4-02 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



October, 1908 



A Modern Spring House 



Dome-shaped Spring-House at Andalusia 



Old but Still Useful 



ing an ice-cold waterway in which milk 

 cans are set, and pans of cold custard, or 

 whatever is to be kept or served deliriously 

 cold. 



The clear cold spring that runs in at one 

 end of the stone structure flows directly 

 into this waterway, continues down one side 

 of the house and around the other end, 

 where there is an outlet for draining off the 

 surplus. The interior walls are plastered 

 from floor to roof, and with the plain brick 

 floor surface meeting the cement waterway 

 and the plaster wall there is no woodwork 

 to decay from dampness, and for the peri- 

 odical cleansing a thorough hosing of floor 

 and walls, and the draining, sweeping, 

 flushing and refilling of the waterway, 

 keeps this delightful food and milk room 

 hygienically clean with little difficulty. 



For twenty-five dollars — or even some- 

 what less, it is asserted — a springhouse has 

 been built on the Dickinson estate, near 

 Crescentville, of patriotic fame. As it is 

 of generous dimensions — about fourteen 

 by twenty feet — with deep underground 

 walls and peaked roof, and with sheltering 

 porch at the entrance-way, one readily 

 surmises that this price necessitated an 

 abundance of fieldstone to be had for the 

 gathering, and also owner-building. In 

 this instance, however, a stone mason's ap- 

 prentice made a slight expense for work; 

 a tight shingle roof, an extra door at the 

 back and flooring boards for the interior 

 brought the cost of material and stone lay- 

 ing near the twenty-five dollar mark, while 

 the carpenter work, as well as the greater 

 part of the stone work, was finished by the 

 owner. This structure presents a novel 

 feature of a second story. The entrance 

 beneath the sheltering porch at the front 

 leads down a few steps into low, cool 

 depths, with a cemented floor; just above 

 this entrance door flooring boards have 

 been laid to form a ceiling of the lower 

 floor and the floor of the upper. The 

 boards, however, are laid in the form of 

 slats instead of forming a close-fitting 

 floor, thus forming a cool upper storage 

 room with a narrow entrance at the back. 



Another two-story springhouse is found 

 at Hartsville, Pa., that is of novel type, as 

 the roomy old-time structure where Wash- 

 ington and his army quenched their thirst 

 in Revolutionary days has of late years 

 been divided into three small rooms — one 

 of the lower rooms, now a mere corner of 

 the structure, containing the spring; the ad- 

 joining room being a tight, well ventilated, 

 window-lighted storeroom, and the upper 

 floor or loft room fitted up as a storeroom 

 or children's playhouse. 



In the Blue Mountains there are many 

 low, stone springhouses thoroughly char- 

 acteristic of the mountain homes adjoining 

 — long and rambling, built substantially of 

 stone, with over-hanging eaves, and nestled 

 down in the wildwood shrubbery of rhodo- 

 dendrons and laurels, close beside a gush- 

 ing, singing, sparkling mountain stream. 



