T H E J O U R N A L OF I N D U S T R I A L A N D ENGINEERING C H E M I S T R Y
F e b . , 1915
in the introduction to this paper were not too emphatic, in which i t is pointed out that special interest rather than the cost of production has controlled prices. If potash has any bearing whatever, through intensive agriculture, upon the production and price of food crops, however indirect this bearing may be assumed to be, the control of the product by any single interest is unquestionably hurtful to the best interests of the people of this country. I n the opinion of some more or less well-informed persons, potash is not nearly so important to growing crops as the other principal plant foods, combined nitrogen and phosphates. I n other words, there is a tendency in certain quarters to believe t h a t the propaganda in favor of the wide-spread necessity for potash in fertilizers has been overdone and t h a t our agriculturalists could rest contented with potash reserves in the soil for many years t o come, provided other coriditions are properly looked after. However this may be, it is difficult to persuade either the practical grower or the scientific agriculturist that he does not increase his yields and early bearing, by a wise use of potash in one form or another. Up to the present time, the statistics of our average crop yields per acre are not a source of pride to those of us who study such comparative data. It is the earnest belief of the writers that the American demand for an American source of potash a t a fair price will continue to increase in the future. Whether the time has arrived when any progress along this line can be made, still remains in doubt. The foregoing paper has been offered to the Institute with no pretense a t settling this important question but merely as a contribution to which we invite the attention and consideration of chemical engineers and others who may be interested. THE INSTITUTE
OF INDUSTRIAL
WASHINIYTOX
RESEARCH
ASPECTS OF S O M E CHEMICAL INDUSTRIES,IN THE UNITED STATES, TODAY1 B y EDWARD GUDEMAK The European war h%s raised a question of very great importance t o us, applying specifically to many chemical industries, based on the application of chemistry. Manufacturers and consumers are asking: “Will and can United States chemists prove equal t o the emergency created, which makes it impossible, in many cases, to obtain from abroad, many chemical supplies for which the United States in the past has been and is today and will be in the future, dependent on foreign producers?” One of our Chicago morning papers has put the question directly up t o the chemical professiofi in asking : “Is the American (U. S.) chemist, scientist and inventor so impotc:nt that he will see thousands of workmen thrown into idleness, because he cannot or will not make these needed compounds?” The italics are my own. This places the whole and full responsibility for a change in the present conditions on the profession I claim as my own, and I accept the challenge and shall try to defend the chemists, as far as I am able and show what in my opinion are the actual reasons and causes of some of these conditions. The inquiry could easily be broadened to include all scientific professions, and their answer would require only the substitution of their own concrete examples for the chemical cases I shall present. Confining myself to the chemical field makes the answer of such extent that I can gi,ve only a very meagre superficial review, and merely indicate the prime and underlying causes that account for many of the present conditions. I am not offering any remedy, but shall point out some changes that may help in developing and protecting lacking chemical industries, having in mind not the present as much as the coming future. The only manufacturer who is also his own exclusive consumer is the uncivilized savage, whose sole object in life is t o protect 1 Address before the 7th Anqual Meeting of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, Philadelphia. December 2 to 5 , 1914.
