Evening star., 1938-07-17
Capital Sidelights
BY WILL P. KENNEDY.

Few persons in the Capital have had
better fan mail during the past two
weeks than Ed" Brown. one of the most
devoted lieutenants of David LYNN.
archltect OF the Capitol and known far
ana woe as "everybody's friend" Let
ters, kilograms and greeting cards have
come to Brown from every State in the
Union and several from overseas-and
because fishing is his we'll known diver
sion he has been invited to ioin fishing
Trips to lakes and streams from the Ca
madam border to the Gulf of Mexico
YOU see, on July / Brown completed 90
years OF service at the Capitol. where he
is IN daily contact with and always doing
faVors for House members. The two
House ONCE Buildings are his babies
Away back in 1903 when the old House
once Building was started he went
around notifying the occupants of the
houses that then stood on the site that
tney must move. The corner stone of
tnat building was laid in 1906 For the
nrst nine months after the building was
occupied he was custodian, and Elliott
Woods. then architect of the Capitol.
LOOK MIN on that assignment and put
nun IN charge of construction work until
l9Z9. He tore down the old buildings be-
tween the Capitol and Union Station
Tor enlargement Of the Capitol grounds
ana ne tore down the famous old Butler
Building, formerly occupied by the Pub
tic Health Service and the Coast and
Ceooetlc Survey, and the old Congress
Hall and Potomac Hotels which occ,Ipied
the site OF the new House Ofice Building
AFTER David Lynn became architect of
the Capitol he placed Brown in his own
oid Joo as superintendent of the House
once Building and when the new
building was erected his Jurisdiction was
extended over both buildings, including
structural repairs. All OF this. of course.
Is under the general supervision and di-
rection OF Mr.. Lynn. So Browns lob
now covers 500 rooms in each building
and he is charged with seeing that they
are all cleaned every morning between
o:30 and $3.50 o'clock, for which service
he employs 100 charwomen. That is only
one of his multifarious duties At the
start OF the last Congress 109 new mem
bers had to be moved in and I24 hold.
over members moved to different Offices.
Brown has made an enviable record on
his job and while all House members are
his friends he has no more enthusiastic
booster than his boss" and longtime
friend, Dave Lynn.
The Seventy fifth Congress was in ses-
sion lis days. compared with 282 days
IN the Seventy-fourth Congress and 1877
days in the Seventy-third Congress.
The Seventy fifth Congress passed 1,759
new laws, many more than the Seventy
fourth and nearly twice as many as the
Seventy third although that earlier Con-
gress lasted 50 days longer.
But this volume of laws did not reach
as big total as in the Fifty-eighth Con-
gress, which enacted 4,041 laws and the
Fifty ninth, which enacted 6,940 The
Seventy-fifth Congress, however, passed
more important and more voluminous
legislation. The. difference in number is
largely due to the fact that in those
earlier days each little private bill re-
ceived separate number and title, but
the former President Roosevelt's admin
istration saw new system of bulking
hundreds of small bills into what is
called an omnibus bill-for public
buildings, river and harbor improve
ments. pensions. claims, etc. In the
late Congress the House committees
made 1888 reports and the Senate COM
mittees 2,219 reports.
Mrs John Tolan, wife of the member
from California. contributes much to the
enjoyment of any trip with her travelling
organ, which she had previously carried
to Honolulu, twice across the United
States from Washington to Los Angeles
and twice to New York She plays it
on the train and on the boat, both going
and returning, while the tourists sing
old-time favorites.
u X *
BY his ring We shall know him-Repre-
sentative Jack Nichols of Oklahoma. It
was made for him by craftsman friend.
The band was made from silver dollar,
the highly engraved signet section, with
the, seal of the United States on one side
and of Oklahoma on the other, is fash
ioned from a. IS gold piece, and 1t Is set
with an heirloom diamond.
Among the present scholarly gentle
men in Congress who have an extraor-
dinary knowledge and devotion to books
is Representative Charles A. Plunlley,
Republican at Large. from Vermont, an
educator. He recently gave an address
on recording books, "Sidelights Of His
tory" before the Columbia Historical
Society, which is printed in the appendix
of the Congressional Record for We'd
nesday, May Is. It Is well worth while
reading. It was Annette Wynne who
wrote:
A little gate my book can be
That leads to fields Of minstrelsy;
And though you think sit at home,
Afar in foreign fields roam.