The Sunday Oregonian., September 27, 1908, Magazine Section, Page 2, Image 46

JL 1. JL
GREAT STRUCTURAL AND
HAS TRANSIENT ATTACHMENT
w
BY W. B. HAMILTON.
HE biggest In tho world, pro
ten." i a descriptive phrase
applied to structural and me
chanical achievements that Is becom
ing popular, and Is an Index to the
spirit of the times. Often the distinc
tion that it conveys is held but for
a brief time, a few weeks or months.
Then the fickle superlative passes to
some new wonder. A list of the most
stupendous buildings and other - pro
duets of architectural and mechanical
genius, to be comprehensive and accu
rate, must be revised almost every day.
A tall building; holds the record for a
short time, then one reaching; a little
nearer the clouds Is built, and a still
taller one projected. A dam contain
ing a billion tons of water elicits
amasement for a few years in an era
when marvels are commonplace, but it i
is to be surpassed by two reservoirs 1
much larger. One ocean liner Is the
leviathan of the seas today, others that
will displace It In pre-eminence are be
ing built. The fickleness of the super
lative has been bewildering In the first
few years of the twentieth century,
and it applies to a miscellaneous as
sortment of marvels, such as bridges,
clocks, railroad stations, telescopes and
tunnels.
New Tork City is the most generous
contributor to the bigness of big
things, but honors are well distributed.
Washington has. among other things,
the biggest railroad station and the
btggest printing office, and it has had
for yesrs the biggest monument.
Philadelphia has the biggest city hall.
Jersev City, N. J, has the biggest clock.
Cambridge. Mass.. the biggest tele
scope, and Baltimore claims the big
gest pumps. The fickleness of the su
perlative extends even to natural won
ders, due to the diligence of explorers,
a familiar Instance being the discovery
of Victoria Falls, much greater than Ni
agara, and in recent years, of natural
bridges in Utah much larger than the
one In Virginia.
Record-Breaking Office Buildings.
Manhattan Island, hemmed In so that
its growth naturally takes a skyward
direction, making Its streets resemble
canyons, has for years had the tallest
building, excepting the tower of the
Philadelphia City Hall, but one suc
ceeded another In holding the distinc
tion with startling rapidity, until even
the Philadelphia tower was exceeded In
height. At present the 4-story Metro
politan building holds first place, with
a tower rising TOO feet from the curb
line. Soon It may be the si-story Equi
table building. 0 feet In height. Re
cently it was the Singer building, hav
ing T stories above ground, and rising
tit feet from the sidewalk to the base
or the flagstaff. But the tallest build
ing la not the largest building. The
largest office building In the world is
now the Jt-itory Hudson Terminal
building In New Tork. embracing two
twin skyscrapers, connected by an ar
cade, rising above a large underground
station. The two structures are in ev
ery respect similar and are practically
a unit. This building takes up 18.
1S0O0O cublo feet of space, of which
14 S00.00J are above ground. The claim
Is' made that It exceeds In bulk any
building In the World. It has 36 acre,
of floor space. 10 of which are rencable,
compared with U acres of rentable
space in the City Investing building,
the next largest office building. 9H
acres in the Singer building, and IS
acres of floor space In Philadelphia s
massive City HalL A more striking
comparison is afforded, however, by
the number of offices 4000. The
State. War and Navy Departments at
Washington was formerly the largest
offlre building in the world, and it has
but 500 offices. Two large clubs have
suites of rooms in the Hudson Termw
nsl building and the directory systete
is most elaborate. There are office
directories on each floor, supplemented
by Information desks in each main hall.
The building has a population of near
ly 10.000.
National Public Buildings."
Washington, the Nation s capital, ex
cels, however. In buildings that cover
an extensive area of ground. The Union
Station at Wsshington is not only the
largest railway station In the world.
but there are very few buildings that
exceed it In the area of ground that it
covers. Exclusive of its train shelter.
which is not a building., but a series of
umbrella sheds, the area taken up by
Union Station la So.ono square leet.
more than five and three-eights acres.
