GERMANIC MUSEUM PLANS

The plans for the new Germanic. Museum have been completed by a German architect, and ground will be broken in the near future. The site for the building acquired by the corporation is at the corner of Divinity avenue and Kirkland street, nearly opposite Memorial Hall.

The total amount subscribed so far for the new museum is $290,000, of which Adolphus Busch of St. Louis has donated $250,000 in two gifts of $150,000 and $100,000. About $10,000 is the result of Miss Maude Adams's presentation of "Joan of Arc." "The Emperor William Fund" which was started several years ago makes up the balance.

The following description of the projected building by Professor Kuno Francke, is reprinted from the current number of the Graduates' Magazine.

History of Germanic Museum.

On November 10, 1903, the anniversary of the birth of Martin Luther and Friedrich Schiller, the collections of the Germanic Museum were formally installed in the little building--the Old Gymnasium--which, as a temporary shelter, had been put at our disposal by the University authorities. It seems probable that on the same day of the present year--eight years later--ground may be broken for a building which in every way will be worthy to house the splendid specimens of German art given to Harvard University by the German Emperor, other German princes and governments, and numerous friends of German culture both in this country and abroad.

This happy consummation of the Museum propaganda has been brought about through the munificence of Mr. Adolphus Busch of St. Louis and the interest of his son-in-law, Mr. Hugo Reisinger of New York. From other sources and in various ways, partly with the aid of the Germanic Museum Association, we had collected by the end of 1909 about $37,000; but only the $250,000 given since then by Mr. Busch has brought within sight the realization of the building to which we had so long been looking forward. It is gratifying to note that the man who thus links his name with those of the great benefactors of Harvard University is a German by birth, and that the motive of his generous action has been the wish to establish at the oldest American university an institution which shall bring to view the best that German artistic genius has given to the world.

Professor Bestelmeyer Architect.

It was Mr. Busch's desire that the new building should be a characteristic specimen of German architecture and that it should therefore be designed by a leading architect in Germany. Through the kind intercession of Geheimrat Schmidt, of the Prussian Ministry of Education, who has done so much to facilitate the interchange of professors between Harvard and Berlin, we succeeded in obtaining the services of Professor German Bestelmeyer of Dresden, one of the very foremost architects of contemporary Germany, whose recently completed Central Hall of the new University building at Munich is an undoubted work of genius and justly enjoys a more than national reputation.

Professor Bestelmeyer, entering upon his task with earnest enthusiasm and rare insight, has produced a plan remarkably consistent and simple and at the same time strikingly original. The Corporation have at once accepted it and authorized him to proceed with elaborating the working plans and specifications. In this Professor Bestelmeyer will be assisted by our own Professor H. Langford Warren, who all along has taken a keen interest in the Germanic Museum and to whose intelligent and expert advice we owe much. In the absence of Professor Bestelmeyer, the supervision of the construction of the building itself is to be committed to his firm (Warren & Smith).

Description of Building.

The whole building embraces an oblong rectangular space of about 130 feet on Kirkland street and about 200 feet on Divinity avenue and Frisbie place. But the Museum proper consists of two wings of unequal length, placed at right angles to each other, the longer one facing Divinity avenue, the shorter one stretching from Divinity avenue to Frisbie place, parallel with Kirkland street, but set back from it some 100 feet. The space between the two wings is conceived of as an ornamental court, with shrubs, statuary, and waterbasins, connected with the Museum itself by cloister-like arcades running along Kirkland street and Frisbie place. A massive tower rising at the point of junction of the two main wings holds the various parts of the design firmly together. Thus the whole structure is marked by a happy combination of diversity and unity, of picturesqueness and monumental effect.

The main entrance is from Kirkland street. Through a lower vestibule, with office-rooms on each side, and through a little rotunda, one enters first the Romanesque Hall, about 70 feet long. By a system of pillars supporting the vaulted ceiling of this hall, alcoves are formed on both of its sides, increasing its wall space and giving ample opportunity for placing properly the many specimens of early mediaeval art in our possession. This hall will contain, among other notable works, the colossal Bernward Column and the bronze gates of Hildesheim Cathedral, the bronze gates of Augsburg Cathedral, the pulpit and the Crucifixion group of Wechselburg, the choir screen of St. Michael's at Hildesheim, the Bamberg sculptures, the smaller portal of the Church of Our Lady at Treves. At its further end, raised a few steps above the floor level, there will be placed the Golden Gate of Freiberg Cathedral, in such a manner as to form the entrance to the next hall, the Gothic one.

Interior Arrangements.

The Gothic Hall consists of the square space beneath the tower, resembling the crossing of a church, and a choir separated from the crossing by the rood-screen of Naumburg Cathedral, so that this important monument of the transition period from Romanesque to Gothic sculpture will have the same relative place in our building which the original has at Naumburg. The other Naumburg sculptures, the twelve remarkable portrait statues of princely founders, will be placed in the choir, also in accordance with their original positions. The further development of Gothic sculpture down to the 15th cen-