|
| MONTANA'S BUILDING - The elk which stood so
conspicuously over the portal of Montana was nine feet high, and its
antlers measured ten feet across. This structure measured one
hundred and thirteen feet in width, and was sixty-two feet deep. It
stood beside and east of Utah, next to the
fanciful log cabin of
Idaho, on the northernmost avenue of the park.
It was designed by
Galbraith & Fuller, architects, of Livingston, Montana, and copied
the methods of the Romans, with arches, pediments, pillars and
balustrades in the ancient Italian style. The inscription on the
left, as seen in the engraving, is in Spanish, "Gold and Silver."
The reception rooms on each side of the central arch and lobby were
handsomely furnished and hung with double curtains, where the ladies
of the new-born State might hold their assemblages with as much
pride as their sisters of the oldest commonwealths of New England,
across the avenue. The lobby was twenty-two feet square, and
supported the glass dome which is here seen. This dome was
thirty-eight feet high. Under this dome, on eight panels of pine,
were recorded the principal historical events in the records of the
people. There was a banquet hall, fifty-two by forty feet in area,
and the gallery in which were displayed exhibits that had not been
entered in the State's pavilion elsewhere on the grounds. The
painters of the commonwealth, like those of Washington and other
Western States, here displayed their art, and the mineral showing
was what might be expected of Montana. |
