8
THE STUDENTS JOURNAL.
the first story to the roof, and support the floors of the different stories and the book shelves. It is simply a gigantic skeleton in which books are to be packed. The book stack is shut off from the main structure by brick walls and iron doors, so that it seems absolutely fire proof.
A very good idea of the main structure is given by the cut. Built of quarry-faced ashler stone, with red Dakota sandstone trimmings, it has in reality four stories, a sub-cellar, basement, first and second stories. Entering the building by the porch at the western end, we find ourselves on the first floor. On either side of the stairways that lead to the stories above and below is a cloak room, and beyond is a seminary room on the left and the newspaper room on the right. To the east is the reading room, which occupies the largest part of the first floor, and beyond and on a level with it, the fourth story of the book stack, which will, for the present, receive most of the books.
Of the seminary rooms there are seven, the basement story being entirely given up to them. The second story is a large hall, which will be used for receptions and other social events.
We shall now consider the rooms on the first floor, since it will for the present, be most used. The seminary rooms will contain the principal reference books on the subject to which each is devoted, such as Modern Languages, Political Economy, American History. The newspaper room will contain the leading newspapers spread open on newspaper tables, extending around the walls.
The reading room is well fitted to accomplish its design. In the central portion of the room there are to be six long tables for the use of students desiring to read and study. Along the south wall are to be four alcoves securing quiet and freedom from interruption to any one desiring to work. The west wall will have cases containing periodicals; and the north, reference books and the catalogue cases. The eastern end of the reading room is fitted up for the librarian and her assistants. In the center, before the door of the book stack, is the delivery desk, where books are called for and returned; and on either side the offices of the librarian and cat-
aloguer. All the wood work and furniture is beautifully finished in brown ash.
Everything is simple and convenient. To show the systematic manner in which work may be carried on with the convenient arrangements of the new library, we may trace a new book on its way into the building. Boxes of books are unloaded at the sub-cellar. They are there opened and examined, and the books are invoiced, collated, stamped, and classified. They are then placed in one of the book lifts, which carry books to any story of the building, and taken up to the cataloguer's room on the first story Here they are catalogued and then placed in the book stack ready for any one who wishes to use them.
The building must be seen to be appreciated. Those students who will enjoy its advantages may consider themselves very fortunate.
THE ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING BUILDING.
Fully as handsome as the building just described, will be that of Electrical Engineering, if we may judge from the basement story which is now almost completed, and from the picture of the building, taken from the architect's plans, which appears in the cut just below the Spooner Library. It will be a three story building, 108 feet long, 86 feet wide and about 100 feet high. Cottonwood Falls limestone is the material of the basement walls, and Berea sandstone of the first and second stories. The woodwork of the basement is to be of yellow pine, that of the other stories red oak.
Of most interest at present is the heating system which is being put in the building. Southwest of the Electrical Engineering building, on the edge of the hill,a fan house,16x30 feet,is to be built. The larger part of the interior will be occupied by a huge steam coil, supplied with steam from the power house. Air,hot from its passage through this coil,will be forced by a fan at the upper end of the fan house through a tunnel that leads into the Electrical Engineering building, and there divides into many smaller ducts leading to the various rooms of the basement,and within the walls to the floors above. Cold air is also forced by the fan through a separate tunnel into the larger rooms.The tunnel