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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (June 27, 1909)
-4 I y The Omaha PAAT THREE HALF-TONE PAGES 1 TO 4. UNDAY adve&tlsx in thx OMAHA BEE BEST IN TUXTSfEST r VOL. XXXIX NO. 2, OMAIIA, SUNDAY MOKNING, JUNE 27, 1901). SINGLE COPY FIVE CENTS. OMAHA'S ONE CROOKED STREET HAS ITS OWN STORY Bee. ( i i i Vinton Street the One Thoroughfare that Deviates from a Straight Line Is the Result of an Effort to Accommodate Purchasers of Building Lots in a Section that Did Not Develop. O MAIIA probably has fewer crooked streets than any city of equal size In the United States. Only three, Vinton street, St. Mary's avenue, and Ames avenue, can be Bald to swerve from a straight course. Of these. Vinton Is the only one that follows a crooked path for any consid dlstance, and can well be termed Omaha's only crooked erable street. Beginning at Thirteenth street, Vinton runs west to Fifteenth, the location of the Western league base ball park, where Us course is deflected southwest for three blocks. A few yards beyond Eight eenth street, Vlntoa gnln swerves south, (l aving from this point, fVr three blocks, or un til It reaches Twenty first street, a path that lacks not many degrees of being directly south and north. After reach ing Twenty-first street, Vinton follows a straight line west to the city limits. In following its devi ous course, Vinton is di rectly approached or en tered by a few street that would be parallel to It were Its direction due east and west, as It Is for two blocks from the beginning at Thir teenth, and for several blocks west of Twenty first street. The first of these streets Is Bancroft, which opens into Seven teenth Btreet a few yards north of Vinton. Kim street, the next be yond Bancroft, finds a direct original owners of the property in that part of Omaha that is now cut through by Vinton. The street was not laid out with the original plot of Omaha, but was put through in later years, after lots In the Vinton tract of land had been sold. Men bought lots In various parts of the tract, and the street was allowed to curve so as to pass by these lots as they were purchased. Some lots were sold at Fif teenth street, and the road passed along by these; others, several hundred yards south and west of the lots; at Fifteenth, were then sold, and the street had to be made crooked In order to go by these. Such was the manner in which the course of Vinton was deter- many who dreamed of making a great business center somewhere In the vicinity of Vinton street. It was south of the railroad tracks that the Credit Foncier addition was laid out and exploited by George Francis Train, who conceived that the tide of growth might as easily be turned in that direction as in any other. The study of city growth has not yet developed any definite "law" along which urban expansion proceeds, and at the time the eccentric but enter prising Train undertook bis dream of greatness for that part of Omaha which lies among the hills and hollows south of the ravine through which the Union Pacific and other roads found a way out of Omaha to the west no especial effort had been made in the way of developing the psychology of the city. Great conquerors and monarchs had built cities, their Ipse dixit settling all the details. Alexander laid out in the marshes of the Nile delta a city that still stands; Peter the Great of Rucsla planted St. Petersburg In the swamps along the Neva, and similar instances may be multiplied. Ilaron llfrtissmann drew straight lines across the plat of Paris, and they became boulevards, and London and Berlin have been reformed in the same way. So why might not the development of Omaha be controlled by a master mind and its life be diverted into a channel chosen by George Francis Train, as well as to allow It to wander aimlessly over the landscape, as It eventually did? One of the vagaries of city growth is that Omaha would not follow along the thought of Train's plan, and Credit Foncier is still a dream unreal ized. The section covered by the addition has been thickly built up, but it is not the principal section of the city. outlet Into Vinton about half way between Elchteenth and Nineteenth. The first street south of Elm, Oak, opens into Twentieth nearly a block north of Vinton. Spring street enters Vlntoa at Twentieth, Just a block north of the corner at which the crooked rout take a straight course west to the clty'e edge. A poet sang In sardonic vein of how one crooked street cam into existence. A wobbly-legged calf, lost from Its dam. wandered through the woods in search of its dinner, and left a trail that wig gled like an angleworm. Next day a sheep followed the trail of the calf, and then a man wandered over the same route. Soon another passed, and one day some loitering horseman rode along the devious way. Thus it