THE THING THAT IMPRESSED ME MOST AT THE EXPOSITION
By KatKryn Wilson
THE best art is that which most wholly practical man who is interested in fitly embodies the characteris- the problems of production and who ap- tics of its subject, preserves tlie predates what it means to fell and saw harmonies and emphasizes the and skid such massive bulk out of its na- aesthetic qualities that make it tive forest and down to the waters of the worthy of reproduction. In these days Columbia, where it floats for seventy-five of rather indiscriminate architecture, miles before entering the Willamette and where little attention is paid to the eternal passing on to the Exposition grounds. To fitness of things from an artistic stand- him also it means much that these huge point, it is gratifying to find a structure sections of timber have been raised by that meets so many of these requirements powerful mechanical means, piled one up- as does the Forestry building at the on another, hewed, mortised, and made Lewis and Clark Exposition. firm with wooden pegs, to evolve finally Situated as it is on one of the highest into a great building in the construction elevations on the grounds, surrounded by of which no carpentry has entered, snow-capped peaks, wooded hills, and But to the imaginative mind which per- sloping terraces mirrored in the clear ceives less of the practical than the pic- waters of a natural lake, the edifice is at turesque, there is also a certain poetical once the most unique, the most pic- significance in the structure — a signifi- turesque and the most impressive of them cance that personifies the whole history all. With the possible exception of the of the West.
California building, whose mission style As one enters the door of the build- very adequately recalls the first archi- ing and comes immediately into the tecture of the sunny state, the Forestry presence of these monarchs of the forest, building is the only one which is really it is like being transported suddenly out representative of a locality. All the of the confused activities of a trivial pres- others, beautiful as they are, have been ent into the solemn hush of a mysterious constructed along conventional lines past. With the first breath of pungent which reflect various influences typical of air, fragrant with the incense of the pines, a universal rather than a speciflc civiliza- with the first view of immense colonnades tion. The Forestry building, however, outlining a great nave through the center represents not only a particular place, but and cutting off chapels on either side, with it stands at once for the history of the the soft notes of an organ whispering past, the accomplishments of the present, through its lofts and aisles, one finds him- and the possibilities of the future, and self involuntarily reverential in a cathe- thus personifies all the principles for dral whose deity is Nature. Here is a which the Exposition itself was organ- memory of the forest primeval, of those ized, first temples which for ages have minis- To the utilitarian who sees in the struc- tered to the needs of living things, and ture only those great commercial at- which sheltered that explorer who came tributes which it embodies, the enumera- with axe and compass to blaze the first tion of its statistical features is of para- trail from the known into the unknown, mount interest. The fact that two miles In the logs themselves, strong, sturdy, of logs five and six feet in diameter, eight and enduring, one sees embodied the miles of poles, and tons of sliingles and characteristics of those pioneers who fol- slabs were used to produce it, is of itself lowed in the path of the leader and who remarkable. When it is learned further came as an advance guard to the army that each of these logs is from thirty to of settlers behind them. Powerful in fifty feet long and contains lumber enough physical strength, firm, steadfast, bearing to build a one-story cottage forty by forty a rough exterior, but staunch, true-hearted feet, there is left nothing at which to and vigorous within, they, too, have per- niarvel. These things appeal to the formed their work and accomplished