The station building comprises a head
house 620 feet long by 220 feet wide.
ranging In height from 66 to 120 feet, and
I is a oescripuve pum . Ill "a X V &, i9' w '
a passenger concourse of 760 feet long by
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130 feet wide. The St. L.041 union station
is regarded as the next largest station in
the world, but its headhouee La only 4&S
by 80 feet. It has an immense trainahed.
There are 32 tracks leading Into the St.
Louis terminal and SJ at Washington. The
State. War and Navy bulling. Wo feet by
343 feet, covers 183,230 square feet; the
Capitol, 751 feet long by 360 feet wide, but
of very irregular dimensions, more than
4 acres (152,460 square feet); the Uhrary
of Congress. 470 by 340 feet, nearly 3i
acres; the Philadelphia City Hall, 470 feet
square, ).900 square feet, but the Phil
adelphia City Hall, the State, War and
Navy building and the library have large
Interior courts, while Union Station's
ground area is entirely covered.
Foreign Great Edifices. ,
The louvre at Paris incloses an area of
4S acres, but it resembles In ground plan
a truncated letter. A, one side of which is
2360 feet long. It has a hollow square at
one end with a facade 548 feet long, but
the Interior court measures 349 feet
square. The Vatican palace at Borne,
probably the largest palace, covers 13H
acres. The houses of Parliament, one
building, London, spreads over eight
acres. Its river front is 940 feet long. The
Csar of Kusaia's Winter Palace in St.
Petersburg is 660 feet long by 350 feet
wide, covering 131,250 square feet. But
this handsome house is not sufficient for
the Csar, for the hermitage, another pal
ace, and art gallery, is near it, measuring
613 by 875i feet, while the Taurida Palace,
which haa a ballroom 320 by 70 feet, is
another great structure. The Cxar's pal
ace at Txarskoe Selo is reported by trav
elers to have a front from 800 to 1000 feet
long, but its width Is not given. The
Escurlal in Spain and the Alhambra are
palaces embracing an extensive group of
buildings. The prlnclpalfacade of Ver
sailles Palace Is 400 yards long. The
Windsor Castle enclosure embraces 13
acres. The Admiralty Building in St.
Petersburg Is a half mile long, with two
wings 660 feet long, and forms three sides
of a hollow rectangle, but it is not very
wide. The British Museum is a mam
moth structure, covering perhaps ss much
ground as "the houses of Parliament. St.
Peter's Cathedral at Rome, 13 feet by 44
feet, covers 373,398 feet of ground, more
than eix acres, and is the largest church
edifice in the world. The Colonge Cathe
dral la 4f0 feet long and S31 feet wide,
with a jsplre Tlslng 611 feet high. The
ground area of St. Paul's Cathedral in
London, is 69.700 square feet, while that
of the Hudson Terminal Building is 70.000
square feet. The largest church in Amer
ica is 8t. Patrick's Cathedral, New York,
which is 332 feet long and 174 feet wids. It
has 330 foot spires.
Some factories are also among the
world's largest buildings, the Baldwin Lo
comotive plant In Philadelphia, for in
stance, covers 16 acres In the heart of
the city.
Where Audiences Assemble.
Washington's Union Station contains the
largest room under a single roof in the
world. It is the. passenger concourse, the
Interior dimensions of which axe 756 feet
THE SUNDAY OREGONIAN, PORTLAND, SEPTEMBER 27, 1908.
N
MECHANICAL
long by 130 feet wide. It has 98.390 square j
feet of floor space, as against 75,200 square
feet In the Grand Central Station, New
York, and 68.528- in the concourse of the
Pennsylvania terminal in course of con
struction in New York City.
Comparison of this Immense room with
the auditorium of Madison Square Garden,
New York, the largest auditorium in the
United States, gives an Impressive idea of
its size. Madison Square Garden has 33.000
square" feet in its main area, 6500 square
feet on the elevated platform and 6000
square feet In the concert hall. The seat
ing capacity of the arena is 6000, which
can be Increased to 12,000. That of the
concert hall Is 12.000. Other large audito
riums are the convention halls at Kansas
City, Chicago and Denver, and it is said
that the largest audience ever assembled
at a theatrical performance was when
Sarah Bernhardt played "Camille" In the
convention hall at Kansas City.
