The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1903-07-19

Z
is the case in regard to the four great
docks or grounds In this city, between
Thirty first and Thirty-second streets
and Seventh and Ninth avenues, New
York, where the Pennsylvania Railroad
company is now preparing to erect it's
great metropolitan terminal, which is
to be the largest, and most complete
railway station in the world. In this
that makes the paradox.
The house Is down! Long stand the.
house! So goes the song Of the march
of Improvement. The admired build
/ ing to today becomes an encumbrance
tomorrow, and it is RACED to make room
! for another; but in the case of the
great improvement being made by the.
Pennsylvania company four hundred
buildings have to disappear to make
| room for one.
i The work of destruction is now well
under way, and it involves most in
/ teresting story as told by Samuel Rea,
vice president of the company under
| whose immediate supervision the work
is being done; Charles M. Jacobs, the
| engineer in charge, and c. H. South
ard, who is now removing the build
| ings.
| Passing of a Town.
| That the metropolis may have rail-
way station equal to it's needs, beau
tiful in architecture and perfect in ap-
pointments, town must be destroyed.
Nearly two dozen score homes and
shops of the butcher, the baker and
the candlestick maker must crumble
that a single stately building may rise
where they stood.
| 1t is easily worthy of the name of
| town. these four great blocks, with
their four hundred buildings, that shell
tered a population of 1920 souls.
Many towns of some pretensions have
no more inhabitants than that 1T is
a town in which q person might be
| born and find all Of the necessities OF
| life without having to cross one of the
four streets that bound it. There he
| finds his doctor, his minister, his land
| lord, his butcher. his grocer, his baker,
his clothier. and finally his undertaken.
! But this town is doomed. The hand
of the destroyer is now laid heavily on
it, and it's passing has begun. It's peo-
pie are fleeing; fleeing from the town
of destruction, to prevent their houses
| About one half Of the inhabitants OF
these four blocks have already gone
and the other half are holding tena-
ciously to their leases until the final
| hour Of their expiration, while the
on next door to them.
| Many of those dispossessed have
found homes in the immediate neigh
| borhood, for their friends and associa-
tons, perhaps for long years, are there,
and they do not want them destroyed
with the homes in which they lived.
go Work Well Under Way.
| The work of destruction is well UNI,
der way, twenty nine buildings now
being down, most of them on Thirty
second street, giving that thorough
fare the appearance of a giant jaw
| from which few teeth have been
| taken. ..F1sifst 6lIoo&I .z4fL1 ii55
+ According to Mr. Southard's esti
mate it will be about year before
| the entire 400 buildings will be removed
and the ground be clear for the work
| of excavation, and then three years
more must pass before the great term
! inaI with it's station and connecting
| tunnels will be ready for travel, with
a capacity of handling 100000 passen-
I gers daily, after an expenditure OF $685.
/ 100000 for the entire work. te.i4
| Hundreds of structures must be torn
| down and carted away-buildings that
tccst all the way from $4,000 or $4,000
| up to thirty times that much, ranging
| in size from a two story brick saloon
on the Seventh avenue boundary to
large brownstone church, with tall,
| shapely spire, on the northeast corner
of Thirty-first street and Ninth ave-
nue.. Many of the, buildings are ordi-
nary three and four-s story brick DWELL
| ings, often with shops on the first
| floors, and some are quite pretentious
! brownstone apartment houses, notice
ably the block son | the south side of
| Thirty second street, between Eighth
and Ninth avenues.f
| Value Of the Buildings.
| According to iMr, Southard's esti-
mate, these buildings, now being RACED,
are worth $4,O00,000. This great value
must be reduced to. heaps Of bricks and
piles of lumberJ and no insignificant
heaps and piles, either, for in these
buildings are 5S,O00!000 bricks and H.
! 100000 feet of lumber. To put these
| bricks and this lumber into piles will
cost $4,000. All this is to make room
| for station.
What becomes of this vast amount
| of material? 1t is not lost, by any
means 1t can be used again,>and some
| of it has been used before. 1t is cart
| ed to yards where is stored second
hand building material, and it is again
| in the market for building purposes
In fact, this material gets but little
rest, for since the work Of tearin
down has begun some of the bricks
and some of the lumber has been sold.
| and 1t has again found a resting place
| in new structures in and around the
city
All of this great mass of material
will go in that way and stay in use
unless fire shall destroy 1t or continued
using gradually reduce it's value until
| it is good only for fuel or material to
| be used for filling. Some of it now,
| like the plaster, broken laths and splin-
| tered boards. is consigned to such uses
| Some Used Before.
! This material will not only be used
again, perhaps many times, but it has
been used before, and likely more than
! once Some tin1bers- taken out of
| building on the north side of Thirty-sec-
| ond street, west of Eighth avenue.
came from warehouse that was built
near Washington square about eighty