Each
month picturesque event followed graphic happening, and never was
unwritten history more readily read by the young, or the memories of the
older folk more catered to than in this series which won new friends for
the magazine on every hand.
XXI. A Signal Piece of Constructive Work
The influence of his grandfather and the injunction of his grandmother
to her sons that each "should make the world a better or a more
beautiful place to live in" now began to be manifest in the grandson.
Edward Bok was unconscious that it was this influence. What directly led
him to the signal piece of construction in which he engaged was the
wretched architecture of small houses. As he travelled through the
United States he was appalled by it. Where the houses were not
positively ugly, they were, to him, repellently ornate. Money was wasted
on useless turrets, filigree work, or machine-made ornamentation. Bok
found out that these small householders never employed an architect, but
that the houses were put up by builders from their own plans.
Bok felt a keen desire to take hold of the small American house and make
it architecturally better. He foresaw, however, that the subject would
finally include small gardening and interior decoration. He feared that
the subject would become too large for the magazine, which was already
feeling the pressure of the material which he was securing. He
suggested, therefore, to Mr.
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