17 
July, 1917 
SILK CORD — FLEXIBLE 
How a Little Foresight Can Eliminate This Electrical Appendage 
and Make the Lighting of the House a Finer and a Better Thing 
VIOLA BROTHERS SHORE 
I T droops listlessly from the chandelier 
in the living room to the table lamp. 
It trails its sinuous length along the ma¬ 
hogany baseboard of the music room to the 
piano light. It pursues its insurance-defy¬ 
ing course through doorways and transoms. 
It crosses the dining room at exactly the 
height which disturbs the studied placidity 
of the three top hairs of your head. It 
dangles impotently from a hook on the 
kitchen wall awaiting the moment when 
you, dispossessing the electric bulb from 
the socket, shall insert the electric iron plug. 
In color it is a poisonous, harmony-wreck¬ 
ing green, or a white in the past perfect 
tense. Habitat, everywhere. Few homes 
are free of its serpentine insidiousness. 
Actually, it is a touching little monu¬ 
ment to the carelessness with which most 
home builders treat what really has an im¬ 
portant bearing on home beauty and com¬ 
fort—very important when you consider 
that the man of the house and most of his 
guests see more of his home by electric 
light than they do by daylight. 
There is a simple reason for this neglect. 
The cost of building most houses runs far 
above the originally planned outlay, and 
by the time the item of lighting is reached 
there is very little disposition to do any¬ 
thing but get off as cheaply as possible. 
There is also another reason. 
In view of the recent develop¬ 
ments in the field of electric ser¬ 
vice in the home, not every archi¬ 
tect can be expected to have a 
specialized knowledge of the sub¬ 
ject, or do more than treat it in a 
generally conscientious way. In 
fact, his electric specifications are 
sometimes omnipotently vague— 
little more than “Let there be 
light!” And there is light—after 
a fashion. 
The Illuminating Expert 
The safest course to pursue is 
to insist on the services of a com¬ 
petent illuminating engineer in 
planning your electric layout and 
drawing up your specifications. 
For a comparatively small sum 
you may secure the services of an 
experienced man who has a spe¬ 
cialized knowledge on the subject 
of the requirements of home il¬ 
lumination — not a contractor, 
electrician or engineer, but an il¬ 
luminating expert. This is not 
only logical, but economical as 
well, since it costs three times as 
much to install wiring in a house 
already completed. 
The average home builder looks 
over a set of blue prints in a 
vague, hopeful manner, and with 
fine trust and visible relief feels 
that his wiring needs are being 
amply provided for when he sees, 
under the guiding point of the 
architect’s pencil, some marks 
which represent, say, a center outlet in 
each of the rooms, a hall light, a drop 
light for the dresser in the first master’s 
bedroom and—if the architect is in a reck¬ 
lessly generous mood—two base receptacles 
in the living room. 
Then, after the home has been finished 
and decorated, he finds he needs not only 
extra lights here, there and everywhere, 
but provision for practical electrical ap¬ 
pliances as well. He calls in a contractor 
who demands an apparently exorbitant 
price. This he either pays, watching with 
mingled emotions the relations between a 
$2-a-day helper and sundry finer mold¬ 
ings, carvings and plasterings, or he refuses 
to pay, and resorts to green cord. All this 
is as common as it is unnecessary, and re¬ 
quires but the proper attention beforehand 
to be completely eliminated. 
Lighting Generalities 
First of all, let us consider the general 
subject of illumination, without going into 
details of fixtures and glassware. Many 
experts claim that light from concealed 
sources, being the nearest approach to 
natural light, is the only scheme to be en¬ 
tertained. On the other hand, many ex¬ 
cellent decorators depend almost entirely 
upon lamps and artistically executed and 
shaded light units. Somewhere between 
these two extremes lies the plane of your 
own taste, bounded by the lines of your 
own needs. 
Consider seriously what will best suiv 
your individual requirements in each room, 
and select your type of lighting accordingly. 
Plan your lighting in a general way before¬ 
hand, and if you want a central light and 
six lamps in your living room, make provi¬ 
sion for all six lamps. Do not go about it 
with the vague idea that you can always 
have some sort of arrangement rigged up 
for an extra lamp or two. 
Have you valuable paintings in which 
you take especial pride ? Plan for the 
room in which you are going to hang them 
and the sort of light that will show them 
to the best advantage. 
Totally indirect lighting is splendid for 
paintings, since it throws no shadows. Or 
perhaps you have just one magnificent 
painting, which you know you are going to 
hang on the south wall, where it will be the 
chief point of interest in your room. If it 
deserves all the attention you have be¬ 
stowed upon it, it certainly deserves the 
proper light to bring it out. 
It is rather a good idea, in the matter of 
lighting, not to let your artistic impulses 
run away with your practical sense. Light, 
after all, has a distinctily utili¬ 
tarian aspect. One highly artistic 
woman of my acquaintance re¬ 
fused to have any electric lights 
in her dining room, which was 
pure Colonial, and consequently 
demanded candles. She found to 
her dismay that while candle light 
is charming, there are times when 
the good old Edison current has 
its decided advantages, and intro¬ 
ducing it into a finished room 
means a great deal of inconveni¬ 
ence at best. 
The wiring of each room is an 
interesting problem. In the bed¬ 
room do not overlook the reading 
light over the bed or beside the 
bed on a night stand, and the pos¬ 
sible need for a warming pad. 
For curling irons, the dressing 
rooms or the bathrooms should 
have a convenient connection. 
There should be one for the vi¬ 
brator as well. You do not want to 
unscrew an electric bulb to use it. 
What the Nursery Needs 
The nursery will need a place 
to connect the bottle warmer and 
the heating pad. And if you are 
not one of the old-fashioned ad¬ 
vocates of the experience method 
of teaching, and believe that 
Baby can learn from books at a 
later date all she needs to know 
about electric shocks, why there 
are special receptacles into which 
she can poke a fat, inquisitive fin- 
(Continued on page 62) 
The child-proof floor plug is shocking only to the 
upholders of the education - by - experience theory 
