The Washington herald., 1913-01-19

While the White House has been the
home Of all our twenty-six Presidents,
with the single exception of Washington,
the old mansion is painfully lacking in
historical furnishings and in the art
treasures which should have accumulated
there during the 112 years It has housed
its distinguished occupants. Aside from
some plate, a few pieces of china a
little bric-a-brac, and the famous por-
trait Of Washington which Mrs Madison
saved from the flames of the British in
1914. there is nothing in the furnishings
of the White House which antedates
that disastrous event.
After the Fire.
After its destruction at that time re-
building operations were begun the next
year in 1915. and many of the incom-
pleted plans of the original structure
were then carried into effect The i'm
posing north and south porches were
begun, the wings at the east and west
OF the house were added. and store
rooms were made under the porches and
in the wings. Before the days of man.
moth refrigerators the early Presidents
utilized the space under the north porch
as a cold storage wine cellar. The
classic, colonial white marble mantels.
which now grace the green and blue
parlors and which the architect Nc
Kim, retained when remodeling the build
ing during the Roosevelt administration,
We're set in the fireplaces of the old
State dining-room and the blue parlor
when the house was rebuilt in 1915. They
replaced the pine mantels, which, from
want of funds. were used in the original
building.
The first floors were of solid mahog
any, for both Washington and Jeffer-
son, to whom the stately beauty of the
Presidents house, as well as that OF
the Capitol, is TO be credited primarily.
had a fitting sense of the dignity of the
residence which was to be occupied by
the Chief Executive of the young re-
public and planned accordingly, although
the records now on file in the Bureau
Of Public Buildings and Grounds at
Washington show that they were almost
hopelessly hampered by Congress lack
Cf appreciation of the need Of money
for the construction of these as well as
that of all the other public buildings. |
The floors of the Presidents house were !
burned beyond repair by the British SOL |
diers, as were many of the doors, and |
in the rebuilding oak floors had to take |
the place of the original material. but the |
doors and window frames were made OF
the handsome mahogany which we see |
there to-day. |
Portraits of Presidents.
When Mrs. Wilson becomes mistress of |
the White House next March she will |
rot find very much in the mansion of |
long historic lineage. OF course, the |
portraits of the Presidents, which have |
been painted usually by the order of the |
incumbent Executive and presented to |
the mansion are of great historic value, |
even though some of them are not OF |
much artistic merit While the pictures 1
of all the Presidents hang upon the |
White House walls, in the main corri- |
cor and rooms of state. but eight of |
those OF the women who have been mis- |
tresses in the Executive Mansion have
been similarly honored. Six of these are |
in the ground floor corridor, where Mrs |
Roosevelt had them hung that they 4
might be seen by all visitors. The life
sized painting of Martha Washington, |
by Andrews, hangs in the Red Room
and the picture of Dolly Madison, pre-
sented last year by the Colonial Danes,
stands on an easel in the Blue Parlor
Seemingly in our earlier history each
administration was marked with a zeal to
throw out the old-at public auction-and |
to fill the house with the new Conse-
Quently there is not vestige of anything
within the four walls which could in any
way be connected with the far greater
part of the distinguished families who
have lived in the Presidents house
1t was this which melted Mrs. Roose-
velt to start the White House collection
of Presidential ware. and she succeeded
in getting the project well under way
while she was mistress of the mansion.
She gave the work of gathering the china,
or plate, into the hands of Mrs. Abby q.
Baker. Of Washington, who is still the
curator of the collection, and twenty-one
Of the Presidents are now represented in
the cabinets which are standing in the
0f |
Collection Is Growing.
The endeavor to secure historic relics
has been purely patriotic from the first