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and sustain his physical body, and perhaps, although not always, that of his own immediate family. Many, only within the last few weeks, have fully recognized t h a t while they have styled themselves “manufacturers” of this or that, or of this or t h a t “profession” are in the final analysis very important consumers. Many, including the chemists, have, up to the present time, given little thought or consideration, as to how or where their products of consumption actually originated, as long as their supply, quality and quantity could be obtained a t satisfactory costs. Today, with a restricted supply and in many cases great advance in costs, there has been a sudden awakening that there are such people as chemists, that this has been recognized in foreign countries, and that we in the United States are absolutely depending on foreign chemists and foreign chemical industry for our supply of many of certain commodities, all of which we have been importing, such as direct chemicals, medicines, colors (aniline or mineral), alloys, precious and semi-precious metals, etc. Up to the present time the chemical profession has not been recognized in the United States as i t should have been,‘ and it is this sudden awakening to the existence of a chemical profession that has led to the asking of the above-mentioned questions, t o which should be added the very necessary one, why do these chemical industries not exist and flourish in the United States? It is this complete question that I am trying to answer. I hold no brief for any of the chemists in the United States, but I say most emphatically that the chemists of the United States are not impotent, that they can and they will do more than their full share and ‘I believe that every research, industrial, technical, engineering and manufacturing chemist, and every teacher of chemical science will back me up in this statement. All that is required and necessary is to create in the United States the proper conditions for our chemists to do what they can do and what they are most willing to do. All must admit that the application of chemistry, or any other science, is only one of the cogs that help drive the wheels of commerce. Commercial chemistry, in its widest or in its most limited sense, is a science built on the dollars and cents, and the actual, direct chemical reaction, or its application or use-the individual result of the mental and physical efforts of the chemist-is not the whole thing; far from it. Every business man, commercial or professional, styled manufacturer or consumer, is of as much if not much more importance than the chemist, as without him, the chemist can do nothing. They are the first consideration as they have and must give to the chemist what he lacks. They, not the chemists, represent engineering problems, labor conditions, market conditions, normal relationships between costs and selling prices, transportation questions, etc. ; they stand for quantity and quality, supply and demand, not overlooking legislative enactments and financial resources. Present temporary abnormal war conditions should not be considered in trying to build up a chemical or any other industry. Has not too much stress been laid on our natural resources and their development, perhaps exhaustion, and some of our so-called wasteful methods? There are two sides to these questions, both of which may be wrong, and the remedy may be in the application of the fourth dimension. A single smelter, near natural resources of raw material, is daily polluting the atmosphere with enough sulfur compounds to make 2000 tons of sulfuric acid, worth in New York or Chicago, say, $40,000. We chemists know how to recover about 539,999 worth of this waste, but we do not do it t h e k , because the sulfuric acid, if produced, would be less than worthless; we could not give it away, and its production would create an additional expense of manufacture and storage, due to the fact that there is no market for that chemical within a reasonable distance of its source of origin. 1 See Gudeman, THIS JOURNAL, 6 (1914). 687.
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Natural resources of soda, near the Pacific Ocean, are sufficient to supply the world’s demands for years to come, but present costs of transportation and local conditions make them worthless today as a world’s commodity. Whether the opening of the Panama Canal route will change this remains to be seen. If distance, actual mileage, between source and market were in that part of the United States, as it is east of the Mississippi River and in foreign countries, Montana and California would be able to furnish all the soda and all the sulfuric acid required in the manufacture of all the refined chemicals, coal-tar colors, and medicinal preparations we now import, besides leaving a fair surplus t o be used in the soap and fertilizing industries. As cleanliness is next t o godliness it would improve us morally and in assisting agriculture would bring us nearer to nature again. What would the natural soda deposits in British Africa be worth t o Great Britain, if the cost of transportation to British ports were about 50 cents per IOO Ibs., a fair value of the commodity a t the port of entree? The discoverer of these fields told me they were worth t o Great Britain hundreds of millions of dollars. Utilization of natural resources and recovery of some waste products, may be like the tariff, a local issue. Preservation of these natural resources is a much more important consideration and thereon hangs our future welfare. The chemists of the United States have been, and are today, ready and willing and they have the brains and ability to manufacture here a t home every chemical product, raw or refined, without exception, t h a t is now imported, and it is not adverse labor conditions nor a question of tariff, all of which should be considered, that keeps the chemists from so doing. In many cases, not all, federal requirements restrict us so as to actually prohibit and