CROSS-COUNTRY
PHILADELPHIA: PLANS AND PIGEONS
For a long time there was a rumor floating around New York
that Philadelphia did not exist. When you mentioned it to certain
metropolitan people, Struthers Burt reported in
Philadelphia : Holy
Experiment,
"they thought someone was pulling their leg." He exploded
the rumor (gave incontrovertible proof, in fact) , but it has always seemed
hard to believe that a big city so near would make so little noise. On
the other hand, Philadelphians know of the existence of New York,
though a great many of them do not consider it even a good place to
visit. "So it has more movies," one Philadelphia lady told me during
my last visit there, "but we have television
too--three
stations." And
when she went on to further assess the values of her home place she
was undoubtedly right in assuming that the nerves are not worn so
edgy here, and the lights (an inadequate number of them) are never
likely to induce a fever.
As for myself, I am one of those who always have the feeling after
that ninety minute ride from Pennsylvania Station in New York that
I
have entered a distinctly different world. The tensions loosen, you hear
your footsteps striking the pavement, and suddenly you are in no
particular hurry to get where you are going. There is time, much time:
the afternoon and evening stretch before you, but not invitingly, and
lethargically you move towards your appointments. There is no before–
hand savor to the meetings, for it does not seem to matter much whether
you meet or not.
If
I
should happen to meet an old acquaintance my
shock of recognition (now that
I
have long left the city) is always
greater than his. A quiet hello and things, you discover, are much the
same.
I have felt a wonder on passing through the large, quiet, marble
hall that is the new (in a Philadelphia sense) 30th Street Station, as I
waited for the trolley to take me to the center of town where, perched
on City Hall, William Penn stands eternally dreaming, his arms out–
stretched in what must by now be hopeless pride. Here was America's
third largest city, an enormous and variegated manufacturing center
(television sets, incredible quantities of false teeth, stainless steel pull-