became a footpath, and later a lane, and when a city was bullded there the uncertain course along which a day-old calf staggered became Its principal thoroughfare. This is Intended to show the vagarious origin of some city streets. It Is said that in Boston some street remain whose way Is so tortuous that it Is possi ble to go out and come back on the same street without turning about. Such street must have been In the minds of the engineers who laid out the city of Omaha In Us beginning. These were men of broad mind. In the sweep of whose Imagination arose a picture of a city fair and great, whose Btreets were broad as avenues and straight as could be laid by compass. It was not a difficult task. The virgin sheet of paper on which the city was platted would per mit of straight lines as well as of crooked, and so the city streets were marked as the '"shortest course between two points," lntersect- lng each other at angles aa true as ever student fixed for experimen tal purposes. It mattered not to these men that the way of the thor oughfares thus proposed lay over huge hills, some towering like mountains. apparenUy inaccessible, save to mountain goats, and that others found their course Intercepted by muddy creeks, that slug gishly trickled between the banks of deep ravines or roared In tor rential fury when swollen by heavy rains. This airy Indifference to the natural contour of the land has cost the survivors of those pio neers not a little worry and contriving, not to speak of several mil lions in money that have been spent In grading and filling. If the man who made the town site of Omaha in the first place could come bnck and see It now he would not recognize It for the same place. Hills have vanished, hollows have disappeared, creeks have been swallowed up and left no trace and the dream of the engineers has been patiently wrought out In broad and Btralght streets that pro ceed in due order, "square with the world," and crossing each other with mathematical accuracy. The tree-crowned bluffs that reared their heads above the Missouri's banks when the pioneers pitched their first camp here half a century ago have followed the pioneer, and In place of the Jack oak, the pig nut and the cottonwood, the box elder and the scrub elm, now stand great piles of brick and mor "Vtar. stone and steel, while the line marked on that virgin sheet of paper are now broadways of commerce, nurraced with aspnaitum or brick and traversed dally by many thousands of busy people. It Is a dream realized as Us dreamers never could have hoped. Why Vinton street Is crooked has never been satisfactorily ex plained, although the reason given at the city engineer's office Is a plausible one. There the blame for the crooked way is placed on the So Isaac Ilascall dreamed he might control city growth, and by anticipating some of the needs of the expanding life of Omaha direct Its course into the part of town he predetermined was the one best suited for it. In the early days of Omaha Isaac Ilascall was consid ered one of the leading and richest citizens of this growing town. lie ... f l f t. ' ... - A L I -..I.-,-.. . mm w 1 1 1, i . lib mi .,Ja -,, . I . rv-ai, frrK vi I ' -4&4.' -w... tri?IHi;lT 1 1 T f V VI V-L''iatr.TOMll leading and richest growth r Y Ift&Kfe ""sen. ot this died in ivt! v .... . ;r-h- -v. . r v.-. -.--ir !-:. r -v.- ........ . j.; y... ; . . - - ,V . 1 " z. : j- 1 mined until it reached Twenty-first street, where it De came a straight street for a great distance west. Employes in the office of the city engineer are wont to become facetious in talking about crooked Vinton, and then delight in telling strangers that the street is crooked because It was laid out by a surveyor who had taken more than his share of stimulants. They say he made the lines for the street as he tried to walk down the now crooked Vinton, and that he could not steer his legs in a Straight course. Consequently Vinton becamo, these facetious ones say, a twisted street, all because of the drunken surveyor's work on that day, many years ago. All along Us winding way Vinton is a busy street. It is traversed by the tracks of the street railway and has a commercial and social lfe that Is all Its own. In fact, it Is perhaps the busiest street in the extreme south part of the city. While It wanders In and out among the shade trees that line -its sides, offering no where an unobstructed view, its vistas are pleasing, and the Btranger is kept wondering what lies Just beyond the bend he can see ahead. He finds, when ne has made the turn, the same short Btretch of well-paved street, with homes or business blocks on either side. Dwellings along Vinton street are all comfortable, and some are pretentious. In some places it pretends even to exclusiveness, while in others its democracy is Just a trifle emphasized. It has manufacturing