THE SUNDAY OREGONIAX, PORTLAND, NOVE3IBER 25, 1917.
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(Copyrlsbt, 1017, uy Prank G. Carpenter.)
GARY. Ind., 1917. I have come from
the iron mines at the head of
Lake Superior on a vessel loaded
with ore to the great steel plants here
at the foot of Lake Michigan. My
steamer had a cargo of 12.000 tons. She
unloaded this in less than five hours
and the ore is already on its way to the
furnace. By the time this letter is
published it will have been made Into
eteel and will have gone out with other
Bister cargoes into steel rails, big guns
and shells and the thousand and one
other forms in which Uncle Sain is
using steel in our fight with the Ger
mans. Last year, when we were still
out of the war, we sold to England and
France 4,000,000 or 5,000,000 tons of
Eteel shells and 766,000,000 pounds of
barbed wire for entanglements. That
steel would have filled a train of 50
ton cars as long as from New Tork to
Chicago, and the .barbed wire would
have been enough to build a nine
Btrand hog-tight fence around the
world on the line of the equator. Those
were the sales of one year and of only
two items. They were made when we
had not yet begun to fight. Now, we
are in the struggle with every atom of
muscle and every bit of machinery we
can command. The Government is
taking the produce of all the steel
plants and the output will be greater
than ever before. The plants are now
backed by more than $4,000,000,000 of
capital. Every worker in steel and iron
has been drafted into the industrial
Army and we have today more than
1.000,000 such men in the ranks.
Away down here at the foot of Lake
Michigan are two of the biggest camps
of this army of iron and steel. Al
though officered by the United States
Steel Corporation, they are now under
the Government and they are fighting
the battle after the most improved
methods of modern efficiency. It is to
ehow you something of what they are
doing that I have come here to South
Chicago and Gary. But first let me
show you how strategically the two
camps are located and how well they
are fitted for waging the war. They
are situated on the deep waters of
Lake Michigan, where the ore from
the mountains of Lake Superior can be
ehot from the ships almost into the
furnaces, where coal and limestone can
be cheaply secured and where the steel
products can be rapidly transported to
any part of the world.
The South Chicago plant is a part of
the city of Chicago. This section has
about 80,000 inhabitants and the most
of them are supported by the steel
works. The town of Gary is just
across the Indiana boundary, about 30
miles from Chicago. It has 55,000 in
habitants and there are about 12,000
men at work In the mills and the fur
naces. The South Chicago plant is that of
the Illinois Steel Company. Its build
ings already cover about 400 acres and
It has more than twice as much more
land adjoining it which will eventual
ly be used for the works. The Gary
plant belongs to the Indiana Steel Com
pany, another branch of the United
States Steel Corporation. It is already
tnree miles long and a mile and i
quarter in width and this whole terri
tory is covered with structures that are
very mountains of steel. The towers
and turrets of its furnaces stand out
like mighty castles against .he sky
and its huge buildings are filled with
masess of machinery that seem to
move on ball bearings. A network of
railroad tracks runs in and out through
tne works ana great pipes of steel
some of them so large that a Pullman
train could pass through them without
touching the walls of the pipe, wind in
and out, close to the ground and high
above it, carrying millions of feet of
gas to the various parts of the works,
I do not know the cost of the South
jnicago piant. Dut it has run far up
Into the tens of millions of dollars. The
machinery of the Gary plant alone has
cost more than $140,000,000, and the
United States Steel Coroporation is now
spending millions more in connection
with it.
Today, owing to the demands of the
times, new construction is going on
at both plants. Gary is building four
new Diast lurnaces ana a great es
tablishment for making wheels of
forged steel. She is putting in 14
boilers to utilize the waste heat of her
open-hearth furnaces and is installing
new engine shops, new boiler shops
and other works for increasing the by
products. At the Illinois steel plant
they are installing electric open
hearth furnaces, extending their found
ries, building great gas-driven blow
ing engines and adding to their es
tablishments for turning out Besse
mer steel.a
I despair of making you see the im
mensity of these mighty creations and
the wonderful equipment they furnish
for fighting the war. Take the blast
furnaces. The Illinois and Indiana
steel companies have 29, which are now
blazing away night and day. They
work holidays and Sundays, year in
and year out, and since they have been
built many of them have been smelt
ing iron continuously for 98 per cent of
their running time.
