White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1932-06-02

(Prerared by National Geographic Society.
Washington. d. C.)-WNU Service.
IN ESPITE its youth and expert
ence compared with London,
~ and the recent flow Of gold to-
ward the British capital, New
York retains it's position as the worlds
leading banker.
New York is city of superlatives.
1t is mans Incompatible feat! AS in
credible almost as that ants should
have built the Andes! Go up on any
high hotel roof after sunset and watch
the city come to life. BY electric
moons, rainbows, and fixed comets you
see Manhattan blaze from dusk into
gorgeous theatrical illumination.
It's twinkling skyline GIBBS and flows
in tides of tempo and color. AS each
edifice melts into new lights and shad-
ows, all the architectural phantasma-
goria of the ages, linked even with
earth's ancient scars, seems to unfold
In fancy fyou see phantom city,
Kaleidoscope riot of Alps and Acrop-
oils; Ming tombs, Tai Mahal, and
Pyramids; Gibraltar Panama canal
Tower of Babel, with Grand canyon
and Yangtze gorges formed by street
caverns far below; Cologne cathedral,
Pixies Peak, and st. Peters, Chi
nese Wall against Sahara desert of
lamp-lit sky; towers and turrets,
mosques, minarets, domes, steeples,
roof tanks and penthouses all heaped
and crowding and seeming to burn as
smoke moves in electric light.
Next day, from the same high place,
see it again-realistic, noisy, its streets
crowded with traffic. New York new
er rests. Higher and ever higher rise
the skyscrapers. Their mastodontic
bulk; their grace of geometric design:
their dizzy height and fearsome beauty
at first they almost hint that mans
monsters have run away with him.
Stare up at such, building and it
From their upper stories you see
bits Of fog floating by. Miles to the
east stretches Long Island; to the
south is the Statue Of Liberty, and
Staten Island; to the west spreads
New Jersey, and to the north that
part of the city beyond Central park.
Below lie mere pigmy structures Of
six and eight stories. Here and there,
up from among them, other skyscrap-
ers rise in this swiftly changing region
of Manhattan. In their myriad
windows one sees girls pounding type
fhofr hI1f
save for faint metallic city hum from
far below, there is no sound.
Vertical Travel Is Immense.
These high buildings, that visitors
from all over the world stare at with
such establishment, make New York
what it is-the supreme wonder of
the modern world. When the first
"skyscraper," of only 10 stories, went
up on lower Broadway, people feared
1t. Those in adjacent houses moved
out in alarm. Now, higher and higher
they $780, 80, 70, IS stories. So
many there are, and so high that to-
day the vertical travel in New York
actually exceeds the horizontal. In
other words, elevators carry more pas
sengers than do all the surface cars.
elevated trains. taxis, busses, and sub
ways combined.
In one skyscraper 81 elevators Gov.
er a mileage equal to the run OF the
Twentieth Century Limited from New
York to Chicago. daily. One of the
big problems in New York is getting
the occupants of skyscrapers in and
out on time. The larger buildings
hold anywhere from 5000 to $4,000.
and even 10000 workers. In some are
found people from practically every
state in the Union.
Even with express elevators, it takes
nearly an hour to empty some Of the
larger buildings and get the people
away from the ground floor and en-
frances. because of congested subways
If they all came down at once. 1t would
pile people up ten or twelve deep in
the streets around building.
The New York skyscraper is a city
in itself, with al, city's problems of
traffic. water, heat, lights. sewage. fire
and police protection. and cleaning
Its total floor area equals that of
many a farm. To run the elevators
of one of them requires starter. six
assistant starters 80 operators, and
a crew of ten maintenance men.
Since water from fire hydrants can
re squirted upward only about 1871
feet, and since firemen cannot drag
hose up so or IS stories. H skyscrap
err has its own upright water mains.
turks and high pressure pumps. with
an elaborate system of alarms and ex.
tingu.shing apparatus.
Renenth one building are turnta
bles for buses from railway terminals