enterprises and amusement projects along Its way, a postoffice supplies Its needs for communication with the outer world, while bakeries, laundries, groceries, dry goods stores and saloons complete the list of modern requirements for a self contained community. Thus Omaha's one really crooked street has enough to make it independent of the rest of the world for a little while at least, If It were suddenly cut off from the rest of the city. The. story of Vinton's crooked way recalls to the minds ot the older residents of Omaha the story tf Isaac Hascall's boom project, which he launched in the middle seventies, and which had for its scene the vicinity of Vinton street Judge Ilascall was but one of vicinity of Vinton by erecting cortly buildings there. On his property, between Thirteenth and Fourteenth streets and Castellar, he constructed a large brick building. He knew not what it was to bo used for, but the. idea ot a large brick building pleased him, and he would put It up, despite protests of his friends. A friend one day met him at the site of the building when the masons were laying the foundation, The walls of the foundation were made three or four feet thick, and looked as though they were for a fortress. This frieud, as he looked upon the foundation, asked Hascall what he intended to do with such a building. In reply, the boom agent replied: "O, I'll want this building largo, tor some day I'm going to chase the devil around these walls, and I'll want to give him a run for his money." Another brick building was erected at 1925 South Thirteenth street. It still stands there, and now is the home ot the Humane Horse Collar Manufacturing company. This building was, for many years after Its construction, loft vacant, and never, until very recently, brought in much rental. 'A few other buildings were put up by Hascall along Thirteenth, but they since have been torn down. None of them was used for any special purpose during the builder's boom days. One of the queerest things done by Hascall, when ho was making for a greater Omaha, was his construction of a stone fenco running around two blocks of ground between Vinton and Castellar Btreets. The remains of this stone wall still stand n Castellar and Thirteenth streets. The land which this wall enclosed Is now the site of tho Western league base ball park. Hascall never gave any sensible reason why he built the wall. He told friends that it made things look nice and beautified the place. x Isaac Hascall's boom project, like a great many of Its kind, burst and left its promoter a ruined man. His money was tied, up in buildings that brought him no return on the investment. Th buildings were not rented, and the business center of Omaha con tinued to remain several blocks north of Hascall's district. Other sections of Omaha can tell similar tales of defeated am bition. Perhaps none other can show the monumental outlines In stone of "Hnscall'8 Folly," as the work he left Incomplete has been called, but the dreams of urban greatness cherished by founders has not frequently been realized. Isnac Hascall bullded better than he knew in some ways, and laid the foundation for a substantial In the Vinton street region. Major Wilcox, who Council Bluffs a few years ago, poor, was the future of that section great possibilities, and In preparing for Wil cox's additions to the town site he had In mind the growth of Omaha that was cer tain to follow the establishment of South Omaha, and could center In the Vinton street neighborhood. But Major Wilcox reckoned without his host and did not live to see the crooked street become tho bustling thoroughfare he had in mind. But many who did buy lots from him are realizing now that all be bad in mind was not mere Imagination. The Increase in use of property in that section of the city has brought corresponding Increase In value, and the good fortune that missed Hascall, Wilcox and others has fallen to the lot of those who now own the lots these men laid out, 3 was an eccentric character, but smart and progressive. He be lieved in a bigger and better Omaha, and stood by his convic tions. He saw in his owu mind the day when Omaha would be tht fii'cat city of the middle west, and ho decided to prepare for that time. In tho vicinity of Vinton street he owned some land, which he thought vtii a good place for the center of the greater Omaha, of which he dreamed. He conceived the idea of turning that land into a thriv ing business district, and with that idea in mind he started to boom that part of Omaha in the 1 . . V. UPPER PICTURE. VINTON STREET'S FIRST TURN AT FIFTEENTH; SECOND PICTURE, AT THE INTERSECTION OF EIGHTEENTH; THIRD PICTURE. DOUBLE CURVE AT TWEN TIETH AND VINTON; BOTTOM PICTURE, THE LAST TURN, AT TWENTY -FIRST STREET. Explorer Baldwin Will Raise Vegetables While Drifting Across Arctic NEW YORK, June 26. Novel