Village Improvements and Farm Villages

Part 1

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VILLAGE IMPROVEMENTS AND FARM VILLAGES.

GEO. E. WARING, JR.

CONSULTING ENGINEER FOR SANITARY AND AGRICULTURAL WORKS.

BOSTON: JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY, (Late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co.) 1877.

COPYRIGHT, 1877, BY GEO. E. WARING, JR.

FRANKLIN PRESS: RAND, AVERY, & CO., BOSTON.

The following papers on Village Improvements and Farm Villages are reprinted, with some amendments, from "Scribners Monthly." These constitute the more practical part of the book, so far as villages are concerned.

It has, however, been judged appropriate to add to them a paper on Eastern Farming, which originally appeared in "The Atlantic Monthly," and which continues the discussion of the question of village residence as a means for mitigating some of the hardships which beset the lives of isolated country families.

The wide-spread and growing interest in the topics considered makes it seem worth while to give these short essays a more permanent form.

G. E. W., JR. NEWPORT, R.I., June, 1877.

CONTENTS.

PAGE VILLAGE IMPROVEMENTS 11

VILLAGE SANITARY WORK 69

FARM VILLAGES 114

LIFE AND WORK OF THE EASTERN FARMER 159

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE FIG. 1.--DRAINAGE OF HILL-SIDE FOOT-PATH 31

FIG. 2.--SECTION OF ROAD WITH DRAINS 44

FIG. 3.--PIPES RESTING ON THEIR SHOULDERS 73

FIG. 4.--PIPES RESTING ON THEIR FULL LENGTH 73

FIG. 5.--GREASE-TRAP 79

FIG. 6.--FIELD'S FLUSH-TANK 80

FIG. 7.--THE EMERSON VENTILATOR 86

FIG. 8.--DIAGRAM ILLUSTRATING MANNER OF SEWAGE DISPOSAL AT LENOX, MASS. 97

FIG. 9.--SETTLING BASIN 102

FIG. 10.--ARRANGEMENT OF ABSORPTION DRAINS, 105

FIG. 11.--DIVISION OF FOUR SQUARE MILES WITH CENTRAL VILLAGE 124

Part 2

FIG. 12.--DIVISION OF THE CENTRAL VILLAGE 126

FIG. 13.--DIVISION OF THE CENTRAL OPEN SPACE OF THE VILLAGE 131

FIG. 14.--PRESENT DIVISION AND SETTLEMENT OF TRACT IN RHODE ISLAND 133

FIG. 15.--THE RHODE ISLAND TRACT WITH ITS BUILDINGS GATHERED TOGETHER INTO A COMPACT VILLAGE 135

FIG. 16.--PROPOSED ARRANGEMENT OF THE RHODE ISLAND FARM VILLAGE 139

VILLAGE IMPROVEMENTS.

It may be because the newness of our country and the fragile character of our early structures have prevented the accumulation of inferior, ugly, and uncomfortable houses, as the nucleus around which later building has crystallized; it may be from circumstances which have prevented the isolated residence of the better classes of our people; or it may be the result of accident. Whatever the reason, it is beyond dispute that the United States is par excellence a land of beautiful villages. North, south, east, and west, there are plenty of hideous conglomerations of poor-looking houses, with an absence of every element of beauty; but there are thousands of other villages scattered all over the land, which are full of the evidences of good taste in their regulation and in their management.

As a rule, these more attractive features are very much modified by the presence of badly-kept private places or neglected public buildings, and by a general air of untidiness. Still, the foundation of attractiveness is there; and nothing is needed beyond a well-organized and well-guided control of public sentiment, to remove or to hide the more objectionable features, and to permit such beauty as the village may possess to manifest itself.

The real elements of beauty in a village are not fine houses, costly fences, paved roadways, geometrical lines, mathematical grading, nor any obviously costly improvements. They are, rather, cosiness, neatness, simplicity, and that homely air that grows from these and from the presence of a home-loving people.

To state the case tersely, the shiftless village is a hideous village, while the charm which we often realize without analyzing it comes of affectionate care and attention.

