VIALE GRISCOM, AMERICAN VILLAGE, MESSINA. Page 431.
up. I said I thought the plan the King had spoken of as his idea—the drawing of the cottages by lots—was the only way, in spite of the fact that some undeserving people might be housed while people of higher grade, really the greatest sufferers, might get nothing.”
The day after Mr. Roosevelt’s visit the Camp was astir early. The Ambassador breakfasted with the officers and master carpenters in the mess-room; in spite of the pouring rain, he was off before eight o’clock with Belknap on a tour of inspection. He was delighted with everything, had a good word for everybody. More than twelve hundred men were now employed at Messina, Reggio, Sbarre and the smaller places, where our Lilliputian “wooden palaces” were going up. The Ambassador, who had kept in touch with every step of the work, now saw it “in full swing,” saw the working of the system, the organization of the army of labor. There were corps for clearing the ground, stacking the lumber, delivering the building materials, and for cleaning up. There were interpreters, mostly Sicilians, who had been in America, carters and water-boys. The Sicilian and Calabrian carpenters all served an apprenticeship in the “shop.” Here under the keen eye of Phillips, the carpenter in charge, each man was tested, and then taught to do one thing,—whatever he proved fittest for. To build one hundred houses a week was Belknap’s ambition; sometimes he fell short, oftener he exceeded the number. This is the way the thing was done:
First on the ground came Cook—ship’s carpenter from the “Celtic,” a Boston man—with his gang. They cleared the land (the peasants had already cut down the lemon trees), smoothed and leveled the soil, drove the foundation posts, laid the sills.
Second, came Emerson, the Philadelphian, and his gang of framers. They put up the side studs, the roof frame, the gable ends (made in the shop), and laid the floor joists.
Third, came Cox of Brooklyn with his gang. They placed the end studs, the door and window frames, their “cripples,” and the kitchen framing. When the work of these two framing gangs was done, they passed on, leaving a skeleton house behind them.
Now came one of the four enclosing gangs, organized by Neil Mackay, a canny Scot, king of carpenters they called him. There were fifty men in each enclosing gang, with one of their own number for leader, who was made responsible for the tools. At seven every morning each gang was given its tool-box; a close tally of the contents was kept, and at night the precious tools must be returned intact. The enclosing gang made more of a showing than the others. They took a skeleton house and clothed it with clapboards and floors; so that the roofers—who came next with their Sicilian capo (boss), Ferrara—found something that looked a good deal like a house. After the roofers had put on the roof, the finishers came. They hung the doors, fitted and glazed the windows, put on locks and fastenings, added the steps. When the carpenters were done with the house, the bricklayers and masons took hold and built the famous kitchen, putting in a stovepipe to make all complete, and in their turn making room for the painters. These men gave each cottage two coats of white paint, green doors and trimmings and dark neutral-colored base, “so that the mud splashed up by the rain would not show.”
When Mr. Griscom had seen the different gangs at work, he went to inspect the foundations of the hotel. While he was admiring the neat brick arches, the royal automobile whizzed up to take the Ambassador, Belknap and J. to the Villaggio Regina Elena, to meet the Queen. Having seen and approved the plans for the hospital and houses the Ambassador had promised to build in the American quarter of her model village, she wished to see the site the buildings would occupy.
They found the Queen already there; in spite of the torrential “earthquake rain,” she was determined to see every detail of her village. The Ambassador walked with her and Captain Bignami; the others fell in behind and followed with the lady-in-waiting, Brofferio and the Italian officers.