Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1912-03-08
IMPRESSIONS OF ATLANTA.
). 3. Emerson Writes Intere stingly
About the Growing Southern City.

Mr.. and Mrs S. b. Emerson are now
travelling through the South. Many of
Mr. Emersons friends will be inter-
ested in reading part of a letter which
he sent to E. c. Crosby, addressed at
Atlanta, Ga. Feb 20:
1 have now been in this city nearly
a week and have seen something of the
place. At first l was puzzled to under
stand how such a city of 1000 people
could have grown up in the middle of
Georgia, without any water communi-
cation, but as l explore the various in
dustries and study the conditions here
1t is dawning upon me, that there must
be some good reason for this growth.
l find that there are more than dozen
railroads centreing here. and that
large territory, covering the middle
Southern states, depends on this city for
supplies. There are many wholesale
houses, several foundries, railroad re-
pair shops and some cars are built here.
l have not explored the factories as yet.
Today 1 passed through a foundry
where they were pouring iron anu
wheeling red hot car wheels into the
annealng pits. They had a good layout
for such work This concern make
specially of buying old engines and cars
and repairing them There are whole
lot of short lines of road that are run
independently and such running stock
is in demand. Coal and iron are avail
able at low cost and labor is cheap COM
pared with some sections of the country.
| don't think | would care to ex-
change Brattleboro as a place to live,
for Atlanta, but somebody must live
here to meet the demand for skilled me-
chanics. / think repair work calls for
fully as skilful mechanics as does new
work. The climate here is mild, neither
too cold nor too hot. There are about
10000 or more people of the black race.
1 am staying at Spelman seminary with
where your sister, Mrs. Rice, used to
be. is little northeast of this place and
in full view, and Baptist college for
colored men nearby, and the whole hill
is covered with houses filed with blacks,
and they seem to be pretty well to do,
as a rule. much more so than in Sa-
vannah, / should judge.
This city is well equipped with trolley
cars, more SO than any place l have
seen. 1 wish you could have been with
me today at the pumping station. This
Is a fine layout. The water in the upper
basin is about the consistency of pea
soup. 1t goes through large settling
basins into huge watts in a large build
ing The water passes through sand, a
part of the watts being used at a time,
while others are being washed out" by
turning the water the opposite way,
which washes the sand and cleanses it,
This is done by a series of levers and
gates and the water enters the pumps
as clear as spring water. There are
four pumps in all, the largest good to
throw 100000 gallons a day. They are
using now 100000 to 100000 gallons of
water a day. ! think it the best water
plant that l ever saw, and as coal is
delivered at less than SO a ton, pumping
water is not so bad a proposition as it
is in Northern cities The water rate
for single families, the men in charge
informed me, was 60 cents a month, at
least the water being metered.
The city Is scattered over a wide ter
ritory with centres of trade in many
sections. There Is no central market
and prices seem to be about the same
as at home for first-class goods. The
city. like all growing western towns, is
raw and ragged. When you get off the
pavements the roads are abominable
and crossing the streets between cross
ings is out of the question, but people
get used to such conditions, but l would
not like it. l came from Boston to Sa-
vannah by boat and had fine weather
all the way, which was my good luck