On the same page with these is shown another strange Philadelphia scraper. Apart from its outline it has no decoration, and what the origin of the design may be it is difficult to determine. To a degree, however, it resembles two crude, ancient battle-axes, the handles forming the scraper bar.
A favorite design consisted of a sort of inverted[132] oxbow with the curved part at the top and the scraper bar taking some ornamental pattern across the bottom from side to side. At the top, both outside and inside the bow, and sometimes down the sides, spiral ornaments were applied in the Florentine manner. Accompanying illustrations show two scrapers of this type at Number 320 South Third Street and another one elsewhere on the same street. The use of a little urn-shaped ornament at the top of the latter scraper is most effective.
At Number 239 Pine Street is seen a scraper employing two large spirals themselves as supports for the scraper bar. The turn of the spiral is here outward as contrasted with the inward turn of the scrapers at Upsala.
A scraper of quaint simplicity standing on one central standard at Vernon, Germantown, suggests the heart as its motive, although having outward as well as inward curling spirals at the top.
Another clever device of Philadelphia ironworkers was to make the foot scraper a part of the iron stair rail. Usually in such a scheme it was also made part of the newel treatment on the lower step of the stoop, but at Seventh and Locust streets, for example, it stands on the second step beside and above the ornate round newel with its surmounting pineapple. Here, as in the case of the simpler handrail in South Seventh Street, one of the iron spindles of the rail is split about a foot from the bottom, and[133] the two halves bent respectively to the right and left until they meet the next spindle on each side, the scraper bar of ornamental outline being fastened across from one to the other of these spindles below. The principal charm of the South Seventh Street rail lies in its extreme simplicity, the twisted section of the spindles near the bottom being a clever expedient. The pleasing effect of the design at Seventh and Locust streets is largely due to appropriate use of the evolute spiral band. Only a little more ornate than the South Seventh Street stair rail is that in South Fourth Street. A special spiral design above the foot scraper, however, virtually becomes a newel in this instance. The same is true of another much more elaborate stair rail at Seventh and Locust streets with its attractive diaper pattern between an upper and lower Grecian band, the whole grille being supported by a graceful three-point bracket.[134]