stop us from manufacturing and going into competition with and replacing the imported chemical products. Patent, trade-mark and copyright acts, with internal revenue acts, stand in the way, firmly braced up by the Sherman Act, so as to block many lines of chemical manufacture. These acts not alone deprive us from the right of manufacture, but from actual use of many commodities, and make us dependent on the good will and ability and policies of foreign nations. You can convince yourselves of this by a study of those United States chemical industries, where this interference, this prevention, is not felt. Most European and some Asiatic countries, as also Canada, require that under patent, trade-mark or copyright granted, the protected product be actually manufactured or sold for the protection granted, and in some countries that a “reasonable” proportion of the amount used in the country be actually made in that country. Also t h a t actual manufacture be started or license for manufacture be granted, within a fixed time after granting of such exclusive protection. There is a great difference of opinion between expert authorities, whether such restrictions and limitations are good or bad policies. I hold that under present conditions, and for our future protection, some changes should be made in the requirements of foreign patents granted in the United States, as is made of United States patents granted in these foreign countries. What we grant to others should be granted to us, and what others require of us, we should require of them. This is reciprocity and an application of the Golden Rule. It is held that rights granted under patents, copyrights and trade-marks are c?ontracts. If so, the breach of contract by one party should and does invalidate the whole contract. The United States certainly cannot be expected t o live up to its end of the contract, if the foreign country cannot or will not live up to its part. It is also held that the rights of patents, copyrights and trademarks are fixed by the Cystitution of the United States. T h a t
Vol. 7 , NO.2
is correct, but there is nothing in the section applying t o these rights that does not allow the United States to issue its rules and regulations in applying this section. The section of the Constitution reads as follows: Sec. VIII-“To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times, to authors and inventors, the exclusive right t o their respective writings and discoveries, etc.” The Constitution of the United States also states, as the very first paragraph of the Constitution: “Preamble : . . . . . . . . . . , promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity,. . . . ” If the granting of any copyright, trade-mark or patent is not to the welfare of the United States, then the granting of such rights and the protection given under such grant, is contrary to the Constitution. Can the United States do anything to better existing conditions, and if so, how long need it take to make a change, only temporary if you so wish, to meet conditions of the present foreign war and the near future after the war is over? A way is pointed out if we consider what Great Britain has done since the beginning of war, and is doing, where similar interests are affected. On August, 7, 1914, the authority and power of the British Board of Trade was extended beyond the acts of 1905 and 1907, putting thereby absolutely into control and charge of that Board, all matters pertaining t o patents, trade-marks and designs, owned or controlled by any of those at war with Great Britain. This official board on that same day appointed a very strong and representative chemical committee, with the following announcement : “In view of the cessation of imports from Germany and Austria, and the fact that there are many articles hitherto imported from these countries of importance, if not necessity to British manufacturers, information is invited by the Commercial Intelligence Branch of the Boartl of Trade from importers of such articles as to their precise nature and quality, in order that steps may be taken t o ascertain whether similar goods might be produced in this country (G. B.) and if so, where or if not, from what neutral sources they may be obtained?” Without waiting for any report from this committee the Board of Trade on that same day, August 7th, amended the Patents, Designs and Trade-mark Acts and on August 21st, issued Statutory Rules and Orders, effective from August 7th, giving to “any person” the right of asking for “avoidance” or “suspension” of any patent, trade-mark or design during the time of war and six months thereafter. On September 7th, those rules were extended so as to apply t o patents, trade-marks or designs of those a t war with Great Britain, irrespective of where issued, and giving the right to suspend in part or whole any patent, trade-mark or design for the whole time of such protection or registration. I n effect this means t h a t Great Britain and also her colonies do not recognize the validity of any patent, copyright or design, in any country that is at war with her and also will place no restriction on any neutral country that may supply any such products. I hold t h a t the United States should take some action, as the welfare of the country is a t a stake; it need not be as drastic as t h a t of Great Britain, but something should be done and be done quickly, either through Executive Order or through action of Congress, confining such action, if you so wish, to foreign patents and protected foreign products. I am not recommending or suggesting the curtailing of any rights under patent, trade-mark or copyright acts, except so far t h a t I hold- this as a matter of self-protection and protecting our future, the Constitutional “welfare” of our country, by giving t o any person in the United States, under proper. restrictions and regulations, the right to use, without claim for payment of royalty and with ~
Feb., 191j
T H E J O C R Y . 4 L OF I M D L - S T R I A L A N D E N G I N E E R I N G C H E M I S T R Y
