,
Philadelphia's city hall, has 6S2 rooms
with a total floor space of 11S acres.
II another story is ever added to the
city hall 1t will be only one of hun
dreds of queer things that have become
Il part of the buildings history. The
leading queer thing to Philadelphia tax
payers, is how the city hall, even if it
is the largest structure in the Western
Hemisphere and N'he worlds largest
municipal building, the parliament
building excepted, ever came to take
s25000000 from their pocketbooks.
A recent report, in endeavoring to eN-
plain this expenditure, reveals some in
teresting facts. 1t states that $4,000
has been paid to the architect and his
assistants in salaries since 1871, when
the building was begun: $351, ,490 for
paint and painting; $5,500,000 for 1.464,-
900 cubic yards of marble for marble
work; $4,000,0O0 for fitting up rooms:
Sl,343,0O0 for watchmen and cleaners;
1886 900 for electric installation; and so
on.
Utilizing Electricity.
The installation of electricity fur
nished an interesting incident in the
halls history. When the walls were
erected electric lighting was unheard
of, but when it's usefulness was demon
strated the now extinct public build
ings commission ordered electric equip
ment.
The electricians had to chisel through
in the stone walls for the wires at an
expense of thousands of dollars, and it
took them the better part of five years
of steady work to wire the building.
Now, however. the hall has a plant
capable of. furnishing all the light a
city of 10000 or 10000 inhabitants could
possibly use.
The dynamo room is one of fifty-nne
in the buildings basement, which runs
not only under the hall, but the plaza
in the centre as well. These basement
rooms teen with surprises. For one
thing there is a sand bed filter with q
daily capacity of 100000 gallons of
water, and the employees and thousands
of strangers who daily tread the corri-
dors, manage practically to consume
this amount. Thousands of gallons are
carried to their homes by the employees,
for the water furnished the Philadel-
phia householder is about the worst on
earth and will be until the city gets it's
big filter beds in working order.
In the Tower.
Ia
part of the building, the tower, is an
interesting and curious place. 1t con-
tains the largest stone in the building.
a block of granite Weighing thirty tons.
1t is 12 feet wide, % feet long and is
inches thick
The towers walls are % feet thick.
The second highest elevator in the
world is the tower. 1t runs from the
seventh floor, 13S feet above ground, to
the base of the Penn statue, an upward
course of 372 feet 9 inches. The air
cushions alone cost $4,000. One of the
400 telephones in the building is located
in the tower, at the base Of the statue.
Then there is the great clock and the
little clock that governs it. Compressed
air is the motive power.
The dials of the great clock are SOL
feet above the earth. and the diameter
of each is twenty-siX feet. The long
minute and hour hands are fifteen and
Twelve feet respectively and their
weights 225 and 175 pounds. The weight
of the dial frames, with glass, is five
and one-half tons, and the total weight
OF the clock is fifty tons.
The little or master clock, the clock
that really runs, is 1t3 feet below the
great clock by which the city and coun-
foll-. L., 90
their watches. Two years We're spent
in building it, and it's mechanism is as
delicate as that Of the finest watch.
1t rests in n metallic case ON n plat
form built into a wall so no vibration
can affect it. Quite unlike the big
clock, which in four years collected
three tons OF dirt, the case keeps it
free from dust
Once every minute this clock, which
is regulated from Washington, opens
the valve which admits compressed air
to the tubes connected with the gears.
The air moves the hands of the clock
up in the tower, which, after all. is just
dummy clock, for it has only four
faces and let's the little clock down be-
low do al! the actual work
Out of Plumb.
1ower Is that in the course Of days
'ontraction and expansion, due to the
un's rays, make 1t lean three-quar
ers of an inch out of plumb. This
POPULARITY has been determined by
pans of tub of molasses placed far
in the tower, the surface OF the
plasses varying three-quarters of an
h, according to the lean of the
yer.
'hen too, the tower is an Unsuitable
inveterate destroyer Of the birds of
air. The ring OF sixteen powerful
lights that glow at the base OF
bn's statue blinds, the birds so that
fly against the towey, are killed
fall TO the roofs below. One of the
employees has "A collection of over
pusand birds that were killed in
manner.
statue of William Penn that caps
owen weighs 5S,34S pounds and is
1t in height. The hat Is feet i'm
ter. the rim % feet in circumfer-
the buttons on the coat are 6
|in diameter and the coat cuffs
Yet long.