READING. A eity and the county-seat of Berks County. Pennsylvania, 59 mile, northwest of Philadelphia: on the Schuylkill River and the Schuylkill Canal. and on the Philadelphia and Reading, the Pennsylvania, and the Wilmington and Northern railroads (Slap: Pennsylvania. F 3). It covers an area of about six square miles, and is regularly laid out. There are 72 miles of paved streets, more than two-thirds of this distance being laid with macadam. The public park system comprises 198 acres. Mount Penn, to the east, and the Neversink Mountain to the south of the city, which afford magnificent views, are reached by inclined and electric railways. The more important educational institutions in Reading are the Inter-State Commercial College, the Reading Classical School for Boys and Girls, and Schuylkill Seminary. Other noteworthy fea tures include the county court house, city hall, opera house. Girls' High School building, Masonic Temple, the public and the Berks County Law libraries, and the Reading, Homeopathic, and Saint .Joseph's hospitals. The annual county fair is held here, handsome grounds and a race-track being maintained by the association in the northern part of the city. Reading is situated in a region possessed of much mineral wealth, in cluding iron, coal, and limestone, and is an im portant manufacturing centre. In the census 1900 an aggregate capital of $27,975,628 was invested in the various industries, which had an output valued at $36,902,511. Nearly one-third of the capital and one-fourth of the output were represented by the iron and steel interests. There are extensive shops of the
Philadelphia and Reading Railroad• foundries and machine shops, breweries, and manufactories of cigars, hosiery, knit goods, hats, carriages, pottery, paper, and wood pulp.
The government is vested in a mayor, chosen every three years, and a bicameral council, and in subordinate officials, the majority of whom are either elected by the people o• appointed by the council. The school board is chosen by pop ular vote. The city has a net debt of about $1,300,000: and the assessed valuation of prop erty (real and personal) is about $46,000,000. For maintenance and operation, there is spent annually about $923,000, the main items being $256,000 for schools, $235,000 for the water de partment, $69,000 for municipal lighting, $61,000 for sinking fund and interest on debt, $57,000 for streets, $52,000 for the police department, $42,000 for the fire department, and $33,000 for sewers. The water-works, which were constructed at an expenditure of $1.937,762, are owned by the municipality. Laid out in 1748 and settled mostly by Germans, Reading (named from Read ing, England) was incorporated as a borough in 1783, its population then being 2100, and in 1847, with a population of about 12,000, it was char tered as a city. Its boundaries were extended in 1867 and 1869. Population, in 1890, 58,661; in 1900, 78,961.