REPORT OF THE PULLMAN INVESTIGATION. At the annual convention of the chiefs and commissioners of the various bureaus of statistics of labor in the United States, held at St. Lonis in June, 1884, it was determined to make a full and exhaustive investigation of the economic experiment conducted by Pullman's Palace Car Company, on the plan projected by George M. Pullman, the president. In carrying out this determination the convention met at Pullman, Ill., in September following, and for three days studied all the economic, sanitary, industrial, moral and social conditions of the city. Every facility was afforded for the closest scrutiny of every feature and phase of any and all the affairs the members of the convention saw fit to examine. The results of their investigations are embodied in this report, which is presented as a joint report through the various annual reports of the bureaus represented. We have availed ourselves of material furnished the press by Duane Doty, Esq., a gentleman connected with the educational work of Pullman, and by other writers, but chiefly our report is the result of our own observation of things and conditions as we found them. Our object in making the investigation was to give to the manu facturers and capitalists of our respective States official information relative to one of the most attractive experiments of the age seeking to harmonize the interests of labor and capital. It is no part of our duty to eulogize individuals; we have endeavored to learn results. The enterprise of Herr Krupp at Essen; the philanthropy of M. Godin in the establishment of the Familistere at Guise, France, the humanity of Sir Titus Salt, that brought into existence the industrial town of Saltaire, in Yorkshire, England; and the broad Christian inspiration which resulted in the founding of Pullman have given the world, in the four greatest manufacturing countries, four magnificent schemes for the uplifting of a large portion of the people seeking a living through wages. In all the countries named there have been many other experiments worth a careful study of all interested in social advancement. This is thoroughly true of our own country, and we might call attention with justice to the success at Peacedale, R. I., at St. Johnsbury, Vt., at Willimantic and Manchester, Conn., and at other points. But for comprehensive plan, for careful recognition of all the strong points, and the fullest anticipation of all the weak features, for the beauty of the executed plan, for the financial and social success thereof, Pullman city, as the outgrowth of the newest of the great manufacturing nations, stands at the head. HISTORY. The commissioners had no opportunity to consult Mr. Pullman personally, he being away at the time of our investigation, and we have, therefore, taken such statements of fact, as appear in our report, from documents already before the public. Pullman's Palace Car Company, was founded in 1867 with a capital of $1,000,000; its extended operations have been conducted on the strictest business principles, and have, from time to time, necessitated increases in its capital stock, until now its capital represents nearly $16,000,000, and $2,000,000 in debenture bonds; its palace cars are operated on npwards of 70,000 miles of railway in America and Europe. Its capital stock had been paid in dollar for dollar, and no watering processes have ever entered into the finan cial operations of the company. Its dividends have been regular and ample, and its affairs conducted on the same scientific basis that has characterized the construction of the works. Four or five years ago Mr. Pullman determined to bring the greater portion of the works of the company into one locality. To accomplish this he must leave the great cities for many reasons, and yet it was essential that a site should be selected where communication could be had with the whole country, and near some metropolitan place like Chicago. He wished above all things to remove his workmen from the close quarters of a large city, and give them the healthful benefit of good air, good drainage, and good water, and where they would be free, so far as it would lie in the power of management to keep them free, from the many seductive influences of a great town. He was fortunate in securing about 4,000 acres of land on the Illinois Central Road, a dozen miles to the south of Chicago. This land was located in the town of Hyde Park, and here he built his city. THE SITE. The city is situated upon the west shore of Lake Calumet, which is a a shallow body of water three and a half miles long by a mile and a half in width. This lake drains into Lake Michigan through the Calumet river, Lake Michigan being not more than three miles distant. The site of that portion of the city now fully covered with buildings is from eight to fourteen feet above the level of Lake Calumet. The soil is a drift deposit of tough blue clay ninety feet in depth, resting upon lime rock. The land gradually rises to the north and west to an elevation of twenty-five feet above Lake Calumet, this lake being usually from three to five inches higher than Lake Michigan. There is no land of a marshy character in this neighborhood. The bottom of Lake Calumet is of hard blue clay, from which the best cream colored brick are made. It was deemed unwise to permit any sewage to flow into Lake Calumet, so the system of drainage adopted is what is known as the separate one. On the 25th of May, 1880, ground was first broken for the building of the Palace Car works, and the city of Pullman. The land was an open and not over-promising prairie. The first efforts were directed towards the scientific drainage of the future town. In old cities drainage follows construction, for the average village or city is but the haphazard conglomeration of odds and ends in the way of buildings, whose inartistic forms, defective constructions, and inconvenient arrangements are supplemented by such drainage and sewerage systems as can be utilized. It is rare of course in the nature of things that drainage is thought of at the outset. It comes after a lapse of time when the soil has become charged with the accumulated filth of years, and all attempts at sewerage are more or less unsatisfactory. The city of Pullman, on the other hand, has been built scientifically in every part, and is exceptional in respect to drainage and sewerage if in no other regard. For here the drainage preceded the population, and the soil is now as free from organic contamination as when it formed a portion of the open prairie. Every house has been constructed from approved plans, and under the supervision of competent builders and engineers. The perfection of the