protection against damage or infringement suits, such patent or product patent or patented process, as is in actual use in any foreign country, and the owner of which will not or cannot manufacture himself, or issue ’license to manufacture in the United States, and thereby compels those in the United States to rely absolutely on the imported article. Some authorities have advised t h a t under present existing conditions manufacturers go ahead and ignore these protective acts and take their chances that our federal courts will not sustain any action taken later on by the foreign owners, and uphold them in creating a monopoly of supply and distribution. As i t may be unconstitutional for the foreigners to so act, against the welfare of the United States, this is a safe gamble, but I do not recommend it, as the defending of a lawsuit, in which chemical expert testimony may be involved, is very expensive both for winner and loser. Ignoring of foreign patent, trade-mark and copyright privileges may be of temporary benefit, but would not b e a very firm basis for the upbuilding of a chemical industry. I n his report as chairman of the Patent Committee of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, dated June I , 1914, L. H. Baekeland very truly says: “It is a pity that, instead of resorting t o those haphazard attempts at legislation, this subject should not be entrusted first to a competent cornmission which could submit a report and recommend such legislation as would render the patent system of the United States adequate to modern requirements of the development of this country. Such a simple procedure, however, seems not to meet the favor of lawyer-politicians, unacquainted with the practical workings of our patent laws.” No doubt it was only a slip of memory for Dr. Baekeland to overlook the “exclusive importers,” possible retainers of his “lawyer-politicians.’’ Let me illustrate this point and make use of a product known t o all of you-acetylsalicylic acid. I am taking, simply as illustration, a well-known medicinal drug, because no medicines, crude or refined, are today being exported to the United States, the warring nations not having sufficient for their own uses Scetylsalicylic acid is a chemical product, commonly known by its protected name, aspirin. Under patent and copyright protection, we would not be allowed t o manufacture or sell one grain of aspirin, without permission of the foreign owners of the copyright name of aspirin. A physician knowingly or unknowingly, who prescribes aspirin, calls for a specific product, made by a specific company, at perhaps a specific place, and the dispensing druggist has no right under state acts, or under federal act, if interstate commerce is involved, t o substitute therefore acetylsalicylic acid, although it is aspirin. It may be that some chemists, druggists, physicians or laymen do not know that acetylsalicylic acid and aspirin are but two names for the same identical substance. This holds good for very many other drug products that are known in the trade by their protected copyrighted names, such as salvarsan, veronal, phenacetin. Some may be afraid t o take 5 grains of acetphenedin or oxyethylacetanilide, but have no fear of 5 grains of phenacetin, the difference being only in their names. Substitutions of this kind have been decided by the courts as being illegal. After the patent rights have expired, we can get busy, often with a 17-year handicap of experience against us. It is against such effects of this kind of protection t h a t many protest: the creating of an absolute monopoly for foreign manufacture and distribution, compelling importation, when the protected foreign owner will neither manufacture nor allow manufacture in our country, nor even issue license to use his protected trade-mark or copyright in our country, and where these protected rights are made use of in other countries. As is well known, many chemicals, drugs, colors, etc., require the use of grain (ethyl) alcohol in their manufacture or purification. Xbith an internal revenue tax of $2.10 per gallon on such
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alcohol, we cannot compete with those countries (European, Asiatic, North and South American) that allow tax-free alcohol to be used in the arts. I knqw of cases where it pays the United States manufacturer to send his raw material t o Canada, t o manufacture this into a finished product in Canada, and to re-import to the United States. He thereby gets it c k a p e r than if manufactured in the United States, even though he pays freight two ways and import duty, simply because in Canada he can use tax-free alcohol in the process of manufacture. This is a very superficial indication of some of the conditions t h a t should be changed and that quickly, and we should strike while the iron is hot. All should help to release the legislative brakes t h a t are retarding the progress and development of many chemical industries that could and should prosper in this country. I am fully aware that importers and representatives of foreign houses do not agree with these views, and that any such action will seriously affect their business and their pocketbooks. Not as a matter of politics must I refer to the Sherman Act as another serious interference in the development of chemical industries, but only t o illustrate what can and is done in Germany, which cannot be done in the United States now, without coming quickly into conflict with the Sherman Act; i. e., creating illegal combinations or trusts. Some of the largest competing chemical industries of Germany, sold representing combined capital of more than $~oo,ooo,ooo, out their interests in the hydro-electro industries of Sweden, hlonvay and Iceland, manufacturing nitrogen compounds from atmospheric nitrogen. With the support of the German government they formed a new “cartel” (syndicate, combination or trust) t o develop in Germany the Haber process of making ammonia direct from the atmospheric nitrogen, as this new process does not depend on cheap