Medford mail tribune., March 15, 1936, Page 18, Image 18

Silk Stockings From Pine Chips-Wonder of WesterrForests
Great Industry Rises As
Science Discovers Ways
To Make Silk From Wood
By Rockwell Evans
CALIFORNIA has its yellow gold. Texas has its
black gold from the oil fields. But Washington
has its green gold green gold in the form of for
ests that cover the mountain sides.
From great trees, about which countless songs
and poems have been written, comes nine-tenths
of the artificial silk produced in the world. From
chips in the forest come filmy stockings to cover
ladies' legs. Artificial silk is rayon, and rayon to
day is used not only in stockings, but in women's
underwear, nightgowns, rayon-satin evening
dresses, covers for cushions and for chairs and
davenports.
It is entertaining to reflect that the pile 6f chips
you passed when' driving through the woods the
other day has undergone chemical process and to
day adorns the lovely young lady sitting a couple
of tables away in a night club.
We are getting so clever we can make every
thing out of everything else, says Professor Henry
K. Benson, head of the chemical engineering de
partment at the University of Washington, Seattle.
Chemistry, he points out, once a mystery to the
vast majority of people, today is fast becoming
a mat'r of common knowledge; its language is
transited by great numbers of interpreters from
crowded classes in high schools and colleges.
T3ANKS to chemistry, we get cellulose from
wood. And from cellulose we get lacquer to put v
on your car, safety glass for the windshield and
waterproof fabrics; two-thirds of your wife's
clothing and, if you are given to silk pants, your
own underclothing. In your home such unsuspected
things as telephones and toothbrushes, to say
nothing of cellophane, come from cellulose, as do
photographic films and smokeless rifle powder.
Add to this the paper on which this is printed
and you have a few of the products which origi
nate in the green forests.
' It used to be, and probably still is, a standing
joke among the kids to refer to the breakfast food
they were served as "sawdust" or wood. But, to
tell the truth, you eat considerable wood for din
ner. Cellulose is not digestible for man, but all
hoofed animals eat it. Therefore your leg of mut
ton, or your beefsteak, really contains a certain
amount of wood.
Furthermore, Germany has now perfected a
process in which sugar is obtained from sawdust.
It is rapidly being placed on a commercial basis
in that country to compete with the cane and beet
product. It has, Bay scientists, all the food qualities
of the sugar you now have on your table.
IT IS not a new process. The DuPonts have a plant
at Georgetown, N. C, to extract sugar from saw
dust and then convert it Into alcohol. And as early
V; . 'r '! ,l fS ... 1
V"S'r.'."- I'll is x I
VtN 'A 1 V n. r-;v J
:ip4 jvi -:
Pi I -: : ' Hy'W-- "7-
E.tfwawn'if-rm in- TiTf riw mat "Amtflf- Ti 1rfl if ft nrii tfi f" wli si ill it i-jjutri ; f V BjAViig rtmar 'MimPHttfuth
Mllidy don a pair of heer rayon hota and little thlnkt that they were made from the mattlve pine that graoe
the Western mountalnel But that, explain Professor Henry K. Benson, upper left, I exaetly what ha happened
Ince the rise of ohemlstry in the lumber business. Even the silk gown adorning lovely Jeanne Meyers, of Seattle,
In the lower left photo had it beginning In a tree trunk. United State rayon mill manufacture 30 per oent of
the world' supply, says Professor Benson, head of the University of Washington's ohemloal engineering department.
as 1911 a plant was started at Port Hadlock, north
of Seattle. A French chemist by the name of Schin
dler was in charge, but the plant failed due to lack
of proper facilities for handling the sawdust.
Cellulose, explains Professor Benson, is a chemi
cal substance closely allied to starch and is a car
bohydrate. Unglazed paper, which is nearly pure
cellulose, is converted by the action of strong sul
phuric acid into parchment paper. By the action
of a mixture of strong nitric and sulphuric acids,
it is converted into nitrates, the higher one of
which is known commercially as gun-cotton.
