HOW NOT TO DO IT. 



SOME HELPFUL SUGGESTIONS IN URBAN ORNAMENTATION AND ECONOMICS. 



UR COUNTRY is young among na- 

 tions, but it is old enough to have 

 witnessed the rise and decline of 

 towns whose stories are fruitful of 

 useful lessons, if people would only 

 heed them. Let us take a single 

 example and call it Bolton. The 

 place seems to have steadily de- 

 clined, while others in the neighbor- 

 hood, with fewer and less important advantages, 

 have maintained or increased their prosperity. So- 

 cial causes have no doubt to some extent produced 

 these disastrous results ; but why have they worked 

 such evils here and failed to injure other places no 

 more blameless ? I maintain that it is because the 

 Boltonians have followed false prophets and ne- 

 glected and disfigured their natural advantages. 



All towns, old and young, wish to add to the num- 

 ber of their desirable inhabitants, and resort to dif- 

 ferent methods of attracting strangers, and from 

 these methods result glorification or ruin. The 

 means in use at Bolton at one time attracted wealth 

 and numbers, but refinement was not encouraged ; 

 the natural beauties were destroyed and replaced 

 by no artificial ones. The broad, liberal and aes- 

 thetic policy inaugurated by the early inhabitants 

 has been contracted or abandoned until in this 

 generation the evils of the present policy are ap- 

 parent to all ; yet they cling to worse than dubious 

 ways. Had the town been kept attractive, it would 

 have drawn more than the wealth that has been 

 employed to corrupt politics and society, and it 

 would maintain its former high standing instead of 

 being a reproach to its inhabitants. 



Let us take a short review of its history, which 

 runs back over two eventful centuries. The first 

 proprietors, unlike those of most of our later towns, 

 were men of wealth, refinement and education, lib- 

 eral in their ideas beyond their own and our times, 

 and able to make a practicable application of them 

 as fine as it was unusual. Situated on a beautiful 

 and well-wooded peninsula jutting into an arm of 

 the Atlantic ocean, Bolton has a climate equalled 

 by that of few places on our coast. Over two hun- 

 dred years ago a royal engineer from England laid 

 out a beautiful town, with wide streets at right an- 

 gles, or in graceful, sweeping curves to conform to 



the topography of the district. Wise restrictions 

 were placed upon builders, and although the land 

 was valuable private property from the first, the 

 proprietors gave a large and beautiful "common" 

 for the use of the public as long as the town shall 

 stand. Succeeding generations have allowed build- 

 ings to be erected on parts of this along some the 

 street fronts, obstructing the view, occupying the 

 land and presenting to the common the backs of foul 

 and unsightly structures ; and this was done while 

 there was plenty of land the occupation of which 

 would have preserved one of the beauties of the 

 town. An old ordinance wisely declares that the 

 streets running to the water should be kept open to 

 the public forever. The beauty and fresh air the 

 town derives from this source are a self-evident 

 blessing. Yet the town itself violates this good pro- 

 vision by placing unsightly wooden buildings on the 

 water fronts of two of the most populous streets. 



The first proprietors set off a portion of their 

 land, the income from which was to be devoted to 

 the maintenance of schools. At first the only renta^ 

 derived from it was a small one from pasturage or 

 farming land, but the generation now living con- 

 ceived the idea that by running streets through it 

 and giving longer leases to householders the income 

 could be increased. This idea, excellent in itself, 

 was so miserably carried out, by cutting the district 

 up into narrow lanes and miserable alley-ways, that 

 only a poor class of people who are able to pay only 

 small rents can be induced to live there, and as these 

 have their leases the hope of improvement by adopt- 

 ing a better plan seems shut out for years. 



The early inhabitants practiced horticulture suc- 

 cessfully and profitably ; fruit was abundant and 

 the large surplus realized good returns when sent 

 to other places. Now it is doubtful if anything in 

 the way of fruit, except a few strawberries, ever 

 finds its way to market from here. Although the 

 few farmers and gardeners pay far more than their 

 proportionate share of the taxes, their property 

 being in full view and assessed at its full value, for 

 it cannot be easily hidden from the assessors like 

 stocks or bonds, yet so poor is the protection of the 

 local police and so lenient the public sentiment to- 

 wards fruit stealing, that the owners of once profit- 

 able orchards have cut them down rather than sub- 