Each of these furnaces Is as big
around as a haystack and as tall as
an eight-story house.' It has four great
stoves, almost as big and 20 feet higher,
which heat the air blast to a tempera
ture of from 1200 to 1600 degrees be
fore it is forced into the furnace, and
it holds a charge of about 1700 tons of
ore, limestone and coke, which this
heat turns to liquid. These furnaces
have each cost in the neighborhood of
a million dollars to build, and they
would cost two or three times that if
constructed today. They are the best
of their kind, and those of the Illinois
Steel Company alone are now turning
out more than 2,000,000 tons of pig iron
a year.
I shall not describe the process of
smelting. The story of pig iron has
often been told. The object of the fur
nace is to rob the ore of Its oxygen
and other impurities and leave only the
iron. This is done by dropping alter
nate layers of coke, limestone and iron
into the mighty towers and admitting
at the bottom a hot blast, which melts
the whole into one liquid mass. Of this
mass the iron, on account of its weight,
drops to the bottom of the furnace and
the impurities of the ore and the lime
stone float like soapsuds on top. Then
by making a hole in the furnace just
above the surface of the iron, the im
purities can be drawn off in the form
of slag, and later on. from a lower hole
the pure pig iron can go out the same
way.
This process is old, but the machinery
with which it is carried on at Gary and
South Chicago is new. Almost all the
work is done by machinery. The ore.
limestone and coke are carried up In
skip buckets -which take less than a
minute to raise their contents from the
ground into the furnace. A single load
is from 15.000 to 30,000 pounds, and the
pulling' of a lever raises this to the
height of 80 feet and drops it into the
furnace. It requires two tons of ore
for each charge. The limestone and
coke go the same way, and the furnace
is practically filled with the aid of one
man. The handling of the iron and slag
as they come from the furnace is large
ly done by machinery, and iron, steel
and electricity do most of the work.
Steel making is rapidly becoming an
exact science and everything is tested
by chemical and physical analysis. The
ore is analyzed when it comes from the
mine, and it is analyzed again at the
furnaces. The limestone is analyzed and
so is the coke, and when the pigiron
flows forth a sample is taken from
every 40-ton ladle and carried away to
the laboratory to see that it is exactly
right for the making of steel. There
are more than 100 chemists at Gary
alone, and there Is practically an equal
number at South Chicago. Their work
goes on day and night and they aid In
the experiments made for saving the
waste as well as to the bettering of the
steel.
Few people realize how closely the
great industrial plants of today watch
the pennies, and how much they will
spend to save a fraction of a cent in a
process. Last year the Illinois Steel
Company spent $1,000,000 on its docks
that it might save 45 minutes unload
ing each steamer. They will spend
thousands of dollars to save cents, pro
vided they think the saving will con-
t
5
ut r- rt c es
tinue, and, at South Chicago and Gary,
they are now coining millions out of
the stuff that only a few years ago
floated away on the air. The gas from
these furnaces formerly went to waste.
Today it is saved and used for heating
the stoves which furnish the blast and
for running the machinery of a whole
plant. It goes to the boilers, where it
generates steam, and to gas engines
which are used for blowing air and
generating electric power.
In one station at the Illinois steel
plants I saw 8000 horsepower created in
this way, and I went through large
rooms where dynamos were running
through the waste gas of the furnace.
One of the latest things in gas saving
is washing this gas from the smelting
in order that the iron dust in it may
be saved and melted over again. In
this process the gas Is passed through
water which washes it. the iron dust
falling to the bottom in the form of a
flour. It Is too fine to be smelted, but
It Is put through processes which trans
form it to lumps the size of a peanut
or larger. These nuts can then be
turned back into the furnaces and made
into steel.
