El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1910-08-29
HLsKIN On GERMAN municipalities
AND BERLIN, THE QUEEN CITY
CONTINUED From Previous Page).

revious Page).
I has better street railway service, better
street lighting. inferior water service
1 and very much inferior telephone ser
vice than is possessed by the average
American city. But the German cities
have no problems OF graft
Judged by concrete results, the Ger
man theory of municipal government
is better than similar theories in other
countries. in that when put into prac7
tfce the German theory enables the Ger
man people to accomplish their express
ed desires. Other systems have not
| been so successful.
BerIiag, the Splendid.
Splendid Berlin, youthful, strong,
/ beautiful and pulSing with life, is a
naicrocosm of modern Germany-that
new united and imperial Germany
which Bismarck built upon the newly
discovered power of organization. In
Berlin the surviving East Prussia junk
er with his immortal retinue of semi
servile peasants is an anachronism. In
Berlin the South German poet-philoso-
| pher is overwhelmed. In Berlin the
Thuringian peasant in his native cos
tune is almost as unfamiliar as an Iro-
quis indian in warpaint on the streets
of Manhattan. In other German cities
there linger reminiscently on the stage,
actors who played their part before the
final curtain was rung down on the
play of the Holy Roman empire. In
other parts of Germany there remain
old churches, old castles, old costumes,
old customs which link the present with
the far gone past of the pre-Frederician
age But in Berlin everything is new,
everything is modern, every thought is
for the future and every back is turned
upon the past. Beyond Berlin in the
dying bits of old Germany men hate
the newness of their imperial capital,
but Berlin does not care It knows
that it has been created by the modern
imperial Germany, it knows that ii
typiifies the spirit of the reborn Faith
erland, and it is happy in its own ap-
prevail.
Beriing is Young.
For Berlin is young. There has been
a HohenzOlern capital here on the
banks of the Spree for some centuries,
but the Berlin of today is as new as if
it~had been established upon western
prairie. In appearance, in spirit, and in
all essentials Berlin is more modern
than New York, younger than Chicago,
and as new as Oklahoma City. 1t has
been called the most American city in
Europe. but it really is the most Euro
pean of European cities, since 1T eX-
presses only the Europe that now ex-
lists. Berlin is the apothesis of mod
ern Germany. There are a great many
relics of the day of Frederick the Great,
and not a few buildings which would be
considered ancient in America, but they
are swallowed up in the vastnesS of the
new Berlin and one does not see them
German Growth Remarkable.
Americans too often think that the
enormous development Of American cit
les is peculiar to the New World. Ger
many has grown even more rapidly
than, the United States when its area
and resources are taken into consider
alton and it has shown the same accel-
Grafton of urban population which has
taken place in all industrial countries.
In 1871 when the empire was estaS-
lished, there were eight towns in Ger
many having more than 100, 600 inhabi-
tants In 1905 there were Il towns
credited with more than 100000, and II
is estimated that there are now proba-
bly, three or four others added to this
list. In 1871 Berlin had 100000 popu-
lation In 1880 Berlin reached the mil
lion mark, the first German city to do
So In that year Chicago had popula-
ton of $4,000 and the area now in
cluded in the city of New York $4,000
inhabitants The growth of New York
and Chicago mas been most wonderful,
but not more so than that of Berlin
The German capital has kept well in
the lead of Chicago and is next to New
York in the race for the honor of being
the largest city in the world, having
considerably more than 100000 peo-
pie. Berlin grows like a new American
city, and is therefore nothing like any
thing else in Europe, and is a source of
perpetual surprise and establishment to
Europeans.
The Military Boulevard.
The kaiser is building q great mill
tary boulevard from Berlin 70 the mill
itary maneuver field at Doeberitz. The
road begins at the Brandenburg Gate,
in the center of the city, and runs in al
most a straight line % miles to its des-
tination. Along this new road, laid
down over the sand dunes and pine
flats, one finds the German equivalent
for American suburban boom subdivis-
ions-whole sections laid out with
streets built, sidewalks laid. lights put
up, and waiting only for the builder to
erect chains Of apartment houses. Ber-
lin devours the pine forest in the same
way western American cities capture
and tame the desert or the prairie.
Berlin is the largest city in the worlG
built on a plan arranged with method
and elaboration. The boulevard system
of Paris is not to be excelled in all the
u
and the greater part of the French city
grew Topsy-tfaShion. The upper part
Of Manhattan Island is amazingly rec
tilinear in its arrangement of streets
but it cannot be said to have a reason
able justification for its severity. Wash
ington is ideally constructed to con-
form with the plans of the Fathers. but
Washington is only One-tenth as large
a city as Berlin. And then no other
city, however perfect its ground plan,
has had the good fortune to have as its
chief citizen a king with the absolute
right 20 determine the height OF every
building erected. Exercising this right,
the kaiser has forced every builder in
every street to conform to the uniform
regulations, and this has given Berlin
q perfect skyline
Modern Architecture.
Modern Germany has evolved a new
school of architecture which has taken |
the lines of its Gothic cathedrals and |