Evening star., 1919-04-27
BUILDS TENT CITY
FOR YANKS IN PARIS
Salvage Section of American
Red Cross Erects Great
Hotel in Eight Days.

| can Red Cross has within eigh,
working days erected on the Champs
de Mars in Paris a great canteen ho.
/ tel adequate to house 1900 and feet
| 500 American enlisted men, anG
composed almost entirely of tent
units according to information just
made public by national headquarters
in this city.
When the United States Army
authorities decided that each man or
duty with the American eXpeditionary
forces should be given three days
leave in Paris before sailing fol
home the question arose as to how
they could possibly be housed and
fed in city already caring for an
extra million of people.
French Give Permission.
Permission was gained from French
on the historic Champs de Mars. in
front of the great Ecole Militaire
near the Eiffei Tower. 1t was esti-
mated that fifty tents would be
| needed for this hotel city, not pup
doughboy shelters himself solitarily
not even those of summer resort bed
room proportions, but dormitory tents
dancing hall tents, Office tents. sixty
by twenty feet, with a roof peak OF
fourteen feet, with eight-foot walls
ted with four paped isingglass windows
The lowest price at which these
tents could be purchased was 1880
each. Nor did that provide for the
flooring, the electric lighting, the beds
and bedding, the stoves and all the
other. things. needed to make a hotel
which a man fresh from bare bar
racks or muddy camps would find a
welcome change of surroundings.
1t seemed large order, even for
the care and comfort of American
boys in Paris. 1t was decided to see
what the salvage section could do for
the situation. The result justified the
conclusion.
The tents were provided from the
storehouses Of the section-tents tina t
had formerly been a part of hospitals.
When Hospital No. at Neuilly had
outlived it's busy days, the oak floors,
fitted. grooved and polished, were
taken in sections from the recreation
pavilIions and stored In the two long
Champs de Mars Hotel these floors are
now laid.
Have Electric Lights.
Electric lights gleam in every tent
as the result Of the careful salvage of
. plant from another hospital. Two
tents, 40x20 feet, are equipped with
hot and cold showers, the entire out
fit seeing service for the second time
Iron beds. fitted with newly cleaned
and covered mattresses; pillows rip
ped apart, steriiIzed and re-covei.u
blankets freshly cleaned, sheets and pill
iowcases carefully laundered and mend
ed, make the soldier dream that he is
once more sleeping beneath the family
rooftree
The salvage section took the beds
and equipment from closing hospitals
and instead of selling everything at
small prices, put them in perfect or
der, then packed the bedding in long
baglike covers. legibly and indelibly
marked as to the number and nature
of their contents.
Coal stoves, formerly on duty dur
ing long wet days and chill nights in
hospitals, canteens and the like, were
| saved by the same interchangeable sec
ton. cleaned and polished. and now
make the dormitory and recreation
| tents warm and coxy Lun Der saved
from all manner of buildings which
outlived their usefulness with the
coming Of the armistice has gone to
the making OF dining hall, 1Sox3C
feet. which. painted white. stands
glistening in the wide open space
between the two sections of the dor
mitory tents. c. Ross Corbfn of Cali
fornia is the man who has directed
this work from the first.