One of the great problems of steel
making has been the waste which has
passed off into slag or refuse of the
furnaces. Until recently this has all
gone to waste and you may see great
mountains of it still lying about the
iron works in different parts of the
country. During my stay at Birming
ham I saw them using this slag for
making building brick and sulphate of
ammonia. The latter is an excellent
fertilizer, and the president of the
steel plant there told me it has be
come a valuable by-product. Here at
the foot of Lake Michigan the steel
plants use their slag for making
cement, and this has been done at
other plants of the United States Steel
Corporation. The slag, as it flows out
in a mass of liquid fire from the fur
naces, is dropped into water in such a
way that, instead of becoming a solid
rock, it turns into granules or a pow
der not unlike sugar. It is on about
the same principle that Bhot are made
by dropping the molten metal from
great height in the shot-tower. In this
powdered form it is mixed with lime
stone, an equal part ax lime being
added, and it then becomes the very
finest of Portland cement.
Continuing the story of saving the
waste, the scrap iron, and even the
sparks from the furnaces are gathered
up and used over again. There is con
siderable scrap from each charge, and
t Vi i u ia iftn in li lnmn It h n 1 11
be broken before it can be used, and ! of Properties of gasoline, and is
it were, a steel ban as high as a man.
This ball weighs six tona. but it flies
up with the amorous kiss of the mag
net, the cable raising It t the height
of a seven-story house. Then, by the
touch of a button, the electricity la re
moved and the great weight drops on
the scrap. Think of lifting so much
steel that it would take 12 horses to
haul It on a wagon over country roads,
to a height of 70 feet, and you have
some idea of the power of this magnet.
The same force Is used for loading the
steel plates intended for our battle
ships. They have magnets here that
would lift 15 tons of such plates and
lay them on the cars as gently as you
drop your baby on the pillow at night.
This Is so notwithstanding some of the
plates are each as big as a bed quilt.
The war is rapidly Increasing the by
product coke ovens. I found this so in
Alabama, and it is being carried on to
an even greater extent at the foot of
Lake Michigan. There are by-product
coke plants at both South Chicago and,
Gary. The Gary plant is one of the
largest In the country. It consumes
10,000 tons of coal every 24 hours, and
the coal is the best that can be ob
tained. It comes from the Pocahontas
mines, the quality of which is equal to
that of the Cardiff mines of England.
This coal is of about the same char
acter as that which was formerly used
In the old beehive ovens, resulting in
a product of coke equal to 60 or 65 per
cent of the coal. The remaining 30 per
cent of the coal was lost, going out in
volatile gases which dissolved in the
air. It took 75 hours to reduce the
coal to coke and that was the result.
Today they make coke in about one
fifth of that time, and they get 80 per
cent of the coal contents of the coke,
while the remaining 20 per cent is
nearly all saved in the way of by
products. This 20 per cent comes out
in gas. which, in the Gary plant,
amounts to about one hundred million
cubic feet every 24 hours. This is run.
through a by-product plant which takes
out of the gas vast quantities of am
monia liquor and the ammonia sul
phate which Is now being used to in
crease our food supply. From this same
pas also comes benzol, which has many
this is done by the means of a magnet
connected with the electric dynamos of
the power houses. The touch of a but
ton throws the electricity into the
magnet, which, attached to a steel ca
ble, is so dropped that it just kisses, as
fTodempoulin Culture
ill
Never In the history of poultry
keeping has the necessity of
rigidly culling the flocks been
more imperative. It is not only a
business proposition, but a pa
triotic duty that all feed be con
served. Any poultryman who
maintains a flock of fowls which
does not make the most of its
feed is adding a burden to him
self and a burden to the cause
for which we are fighting. Edi
sdn says: "Each man must work
a little harder and produce a lit
tle more to make up for those
that are gone." This advice
should be applied to the poultry
flock, too.
tremely so. The head is not only a I ing neck should be so set that It brings
fine Index to the general health of the the head well back over the breast
specimen, but it shows alertness and giving the pullet a thick-set. heavy
W
BY M. L. CHAPMAN.
Judge, Breeder an" Writer.