water-electric power. What privileges and rights and financial support these companies receive from the government I cannot say, but the fact is that the government is party to this combination. As a result it will not be long after war is ended before Germany will be independent of any foreign country for its supply of all kinds of nitrogen compounds and ready to compete in foreign countries with these compounds It is as a matter of protection for its agricultural interests that the German government assists and fosters this new industry. Potash salts are also used in agriculture and the world’s supply today is controlled by the German Kali Syndicate, of which the German government is a direct partner, owning some of the mines that are in this trust. When it was found that the coal-tar product saccharin was seriously hampering the beetsugar industry of Germany, this industry was protected by making the manufacture of saccharin a government monopoly, and prohibiting its use as a sugar substitute-a necessary step as one pound of saccharin has about the sweetening power of 500 lbs. of sugar. But there is no provision limiting the export of saccharin. How well our beet-sugar industry is protected, need not be mentioned, except that we rely for a very large proportion of our beet-sugar seed on Germany. Saccharin was first made and patented in the United States, but the German inventor decided to manufacture in Germany, and not until the patent rights expired could the product be made in this country as it is now. We have tremendous natural vegetable and mineral potash resources. If in order to exploit and develop them quickly, it were suggested that a combination or syndicate or trust or whatever you want to call it, be formed of the firms interested in the manufacture of fertilizers, how long would it be before some legal action would be instituted t o unscramble such company as being contrary to or not in accord with the Sherman Act? But it mill need the capital a t command of such a combina-
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tion t o develop and introduce the potash industry into our country. C. S. Bradley and D. R. Lovejoy, two Americans, were the first t o commercially make nitrogen compounds from the atmospheric nitrogen, and i t was lack of financial backing that drove them into bankruptcy and lost one of the most important industries to the United States, so that today, instead of being the leaders in this industry, we are actually only lookers-on. The Haber process for the making of ammonia is patented in the United States but whether we shall see the process used here before the patents expire is questionable. If we have to wait until then, about 15 years, we shall again be handicapped with 15 years’ experience on the part of foreign workers, not even considering the improvements, modifications and changes that will naturally be made in the operating of this process. It may be partly due to our great natural resources, and the great ease with which we have been able to dispose of them as such, that we have not developed chemical industries based on them. It was easier and quicker money to sell our raw or crude products instead of changing them into refined and finished products. The future is very bright and now is the time to begin working it out. It will not be easy for us to get to the head of the procession, where we belong, even if you modify, change or suspend the patent, trade-mark and copyright acts, even if we get taxfree alcohol, and if you would make a dead letter of the Sherman Law, as far as it interferes with prospective manufacture by a combination or trust. It would take a long time, longer than many may anticipate, before we could replace many of the imported chemical products with those “made in the United States.” We must realize t h a t these foreign industries are in their highest state of development in Europe, due to the opportunities offered their chemists and experts in the past. These chemical industries are very complex, interlocking a t every step, and could not as a whole be moved or transplanted to a new region. The by-product of one process becomes the raw material of another process and in many cases the by-product of one step is the market product exported to us. This accounts for the cheapness of such products, they being It therefore makes only incidental t o some other product it impossible in many cases to make any specific product as your main product and compete in price with this same product if it is the by-product in some other process. These fully developed concerns in Europe also manufacture the products they use in their processes, which gives them a great advantage over the manufacturer who has t o buy such necessary process chemicals. They do not specialize in any one class of chemicals, as is the custom with us as a general rule. We also differ from them in having spoiled ourselves by measuring everything by tons and carloads, instead of ounces and pounds. I t goes against our national grain t o work up a carload to obtain an ounce of refined product. We are beginning to recognize this and in our working up of our radium ores we shall get homeopathic output from allopathic doses. We also lack in this country the application of real, genuine research work and its application to manufacturing industries. We need more and more research and engineering laboratories a s integral parts of manufacturing institutions. You cannot contradict the statement that every manufacturing concern in the United States, which has a well-equipped chemical and engineering research and testing laboratory’ as t o men and apparatus, is on a competing basis with similar concerns in foreign countries, and they are not alone marketing their products in competition, but in many cases are commanding the world’s markets. The routes to the North and South poles are marked 1 United Steel Corporation, Standard Oil Co., Welsbach Co., duPont Powder Co., General Electric Co , Eastman Kodak Co , General Chemical Co.. Packing House Co ’s, and many others.
