VI 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



September, 19 13 



MORGAN DOORS 



Dnor architecture, refinements, durability are brought to their highest perfection 

 in Morgan Doors. No other doors so completely satisfy or serve. No other doors 

 add as much distinction to either the exterior or interior of a dwelling. 



On the top rail of every genuine Morgan Door you can 

 find the stamp of the maker. Every door so stamped is 

 guaranteed. 



Send your name for our book, " The Door Beautiful." Full of unique suggestions 

 for your home. 



Architects will find descriptive details in "Sweet's Index, ' pages 1004 and 1005. 



MORGAN SASH & DOOR COMPANY, Dept. C-21, Chicago, U. S. A. 



FACTORY 



Morgan Company, Oshkosh, Wis. 



DISTRUSTED BY 



Morgan Millwnrk Co., Baltimore, Md. 



Send for catalogue A 28 for pergolas, sun dials and garden 

 iurniture or A 40 ot wood columns 



Hartmann-Sanders Co. 



Manufacturers of 



KOLL'S PATENT LOCK JOINT COLUMNS 



Suitable for 



PERGOLAS.PORCHES 

 or INTERIOR USE 



ELSTON and WEBSTER AVES. 



CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 



Eastern Office 



1123 Broadway, New York City 



What We Will Send You 

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THE CRAFTSMAN 



Room 806 Craftsman Building New York 



THE AMERICAN DOLLAR MARK 



MANY people like to think that the 

 American dollar mark is a corrup- 

 tion of the symbol "U. S.," says The 

 American Numismatist. Others have held 

 to the old historian's idea that it is a re- 

 plica of the pillars of Hercules. Professor 

 Florian Cajori, of Colorado College, has 

 knocked all these pleasing fancies in 

 the head by proving with ancient manu- 

 scripts that the dollar mark is really a 

 corruption of the old Spanish abbrevia- 

 tion of peso — a dollar. 



Professor Cajori looked over thousands 

 of manuscripts to get at his facts. He 

 started with the idea that the dollar mark 

 was an abbreviation of the word "dollar," 

 but, he says, "We had to throw our idea 

 overboard as a useless burden. 



Then he got the clew. When our Span- 

 ish colonists first wrote the word "pesos," 

 one of which is about a dollar, they 

 spelled it out in full. Then it got down to 

 "ps." When it was written hurriedly the 

 "p" and "s" were super-imposed, as he 

 shows from ancient writings, and gradu- 

 ally the dollar mark came into use — the 

 "p" was written over the "s." 



Says Professor Cajori: "It has been es- 

 tablished that the dollar mark is the lineal 

 descendant of the Spanish abbreviation 

 "ps" for "pesos," that the change from 

 the florescent "ps" to $ was made about 

 1775 by English-Americans who came 

 into business relations with Spanish- 

 Americans, and that the earliest printed 

 dollar mark dates back to the year 1797. 



ACORNS AND THEIR USES 



VERY little attention has been given in 

 this country to the utilization of acorns. 

 It is well known that they are used as food 

 for cattle, horses, swine, turkeys, and those 

 of several species of white oaks also form 

 the food of man. 



The acorns of white oaks are mostly large 

 and the trees in general produce fruits very 

 abundantly. The Indians in California al- 

 ways gathered the acorns of the California 

 live oak (Quercus agrifolia) ; and years of 

 great scarcity often caused much misery. 

 Even the early white settlers -of California 

 relied on the crop of acorns as a part of 

 their food supply. The acorns were gath- 

 ered by the squaws, who preserved them by 

 putting them in wicker baskets, which were 

 generally stored in hollow oak trees or .in 

 caches of somewhat rude construction. 

 They were prepared for eating by grinding 

 and boiling them with water into a thick 

 paste, which was baked into bread. The oven 

 consisted of a hole in the ground about eigh- 

 teen inches each way. Red hot stones were 

 placed in the bottom of it and a little dry 

 sand of loam placed over them. Next a 

 layer of dry leaves was spread over this 

 and the dough or paste poured into the hole 

 until it was two or three inches deep. A 

 layer of leaves, more sand, red hot stones, 

 and finally earth were placed on top. At 

 the end of five or six hours the stones had 

 cooled and the bread, which was an irregu- 

 lar mass nearly black in color, was taken 

 out. 



In parts of the South acorns of the cow 

 oak {Quercus michauxii) have been used 

 when roasted as a coffee substitute, and 

 there are a good many other uses to which 

 they might be put. Alcohol can be ex- 

 tracted from them, as from all starchy sub- 

 stances. Starch is at present made princip- 

 ally from rice, corn and potatoes, but if the 

 starch from acorns is sufficiently refined it 

 may be employed as an article of diet as 

 well as for laundry purposes. 





