Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-09-09
EnRnt&t} 0lrat

ihS 10 an enu In ana ABOUT Har-
risburg and nowhere is it more no
ticeable than at the Capitol. The
400 or 500 folks whose daily work
centers in the big granite building
have had their fling and barring
those who arranged matters so that
their free time comedies with the
primary election activity things are
getting back to the normal, nor
NAL meaning as they were a year
ago before the gubernatorial cleo
ton, the influenza epidemic and the
Inauguration and the Legislature
| came along in turn. The way it
is told that vacation days are nearly
over, however, is not from the peo-
pie in the building regularly. but by
the stream of visitors. From a cou-
pie of thousand a week they have
started to fall and although auto
mobile tourists continue to come
and go in Harrisburg, the number
at the State House is not as great
although that striking distribution
of visitors throughout most of the
counties of the State, noted a few
weeks ago. continues, men from
Wayne meeting men from Greene
and Erie. A good many farmers
are to be seen in the Capitol just
now. They all come in their own
automobiles and they tell of boun-
teous corn crops and of trouble with
the apples and the peaches. In
the throngs are quite a few of the
plain people" from Lancaster
county, Mennonites and Dunkards
and others of the various sects.
Every now and then some party
| civ nj h,.
asking if they will mind it if they
go up, while more than one per-
son remarks with a sigh or a smile
as the time comes to step out of a
car that has "swushed" them up
four or five stories that 1t was "the
first time l ever rode in one of
these"
The folks who come to the Capt.
tol for the first time can nearly
always be spotted" The first eX-
pressions are of surprise. The old.
old impression that was scattered
and shattered throughout Pennsyl-
vania in 1906 and 1906 that the
Capitol was made of putty or some
thing that would melt if the winds
and the rains ever got to it seems
i to linger in the minds of a great
many men and women. The stories
|
: splendid proportions, its fine declar-
ations, its notable works of art,
written by some of the famous writ
ers of the land do not seem to have
made near as much headway as the
average man would imagine. The
, people who come here for the first
: view of the Capitol candidly admit
that some one misrepresented or as
one stalwart farmer from up in
fr4 30 al. f.N A1,n
rotundas center and gaSped up at
the superb interior of the dome,
expressed it Some ones a liar.
1t all goes to show that Samuel
w, Pennypacker knew what he was
talking about when thirteen years
E ago he inaugurated the "penny-a-
: mile" excursions to see the Capitol.
Seeing is believing" at the Capitol
in more ways than one.
5 There are lots of funny things up
at the Capitol. There are people
who come here thinking that there
are gold pieces sticking around and
others who are so startled by the
beauty that they did not know was
!, here that they go about in awed
l silence and walk as though on eggs.
Nine of every ten men who visit
E the hall of the House of Represen-
e tatives sit in one of the seats of the
4 lawmakers and oftentimes they
hunt up the seat of the man from
their home district. Senator ED"
y Vare's seat is a matter of interest
" to many a Philadelphian, while most
Elk countians want to go and sit
where John Flynn watches tho
: House. The curious effect produced
f by the lights and shadows in the
rotunda that forms the halo" about
the Quay statue causes much COM
ment, while there is a general move
ment toward the glass cases con-
' tanning the Civil war battle flag
on the part of people who had rela-
tiVes in that great struggle. Most
l people who visit the Executive De-
partment want to know If the Gov
, ernor is "in." And similarly a good
many ask what the Abbey medal
lions in the rotunda are "all about?"'
Perhaps the greatest entertain
ment watching the visitors comes
from observing the way they treat
the tile pavement of the first floor.
There is nothing more interesting.
r more distinctive than this product
of old Moravian days. that has been
so much derided and condemned
1t is one of the features of the
, Capitol i>S notable in ITS way as is
that gem OF interior arrangement
and decoration-the supreme court
chamber, isolated. simple, spacious
and so suggestive of the dignity of
, the courts. When party with chill
dren comes along the first thing is a
squeai of delight as a youngster
spies on the tile pavement a butter
. fly or an oyster. Some one lets off
surprised giggle when the teIe-
phone is seen in the south wing
floor with the almost erased from
hello" More people spend time
, tiguring out the designs on the tile
floor than they do the theme of the
Abbey paintings in the Senate or the
relation of the great of PENNSYLVANIA
to the history of the Commonwealth
in the allegorical painting in the
hall of the Representatives. AS D
matter of fact the tiled flooring
tells the story of Pennsylvania,
shows industry flora and fauna
, And most Harrisburgers know very
little about what there is in the
> Capitol, it may he said In PASSING,
, on.