New York has probably the largest ho
tel and the largest apartment house, but
it would be reckless to specify the super
lative here, on account of Its transitory
nature. New York also has the largest
statue, the Statue of Liberty, and Wash
ington has the largest monument, the
stately shaft in memory of the Father of
His Country,-rising 560 feet near the banks
of the Potomac. The Eiffel Tower at
Paris is 984 feet high, but is not classified
as a monument.
Colossal Bridges.
While New York does not have the long
est bridge in the world, the highest bridge
or the longest span, its bridges are re
garded as the largest In general dimen
sions and capacity, and it has the bridge
with the longest suspension span. From
an engineering standpoint the length of
span is the most notable achievement in
bridge building, mere multiplication of
arches and trestles, producing a bridge
of great length, being of minor interest.
The longest span in the world Is found in
the cantilever bridge over the Firth of
Forth, which has two spans 1710 feet long.
The cantilever bridge of the St. Lawrence
River at Quebec was to have had a span
1800 feet long, but It collapsed tn construc
tion. The Firth of Forth bridge la S296
feet long and is probably the heaviest and
most expensive bridge in the world. It
cost 316.000,000 and its building occupied
several years. Jt is not a bridge of great
capacity, taking into consideration its
magnitude, as it narrows to a width of 27
feet in the center, whereas the Williams
.--..iim.ii. i in l . d -sii
burg bridge. In New York, is 118 feet wide.
The Williamsburg bridge has the longest
suspension span, 1600 feet; the Brooklyn
bVldge, with its 15054-foot span, is next,
while the Manhattan bridge, now building
will have the third longest, 1470 feet,
which place is now held by the Niagara
suspension bridge, 821 feet. The Manhat
tan bridge will have the greatest capacity
of any bridge in the world, and it will be
a much more handsome structure than the
Williamsburg bridge. It will be complet
ed, it is expected, in 1910. Another bridge
that Is being built over the East River is
the Blackwell's Island cantilever bridge,
with one 1182-foot span and one 984-foot
span. No bridge with a span that is now
regarded as long was built before the Eads
bridge was erected at St. Louis, in 1874.
This has 620-foot spans. The Schuykill
arch truss bridge at Philadelphia, built in
1812, has 346-foot spans, probably the long
est when built. There is a cantilever
bridge at Memphis with a span of 790H
feet. ,
The longest metallic arch spans are as
follows: Niagara highway bridge, 840 feet;
Viaur railway bridge In France, 721 feet;
Bonn highway bridge in Germany, 614
feet; but if the Pennsylvania Railroad
builds Its projected bridge over the East
River at Hell Gate it will have a metallic
arch span of 1000 feet and be the heaviest
bridge in the world. It will have a total
length of 17,000 feet, or more than three
miles. The stone arch bridge with the
longest span Is that over the Petrusse
River at Luxemburg. 275 feet, built in
1901. The next longest stone arch span
is Cabin John bridge, near Washington.
333 feet. It is said that the span of the
stone arch bridge at Treszo, Italy, de
stroyed in 1416, was 251 feet long. The
bridge at Poughkeepsie, over the Hudson
River, it is said, has the longest truss
span, not arch, 790 feet. A similar span
at Thebes, 111., is 671 feet long.
Some very long bridges are as follows:
Over River Tay. at Dundee, 10.612 feet;
over Ohio, at Cairo. 111.. 10,560 feet; Long
Key viaduct, beings built as part of the
Florida & East Coast Railway, 10.500 feet;
Victoria bridge, Montreal. 9144 feet; Firth
of Forth bridge. 82S feet; Blackwell's
Island (under construction). 7636 feet;
Brooklyn bridge, with extensions, 75S0
feet; Williamsburg bridge. 7275 feet;
Poughkeepsie bridge, 6767 feet: Manhattan
bridge (under construction), 6500 feet, and
Long Bridge, at Washington, 4677 feet.
But the Norfolk & Southern Railway is
building a bridge across the Albemarle
Sound eight miles long, and some viaducts
A All
VYVK
ACHIEVEMENT
leading into cities exceed in length any of
the other existing bridges, that of the
Chesapeake & Onio Railway at Richmond
being more than 15,000 feet.