with the discarded packages t h a t contained products of United States manufacture. We must get away from the ton and carload methods of giving away our natural crude or raw materials and then importing the refined or finished commodities made therefrom. Our exports of raw or crude chemicals far exceed in money value our total imports of refined chemical products, and we take back in ounces what we sent out in to&. Real genuine research work and chemical manufacturing experience go together, are absolutely dependent on each other and are the foundation of the development of chemical industries. I referred to the development of the Haber ammonia process; let me illustrate with another case. Prof. Adolph Baeyer, of the University of Munich, Germany, worked for 15 years in his private laboratory before he invented a process for the making of artificial indigo. The Badische Anilin and Soda Fabrik obtained the rights to the Baeyer invention, and it took their chemical and engineering staff another 20 years before they developed this process commercially so as to actually replace nature’s product with that made in a chemical factory. Thirtyfive years of research and experimental work to manufacture commercially one coal tar or anilin color, and we have thousands of them-and a similar story can be told of others! M y answer to the question “Why do we not manufacture anilin dyes in the United States?” is that we do. This is confirmed by the symposium on the American Dye Industry’ and in the articles of Grosvenor and Frerichs,2 just published. The anilin-dye industry is only a small phase of the total chemical industries, in fact, we could say that in many cases dyes are by-products in the manufacture of other chemicals. For figures as to the magnitude of the chemical industries in the United States, we must use the census and other governmental reports. Such reports ,in many cases enumerate importers, sole agents, distributors (wholesale and retail) as direct manufacturers. Many of these statistical figures are good for nothing. The nearest I can get to figures for 1913 are3
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Total manufactured products, U. S., 1913.. . , . . . . . . . . ~13,000,000,000 1,400,000,000 Chemical and allied products. , . . . . . . , . . . . 120,000,000 Striqtly chemical products (8.5 per cent), domestic. . . . . Strictly chemical products (6.5 per cent), imported., , . . 90,000,000 10,000,000 Coal-tar dyes, imported (0.7 per cent). . , . . . . . . . . . . . ,
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The profits on the .$go,ooo,ooo of imported strictly chemical products must be about $30,000,000 for the foreign manufacturers, based on the dividends declared and surpluses set aside by the foreign companies manufacturing them. By the time these imported chemicals reach the hands of the actual consumers, their cost has increased to about $z~o,ooo,ooo. How the retail prices of chemical products are affected by their manufacture in the United States, generally after patents have expired or license for manufacture is issued, is well shown . . . , .Incidentally the community by Frerichs, who states: a t large was compensated by the cheafiening of prices for many articles, the manufacture of which was undertaken in the United States. , , , , , .Salicylic acid from $1.25 t o 35 c.; Synthetic Oil of Wintergreen from $1.25 t o 40 c . ; Acetanilid $1.00 against 30 c. ( 7 0 c. additional for trade name, copyrighted); and when patents have expired, Acetylsalicylic Acid a t 5 c. in place of Aspirin, the same thing, at 43 c. (38 c. additional for patents, protection and copyright).” As Frerichs’ figures are of a year ago they were not determined or influenced by the present war conditions. These figures, and you can supply many others, bear out the statement, that we can manufacture on a competitive basis I‘.
1 2
THISJOURNAL, 6 (1914). 941. Trans. A . I. C. E., 1913.
s But in giving them I a m in accord with Mark Twain’s classification and grading of lies as: First-Lies; second-Damn lies; and fhird-Statistics. Specifically applied t o anilin colors I suggest the change of the letters D t o L in the legend that: “Some Dye to Live and Others Live to Dye.”
