Omaha daily bee., 1909-03-15
W~aShington Life
9kora gksechss q T~noiaemas ana
Of Events at the Nations oapftni.

on ANSnta ~ Nhe Aetione OApapAa.
The new marble office building Of the
honorable senators is finished and many
Of the senators are moving in. Others are
hanging on TO their office rooms in the
capitol, preferrlng old quarters redolent
with historic associations to the modern
and somewhat garish splendors of the new
building. Among the splendors may be
mentioned a center table costing $3.50 IN
each room. a shade too elaborate to rest
ones heels on. Some senators from rural
states are reluctant to shine in such mag
nificent settings, and are inclined to dwell
yet awhile in modest quarters. A subway
connects the capitol and the office annex,
enabling members to escape the rigors of
Washington weather in making the trip.
In order TO make the trip easy, electric
carryalls will be operated so as TO run in
two minutes from the senate wing TO the
offices and back. There are two of these
electric conveyances, and they will stop
at any elevator in the building OF the
offices at the convenience OF senators.
i
Fred Warner Carpenter. the presidents
secretary. has been with Mr.. Taft for
some eight years. Mr.. TAFT got him when
president of the Philippine commission by
cabling to a friend in San Francisco for a
competent stenographer. The choice fell
upon the private secretary of Charles S.
Wheeler OF the law firm of Bishop &
Wheeler. Mr.. Carpenter had been pre-
viously admitted 10 the bar in Minnesota,
and is a graduate Of the university of that
state. He did so we'll as stenographer
that Mr.. Taft made him private secretary
when he became governor general of the
Philippines. Secretary Carpenter has just
passed his thirty-siXth birthday. enjoys the
full confidence of his chief, and IL Is ex-
pected that this successor Of William
Loeb, dr.. Mr.. Cortelyou and the late Col
onel Lamont will make good" in q place
that calls for much good sense and a great
degree of tact.
Exclusive of the capitol, and congress
sional library. grounds. the union depot
plaza and the botanical gardens, says a
Chicago News letter, the city Of Washing
ton boasts more than 5000 acres in parks,
excluding nearly 100 triangles and circles
at street intersections and miles upon
miles of shaded asphalt streets equal to
the boulevards of many other cities. The
largest of all these parks is Rock Creek
park. This beauty spot covers 1905 acres
Immediately adjoining the Geological park,
which contains IA acres, and fits natural
combinations of rocks and streams. hills
and deles, trees and meadows. go to make
perhaps the finest groundwork of a public
park In any city in the country.
1t will be probably 100 years before the
possibilities of this park are realized to
the full, including the building of a boule-
ward dawn Rook craah into the rftpr IF
Washington. connecting with the River
side driveway, now known as Potomac
driveway. The River park, which reaches
from the capitol to the islands OF the
Potomac, contains in the aggregate 1880
acres. but does not represent an amalga-
mated whole as does the Rock Creek park.
In the northern portion of the city, about
a mile eastward frem Rock Creek park
and connected herewith by the old mill
tary road over which union armies marched
In the defense Of Washington, is the Sol
dier Home park. Commanded by a group
of white marble Buildings erected on the
highest point In the city, the park slopes
toward the city over an extent OF 682
acres. Still another park, Analostan, In
southeast Washington where the river
flats will some day be one of the flower
gardens of the national capital. contains
$40 acres. TIL last OF the larger parks,
also in north Washington, is Tacoma park,
containing 73s acres.
Other amusement places are the Henry
and Seaton parks of thirty-two acres;
Garfield park, t~wenty-four acres; Judiciary
square, where is the pension office. nine
teen acres, and Howard University park
OF twelve acres. Lafayette square, in front
Of the White House on the north, in which
no tree or bush is duplicated, contains six
acres.
Congress. more's the pity, has lost its
last member that wore boots. His name is
Brumm habitat Pennsylvania, and he is
not dead of old age. certainly not of cold
feet. Mr.. Brumm, indeed, is not dead at
all, even II his species be extinct. He has
simply quit Washington. boots and all, TO
become a judge in %SchuylkIll county. The
house will miss him and his leather-clad
extremities Gone is sockless Jerry Simp-
son. Gone almost are the full boards,
burnsides and chin whiskers Of earlier con-
gressional efflorescence ''Uncle joe Can
non no longer wears the Suit OF ostenta-
tious blue jeans, presented him by North
Carolina admirers. Quaintness and pic
turesqueness. qualities that had a definite
political value. are represented in the
popular branch of the national legislature
chiefly by the speakers vocabulary.
A law passed by the last congress pro-
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