High In the Air.
' The Long Key viaduct, off the Florida
coast. Is one of severed concrete bridges
which will be part of a remarkable rail
road extending from Homestead to Key
West, a distance of 128 miles 74 on land,
25 over swamp and 20 over water. There
will be 6.9 miles of concrete viaduct
over the ocean and 33 miles of embank
ment in the water. WTiat is regarded
as the largest concrete bridge in the
world at the present time is the Connecticut-avenue
bridge, at Washington,
a quarter of a mile long.
The highest bridge in the world is
probably the Nooeschlact highway bridge
at St Giustina, Tyrol, which has a 197
foot span that is 453 feet high. The
bridge over the gorge of the Zambesi
River below Victoria Falls, In Africa,
which forms part of the Cape to Cairo
Railroad, has a single span of 600 feet
which is 420 feet above the rapids. The
first train crossed this bridge in 1905.
The Garabit bridge over the Truyere
River, France, has a 541-foot span, 401
feet above the- gorge: the Kaiser Wil
helm bridge spans the Valley of Wup
per, near Mungsten, Germany, at a
height of 350 feet, and the bridge over
the River Loa, in the Upper Andes, is
336 feet above the waters. Niagara sus
pension bridge is 425 feet above water.
Some high bridges which are moderately
long are the Gotkeik viaduct, Burma,
India, 336 feet high, 2260 feet long; Pecos
River viaduct, 321 feet high, 2180 feet
long; Kinzua viaduct, on the Erie Rail-
day, In McKean County, Pennsylvania,
301 feet high and 2063 feet long.
For many years the Natural Bridge in
Virginia was regarded as the largest of
its kind, but in 1895 three natural bridges
were discovered in Utah, the longest of
which Is more than twice as high and
has a span three times as great as the
one in Virginia. It is named the Au
gusta bridge and is a solid arch of sand
stone 60 feet thick and 40 feet wide, with
a clear span of 337.7 feet from wall to
wall,- and the bottom of the arch Is 357
feet above the ground. It would over-
span the Capitol dome at Washington
or if located among California's redwoods
It would overspan the tallest of them.
191
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for wnicti the superlative:
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Another l ull natural bridge, the Caro
line, Is 208 feet 6 Inches from buttress
to buttress, and has a span 197 feet high.
But the arch of the bridge Is very thick
and a traveler standing on top of It
would be 332 feet from the ground. In
Algeria there Is a natural bridge with a
250-foot span and a height from the bot
tom of the arch to the ground probably
twice as great.
Gigantio Dams.
Some of the most gigantic structural
undertakings In recent years have been
those connected- with getting water sup
plies for municipal use and for irriga
tion. The great Assouan dam across the
Nile, 850 miles above Cairo, is the largest
dam" that, has been completed. The ca
pacity of the reservoir is 1,000,000,000 tons
of water, or nearly 36,000.000,000 cubic efet
of water. But the Roosevelt dam now
being constructed as a part of the Salt
River irrigation project, in Arizona, will
have a reservoir containing 61,000,000,000
cubic feet of water, and this in turn will
be exceeded by the Engle dam. in New
Mexico, another irrigation project which
will back up the . waters of the Rio
Grande a distance of 40 miles and will
have a reservoir holding 87,000,000,000
cubic feet. The Assouan dam Is 14
miles long and 130 feet high. It has 180
sluice openings, each 23 feet high by 6V4
feet wide. Another very long dam is
the Tansa dam. in India, 8800 feet long,
118 feet high, probably the longest dam
in the world.
