Building a power house

Pennell, Joseph, 1857-1926 · 1910

"The purists and the theorists have made a great fuss about the destruction of the Falls and the vandals who have done it. Now the Falls, I believe, have not been lowered an inch, and as for power houses, they are most of them Greek temples, and placed just where the Greeks would have placed them. For once the Greek temple is right in American, and therefore the American purist and theorist doesn't like it - he would not have liked Greek temples had he been Greek. I did not draw the temples, but the temples being built, which was interesting. Below the bridge on the American side are older works, wondrous works, high on the cliffs, great overflows of water gushing from the rock. This lithograph is a proof that engineers design today for companies, not churches." Joseph Pennell, 1916.