Part 3

One dream of the builders of the canal has not yet been realized. They called it the Chicago Drainage and Ship Canal, in the hope that it might some day be used for shipping purposes as well as for draining the river. This cannot happen, however, till the rivers which it connects are deepened and otherwise improved.

Such has been the history of the growth of Chicago--to-day the greatest railroad center and lake port in the world. It is now the second city in size in America and ranks fourth among the cities of the world.

The port of Chicago owes much to the Chicago River, which has been repeatedly widened, deepened, and straightened. It is to-day one of the world's most important rivers, commercially considered. After extending about one mile westward from the lake, the river divides into two branches, one extending northwest, the other southwest. Many docks have been built along its fifteen miles of navigable channel, and its banks are lined with factories, warehouses, coal yards, and grain elevators.

These grain elevators are really huge tanks where the grain is stored and kept dry until time to reship it. There are many of them along the river, and they bear witness to the fact that Chicago is the world's greatest grain center.

In 1838 the city received only seventy-eight bushels of wheat. This was brought in by wagons rumbling across the unbroken prairie. Canal boats and railroads have taken the place of the wagons of early days and every year bring hundreds of millions of bushels of grain from the West to the elevators along the Chicago River.

Though much of the grain remains here but a short time and is then shipped to other points, a great quantity is made into flour in the city's many flourishing mills.

Of equal importance with the Chicago River harbor is the great harbor in South Chicago at the mouth of the Calumet River. Here ships from the Lake Superior region come with immense cargoes of ore. This ore, together with the supply of coal from the near-by Illinois coal fields, has developed the enormous steel industry of South Chicago.

Vast quantities of steel are turned out. Some of this is shipped to foreign countries, but most of it is used in Chicago's many foundries for the making of all kinds of iron and steel articles, in the city's immense farm-tool factories, and in the shipyards for building large steamships.

Close to the water front, too, are extensive lumber yards, for Chicago is the largest lumber market in the United States. Here boats can be seen unloading millions of feet of timber from the great forests of Michigan and Wisconsin, sent to Chicago's lumber yards to be distributed far and wide over the country. Large quantities are also taken to the factories in the city, to be cut and planed and made into doors, window frames, furniture, and practically everything that can be made of wood.

In addition to her inner harbors, Chicago has a fine outer harbor. This is now being enlarged by the extension of its breakwaters, and a $5,000,000 pier is under construction which will be more than half a mile in length and will greatly increase the shipping facilities.

With all these advantages as a shipping point, thousands of vessels come to Chicago every year. Steamers connect it with the states along the Great Lakes and with Canada and the outer world. Its trade with Europe is large, corn and oats being the chief exports. New York alone in America surpasses Chicago in the total value of its commerce.

Of Chicago's nearly 2,500,000 inhabitants a large percentage are foreign born, Germans, Poles, Irish, and Jews having settled here in great numbers. About forty languages are spoken, and newspapers are regularly published in ten of them.

With its suburbs, Chicago stretches nearly 30 miles along the shore of Lake Michigan and reaches irregularly inland about 10 miles. The city limits inclose an area of over 191 square miles, which the two branches of the Chicago River cut into three parts, known as the South, West, and North sides. The three divisions of the city are connected by bridges and by tunnels under the river.

Though business is spreading to the West Side, the central business section is still on the South Side and extends from the Chicago River beyond Twenty-sixth Street. Most of the great wholesale and retail houses, banks, theaters, hotels, and public buildings are crowded into this area, and here is the largest department store in the world, in which over 9000 people work. The automobile industry alone occupies nearly all of Michigan Avenue for two miles south of Twelfth Street.

Surrounding this crowded business section are most of the terminals of Chicago's many railroads. These connect the city with New York, Boston, and Philadelphia in the East; with New Orleans, Galveston, and Atlanta in the South; as well as with San Francisco and the other large cities of the West. The courthouse and city hall and the new Northwestern Railway Station are among the city's finest buildings.

Elevated railways and a freight subway have been built in recent years and have somewhat relieved the crowded condition of the streets. This subway, opened in 1905, connects with all the leading business and freight houses, and carries coal, ashes, garbage, luggage, and heavy materials of every kind to and from them.

Five miles southwest of the city hall are the Union Stockyards, the greatest market of any kind in the world, covering about five hundred acres. When Chicago was only a small village, herds of cattle were driven across the prairies to be slaughtered in the little packing houses which grew up along the Chicago River. As the raising of cattle and hogs increased in the state, most of them were sent to the Chicago market, and the stockyards continued to develop until to-day they can hold more than four hundred thousand animals at once.

