The Daily Missoulian. [volume] (Missoula, Mont.) 1904-1961, 1917-06-15
Talk OF Me Tom

oil are as blind to the real nature Of
81 reefs as IL :hc cWil engineer who
] Asards them ~ I.ore geometry. 1nt
few realize that NEST streets tr. en-
,o"able and ErO:ttaDle acquaini:,nres.
TO say tHst st..,.i il like /" person
Is not fair; some streets have more
character. more individual grace than
most people.
There are streets in this town whose
careers have been more interesting
than their inhabitants There a.e
streets which have struggled through
early Obscurity to n Inaturity OF Well
earned leisure. There are streets which
have come, through little p.ccadiloes,
TO mean and graceless ends. There
are snobbish streets and sr,us little
bourgeois streets and wicked streets
and happy streets and streets q: hui
manly indefinite character.
Consider the sad story of Front
street. 1t would aiorn any Sunday
schooI library, so obvious is its moral.
out in the suburbs it is born, humbly,
II is true. but honestly. There is n
touch of the Old Homestead about its
origin. And about it's youth. too. for
II stnrdily scrambles from the hard
environment OF its beginnings at the
Van Buren, street bridge ana after a
block or two of dinginess arrives at an
honest prosperity. The early roughness
disappears. Smart little parks of grass
take the place of scraggIy edges A
fashionable bitulithic surface effaces
memory of rocks and ruts And it
comes to hob mob with the mighty of
the town.
An upright. worthy citizen is this
young street. 1t does not become
chnrchly. yet it takes on a sober air
as of one with money in The bank and
finger in solid enterprises; a bust
ness man with Il family and an inter
est in conservative politics. So it
spends fully half of its life.
business. however. becomes DOM
inant over home. The spruce. elegant
air is lost for a hard acquisitivcness
Kindness disappears. Desire for gold
grows. So comes the meeting with
Higgins avenue. and the fall Easy
| money brings the street to grief. From
| Legitimate business it turns to vice. A
wv ''''>N' VI 1uN StIcfl oIl dSc
spent in drinking and worse Pros
| perity dwindles to meanness and it h
shabby. unrespectable, unlovely old
street that ends at last with plunge
| into the river.
Then there is Gerald avenue, an
aristocrat born with silver spoon in
| it's mouth. No touch of vulgar bust
ness is on this street. 1t begins in
prosperity and ends so. It's first bow
| to the world is made in all the ele-
sance of pavement, parks. broad lawns
and spacious homes. 1t is high church
early in life and never loses an air of
goodness, though rarely pious. 1t h.
no betters, its very carriage says, and
it worries not. Like one with a steady
| income from good investments Gerald
avenue moves calmly along to an hon
orable end in the clean. open country
1t is patrician without snohbery.
-
For all the intenseness of Front
street and the elegance of Gerald av.
enue, no other Missoula thOroughfart
deserves rank with South Fourth
street. Here is the most gracious per
sonality of them all. You should know
South Fourth street. 1t has a charm
of its own, natural beyond all imita
ton. 1t is rough in spots. has no or
derby parking, disdains hurry ant
money getting and elegance. Yet i
Is the street most worth while.
1t is like a country lane come t,
town. Great trees, planted in no or
der. almost completely overhang it
hal
across the street, now barely past thu
sidewalks. The lawns have an air o
intimacy. as if they felt out of thu
public gaze where they might be a
ease. The homes lounge about lik'
good ncighbors From Higgins avenue
clear out into the Orchard Homes
Fourth street is Enthusiastically its de
liightful self
Some day perhaps ruthless city
beautifiers will lay hands on Souti
Fourth street and make it over. TIL
easy negligence of the street must b.
a con slant affront to the sort OF per
son who thinks cities should be mad.
with rubber stamp-precisely 81
many trees of one kind to a block: ex
actly so many feet of curbed parking
They will tear up the big. meanderint
trees and plant film little naples there
They will herd the careless lawns int
orderly curbings and put nice pave
ment in to make the houses sit ~
straighter and mind their manners
And the charm will disappear. SOutf
Fourth street today Is a tremcndou:
rcbuke to those Prussian city plan
ners so popular among us. HEAVIER
preserve it!
1t is not quite evident Ito come lacl
to the tcXt whether streets gain theil
character from their inhabitants o.
maintain it despite them. Perhaps th'
| truth lies between. No doubt it's en-
rironment is responsible for From
streets sorry finish, but who would b.
bold enough to say that Fourth street
has not influenced the character of it.
people. Why. one who knew Fourth
-.