There are villages in New England, in Western New York, and all over the West, even to the far side of Arkansas, which impress the visitor at once as being homelike and full of sociability and kindliness; which delight him, and lead him almost to wish that his own lot had been cast within their shades. These are chiefly villages where the evidences of public and private care predominate, or are at least conspicuous. A critical examination would, in almost every case, develop very serious evidence of neglect, unwholesomeness, and bad neighborhood.

Within a few years, beginning, I believe, in Massachusetts, the more thoughtful of those whose affections are centred in their village homes have united in organized efforts to make their villages more tidy, to interest all classes of society in attention to those little details the neglect of which is fatal, and to make the village, what it certainly should be, an expression of the interest of its people in their homes and in the surroundings of their daily life.

The first of these associations of which I have any knowledge (though, as such work is unobtrusive, there may have been many before it) was the "Laurel Hill Association" of Stockbridge, Mass. It takes its name from a wooded knoll in the centre of the village, which had been dedicated to public use. The first object of the association was to convert this knoll into a village park. Then they took in hand the village burial-ground, which was put in proper condition and suitably surrounded with hedge and railing. Then the broad village street was properly graded and drained, and agreeable walks were made at its sides. Incidentally to this, the people living along both sides of the streets were encouraged to do what they could to give it an appropriate setting by putting their own premises into tasteful condition and maintaining them so. The organization worked well, and accomplished good results. The Rev. N. P. Eggleston, formerly of Stockbridge, in a paper on village improvements written for the "New York Tribune," thus describes the collateral work and influences of the Laurel Hill Association:--

"Next followed the planting of trees by the roadside wherever trees were lacking. The children, sometimes disposed in their thoughtlessness to treat young trees too rudely, were brought in as helpers of the association, while at the same time put under a beneficial culture for themselves. Any boy who would undertake to watch and care for a particular tree for two years was rewarded by having the tree called by his name. Other children were paid for all the loose papers and other unsightly things which they would pick up and remove from the street.

"Gradually the work of the association extended. It soon took in hand the streets connected with the main street. Year by year it pushed out walks from the centre of the village toward its outer borders; year by year it extended its line of trees in the same manner; and year by year there has been a marked improvement in the aspect of the village. Little by little, and in many nameless ways, the houses and barns, the dooryards and farms, have come to wear a look of neatness and intelligent, tasteful care, that makes the Stockbridge of to-day quite a different place from the Stockbridge of twenty years ago. Travellers passing through it are apt to speak of it with admiration as a finished place, and, compared with most even of our New England villages, it has such a look; but the Laurel Hill Association does not consider its home finished, nor its own work completed. Still the work goes on. Committees are even now conning plans for further improvements. By itself, or by suggestions and stimulations offered to others, the association is aiming at the culture of the village people through other agencies than those of outward and physical adornment. It fosters libraries, reading-rooms, and other places of resort where innocent and healthful games, music and conversation will tend to promote the social feeling, and lessen vice by removing some of its causes."

No one can drive through this beautiful old place without realizing the effect of some influence different from that which has usually been at work in country towns. One feels that it is a village of homes; that the people who live in it love it, and that it has no public or private interest so insignificant as to be neglected.

I have cited this instance somewhat at length, because it was the first, as it is the most complete, that has come to my notice. In other places, more serious work of improvement has been undertaken in the direction of sewerage, gas-lighting, &c. In fact, the present writing was suggested by frequent requests for information and advice on the more practical parts of the subject.

At the outset it is to be said that the organization and control of the village society is especially woman's work. It requires the sort of systematized attention to detail, especially in the constantly-recurring duty of "cleaning up," that grows more naturally out of the habit of good housekeeping than out of any occupation to which men are accustomed. Then, too, it calls for a degree of leisure which women are the most apt to have, and it will especially engage their interest as being a real addition to the field of their ordinary routine of life. The sort of enthusiasm which has led to marked success in the Dorcas Society and other organized action outside of the household, for which American country women are noted, will find here a new and engaging object. This, however, is only a suggestion by the way, and one which may or may not be appropriate under varying circumstances.

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