Near the yards are the famous packing houses of Chicago, where over two thirds of the cattle, hogs, and sheep received in the city are slaughtered and prepared for shipping. The use, during the last forty years, of refrigerator cars has made possible the sending of dressed meats to far-distant points, and a great increase in Chicago's packing business has resulted.

Beef, pork, hams, and bacon from Chicago are eaten in every town and city of America and in many parts of Europe. Other products are lard, soups, beef extracts, soap, candles, and glue, for every bit of the slaughtered animal is turned into use.

In a district of South Chicago, known as Pullman, are the shops of the Pullman Palace Car Company and the homes of its army of workmen. Cars of all sorts are manufactured by the Pullman company, which owns and operates the dining and sleeping cars on most American railroads.

There is no one striking residence quarter in Chicago, but beautiful homes are found in many parts of the city. Among the finest streets are Lake Shore Drive, along the lake front on the North Side, and Drexel and Grand avenues.

The parks of Chicago are nearly one hundred in number, the most important being Lincoln, Washington, Humboldt, Garfield, Douglas, and Jackson. These are connected by boulevards, or parkways, forming a great park system, sixty miles in length, which encircles the central part of the city. Lincoln Park borders the lake on the North Side and covers hundreds of acres, its area having been doubled by filling in along the shores of the lake. Jackson Park, on the lake shore of the South Side, was the site of the World's Columbian Exposition, which celebrated the four-hundredth anniversary of the discovery of America. This park is connected with Washington Park by what is known as the Midway. Grant Park has been recently constructed on made land facing the central business portion of the city. Here is to be located the Field Museum of Natural History.

Bordering the Midway are the fine stone buildings of The University of Chicago, opened in 1892. Its growth, like that of Chicago, has been marvelous. Already it is one of the largest universities of the country.

But with all its parks, its boulevards, its splendid water front, and its many other advantages, the people of Chicago are not yet satisfied. To-day they are working to carry out a splendid plan which will give the city more and larger parks and playgrounds, better and wider streets, and a really wonderful harbor. All this is being done "that by properly solving Chicago's problems of transportation, street congestion, recreation, and public health, the city may grow indefinitely in wealth and commerce and hold her position among the great cities of the world."

=CHICAGO=

FACTS TO REMEMBER

Population (1910), over 2,000,000 (2,185,283).

Second city in population.

Second only to New York in value of manufactures.

The leading market in the world for grain and meat products.

A great iron and steel center.

Chief lumber and furniture market of the United States.

Greatest railroad center in the country.

Most important lake port in the country.

Has had a remarkable growth in industries and in population.

QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW AND STUDY

1. Tell what you can of Chicago's early history.

2. What great disaster befell Chicago in 1871?

3. Give five causes for the wonderful growth of Chicago.

4. What part has the Chicago River played in the development of the city?

5. Describe a grain elevator. Why are they necessary in handling grain?

6. Name the advantages which Chicago enjoys on account of its location.

7. What are the great wheat-growing states of the United States?

8. Give reasons for the development of the following industries in Chicago:

Iron and steel industries Meat packing Lumber trade

9. What are the advantages of water transportation over rail transportation?

10. In what respects is rail transportation better than water transportation?

11. Why was Chicago willing to spend millions of dollars to improve her water supply? How was this done?

12. Where are the workers secured to carry on the great industries of Chicago?

13. Make a table, by measurement of a map of the United States, showing the distance from Chicago to the following places:

New York City Denver Boston Seattle Washington, D.C. San Francisco New Orleans St. Louis

14. In what respects does Chicago stand first of American cities, and in what two things does she lead the world?

15. Compare Chicago and New York as to exports and value of commerce.

16. What is the benefit of parks to a city? What has Chicago done to make her parks among the best in this country?

PHILADELPHIA

In early days, when there was no United States and our big America was a vast wilderness inhabited mostly by Indians, people who came here were thought very adventuresome and brave.

At that time there lived in England a distinguished admiral who was a great friend of the royal family. The king owed him about $64,000, and at his death this claim was inherited by his son, William Penn. Now William Penn was an ardent Quaker, and because of the persecution of the Quakers in England he decided to found a Quaker colony in another country. King Charles II, who seldom had money to pay his debts, was only too glad to settle Penn's claim by a grant of land in America. To this grant, consisting of 40,000 square miles lying west of the Delaware River, the king gave the name Pennsylvania, meaning "Penn's Woods." The next year, 1682, William Penn and his Quaker followers entered the Delaware River in the ship _Welcome_.

