The Birmingham age-herald., 1906-05-13
BRIDGE BEAUTIFUL
 NOW IN ORDER Aesthetic Temperament Reveal
 ed in New Phase AMERICANS WAKING UP On Site of Ugly Structure Immortal ized by LonefeIIow Fine Exam pie of Modern Architect
 ure Is Building.
AMERICANS WAKING UP

Boston, May 12.-The United States is filled with the wonders of the bridge builders art-gant structures of steel that overstretch mighty rivers and arms of the ocean, bridges that lift to let man. moth ships go under, bridges so high and so peculiarly constructed that ships can pass beneath them without lifting. tres ties that are flung from mountain side to mountain side. spanning deep canyons, cantilevers over resoundng cataraets. bridges of immense size and little bridges of sighs Only one kind of bridge has up to this time been conspicuously absent from the North American continent That is the bridge beautiful
 Not absolutely, perhaps, is American bridge building to be condemned on esthetie grounds, for, although majority of the structures spanning rivers and estuaries in this country have been built with regard only to utiliitarian considera- tions, some few are artistic enough to compare favorably, if not with the best examples of ancient workmanship, at least with the severe but generally well proportioned creations with which French, German and Italian engineers are all the while spanning their rivers German commissioner appointed some twenty five years ago by his government to look into the railroad systems of the United States reported among other things: ''In America public works are executed with out reference to art" Yet the nineteenth century witnessed the erection in this fer- arched High bridge which carries Croton water into New York city; the massive and not uninteresting Cabin Johns bridge near Washington, famed until very re- gently as being the largest single arch bridge in the world; the Eads bridge across the Mississippi at St. Louis, repre- senting striking and generally pleasing combination of masonry and iron work and many minor structures of distinct artistic merit Even the all iron bridge, in the hands of some engineers who are willing to look at their work as an archi- tectural proposition, has proved to have an attractveness of its own. though beauty of the highest type it can never possess Among the older bridges of the country, those especially involving stone work of the colonial and revolutionary period, there are many that are truly notable in appearance.
 Spirit of Improvement Here.
 The spirit of esthetc improvement is on us at last, and the opportunity that a structure thrown across d body of water offers for picturesque and decorative eff feet has become recognized by practically all architects and by the intelligent pub Vic In the plans for the Identification of Washington, for example, special feature is a great bridge with heavy tow CTS above the central draw bridge
 Again, the community of the greater Boston, which heretofore, though supplied with multitude of smaller brrges of more or less architectural merit. has had no large bridge comparable in popular estimation with some of the big spans of other American cities-such as the two great suspension bridges over New York S East river-has now very nearly com pleted one of masonry and steel which will be of distinctly monumental charac- ter, making an important part of the lanu- scape of the Back bay and giving im- pressiveness to the former rather mean and squalid approach to Harvard uni- versty. This work has lately been hailed by a writer in the Century Magazine as unquestionably the most artistic Amer ican bridge yet designed It will be one of the most conspicuous features of the ornamental basin, which, on larger scale than Hamburg's S celebrated Alster basin is being created out of the salt water estuary where the Charles river broadens before flowing into the ocean. IL has also a sentimental significance, for it takes the place of the ugly, insignificant pile bridge which Longfellow immortal ized by standing on it at midnight, and which, if he followed the dictates of his artistic tastes. he probably ran away from by daylight.
 In the building of the new bridge a dis tinct effort was made to secure beauty of line and mass and to avoid the mistake which was committed when the low. stringy and unimposng Harvard bridge was thrown across the Back bay about d mile to the south. Given a wide stretch of water with. on the one side hill covered with high buildings and on the other an esplanade soon to be lined with apartment houses or possibly with educa- tional institutions, the bridge must be massive to create any positive impression at all. and 8 certain swelling bgness of effect is what City Engineer Jack of Bos- ton and MT. Edmund M Wheelwright. former city architect who drew the plans evidently had in mind. The brIuge is com posed of eleven spans of steel arches with graceful curves between twelve piers of granite, the spans varying in length from
 
 is the custom with most of the ornamental bridges of the world, are by far the heaviest When complete, they will carry four granite columns, around the top of each of which will appear a cluster of electric lights. On the front of the two center piers is a massive granite carving representing in the one case the seal of the city of Boston carried over the brow of galley, with dolphin heads and other accessories, and in the other case the cor responding seal of the city of Cambridge.
 LiberaIity of Street Car Go.
 It is characteristic of the new attitude of many public service corporations to- ward esthetic considerations that the architectural quality of this bridge, which within few months will be opened to the public has been made possible largely through the public spirit and lberality of Boston's street car system, the Boston Elevated Railway company. The con- struction of the elevated company. which will make use of a portion of the bridge as offering a direct line of rapid transit to Harvard square enabled the erection of structure involving the expenditure