site selected was accomplished through surface drainage, and the con struction of deep sewers. These should be described as a matter of logical order before any thing is said of the building of the town. SURFACE DRAINAGE. The atmospheric water goes from roofs and streets through one system of pipes and sewers directly into Lake Calumet. Brick mains from three to six feet in diameter are built in alternate streets running east and west, the intermediate streets being summits from which the surface water flows into the main sewers. The fall is sufficient to secure good cellars for all the dwellings in the city, the drain pipes leading from cellars being at least eighteen inches below the cellar bottoms. A two foot cobble-stone gutter borders either side of every street, leading at short intervals of 150 feet into catch-basins, these basins connecting either with the lateral or the main sewers. This system of surface drainage is calculated to carry easily an amount of water that would cover to the depth of one and one-half inches the entire area drained. For the drainage from lots, six inch pipe is used while for block drainage and for laterals pipe varying from nine to eighteen inches in diameter is used. The parks and play grounds are all thoroughly drained. The amount of vitrified pipe already laid in the town is as follows: Of 18 inch pipe. 4,500 feet. Of 15 inch pipe. Of 9 inch pipe... 6,500 feet. 6,600 feet. .16,000 feet. There are also several miles of six inch pipe. In addition to the piping of diameters from six to eighteen inches, the necessary quantity of four inch tile has been used to carry water from cellars and down-spouts to the laterals from brick houses for 1,476 families. The lands surrounding the town are well drained by ditches. DEEP SEWERS. In every other street running east and west, and lying between the streets having brick mains for surface drainage, there are sewers made with vitrified pipe which lead to a large reservoir under the water tower, entering it at sixteen feet below the surface of the ground. These glazed pipe sewers are from six to eighteen inches in diameter and constitute another and separate system of drains which carries the sewage proper, by gravity, from houses to the reservoir. This reservoir has a capacity of 300,000 gallons, and the sewage is pumped from it as fast as received and before sufficient time elapses for fermentation to take place. The ventilation of this reservoir is perfect. Flues run from it to the top of the tower above it, and a flue leads from it to the large chimney which takes off the smoke from the fires under the boilers of the Corliss engine. The sewage is sent to the model farm through a twenty inch iron main, and at the farm end of this pipe, it goes into a receiving tank, which contains a screen placed in a vertical position through which substances that are more than half an inch in diameter cannot pass. The pressure of the sewage upon the tile piping in the farm seldom, if ever, exceeds ten pounds to the square inch, provision being made at the pumping station and at the farm to relieve the pipes from greater pressure. About 100 gallons of sewage are now pumped daily for each person of the population. This seems a large amount, but when it is remembered that every tenement is provided with the best of closets and sinks, and that the water taps are all inside the houses it will be seen that a large amount of sewage per capita is unavoidable. THE MODEL FARM. About 140 acres of land have been thoroughly underdrained and piped for the reception of sewage with which these acres are irrigated by means of hose. Hydrants are placed at proper intervals so that the distribution can be easily effected. There is nothing offensive about this work, nor can one detect noxious odors at the pumping station or at the farm. All organic matter in the sewage is at once taken up by the soil and the growing vegetation and the water, making from 100 to 500 parts of the sewage, runs off through the under-drains to ditches, which carry the filtered waters into lake Calumet. Where the sewage water leaves the drains it is as clear and sparkling as spring water, the laborers often drink it. One acre of land will take care of the sewage made by 100 persons. The population is now only 8,500, but there is land enough already prepared to receive the sewage made by a population of 15,000. The pumps now at the pumping station can handle 5,000,000 gallons a day if necessary, and the main to the farm could carry the sewage for a population of 50,000. These pumps are now required to handle about a million gallons a day, coming from the shops, homes and public buildings. All waste products at Pullman are carefully utilized, being transformed by vital chemistry into luxuriant vegetable forms. This farm is now a source of profit, and its products are sold in the market of the country from Boston to New Orleans. THE BUILDINGS. With the scientific drainage and sewage system, in the construction of which nearly one million dollars ($1,000,000), were expended underneath the ground before any thing appeared on its surface, came the erection of the works and the dwellings of the town. It is sufficient to say that the same care exercised in guarding the future health of the place has been bestowed in the erection of works and dwellings. In the center stands the water tower which takes a supply of water from Lake Michigan and distributes it through the town. Underneath this immense tower is the reservoir into which flows the sub-sewage of the place as described. Around the tower are located the principal works; to south and north of the works, chiefly to the south, are the dwellings. The appearance from the railroad as one approaches from Chicago is effective. The neat station; the water tower and the works in front; the park and artificial lakes intervening; to the right a picturesque hotel backed by pretty dwellings; the arcade containing stores, library, theatre, offices, etc.; still further to the right, and beyond, a church which fits into the landscape with artistic effect. The laying out of the whole town has been under the guidance of skilled architects aided by civil engineers and landscape gardeners. The dwellings present a great variety of architecture, yet give harmonious effects. They are not built like the tenement houses of ordinary manufacturing towns where sameness kills beauty and makes the surroundings tame, but a successful effort has been made. to give diversity to architectural design. The streets are wide, well built, and whenever possible parked. The lawns are kept in order by the company; the shade trees are cared for, and all the public work is done under competent supervision. |