Celluloid, for instance, is composed of the lower
nitrates of cellulose and is extensively used as a
substitute for ivory, bone, hard rubber, coral and
similar products.
But rayon is probably the outstanding by
product of wood. A substitute for silk had been
sought for many years and in 1889 a French sci
entist produced a cellulose yarn that had many
of the qualities of real Bilk.
HIS process was improved upon and developed
until it has become the rayon of today, manu
factured in more than 100 factories throughout
the world.
"The basic material," says Professor Benson,
"is wood pulp. Any pinaceous trees will do for pulp
Modem Chemists Create
Amazing Number of Uses
For By-Products of Trees
making, the important thing being uniform ma-
terial. The wood is pulped by the sulphite process
and converted into nitro cellulose, or gun-cotton.
"This is dissolved in a mixture of alcohol and
ether and the solution is filtered and then aged.
When in proper condition, the pulp is forced
through extremely fine holes in a 'spinnerette' and
becomes thread. By winding several threads to
gether, yarn Is produced. It then may be dyed
either in the yarn or after weaving."
The United States today has 20 rayon factories
turning out 30 per cent of the world production.
In a single year the United States factories will
produce approximately 65,000,000 pounds of rayon,
a product which has the appearance and luster of
silk, but Is not so strong.
Rayon Is used extensively with cotton, also, for
production of moderate priced garments.
And so, while we may not actually make a silk
purse from a sow's ear, chemistry produces other
wonders even farther removed.
"As another example," says Professor Benson,
"chemistry has shown men in the logging industry
how to make tannin from the bark of trees and i
use it to tan hides from China and South America. '
"Or the debris of the forest may be reduced to
chips, treated with steam under pressure, ex
ploded, the fibers reassembled and made into
strong, durable panels for radios and the decora
tion of our homes.
"Liquid waste from pulp mills has been used in
the athletic stadium of the University of Wash
ington to make a running track that is dustless
in summer and mudless in winter.
"Thanks to chemistry, the conversion of electri
cal energy into commodities is no longer a mys
tery, but an accomplished art. From the rushing
waters of the Nisqually River we have for years
made a nitrogen product from water, air and elec
tricity, combined it with ordinary washing soda
and sent it East in barrels for making dyestuffs.
"With electric energy and ordinary sand we can
make phosphorous from the country's greatest de
posit of phosphate rock in Idaho, combine it with
ammonia made from air, water and electricity, and
ship cargoes of fertilizer to the ends of the earth.
"Nitrogen. today is being removed from the at
mosphere at the rate of thousands of tons a day
and, besides its primary use as a fertilizer, it plays
a leading role in the manufacture of nitro cellulose
or gun-cotton and there we are right back to
the production of rayon again."
All very clever. Eve started out by wearing a
' fig leaf taken from a tree. Today the girls wear
silk undieB taken from the trees. We're making
progress.
And if the metamorphosis from the raw material
to the finished product is a bit confusing, just con
sider that the "miracle" is the basis from which
an ordered and marvelous future will ariBe!
Setbacks, Not Medals, Develop Men, Says Reno "Sky-Pilot"
Story of Young Singer Who Got the "Gong" Proves Value of Being Able To Fight Back
FOR a quarter of a oentury, Brewster Adams, Reno'
beloved Baptist paetor, ha oome to oontaot with olty
folk and old-time desert dwellers. He know at first hand
tori of (taunoh oouraga and fortitude In the faoe of
hardship . . . whleh prove to him that men and women who
have lost the aooumulatlon and ease of yesterday are oarv
Ing out new frontiers for themselves. He knowe modern
pioneer with hearts "that oan begin anew" ... and recall
personal experlenoee. Brewster Adam' artlolee are a regu
lar feature. Editor.
By BREWSTER ADAMS
For 25 Year Reno' Baptist Preacher
EE! I thought I would be bringing back a lot
w of medals, but all I got was the gong."