Penn believed in honesty and fair play. He was generous enough not to limit his colony to one religion or nationality. All who were honest and industrious were welcome. The laws he made were extremely just, and land was sold to immigrants on very easy terms.

Soon after his arrival in America, Penn wisely made a treaty with the Indians whose wigwams and hunting grounds were on or near the banks of the Delaware River. Beneath the graceful branches of a great elm he and the Indian chief exchanged wampum belts, signifying peace and friendship. In the center of the belt which Penn received are two figures, one representing an Indian, the other a European, with hands joined in friendship. This belt is still preserved in Philadelphia by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

In 1683 Penn laid out in large squares, between the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers, the beginning of a great city. This city he called Philadelphia, a word which means "brotherly love." At that time the so-called city had an area of 2 square miles and a population of only 400. To-day Philadelphia has an area of nearly 130 square miles and a population of more than a million and a half. It is America's third city in population, and it ranks third among the manufacturing cities of the United States. Philadelphia is on the Delaware River, a hundred miles from the ocean, but it has all the advantages of a seaport, for the river is deep enough to let great ocean steamers navigate to the city's docks. Philadelphia's easy access to the vast stores of iron, coal, and petroleum, for which Pennsylvania is famous, its location on two tidewater rivers,--the Delaware and the Schuylkill,--and its important railroads, all have helped to make it a great industrial and commercial center. One half of the anthracite coal in the United States is mined in Pennsylvania. Much of it is shipped to Philadelphia and from there by rail and water to many other states and countries.

Some of the greatest manufacturing plants in the United States, in fact in the world, are in Philadelphia. In certain branches of the textile, or woven-goods, industry Philadelphia is unsurpassed. In the making of woolen carpets she leads the world. This industry goes back to Revolutionary times, when the first yard of carpet woven in the United States came from a Philadelphia loom. In 1791 a local manufacturer made a carpet, adorned with patriotic emblems, for the United States Senate.

Other important industries of the city include the manufacturing of woolen and worsted goods, hosiery and knit goods, rugs, cotton goods, felt hats, silk goods, cordage, and twine and the dyeing and finishing of textiles. The largest lace mill in the world is in Philadelphia.

Philadelphia is also noted for the manufacture of iron and steel. The largest single manufactory in Philadelphia is the Baldwin Locomotive Works, which is the greatest of its kind. Pictures of the old Flying Machine, a stagecoach which made trips to New York in 1776, and of Old Ironsides, the first locomotive built by Matthias W. Baldwin in 1832, seem very queer in comparison with the powerful 300-ton locomotives built in Philadelphia to-day. Old Ironsides weighed a little over 4 tons and lacked power to pull a loaded train on wet and slippery rails; hence the following notice which appeared in the newspapers: "The locomotive engine built by Mr. M. W. Baldwin of this city will depart daily when the weather is fair with a train of passenger cars. On rainy days horses will be attached."

Besides the American railroads using Baldwin locomotives, engines built in this plant are in use in many foreign lands. There is hardly a part of the world to which one can go where a Philadelphia-made locomotive is not to be seen.

Philadelphia holds an important place in the construction of high-grade machine tools. She has great rolling mills, foundries, and machine shops, and one of the most famous bridge-building establishments in the world. Her people smile at being called slow; in fourteen weeks a Philadelphia concern made from pig iron a steel bridge a quarter of a mile long, carried it halfway around the world, and set it up over a river in Africa.

Shipbuilding in Philadelphia began with the founding of the colony. It was the first American city to build ships and was also the home of the steamboat. The first boat to be propelled by steam was built by John Fitch in Philadelphia in 1786. This was more than twenty years before Robert Fulton had his first steamboat on the Hudson River. Robert Fulton, who was a Pennsylvanian by birth, also lived at one time in Philadelphia. Shipbuilding, to-day, is one of the city's great industries.