The Roosevelt dam, which Is nearly
finished, will be 284 feet high, 1060 feet
long at the top, 170 eet thick, at the base
and Its foundation wil cover an acre of
ground. Placed by the side of a 20-story
building it would be 20 feet higher. Its
width will be the length of two- city
blocks and it will have a roadway 20
feet wide across the top. Its reservoir
will be 25 miles long, 3 miles wide and
the water will be 200 feet deep. The
town of Roosevelt will disappear when
the dam is completed and the conversion
of waters takes place. The Engle dam
will be 225 feet high, 11E0 feet long and
180 feet thick at its base. The highest
dam in the world is the Shoshone dam,
in Northern Wyoming, blocking a narrow
gorge, It will rise 315 feet above bed
rock, will be 176 feet long at its crest
and 108 feet thick at its base. It will
store 19,863,000,000 cubic feet of water. The
irrigation projects of the Government
embrace another reservoir larger than
the Assouan in the Pathfinder dam,
North Platte River, Wyoming, to be 210
feet high and contain 43,563,000,000 cubic
feet of water. The largest earth dam
in the world is the Belle Fourche em
bankment, in South Dakota 115 feet
high and mora than a mile long, forming
a reservoir with a storage capacity of
nearly 9,000,000 cubic feet of water. The
highest earth dam is probably that at
Druid Lake, Baltimore, 119 feet. The
new Croton dam. New York, is 291 feet
high, 2240 feet long. 18 feet thick at
top and 200 feet thick at bottom. It has
a storage capacity of 32,000,000.000 gallons
of water and increases the storage ca
pacity of the entire New York water sys
tem to 75,000,000.000 gallons. The Wachu
setts dam. at Clinton, Mass., from which
Boston derives its water supply, has a
storage capacity of 63.000,000,000 gallona
The longest railroad tunnel Is the New
York subway 21 miles. The twin Sim
nlon tunnels through the Alps are 12
miles long, the St. Gothard tunnel 91-4
miles long, the Mont Cenis tunnel 7 8-S
miles long, and the Hoosao tunnel is 4 3-4
miles long. The tunnel systems radiating
from Manhattan Island, when completed,
will embrace 24 separate tubes.
The' Biggest Steamships.
The growth of transatlantic travel has
been accompanied by wonderful increases
in the size of ocean liners, and the rec
ords for size are broken almost, as fre
quently as the records fpr speed. At the
present time the Lusitanla and Maure
tanla. of the Cunard Line, each 790 feet
long are the biggest steamships afloat-
each about twice as large as the biggest
battleship. But the White Star Line will
build a ship 840 feet long, and the Hamburg-American
Line is having a ship built
at Belfast which is to be 804 feet long.
Before the Lusitania began her voyages
ih. Adriatic, of he "White Star Line. 725
feet long, was the largest ship afloat-
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Great Britain Is building the St. Vincent,
a battleship with 19,260 tons displacement,
1.350 more than the Dreadnaught; and
several other nations, including the,
United States, have slightly larger bat
tleships under way. The United Stales
will have 20.000-ton ships In tho North
Dakota and Delaware. The South Caro
lina, launched July 11, is 16,000 tons.
Big telescopes are two kinds reflectors
and refractors- The mirror of the first Is!
generally much larger than the lens of the
second. Harvard University recently ln-i
stalled the largest reflecting telescope i
service, with a five-foot reflector. Lord
Rosse, in 1842, set up a reflecting tele-;
scope with a, six-foot reflector in hta park,
at Parsi.ntown, Ireland, but it has boen :
a.bandoid as an astronomical instru
ment, it is said that an even larger re
flecting telescope than Lord Rostse's or'
the Harvard instrument will be placed at
the Mount Wilson Observatory, Cali
fornia. It will have a disk loo inches in
diameter.
The most famous telescopes are the re
fractors. The largest is one that was
built for the Paris Exposition, with a re
iraotor 49 inches in diameter. This is not
equatorially mounted, its 197-foot tube oc
cupying a horizontal position. The larg
est refractor telescope equatorially
mounted is the Yerkes, belonging to the
University of Chicago, and located at
Williams Bay Lake, Michigan. It has a
40-fhch lens. Lick Observatory has a 36
inch refractor and a 36-inoh reflector.
Other notable refractors are Naval Ob
servatory. Washington, 26 Inches: Lowell,
26 Inches; Princeton. 24 Inches: University
of Pennsylvania, 20 Inches, and North
western University. 20 inches., I
Several months ago a clock 38 feet In
diameter was erected on the top of a
soap factory In Jersey City, its diameter
being '13 feet greater than that of the
City Hall clock. Philadelphia, and longer
than the largest dial In the world. 25
feet in diameter. "Big Ben," the West
minster clock hi London, in the tower of
the houses of Parliament, is 221-2 feet.
