Public Improvements at St. Louis 



A NEW DEPARTMENT AT THE EXPOSITION 



THE appointment by the directors of 

 the Louisiana Piirchase Exposition 

 of Mr. Albert Kelsey to take com- 

 plete charge of the public improvements 

 section at the St. Louis Fair next year 

 is a well-earned triumph for Mr. Kelsey, 

 and a significant recognition of the Amer- 

 ican League for Civic Improvement. Mr. 

 Kelsey, having accepted this appointment, 

 has already given a day to conference in 

 St. Louis, and will be able to announce 

 the scope and details of the exhibit in the 

 near future. On his return from St. Louis, 



ALBERT KELSEY 



Mr. Kelsey met with the Chicago officers 

 of the American League for Civic Im- 

 provement for the consideration of the 

 St. Louis exhibit, to which it is expected 

 the League will give the heartiest possible 

 cooperation. Mr. Kelsey is a member of 

 the executive board of the League, and it 

 was at the League's second annual con- 

 vention (held at Buffalo in August, 1901) 

 that the first suggestion was made for a 

 Model City exhibition at St. Louis. Mr. 

 Kelsey's department is an official section 

 of the department of Social Economy. 

 His title is Superintendent of the Public 



Improvement Section of this department. 



It is, as yet, too early to give the exact 

 scope and details of the exhibit of which 

 Mr. Kelsey will have charge. He starts 

 for Europe shortly to gather data and sug- 

 gestions for a comparison of American 

 and European municipal progress. 



The history of the Model City idea 

 shows the gradual development of a happy 

 thought. The original resolution was in- 

 troduced at Buffalo by Mr. Kelsey, and 

 unanimously passed. 



A number of other improvement asso- 

 ciations, prominent among them the 

 Architectural League of America, the 

 American Park and Outdoor Art Associ- 

 ation, the T Square Club, of Philadelphia, 

 and the Municipal Art Society of New 

 York, indorsed the Model City idea or 

 afterwards passed indorsing resolutions. 

 The press of the country was also virtually 

 a unit in heartily approving the plan. 

 Several other similar plans were formu- 

 lated by different individuals and organ- 

 izations, but the general idea first sug- 

 gested by Mr. Kelsey has been accepted 

 as a working scheme by the exposition 

 authorities. There is added interest 

 and significance in the fact that the adop- 

 tion of Mr. Kelsey's plan has been due 

 largely to the influence of that remark- . 

 able improvement society, the Civic Im- 

 provement League of St. Louis. 



Mr. Kelsey is a well-known architect 

 of Philadelphia. It is significant of the 

 development of the improvement idea that 

 at the moment of his appointment to head 

 the new department at St. Louis, Mr. 

 Kelsey has also been officially selected to 

 prepare working plans for the beautifying 

 of the Chautauqua Assembly grounds 

 during the next fifty years. The idea is 

 to make Chautauqua a model community 

 and to maintain the highest standard of 

 architecture and landscape gardening. 



