Our first century: being a popular descriptive portraiture of the one hundred great and memorable events of perpetual interest in the history of our country, political, military, mechanical, social, scientific and commercial: embracing also delineations of all the great historic characters celebrated in the annals of the republic; men of heroism, statesmanship, genius, oratory, adventure and philanthropy . thing, lightbeing communicated to the interiorthrough the lantern, and also in part fromthe sides, pierced for thirty-two orna-mental windows, these being glazed withstained glass one-eighth
Our first century: being a popular descriptive portraiture of the one hundred great and memorable events of perpetual interest in the history of our country, political, military, mechanical, social, scientific and commercial: embracing also delineations of all the great historic characters celebrated in the annals of the republic; men of heroism, statesmanship, genius, oratory, adventure and philanthropy . thing, lightbeing communicated to the interiorthrough the lantern, and also in part fromthe sides, pierced for thirty-two orna-mental windows, these being glazed withstained glass one-eighth of an inch thick,and representing the arms of the Unionand of its several States,—a feature whichformed no inconsiderable part of the inte-rior decoration, and won the admiration ofevery beholder, foreign as well as Ameri-can. The enamel, with which the whole of theglass used in the structure was covered,was laid upon the glass with a brush, and,after drying, subjected to the intense heatof a kiln, by which the coating became vit-rified, and as durable as the glass itself ;the effect produced being similar to that 604 OUR FIRST CENTURY.—1776-1876. of ground glass, translucent but not trans-parent, the suns rays, diffused by passingtluough it, yielding an agreeable light,—deprived of that intensity of lieat andglare which is so peculiar to them in thisclimate. In the absence of a similar pre-. raution in the London crystal palace,whoso roofs, as well as walls, were inclosedwith transparent glass, it was found nec-essary to cover the interior of the buildingwith canvas, to produce the requiredshade. The external walls of the New York building were of cast-iron framingand panel-work, into which were insertedthe sashes of the windows and the louversfor ventilation. But the rapid and unexpected increaseof applications for space by exhibitors, ledto the erection of a large addition to thestructure thus described. It consistedof two parts, of one and two stories re-spectively,
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookpublishersprin, bookyear1876