E must get rid of the "slackers,"
and by so doing we are not only
cutting down the consumption
of grain and releasing labor for more
productive employment, but we are
helping to swell the meat eupply, which
is becoming seriously low. Severe
culling will not work any hardship on
the poultry keeper. It will Increase
his profits and improve his flocks.
Culling will permanently remove the
slackers" from the breeding flocks.
so that future generations will be more
productive. It- will also force home
the lesson that a few hens, well se
lected, are the most profitable.
The selection of pullets for layers
depends upon their vitality and vigor.
If they lack these qualities they had
better be sent to the fattening pens.
Late-hatched chicks which are only
partly grown have no place on the
present poultry plant. These pullets
will not lay before Spring, and then
only In a desultory manner. They lack
the constitutional vigor necessary for
heavy egg production, and it must not
oe lorgoiien mat egg production is a
heavy drain upon the constitutional
vigor of the fowL Besides, the pullet
intended to produce large numbers of
eggs must be so constituted that it
is able to eat and assimilate large
quantities of food.
Shape Tells Tale.
Constitutional vigor cannot be
measured, but it has a close relation
to the shape of a fowl. By shape 1
not meant those characteristics v-iich
separate our birds into breeds and va
rieties, but a general conformation
mat is adaptable to pullets of any
Dreed or variety.
Those. nearest standard weight
should be selected. There are many
reasons why those that are oversized
or undersized should not be chosen.
The former are inclined to be Inactive
and non-prot. .ctlve. Undersized birds
should be rejected, as their tendency is
downward so far as size is concerned.
From a careful selection as to size
and stamina. It is well to select the
pullets for individual perfection. From
some standpoints the head of a spec!
men is not considered very important.
but from other viewpoints It la ex-
general vigor which are so essential,
If the head is small and refined It
usually indicates lack of vitality.
Reliable Head Points.
The best specimens should possess a
medium-size head, with short, stubby
beak. Indicating strength. The beak
should be fairly well curved. A short
face, short from the eye to the end of
the beak. Is best. The face should be
broad between the eyes, with comb set
fairly well upon the head, and rather
thick at the base. The eye should be
large, bright and snappy and should
protrude like a ball. The face should
have character In its appearance, with
plenty of color.
The neck should not be too lo.ig. but
fairly short and well curved. This de
notes strength in a fowl, and the curv-
appearance. The wings should be
short, well tucked or tightly held
against the body. The back should be
broad and straight, not only broad
across the shoulders, but the breadth
should be caried back to the tciL One
of the greatest weaknesses in birds is
the narrowing of the back from the
neck to the tall. Avoid the arched back
j or the long, narrow back. The back
of the pullet is one of the best meth
ods of determining her future useful
ness and is very important in making
a selection. The back virtually forms
the framework of the body. The re
productive organs are Just below the
back, and as it is essential that these
organs should have plenty of room to
perform their functions, this portion
of the pullet should be long as well as
broad. It is not desirable that the
I SILVER DIX'KLl.VG GAME BANTAMS.
4
" V IVALRT amonr fanciers of game attractive of Game Bantams. The fe-
w bantams is keen, and Dreeders of
this variety devote constant study
to the improvement of their birds for
exhibition .purposes. They strive con
stantly for Increased length of legs and
necks, some fanciers even confining the
birds In yards surrounded with boards
so that they have to stretch to see out.
Others place the food so high that the
birds have to stand on tiptoes to reach
it, and then spend hours training them
to stand erect in the exhibition coops.
Thousands of dollars have been spent
by fanciers in importing Silver Duck
wing Game Bantams and in breeding
this variety, which is one of the most
male is unoDtrusive in, its soft gray
plumage, but the rich greenish black
and silver white of the males contrasts
sharply with the grass or soil of the
lawn or breeding pen. Game Bantams
mature much more rapidly than large
fowls, and may be hatched after the
last cold days of Spring and be fully
matured before the first cold days of
Autumn. Much stress is laid on their
smallness, and the weights set as
standards for -tiales are 20 to 22
ounces, for females 18 to 20 ounces.
