IRON MANUFACTURE. While the increase in every department of manufacturing enterprise has been steady and healthful, the various iron furnaces and iron works of different kinds have shown a wonderful augmentation in the capital employed, the number of operatives, and the value of the products. A few years, at our present rate of advancement, will realize the prediction of the distinguished Pennsylvania iron-master, that St. Louis is destined to become the great iron center of the American continent. To illustrate the manner in which the iron business of St. Louis is progressing, we may with propriety refer to a grand enterprise that has been inaugurated since the body of this book was put in type. The "Vulcan Iron Works," established by a company with two millions of capital, and with D. R. Garrison, Esq., as President, will be one of the largest establishments of the kind in America. One of the buildings will be 485x87 feet; one about 200x87, with an L about 190x87 feet. The buildings are being constructed of brick, with slate roofs, and their foundations on the bed-rock. The capacity of the furnaces will be 90 to 100 tons of pig-iron per day, while the rail mill will be able to turn out from 175 to 180 tons of railroad iron every twenty-four hours. At the present value of iron rails ($83 per ton), the annual product of this rail establishment will be nearly or quite $4,000,000—a larger amount than is produced by any single mill in the United States. The mill will employ 350 hands, and the furnaces nearly 100 more, and most of them will be men with families. In connection with this general subject of manufactures, it is proper to state here that we learn from reliable sources that nearly ten millions of capital from the East will be invested in the mechanical industries of St. Louis within the next twelve months. EDUCATION. The public school system of St. Louis will compare favorably with that of any city in the world. Amongst the finest structures in the city are the new school-houses erected to meet the universal demand for "more light." St. Louis has now forty-nine public school-houses, some of them with a capacity to accommodate nearly one thousand pupils, and all of them, with their little army of nearly five hundred teachers, give instruction now to about 25,000 pupils. In addition to these educational facilities, which offer to every child of the city a good English education almost "without money and without price," there are, including universities, colleges, seminaries, private and parochial schools, sixty other institutions of learning within the city, and about 40,000 pupils and students of different grades are being educated in the public and private schools of the city. Income during the last fiscal year for support of public schools, $624,000, of which $522,000 was raised by taxation and $112,000 derived from public funds. CHURCHES. As regards churches, there were found to be 26 Catholic, 18 Lutheran, 16 Methodist, 13 Baptist, 13 Presbyterian, 9 Episcopal, 4 Congregational, 3 Hebrew, 3 Christian, 2 Unitarian, and 2 Swedenborgian. The Mormons or Latter Day Saints have two church organizations, but no church edifice. There is also one organization calling itself Spiritualists, without a church edifice. The estimated capacity of the above is 87,200. Estimated value, $3,552,000. Sunday Schools in the city, 103. The buildings erected or commenced in 1870 number 1,336, at a cost of $5,627,106. Most of these structures are of a very substantial character, built of iron, brick, stone, or marble, and one of them costing upwards of $300,000, and numbers of others more than $50,000 each. LIST OF STEAMERS AND BARGES PLYING BETWEEN ST. LOUIS AND OTHER PORTS DURING 1870, WITH THEIR VALUE AND CARRYING CAPACITY. Steamers, 209; barges, 229; total, 438. Value, $6,844,200; carrying capacity, 236,960 tons. This showing of St. Louis tonnage is largely in advance of previous years. RECEIPTS OF COAL. The receipts of coal during 1870 were 23,931,475 bushels, a large excess over former years, and showing in itself a great increase in the mechanical industries of the city. LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. expenditu TABULAR STATEMENT, Showing the Financial and Taxable Condition of some of the Principal Cities of the United States. 'CITIES. ita, 1870. 22.65 954,613 871,911,327 0.4375 None. 2.1375 0.125 2.70 0.455 0.455 0.455 1.53 Baltimore.. 16 Cincinnati 48 New Orleans... 91 195,000 127,942,781 0.75 396,300 201,326,746 0.70 0.40 1.50 0.40 2.80 Nonc. None. None. 1.80 0.76 3.87 $23,541,605.69 $24.66 $46,811,208.50 7,746,918.94 $79.61 ...... In 1860 we had in the United States twelve cities containing 50,000 inhabitants and upward; we now have twenty-two, one-half of which are east of the Alleghanies, the other half west of them. CITY PARKS. Although St. Louis has quite a number of small parks distributed throughout her corporate limits, which are highly prized by her citizens, it is well known that she has no GREAT PARK, such as is required for her present and future growth. Nor is it possible for her citizens to remain much longer indifferent toward this important matter. At this eventful period of her history the subject of parks is paramount, and, whether many or few, the enlightened sentiment of her people will soon demand that these important improvements be made commensurate with the magnitude and character of the city itself. If this is to be an imperial city-the imperial city of the nation and of the world its foundations should be laid deep and broad in government, in commerce, in industry, in art, in culture, and in such improvements for beauty, for health, and for pleasure, as its future grandeur and greatness will demand. No people build wisely who do not build for the future. It is the sensuous, the slothful, and the ignorant who live in the ever-present time. It is those who have grown from sensation to consciousness-those who realize a material growth in usefulness on this side of the grave-that reach beyond the life of a man, even to remote generations, in their conceptions and works of improvement. It is such that make their earthly homes beautiful, that adorn cities. with parks and gardens. It is a gratifying thought that St. Louis is favored with such men. Mr. Shaw has already proved himself to be a man of more than ordinary refinement and public spirit in the founding and improving of his beautiful Botanical Garden, for which the good people of St. Louis will ever bear him in grateful remem. brance, and testify of him as a benefactor. As returning springs cause the flowers to bloom, will his memory come afresh in the minds of this people, and their hearts will be made glad for the work he leaves behind him. SHAW'S PARK. Not only has he improved the finest garden in America, but also, through his foresight and liberality, contributed to the city, ground adjoining his garden for a fine park, which is now under way of being improved, and before many months will be opened to the citizens of St. Louisa beautiful park, much finer and larger than any the city now has. Although this park is well situated, and will be as a flowery mead in a fairy land, it cannot supply the future wants of the city. |