The Washington times., 1923-03-25


X call an interesting page a few
months ago which told of the re-
moval of Mrs. w. K. Vanderbilt, the
leader of New York society, and several
other rich fashionables from their Fifth
Avenue palaces to new residences far
over near the banks of East River on the
edgezof the New York slums, where they
could get away from the noise of the
Avenue.
So this little colony of very rich social
leaders have enjoyed certain new and
rather noiseless exclusiveness, which they
did not have in the midst of the whirling
traffic of Fifth Avenue with its cease
less tide of footing automobiles and
crowded sidewalks of shoppers, coming
and going to the great shops which have
steadily encroached upon the old resi-
Dental district of the rich.
But while Mrs. Vanderbilt and her
fashionable coterie have, indeed, escaped
the tiresome noise and surging crowds of
the Avenue, they have awakened to an
never dreamed of.
Scarcely had the new residences been
9smodeled, reconditioned and refurnished
and the wealthy owners moved in, than
their astonished noses were greeted by
series of most extraordinary smells.
There were smells to the right of them,
smells to the left of them, smells in front
of them and smells behind them and there
were smells of all kinds and peculiarities.
Some smells were new and unknown to
their nostrils and some were old and some
what familiar, which they had occasionally
encountered as they passed a cattle train
on the Newport express, or as they passed
a tow of street cleaning garbage scows on
their yachts.
The smells varied according to the
direction of the wind. If the wind was
from the south, the indisputable odor of
great slaughter houses came, In through
the windows with the curious mixture of
the component odors which go to make
up this grand total of the never-to-be-
forgotten slaughter house smell-the odor
of the stable, the odor of the cattle, the
odor of the stale refuse, the odor of the
slaughtered creatures themselves and the
various portions of their carcases as they
went through the many processes of
curing and packing.
Suddenly as the wind shifted, the COM
posite smell of the slaughter house faded
away like the dying measures of
symphony diminuendo and then, as if the
orchestra leader had sounded a few
preliminary smell notes of an interlude,
there came the onward rush of the New
York Steam Heat Company's own special
variety of smells and smoke.
From the great chimney stacks of this
enormous plant came forth volcanic bursts
of black clouds which shot far up into the
heavens and descended in gentle rain
of black particles covering roofs, s'eps,
vestibules, window-sills and floating IN
and sprinkling curtains, tapestries up
holstery, rugs and beds with a gently
growing, snowstorm of SCOT. And along
with the shower Of black coal particles
came the sulphur fumes of the coal gas
which choked the Threats of the fashion
ables.
And again, as the wind veered further
from the north toward the east, the belch-
ing smokestacks of the great steam plant
turned their blasts away from the homes
of the fashionables, and the nostrils of
the new residents scented quite different
odor-the indescribable smell of one of
the city's great garbage dumps.