The combs of the young males are cut
off with special scissors, a process
termed "dubbing." and much rivalry
exists as to the fancier most proficient
in this art.
length should be in greater proportion
than the breadth, thus giving it a nar
row appearance. And it should not be
understood from this that a short, wide
back is preferable to the long, narrower
one.
The tail should be well spread and
carried at a pleasing angle, not too
high nor too low, and it should be of
medium length.
The breast of the pullet is exceed
ingly Important. It should be deep.
full, rounded and broad. Avoid those
birds which have sharp, narrow, slender-looking
breasts that have a flat
appearance from the Junction of the
thighs. Nor must a pullet with a full
crop be mistaken for a full-breasted
and desirable pullet. The full; broad,
rounding breast Is an excellent indica
tion of individual vitality.
Capacity for Food.
The body of the pullet practically in
cludes those portions of the specimen
exclusive of the back and breast. In
other words, the sides and underline,
including the rear portion called the
fluff. In the body we must look for
length and depth in the same manner
as the back governs the breadth or
thickness. The side view of a bird
must show a body extending well back
from the Junction of the thighs and
continually dropping, so that if carried
much further it would strike the
ground. Looking from behind, the body
should get wider as It drops, so that
it is at its greatest width at the point
extreme lowest and farthest back. It
is not to be taken from this descrip
tion of the body that pullets which
have baggy, or sagging abdomens are
desirable, for such pullets usually
break down early in faelr career. The
underline of the pullet should be in
clined to sag, however, rather than be
narrow and short. Great capacity is
necessary, also room for food end pro
ductive organs If the great production
looked for is to l-i realized.
The legs should be fairly short,
heavily made and set wide apart. Such
legs are evidence of sturdiness and
vigor. The toes should be strong and
straight, with good, heavy nails for a
covering.
Cull the pullets that have a long,
slim back, crow or snake head, sleepy
eyes, long neck, narrow chest, wedge
shaped back, pinched tall, long, slim
legs and toes, extremely narow or shal
low abdomen, or one with a deformity
of any kind. Those whih have had
any serious sickenss should also be
rejected.
Avoid Unnecessary Disturbances.
Pullets should now be in their laying
quarters. It does not do to shift pul
lets to Winter quarters when they are
laying or reddening up for lrying, as
such a procedure is very liable to check
or retard them, according to their con
dition at tire time, and so account for
the loss of eggs at a time when they
are at their highest market value.
Before shifting to Winter quarters
such pullets as have not begun to lay
should oe careiuiiy examined to make
sure that they are healthy and frte
from insect pests. Any birds Bhowing
traces of sickness should either be dis
posed of or placed by themsel.es and
given special attention. Such birds,
with care, may pay if retained as egg
producers, but they should not be tol
erated in the breeding pen.
Feeding the backward pullets wet
mashes in the morning and then al
lowing them free range during the mid
dle of the day will hurry them along.
See that tiiey go to roost with a full
crop and that It is empty in the morn
ing. There is no better practice than
that of the operator making a late trip
to the poultry-' ouse t d ex .mining
the birds regarding their capacity or
inclination for food. An oarly morning
visit will be repaid if the pullets are
examined regarding their digestive
ability. The extra time put In upon
the smaller number of pullets wil be
amply repaid by the increased production.
HOW GOBBLER STRUTTED
Grandfather Frog Satisfies the Curi
osity of Teter Rahblt.
People's Home Journal.
One day while Peter Rabbit was
slipping about in the Green Forest he
discovered a big bird, the biggest bird
Peter had ever seen, going through the
strangest antics. When Peter Rabbit Is
puzzled he goes to wise old Grand
father Frog for enlightenment. He did
so this time.
"Chug-a-rum!" exclaimed Grandfather
Frog, opening his big mouth very wide
to laugh at Peter and his excitement.
"That was Tom Gobbler; he was doing
all that for the benefit of Mrs. Gobbler.
who was hiding in the brush. Big Tom
Is the most conceited fellow in the
Green Forest. He dearly loves to strut.
He is Just like his father and his
grandfather and his great-grandfather.
The Gobblers never have gotton over
strutting since Old Mr. Gobbler, the
first of the family, got the habit."