The minute hand of the Jersey City clock
is 20 feet long and weighs nearly a third
of a ton. It travels more than a half a
mile each day. The clock is a part of an
enormous sign across me too or ine
eight-etory butldii. The dial is made of
six-inch pine boards, spaced three Inches
apart. The hour marks are not numer
als, but merely heavy black, tapering
strokes 5 feet 6 inches long and 30 inches
wide at the outer end. At night the hour
marks and hands are outlined by incan
descent lights. Norfolk, Va.. has a clock
that has a dial 25 1-2 feet in diameter.
The Metropolitan Life Tower, in New
York, will have a clock with a dial 25
feet Inches in diameter, with figures
4 feet long and hands 12 feet long.
Gigantic Other Things.
" Paris continues to have the largest li
brary in the world so far as the number of -books
is concerned. It is the Bibliotheque
Nationale. with 2.600,000 volumes. Tho
British Museum library is second, 2,000,
000 volumes. The Library of Congress at
Washington recently moved from fifth
place to third. According- to the last an
nual report of the librarian it oontained
nearly 1.600,000 books and pamphlets, be
sides 900,000 other articles.
The Government Printing Office the
largest establishment of its kind in the
world, has 400,000 square feet of floor
space and occupies a building 408 feet
long, 175 feet three Inches wide and 135
feet high.
No modern artists, except , those who
have produced the mammoth cyclorama
canvases, have painted larger paintings
than the "Last Judgment." Michael An
gelo's great work in the Slstine Chapel at
Rome. This is 18 meters long and 16
meters high and contains 100 life-size fig
ures. It is a fresco.
'ihe ceiling canvas, by F. D. Millet, a
Washington artist, in the Baltimore Cus
tom House, Is notable for Its size, as well
as its beauty. It is 63 feet long and 30
feet wide and was placed in the Custom
House this year. It represents 10 sailing
vessels bound home In a fog. Hans
Makarfs "Diana's Hunting Party," in tha
Metropolitan Museum of Arts, New York,
is 31 by 14 feet. One of the largest por
traits ever painted was that of Bryan,
displayed at the Denver convention, an
oil painting, 13 feet six inches high and
seven feet wide. Denver also claims to
have had during convention time the
largest bar and the largest flag, one 156
by 66 feet, but the largest correctly pro
portioned American flag Is one 60 by 30
feet, which is suspended in the court of
the Postofflce Department building at
Washington.
Baltimore's big pumps are connected
with its new sewerage system and each
weighs about 1,200,000 pounds. Each Is
designed to pump 27,500.000 gallona of sew
age In 24 hours. The largest stone crusher
was built recently for a Tennessee cement
mill. It Is 18 feet 11 Inches high and Its
hopper is 20 feet in diameter. It weighs
425,000 pounds. The redwoods of Califor
nia are more than 300 feet tall, but there
is a big tree at Tule, in Mexico, which
measures 164 feet two inches in circum
ference eix feet above the fround. The
largest snake ever brought to the Unitr-d
States was a 33-foot three-inch python,
which arrived in New York in July, des
tined for the Bronx Park. It is said that
a Milwaukee farmer wears a hat of Si
size, which he has to have made to order,
but a much larger hat was a "Merry Wld
of," worn by an Elk in the Dallas parade.
It was " five feet across." The largest
postal card was sent from Baltimore to
the largest candidate ever nominated for
the Presidency Immediate'y after his
nomination. It is 42 inches long and !
inches wide and the excellent likeness f
Taft. which it bears. Is one of the largest
photographs ever taken. (Copyright.
by W. R. HamlltoiU
There m-ere 8,062,680 cords of wood used
In the fnlted Statem in th manufacture of
paper pulp last year. Just twice ss much
as was ued in 1S99. Mora than 2.TiO0.0fvO
tons of pulp wore produced. The pulp mill
ut.d 300.000 -more cords of wood la 1907
than In the previous year.
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