Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 33, no. 826: January 12, 1884

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January 13, 1884 The Record and Guide, 25 THE RECORD AND GUIDE. 191 Broadway, N. Y. TERMS: ONE VEAR, io advance, SIX DOLLARS. Commurdoations should be addressed to €. W* SWEET, 191 Broadway. J, T. LINDSET. Business Manager. JANUARY IS, 1884. Subscribers will be served to-day with a fourteen page supple- went containing an Index of all the Conveyances and New Build¬ ings given in this publication during the past six months. This toill be specially valuable to those who have bound files, for, in¬ stead of hunting through the twenty-six numbers, a reference to the Index lolll show the page on which will be found all the sales and building improvements within the past half-year. The increase of advertising favors limits our reading matter to¬ day, and crowds out much that is interesting in the way of news and comment. We furnish forty pages in addition to the fourteen of Index, making fifty four pages in all. The increase of huM- ness, as well as the growth of The Record and (Juidk, is shown by the fact that our first Index occupied only four small pages Bound covers for files can be procu7-ed at this ofiice for one dollar each. We have said all along that January would bs a better month for the bulls than waa December, and ho it is proving. Still the advance made during the past week has not a wholesome look. The market has been openly manipulated by Jay Gould and W. H, Vanderbilt. This is only a variation of the p-gging process of last spring. There is no new factor at work to advance prices. At the same time stock are undeniably low, and for those who have money to invest are a purchase. But we will see lower prices before the spring is over, ----------•---------- There ought to be no delay in forwarding the bill of the Land Transfer Reform Association to Albany, It is a very formidable document, and will be subjected to a severe scrutiny from a legis¬ lation of lawyers. The bill provides that the commissioners to carry out the law should be named by the Chamber of Commerce ; but clearly this should be the work of the Real Estate Exchange and Auction Room (Limited). To these commissioners, by the way, should be intrusted full authority for carrying out this reform. Mr. Olmstead's bill subordinates them to the ofBcials who, if they have their way, will never complete the reform. The new Real Estate Exchange will be derelict in its duty if it does not follow this mat¬ ter up closely at Albany. ----------*---------- The bills introduced by Senator Robb in the State Senate aud Assemblyman Rosevelt in tbe lower chamber, depriving the Alder¬ men of all power to interfere with the appointment of heads of de- I>artments by the Mayor, are at least indications of good intentions on the part of some of our legislators. Let our citizens now bestir themselves and bring a pressure to bear that will get this vital reform carried through, There is no hope for good government bo long as the Aldermen have the confirming power. Their interfer¬ ence makes it impossible to hold anyone responsible for inefflcient or corrupt conduct of the various city departments. Of course, the bills introduced will be amended, but tbe experience of Brooklyn should be worth something in giving us a good working charter. Should the Mayor to be chosen next November have real authority it would lead to an exciting struggle, but we have no doubt but that the chief magistrate chosen would be worthy the city. Our Mayors, of all parties, have generally been intelligent and well- intentioned officials ; it is the Aldermen who are always bad. Reporting ia a lost art in the New York newspapers. Judge Barrett, author of the " American Wife," lately produced at Wal¬ lack's, delivered an address before the Nineteenth Century Club last week on the " American Drama," and he was followed by Chauncey M. Depew, A. B. Cauzaran and other notable personages. The discussion was brilliant, and every word uttered would be eagerly read, uot only by members of the dramatic profession, but by every theatre-goer. The subject matter was of the highest interest to the readers of newspapers. But beyond a few lines given to Judge Barrett the matter was ignored by our badly-edited journals. There ia a singular lack of intelligence in the way the news is furnished by the daily press. Instead of cheapening the price of their issues it would pay our daily papers to report tbe important matters which are now entirely overlooked. The World, when Manton Marble was ita editor, found it profitable to give full reports of the meetings of tbe Boston Radical Club, It found a large audience also for John Fisk'a lectures on philosophy. Hux¬ ley's "Protoplasm" necessitated a large edition of that journal. But the newspapers of to-day seem afraid to touch any theme not suggested by the politics of the day or the proceedings of the law and police courts, ---------»-----__ Should a convention of the representatives of North and South American countries be held at Washington towards the close of this year, as suggested by Senator Sherman, it might have import¬ ant consequences anent the silver question. While Asia uses sil¬ ver money exclusively. North and South America produces almost all that is used in the commerce of the world. An agreement by tbe convention to coin silver at a fixed ratio with gold would raise the price of that metal, especially if Canada would agree to enter into the arrangement. The use of silver would help us in what¬ ever trade relations w^e might make with Mexico, Central and South America, for in all these countries silver is the sole unit of value. Our manufactures would find better outlets in thoE e countries and in Asia than in Europe. This is a matter worth thinking about. The Mutual Building. This towering structure seems to be virtually completed as to its outside by the erection of the cast-iron parapet story. At any rate, whatever may be added to it will only alter its aspect in a distant view, since the parapet story itself i^ scarcely visible from the other side of any one of the three streets on which the building fronts. Architecturally, therefore, Mr, Clinton's work can be dis¬ cussed as well now aa hereafter. No matter how good his building might have been, it was fore¬ doomed to be ineffectual by the shortsightedness of his clients in determining to erect ho lofty a building on such a site. Every¬ body seea, now that it is done, what a folly it is, but that was easily seen beforehand, and was so seen. The main cornice must be not far from 100 feet from the ground, and Nassau street, on which is the principal front of the building, cannot be more than forty feet wide. When it waa laid out, it waa expected to be bordered with buildings two stories and a-half or three stories high, and it is stinted even for buildings of that class, and here, on one side of it is an eight-story structure. The widening of the street was urgently needed even while five stories was the limit of the build¬ ings. The Mutual Company have at once rendered the widening far more necessary and far more difficult by setting^this towering palace in this alley. If they had bought two lots in the rear of their plot and set the building back by tbat distance, leaving it of the same dimensions, they would have gained the cost of the improvement in tho superior convenience of their building, besides rendering the architecture visible. Practically the result of this folly will not be realized unless the owner of the property opposite takes it into his hesid to build another eight-story struc¬ ture, as he bas a perfect right to do, and takes for the back of his building the light which the Mutual people now get over the roofs from the west. But architecturally the folly is vividly evident, and there is probably nothing so absurd as the relation of the new building to its surroundings to be seen in any other city in the world. Certainly such a sight cannot be seen in any city in which these things are regulated by law [instead of being left^to what is fondly imagined to be the good sense and consideration of indi¬ vidual builders. The new building, then, is not effective, and would not be effective, no matter how well it was designed. What can an archi¬ tect do with a front of which the cornice can only be seen in a front view by backing away as far as you can get and throwing your head back to look at the cornice which even then is at an angle of eighty degrees from the point of view. It is impossible to judge of a composition in this violently foreshortened condition or to form any reasonable estimate what it would look like if you could see it. The unfortunate designer has tried to give us some¬ thing to look at by withdrawing the centre of the principal front as much as he dared, making up for his temerity by projecting a two-story porch, as it appears, beyond the building line, But with all that he could do the possible recess is so slight tbat, although tt makes one's neck ache rather less to look at the centre than to look at the wings, the projection is not effectual, and the main advantage resulting from it is a better detachment of the porch. This is almost tbe only feature in the building that can be tolerably seen and it is an effective feature. It would, we think, be better, as indeed would the whole building, if the basement and first story had been built of the light sandstone of which the other stories are composed. The granite can scarcely be needed for strength, since the granite piers stand upon brick piers of their own area, and the ■ ontrast between the cold gray of the granite and the warm gray