He was an honest-eyed, clean-featured lad one
any parents would De
proud to have throw his
shirt on the floor, leave
his muddy shoes in the
parlor and let the family
dog sleep under the
covers.
"You see, I won the
audition trials for this
state, and then for the
Western area. I thought
I was pretty good and
went bark East for the
final tryout.
"I was sure I was
coming back with a lot
of ribbons, but when I
sang, all they gave me was the bell."
Fool sorry for him? Surely. But that old gong
has ding-donged so many times on me that I don't
pay any more attention to it than to the family
alarm clock.
"Son, take it straight from me, it's the best
thing than could ever happen if you can take it."
Ho looked at me with surprise, if not disap
pointment. "Everybody else feels sorry for me."
"8ure! And you feel sorry for yourself, and In
stead of fighting your way back, you are trying to
get there by crying. You don't get any medals for
weeping.
"If you had won, you would have thought you
PAGE TWO
Brewster Adams
were good. Nobody could have taught you, and
probably nobody would have wanted to hear you."
IT wasn't easy for him to take. Frankly, I liked
the lad so much, I was trying to get him mad.
There's a lot of people you can help most by slap
ping ears rather than shedding tears.
I told him about a lad who got all the awards.
He was an Eagle Scout in my troop. I got him a
job in a garage. The foreman said to me one day,
with apparent regret, "I can't use that boy. No
body can tell him anything. He's got a swell head.
I guess the kid's got too many medals."
One reason I get so much joy out of watching
the big games is that they so often fumble the ball.
It makes me feel so much easier when I muff them
the opportunities which come my way.
At the last East-West game they awarded an
all-American certificate to Gomez Jones! Gong! He
And the Camera Caught Itl
One of Serit of the World's Most Unusual Ntwt Photographs
tlw. J . jL.j'rtt V" ri ..-.....-..- uj.a-AAi.i mt.r .afeiftaJsflLaM.Ts 1 liTttm h 1
This unusual phots of the beginning of a "pull off" parachute Jump was taken June, 1934, during an aerial meet
at Bristol, England. The camera caught the jumper Just as he was pulled from the wing of the plane.
passed the ball where nobody ain't or wasn't.
nOGER PECKINPAUGH was awarded the prize
I for being the most valuable player in the Amer
ican League. He took the award and- tipped his
hat Gong! He made five errors that game.
McNeilly was given a great hand a promising
youngster from Sacramento. Gong! He overran an
easy pop fly and let in two runs.
"Doc," said my old friend, the prospector, Tve
got a wonderful showing. Looks like a glory-hole.
We're going to blow it. Want to see us bring in the
richest mine in Nevada?"
His holes were drilled and he set a half dozen
sticks of mud, as he called his powder. He shot
them. We rushed to the "glory-hole." Gong! The
hole was there but the glory had faded. The vein
had pinched out.
But no complaint nor wailing from the old-timer.
He had heard the gong too many times.
'Hell! Excuse me, Reverend. But you've got to
admit that it was a good shot I gave her!"
He will dig another hole and shoot again. The
gong is the beginning of another round, not the
end of the last, to the man who is a fighter. The
whisUe blows when a player is forced out of
bounds. But the play is not over. Over the door
of Boss Ketterling's laboratory, out of which have
come so many modern devices, are these words,
When you strike an obstacle you are on the verge
of a new discovery."
THE other day the boy singer was back. He was
1 carrying a little sample case. With considerable
embarrassment he explained that with the sale of
so many subscriptions he could take a thorough
course in voice culture.
"They rang the gong on me. But I'm going back
when I get thu training. This Is quite a come-down
for me. I thought I was a star and now I'm only a
salesman," he apologized.
"Quite a come-back. I would rather say. You're
going back to beat the gong."
I hope I may hear him some day. I feel sure that
ike tone drifting out of his heart, that will touch
the hearts of many, also, who have heard the gong.