"Tell me about it. Please, Grand
father Frog, tell me about it," begged
Peter. "How did old Mr. Gobbler get
the habit?"
Grandfather Frog chuckled. "He got
it from admiring his own reflection in
a pool of water." he said. "You see. In
those days way back when the world
was young people had more time to
form habits than they do now. With
plenty to eat and litlte to do. they had
more time to think about themselves.
Old Mr. Gobbler soon discovered that
he was the biggest of all the birds in
that part of the great world where he
lived, and this discovery was, I suspect,
the beginning of his vanity.
"Then, one day, as he was walking
along he came to a little pool of water.
It was very clear and there wasn't a
ripple on the surface. There, for the
first time. Mr. Gobbler saw his reflec
tion. The more he looked the better
he liked his own appearance. He spread
his tail just to see how it would look
in the water. Then he puffed himself
out and strutted.
" 'There is nobody to compare with
me.' he thought, and strutted more
proudly than ever.
"After that he used to steal away
every day to admire hlmselg in that
little pool of water. He tried new
ways of strutting and puffing himself
out. After a while he was no longer
content to admire himself. He wanted
others to admire him. At the first
chance he began to strut and show off
all his grand airs before Mrs. Gobbler.
At first she paid no attention to him.
At least that is the way she appeared.
She would turn her back on him and
walk off into the bushes. This made
old Mr. Gobbler very angry until he
discovered that she would tip-toe back
and watch him admiringly when she
thought he didn't know it. That made
him strut all the more,'
used largely in the industrial arts. It
furnishes also a certain percentage of
toluol, a powerful explosive which is
now used on the battlefields of Europe,
and also tar and napthalene. Indeed,
of all that goes into the coke plant to
day practically nothing is lost. The
meat packers claim to save all of the
hog but the squeal. The steel makers
are now saving almost every bit of the
raw materials, except the noise and
shriek of the engines, and In the elec
tric work of today that seems to have
almost disappeared.
As it is now, they have here at Gary
560 of these great by-product ovens,
and they expect to Increase this num
ber to 700. so many that It will will re
quire 12,500 tons of coal per day to op
erate them. In the past the coal went
into the beehive oven in a lump. It is
now crushed to a powder or flour, so
fine that the grains will pass through
a mesh of 80 holes to the inch. After
crushing it is carried into the furnaces
by conveyors and it drops automatically
into the oven, when the oven is full
it is so sealed that it is impossible for
the air to get in or the gas to get out.
It Is then in a huge eteel box. abouC
which a blazing heat of 1200 degrees
Fahrenheit plays. It takes this heat
to release the gases of which the by
products are made, and to transform
the oal to coke of Just the right
quality for the making of steel.
And now let me tell you something
about the soldiers of this great, branch,
of our industrial army. As I have said,
there are more than a million iron and,
steel-makers now in the ranks and they
are among the most efficient of our
troops here at home. There are mora
than 250,000 men in the employ of the
United States Steel Corporation alone,
and : ere at the foot of Lake Michigan,
they have 20,000 or 30.000 working;
away in the plants I have described.
A large number of the men are foreign
era. many being Russians and Poles.
They are nearly all patriots, and they
are subscribing liberally to the Red.
Cross funds and the liberty bonds.
When the T. M. C. A. raised its first
war fund of $3,000,000, $3000 was exi
pected from South Chicago. The mat
ter was brought before the employes of
the Illinois Steel Company there, and it
was suggested that each of them give
the pay of one hour a month for the
term of eight months. Nearly every
employe promised to do this, and the
result was that they raised $26,000 in
stead of $3000. The 12,000 employes of
Gary have also done more than their
share, and this is true of nearly every
branch of steel workers all over the
country.
Feed
and eeira Bra worth rrm
much monev this iwam tn w
your hens loaf on the job.
Keep the Hens
Laying with
This irreat reiuvenator twl nnvln.
cer supplies the exact chemical ingredi
ents that a hen must have if she is to be
a real ecu producer. Clrana rh hlnnH
tones up the system and promotes Rood
conn, ana frets winter eggs. Oood
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