The art of printing has been practiced in Philadelphia since the very beginning of its history. William Bradford, one of the first colonists, published an almanac for the year 1687. This was the first work printed in Philadelphia. Benjamin Franklin entered the printing business in Philadelphia in 1723, and six years later published the _Pennsylvania Gazette_. This was the second newspaper printed in the colony, the first being the _American Weekly Mercury_, the first edition of which was printed in Philadelphia in 1719. Both of these papers were very small and would appear very odd alongside of the daily papers of to-day. The first complete edition of the Bible printed in the United States was published by Christopher Saur in Germantown, which is now a part of Philadelphia, in 1743. Philadelphia ranks first among the cities of the United States in the publication of scientific books and law books. One of the large publishing houses of the city now uses over a million dollars' worth of paper each year. It is interesting to know that when the Revolutionary War began there were forty paper mills in and near Philadelphia. At that time, and for many years after, it was the great literary center of the country.

When William Penn founded his Quaker town in the wilderness, he made little provision for parks, as at that time the town was so small and was so surrounded by forests that no parks were needed. But Philadelphia now possesses the largest park in the United States. This is known as Fairmount Park, which covers over three thousand acres of land. Splendid paths and driveways give access to every section of this park. On all sides one sees beautiful landscape gardening, fine old trees, and picturesque streams and bridges. Here is a great open amphitheater where concerts are given during the summer months; here are athletic fields, playgrounds, race courses, and splendid stretches of water for rowing; and here also for many years were located the immense waterworks which pumped the city's water supply from the Schuylkill River.

Among the famous buildings in the park are Memorial Hall and Horticultural Hall. They were erected at the time of the great Centennial Exhibition, which was held in Philadelphia in 1876 to celebrate the hundredth birthday of American independence. Memorial Hall is now used as an art gallery and city museum. Horticultural Hall contains a magnificent collection of plants and botanical specimens, brought from many different countries.

Another interesting building in Fairmount Park is the little brick house which was once the home of William Penn. It is said to have been the first brick house erected in Philadelphia. It stood on a lot south of Market Street, and between Front and Second streets. Some years ago it was moved from its original site to Fairmount Park, where thousands of people now visit it. Here too, before the Revolutionary War, was the home of Robert Morris, the great American financier, who, during that war, time and again raised money to pay the soldiers of the American army.

Many statues of American heroes ornament the driveways and walks of Fairmount Park. At the Green Street entrance stands one of the finest equestrian statues of Washington in the country. The carved base, which is made of granite and decorated with bronze figures, is approached by thirteen steps, to represent the original thirteen states.

The streets of Philadelphia, while not broad, are well paved, and many of them are bordered by fine old trees. It was William Penn who named many of the streets after trees. The names of several of the streets in the oldest part of the town are recalled in the old refrain:

Market, Arch, Race, and Vine, Chestnut, Walnut, Spruce, and Pine.

Philadelphia is a city of homes. Besides its splendid residential suburbs, it has miles of streets lined with neat attractive houses where live the city's busy workmen.

Perhaps the city hall is the most striking of the notable buildings. It is a massive structure of marble and granite and stands at the intersection of Broad and Market streets. This immense building covers four and a half acres and is built in the form of a hollow square around an open court. The most attractive feature of the building is the great tower surmounted by an immense statue of William Penn. This lofty tower is nearly 548 feet high and is 90 feet square at its base. It is 67 feet higher than the great Pyramid of Egypt and nearly twice as high as the dome of the Capitol at Washington. The Washington Monument exceeds it in height by but a few feet. The great statue of Penn is as tall as an ordinary three-story house and weighs over 26 tons. It is cast of bronze and was made of 47 pieces so skillfully put together that the closest inspection can scarcely discover the seams. Around the head is a circle of electric lights throwing their brilliant illumination a distance of 30 miles. To one gazing upwards, the light seems a halo of glory about the head of the beloved founder of the city.

Philadelphia has many fine schools, both public and private. The two most noted educational institutions are the University of Pennsylvania and Girard College. The University of Pennsylvania was founded largely through the efforts of Benjamin Franklin. It now occupies more than fifty buildings west of the Schuylkill River and is widely known as a center of learning.

Girard College was the gift of Stephen Girard, who, from a humble cabin boy, became one of Philadelphia's richest benefactors. The college is a charitable institution devoted to the education of orphan boys, who are admitted to it between the ages of six and ten. Girard left almost his entire fortune of over $7,000,000 for the establishment of this great educational home for poor boys. Two millions of this sum were for the erection of the buildings alone.

Other prominent educational institutions are the Penn Charter School, chartered by William Penn; the Academy of Fine Arts; The Drexel Institute for the promotion of art, science, and industry; the School of Industrial Art; the School of Design for Women; and several medical colleges which are among the most noted in the country.