plans for wresting the final secrets of the Arctic regions have been made by Evelyn Briggs Baldwin. The venturesome explorer purposes on his next expedition to drift straight across the uncharted Arctic sea aboard an ice island several times the size ot Central park. Established on his island, with porUble houses, ponies, dogs, tons ot whale meat and equipment, he will not care much what happens to the ship that brought him there. The ship may be crushed; It will not matter. During the four years of drift ing from Bering Strait to the other side of the world, at the rate of two miles a day the diet of canned food, sea shrimps, gulls, walrus and bear meat will naturally become monotonous. The members of the expedition will crave and need fresh vegetables. How can they be had In the frozen wastes ot the tar' north? Mr. Baldwin plans to raiBe vegetables right on that ice island. He will have a garden patch, with artificial soil and artificial heat supplanting the rays of a six months' sun, and will raise onions and cabbages In close prox imity to the North Pole. To farm on Ice and plant crops in a section where the thermometer may suddenly drop 90 degrees below zero is a feat that none but a scientific argricutturlst would attempt. Mr. Baldwin intends to use captive and dirigible balloons as ac cessories to scientific observations, while a wireless telegraph outfit ' will keep him in touch with civilization through an intermediate sta tion In Alaska. The dirigible balloons may furnish a means of es cape to the explorers in case their Inland became untenable. The wireless system will inform the world what discoveries have been made, how the garden is getting along and when the party expects to reach Spitsbergen, while it will keep the explorers from becoming lonesome by providing them with the daily news of civilization. A searchlight for hunting bears during the six months' night, and a deep sea dredge with a bomb which will by explosion hurl marine specimen into a net, are other novel features. A cinematograph will take pictures of scenes and incidents of Interest or Importance. "Starting In the late-summer for Bering Strait," said Mr. Bald win recently, "mr plan is to have our expedition ship accompanied by two chartered vessels conveying a large quantity of logs or timber from the forests of Oregon and Alaska, casks filled with oil, foods, clothing and the extensive equipment necessary to set up a four years' colony on the Ice. We will make directly for the edge of the pack Ice to the northwest of Point Barrow, Alaska, and will tie up alongside the most promising ice floe. This will be In about latitude 73 north and longitude 165 west, or about 100 miles east of the point of besetment of the Jeannette, or 60 degrees east of the point where Nansen picked up the drift of Do Long. This will give us a course northward right through the heart of more than 2,000,000 square miles of unexplored territory, stretching for 2,000 miles across the North Pole to the opposite edge of the pack Ice between Greenland and Spltzbergen. Our ship and convoys will soon be Joined by one or more of the vessels composing the Pacific whaling fleet. These will bring to us great slabs of whale flesh aud blubber, adding many tons to our Bup ply of dog food. The whalers have no use for anything but the bone of the monsters they pursue, but to u. the w hale flesh will be of the utmost service. I shall arrange with the owners of the Pacific fleet to have the ships wintering on the coast of Alaska gather for us a cargo or two of whale meat. We shall find the whalers in the mid dle of August in the very rtgion where we are going; they are hunt ing the great mammal to the edge of the ice park. "The ice floe, which is our first goal. Is so extensive that were it split Into a dozem equal parts one would be as large as Central park, and, being surrounded by other jnasses of Ice of great size, It forms with its neighbors one continuous pack. The floes can never sepa rate far from one another, but move forward as a group of natural barges floating across the great Arctic basin, parallel with the ob served drift of tlte Jeannette and the Fram, to the opposite side of the Arctic sea. It is a four-year trip and we are absolutely assured of the course over which Nature will transport us free of charge. The ocean currents are slow, but certain. "In distributing supplies on our Ice island we will Initiate our half dozen hardy" Siberian ponies In sledging. Our stores of lumber, portable houses, stables and studios will be established on a firm foundation of Ice twelve feet thick. Our vessel will soon be frozen in near the Island colony, but there Is no tear that It will be crushed, for It will ride high with the removal of coal and supplies, and will be Internally strengthened with crossbeams from the log yard. After the convoys havs