Evening Star Newspaper, September 8, 1929, Page 89

Fiction PART 7. _filaga;ine : C., SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1929. The Sunlyy Stax New White House HAT big pile of gray stone at Seven- teenth street and Pennsylvania ave- nue, known as the State, War and Navy Building, has made funny faces at President Hoover once too often. If the President has his way about it, the Capital’s famous “architectural monstrosity,” to use Mr. Hoover's characterization, is going to bhave its face lifted. The building’s antiquated Victorian coun- . tenance has become a nightmare to him, it ap- pears. Living up on S street hill, Mr. Hoover was able to get away from its gaudy con- glomeration of architectural styles, but when “he moved into the White House he found there was no escape from it. ' Washington’s greatest architectural “blunder” had become his next-door neighbor. Long before he became President, Mr. Hoo- ver had interested himself in the State, War and Navy Building. He wanted to find the whys and wherefores of its existence, to know who permitted its mansard head to rear itself above the stately dignity of the White House and the Ionic simplicity of the Treasury Build- ing. He could not but feel that this blemish on "Washington’s otherwise classic features must _have been an architectural accident that had nosed its way, somehow, into the midst of the Capital’s esthetic serenity. Inquiry convinced him the building actually was more or less of an “accident.” He has been advised that Congress seems to have in- tended the structure to resemble the Treasury Building, but that in the hysteria over Renais- sance architecture the designer just couldn't resist the urge to “go European.” T was just about the time that mansard roofs were running riot qver American residences, too, and it was but natural that some of our public buildings should be caught in the epi- demic. Not that mansard roofs and Victorian types of architecture are not desirable in their proper places, but certainly such things are out of harmony with the general scheme of classic treatment accorded most of the Federal edifices here. President Hoover believes in plalnness of speech as well as plainness of architecture. On more than one occasion he has referred to the State Department home as a “monstrosity” or “absurdity.” He thinks something should be done about it without delay. Any but an engineering-minded President would have suggested tearing the whole struc- ture d-vm 214 - nlancing it with a more suitable President Hoover Is Fostering Proposal. to Reconstruct Victorian State, War and propriated half a million dollars on March 3, 1871, to start work on the project. The act provided: <7 “That the sum of $500 be and hereby is ap- propriated . . . for the construction, under the direction of the Secretary of Siate, on the southerly portion of the premises now occupied by the War and Navy Departments, a build- Navy Building as Duplicate of - imsvco'vn torm tre soun wing o s bust - T'reasury in Keeping With Original, Rejected Plans of Philadelphia. Architect, Which Were Found In 0ld State Department Files. By Rex Collier. . building. This would involve an outlay of more than 10 millions of dollars, it is estimated. That is a lot of money for the budget-balancers worry about. o The President had heard of a suggestion that the lavishly ornamented shell of the present building could be stripped off and replaced by one more in sympathy with the simple motif of other Federal buildings. A cursory personal investigation satisfied Engineer Hoover the pro- posal was within the realm of possibility, and subsequent expert advice corroborated the Pres- ident’s belief. His decision to urge congres- sional action followed promptly. He announced he would seek an appropriation of $2,500,000 for the work. The discovery that the State, War and Navy Building was first projected as a duplicate of the Treasury Building seems to have been made by Waddy B. Wood, local architect, in conver- sation with F. W. Hoover, chief of the buildings division of the office of Public Buildings and Public Parks. Whils rummaging through some yellowed and dusty files in the basement of the State Department structure some years ago, Mr. Hoover came upon several plans showing the White House, Treasury, State Department unit “as proposed.” In each of these plans there was a perspective showing the projected State Department Building as a virtual dupli- cate of the Treasury. ‘These drawings were signed by George U. Walter, noted Philadelphia architect, who de- signed the dome of the Capitol and the com- pleted Treasury Building. The Treasury col- onnade on Fifteenth street previously had been created by Robert Mills, ONE of the Walter drawings was dated 1854— 17 years prior to passage of the bill au- thorizing construction of a home for the State Department. The wording of that act would seem to bear out the contention that Congress had in mind a building like the Treasury when it ap- ground plan and dimensions -to- the Treasury Building, and nrovide accommodations for the - State, War and iNavy Departments; the build- “ing to be of such kind of stone as may here« after be determined by the concurrent deci« " sion of the committees of public buildings and “grounds of the Senate and House of Repres sentatives; three stories in height, with base- ' ment and attic, and of fireproof construction, * . For some unknown reason Mr. Walter’s plans . were forgotten or rejected. A.'B. Mullett was supervising architect of the Treasury at the ' time and he undertook to prepare a design his own. Apparently Mr. Mullett did not think “so much of the Treasury design of Mr. Walter, . for he proceeded fo create something far dif- ferent. : : ' . . Technically, it cannot be said of Mr. Mullett ' that he actually disobeyed the will of C “A careful reading of the act no . vinced him that he need have the. _ing conform to the Treasury only in .plan and dimensions.” That mean interior arrangemgnt of the building m _semble that of the Treasury Building, bu was nothing in the act to compel the exterior like the Treasury. He that it didn’t. Presumably the design was -proved, as required by the act, by the heads of the three departments, which were to be housed in the building. i The south wing was begun in 1871 and was ready for occupancy four years later. The en= tire building practically was completed in 1888, -at a cost of about $11,000,000. Final touches -were not completed until 1893, T s g 3 ! % .chief criticism has been that the European -drchitecture of the building is a-discordant note dn an otherwise harmonious symphony. - -~On the other hand high Government offi- and Navy Building.