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PLANS OF HAVEN SCHOOL-BUILDING, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS.

THE HAVEN SCHOOL-BUILDING, named after LUTHER HAVEN, the President of the Board of Education at the time, and who had been an active member of the same since 1851, is located on Wabash Avenue, south of Twelfth Street. The lot has a frontage of 150 feet. The buiding is three stories high, besides a basement and an attic. The plans here shown are of the principal story and the attic, the latter of which is 14 feet high in the clear, and contains a hall 66 feet by 38 feet 8 inches, for general exercises of the school, with closets for apparatus, teachers'

closets, and wardrobes attached; and a Gymnasium in which the female pupils

of the school may exercise, in inclement weather. Owing to the peculiar con

struction of the roof, this attic story is quite as serviceable for the purpose for which it was designed, as would have been either of the full stories, and it cost much less. The basement is mainly divided into four large rooms, with corridors, and stairways; one of the rooms being used for fuel, and the balance as a place of recreation for the boys, in foul weather. The principal or ground floor, (one of the two shown in the annexed engraving, Fig. 2..) has four school-rooms, each having a wardrobe and teacher's closet attached; spacious corridors, with entrances on each side of the house for pupils, and a principal entrance in

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front. The side doors do not open directly into the corridors, but into vestibules, from which, other doors open to the corridors and also to the stairways leading to the basement. The second and third floors only differ from the first in having windows, in place of the outside doors and vestibules of the first floor; and the second floor has a reception or Principal's retiring room, about 10 by 20 feet, cut off from that part of the corridor towards the front of the house.

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By an examination of the plans, it will be seen that the pupils in passing to and from the school-rooms, will generally pass through the wardrobes. Each of these rooms are wainscoted from the floor up about 24 feet, and the corridors and wardrobes from 5 to 7 feet, with boards, neatly grained and varnished, (as is all the interior wood-work,) and above these on each side of the rooms are blackboards.

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The rooms are ventilated through the large ventilating shafts or buttresses in the exterior walls. The building is 68 by 86 feet on the ground, and each school-room 27 by 33 feet, and 13 feet high. The exterior (Fig. 1,) is in a plain Americo-Italian style of architecture; is entirely devoid of any thing like ornamentation, save in its bold projecting buttresses which form the ventilating and chimney shafts before mentioned; its deeply recessed doorway in front, with massive buttresses on each side; and its elegant Mansard roof, the steep sloping sides of which, covered with slate, and pierced with Dormer windows, gives it altogether a unique and pleasing effect. Externally, the finish of the basement to the principal floor is stone. Above this the building is faced with red pressed brick, neatly pointed, and has stone-dressings to doors, windows, buttresses, etc. The building is warmed by a boiler located in a room at the rear of the building, and covered with a lean-to roof rising no higher than the basement.

The boiler is of the tubular form, twelve feet long by forty-two inches in diameter, of quarter inch best American iron, steam dome 24 by 20 inches, with forty-one three inch flues, grate bars four feet by four feet, boiler set in double eight inch walls with full cast iron front, braced with 6 inch bolts through each way, with cast iron braces outside le and inside the walls.

The whole amount of pipe in Haven School is 13,294 feet, of which mains and returns contain 3,102 feet, and inch coil pipes, 10,192 feet. In each school-room there is one large coil of 530 feet, of inch pipe and one small coil of 50 feet, making 145 square feet of radiating surface in the coils.

There is an average amount in addition to the above of sixteen square feet in the mains and returns in each room, which makes the total amount of radiating surface in each room 161 square feet, which gives one square foot of radiating surface to 75 cubic feet of air. This we think may be set down as a rule for low pressure heating, when the pressure is not to exceed from 5 to 15 lbs.

In the corridor, there are four coils containing 1,500 feet of 4 inch pipe; in the Hall there are two coils containing 1,000 feet 4 inch pipe; in the Gymnasiam there are two coils containing 792 feet, and in the Reception Room one coil containing 100 feet 4 inch pipe.

In the dedicatory exercises of this house, the President of the Board, Mr. Haven, remarked :—

My acquaintance with the public schools of Chicago, commenced in the winter of 1851-twelve years since. From that time to this, I have occupied a seat in this Board. In 1851, there were but four public school buildings in the city. Those buildings accommodated less than 1,700 pupils. The Franklin and the Washington, one on the north and the other on the west side of the river, were erected that year, each with capacity to accommodate 340 pupils. In 1856, the Moseley was erected on the south side, and the Ogden on the north, accommodating 693 pupils each. In 1857, two more of the same capacity as the last were erected on the west side the Brown and the Foster. In 1858, the Newberry was erected, seating 1,260 pupils, and in 1859, the Skinner, of the same size and character. The new and elegant school building on Wabash

Avenue was completed during the past year, with a capacity for 756 pupils. In addition to this building, five branches have been built, making an aggregate number of seats provided during the year just closed, of 2,420, nearly double the number furnished in any one preceding year. In 1857, the High School building was erected, with a capacity for 360 pupils; making a total number of seats provided for the children of this city, 10,995. In 1851, less than 1,700 pupils could be accommodated with seats in our schools-to-day, more than 11,000! It is proper here to say, that the buildings provided during this time have been of the most substantial character, so that now few cities can boast of more ample accommodations for those due at the school-rooms, and few if any can equal us in the beauty of our houses, the completeness of their plans and furnishing, or in the thoroughness of their construction. These buildings have cost the city,) a little over $300,000.

W. H. WELLS, Superintendent of Public Schools, spoke substantially as follows: Notwithstanding Chicago was somewhat distinguished for the frequency and enthusiasm of its conventions and celebrations, this was the first instance in which the friends of education had come together for the dedication of a school building. He alluded to the rapid progress of the public schools. No other city in the Union has so early in its history manifested such a degree of liberality in the establishment of a High School for the education of both sexes. In Boston, a public Latin School was instituted as early as the seventeenth century, and an English High School more than forty years ago; but these schools provided for the instruction of boys only, and the arrangements for a Girls' High School were not perfected till within the last ten years. The Central High School of Philadelphia was organized about a quarter of a century ago, and during the first ten years of its existence was without a rival in the completeness of its appointments and the extent of its course of instruction, But it receives only boys, and it was not till after the opening of the Chicago High School that Philadelphia established a High School for girls. The Free Academy of New York was organized in 1849. Like the Philadelphia High School it embraces a course of instruction that is equal to an ordinary college course, and has the power of conferring the usual college degrees; but it is for boys only, and no special provision has yet been made in the great metropolis of the country for the higher education of girls.

He then alluded to the advantages of a new city establishing a system of public instruction. We can profit by all the successes and failures of those who have gone before us. In an old city, defective systems once established, can not easily be rooted up. In a new city, we have no such prejudices to contend with. In olden cities, the question whether the sexes should be educated together has already been discussed for more than a score of years, and it will probably require another score of years to dispose of it. In Chicago we have omitted all discussion on this point, and demonstrated by actual experiment, to the satisfaction of all parties, that the sexes are best educated together.

The speaker then alluded particularly to the efforts that have been made to improve the character of the Primary Schools. More than half of all our public instruction is given in the Primary Schools, and a large portion of the children do not remain in school long enough to pass into the higher departments at all. He had devoted much the larger portion of his time to the primary grades, and the Board of Education had introduced many important improvements in

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