gone the whallag ships will arrive with the cargoes of whale meat ordered in advance. I shall have trenches two and one-half feet deep cut into the ice to serve as a refrigerator for the whale flesh. By covering the flesh in the trenches with sea water, which quickly freezes, we will protect the meat from any Impurities in the air, and can preserve it for any number of years. As a further protection against wild animals, dogs and gulls we will pile logs and casks above the trenches. "The logs are furthermore useful as chaining posts for the dogs, upon which they may rest high and dry while dreaming their dog dreams, full of good food, and permitting the Arctic game to ap proach our settlement as targets for the marksmen of our party. But the most important use of the logs will be in the making of our polar garden. We must have fresh vegetables up there, both because they taHte good and because they are a preventive of scurvy. Four years on an ice island without vegetables would be too much of a hardship. Not that we are vegetarians by any means. Bear meat and blubber taste fine for nine months in the year, but in the summer time salad and cucumbers are as desirable up north as down here. Why should not vegetables be raised at the pole, when there Is six months of sunshine? Our logs will be the foundation for our garden. We will lay them close together and cover them with a layer of specially mixed earths and fertilizing material brought for this purpose. We will plant the vegetables in grooves chiselled in the logs or in the natural hollows formed by placing the logs Bide by side. By means of long tubes placed in the grooves or hollows we can warm the soil with a supply of artificially heated air, while screens, window glass and blankets will enable us to protect the vegetables against chilling winds that may arise. The methods Is quite feasible; it is the appli cation of hothouse gardening to Arctic conditions. I expect to raise cress, mustard, lettuce, onions, rhubarb and other anti-scorbutic plants. Wherever there is soil In thr northraost land we find many species of flowers and grasses flourishing without artificial aid. Our seeds, of course, must be carefully preserved and enough taken to last four years, since our Arctic vegetables may not be able to reacTi the seed age. Likewise we must carefully gather up and save our garden soil at the end of each summer. As for fertilizers, we will obtain some from the surplus of marine life dredged from the bot tom ot the ocean. "While dredging for marine specimens In summer electric light bulbs attached to the neta will lure to their doom hordes of strange sea animals, and many specimens of these will be stored awax In empty oil casks. Animals which refuse to be coaxed will be killed with a deep sea bomb. In each numbered cask will be placed a flask containing data pertaining to its contents. Whatever happens to the expedition its scientific collections will therefore be safe and will some time float to civilization. The specimens themselvea will be placed in bottles of diluted alcotfol and the bottles packed In the. casks with excelsior and waste paper. "I do not expect to plant my colony more than ten or twelve miles from the edge of the Ice pack. It makes no difference; the current will drive us on. By the first of September young ice of considerable thickness will be forming on the open water to the south, but we are sure to come back and proceed upon our north ward Journey. When winter has frozen the water along the coasts' of all lands bordering on the Arctlo ocean we may compare the ice pack to a great lid resting on the north polar basin, but consisting ' of many large sections, some of which, driven northward by the pre vailing winds in the Bering Strait region, are finally caught by the strong ocean current which sweeps the east coast of Greenland and enters the north Atlantic. The middle sections ot the great Ice lid, being uninterrupted by shore lines, moves more rapidly than all other parts. It also makes more progress in winter than summer, because during the latter season the floes are less tightly packed, thereby allowing the carrying winds to shift them somewhat from a straight course. The course lines of the Jeannette and the Fram conform in a remarkable manner to the contour of the nearest coasts upon which the Ice pack impinges, which Is additional evi dence that the floss can never drift widely apart. "An Illustration ot this fact waa given In the Jeannette expedi tion, when a small storehouse which was erected on a floe was blown out of sight, but after two years was found close at hand. Further more, the wreckage from the Jeannette was driven upon the Ice floes to the southeast coast of Greenland. Had the members of this ex pedition been equipped according to my plan they could have safely; (Continued on Page Two.)