Feb., 1915
THE’ J O I ‘ R N A L O F I N D C S T R I A L A N D E NGI 1VE.ERI N G C H E M I S T R Y
every chemical product that we now import, but we must not be hampered or prevented by adverse legislative acts. Cheap labor is only a minor factor. The $90,000,000 of import-d strictly chemical products represent a t the highest not over $ 1 o,ooo,ooo for actual labor, not over 4 per cent of the actual final selling price of these commoditie.s (Sz~o,ooo,ooo). As soon as all legislative hindrance is done away with and we thereby have a fair opening for manufacture, our schools will do their share and our scientific ,students will receive the quantity and quality of research instruction to make good in these chemical lines. Many of them are getting it today, although i t is valueless as far as its practical application is concerned. I t is the Bread and Bzitter consideration that takes many of our students to the scientific: schools. I consider it the height of folly, not to designate it as criminal, for our teacher. to waste and steal the time of the students, with research instruction, that may be applied oil the Moon or Mars or in Foreign Countries, and allow these students to starve, professionally, on that part of the Earth which we designate as the United States. I believe in finding out what the student needs and wants in the United States and giving that to him or her. Teachers of Chemistry and the Students of Chemistry “Made in the United States” are fully up to and the equals of those who prefix to themselves the legends “ N a d e in Austria, or France, or Germany, or Great Britain, or Italy or Russia, or Turkey” as the case may be. This is the way the coal-.tar color industry has been developed in Germany and the medicinal preparations made in these factories, I designate as by-products of the coal-tar color industry. They are doing the same thing with the nitrogen industry. Artificial rubber, rubber made in the chemical laboratory, is a n established fact in Germany. You do not find it in the market today simply because the German government does not want it in the market and is willing to pay a big sum, so I have been told on good authority, t o keep it out of the market. If, on account of the present war, Germany should have to give up its African possessions, laboratory rubber will perhaps replace natural rubber, just as laboratory indigo replaced natural indigo. Germany has planted its African possessions with rubber trees, and it is not going to let laboratory rubber interfere with its prospective rubber agricultural interests in its African possessions. “ I t is a n ill wind that blows no good,” and some have read and deciphered the handwriting on the wall. It is gratifying to be able to say t h a t the State of Illinois is going to help along, as the foundation-stone for the new chemical industrial technical and commercial department was laid only the other day. I
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hope that everyone, whether of Illinois or not, will back President James, so that his plans can be quickly realized. As t o the immediate future, you have it in your hands, t o at least apply a relief remedy, as without it future progress will continue to be checked and lay dormant. Modify or change some of our legislative acts that protect the foreign product or process or trade-mark or copyright of every manufacturer or owner, who will not manufacture in the United States nor allow the protected product or protected rights to be used in the United States, and who thereby compels everyone of us to rely on his good-will or his ability or the conditions existing in his country for what may be a necessity to us; or that, through the protection afforded him, allow him to make a convenient dzimpiizg ground of our country for his surplus or by-product or even for products which he is not allowed to sell in his own country. The chemists of the United States have the brains and the ability and the gumption to make i t not “Made in America” but “Made in the U. S.” for everyone of the chemical products we now import. All t h a t the chemists of the United States need and all they ask for, is opportunity, fair play, an open field, not fenced in with adverse legislation. The chemist of the United States will then come t o the scratch, toe the mark and cross the finishing line ahead, every time. Their records in the other o p e n chemical events prove this. The chemists of the United States have slept long enough under these heavy legislative blankets. For 50 years they have been compulsory “Rip Van Winkles.” Pull off this narcotic legislative cover, and see them jump up, Wide-Aweke. The chemists of the United States are mot impotent,-far from it. They are very productive, they are willing and ready and can and will do their full share, if you will only prepare the way for them. Having tried to answer the opening question, let me ask another in concluding: Why should the United States be made the dumping ground for many chemical products, originating and coming t o us from foreign countries, fully protected by product or process patents, trade-marks or copyrights, without a single requirement, under these rights and protection granted, to the foreign or home owners, by the United States, t o allow anyone in the United States to manufacture or use these protected products, and without a single requirement of the owners to manufacture themselves in the United States or even a requirement of exporting to us, any of their so-called protected products? SUITE903-4, POSTALTELEGRAPH BUILDING CHICAGO
OBITUARIES CHARLES MARTIN HALL It is with sincere regret that we record the death of Charles Martin Hall, after a long illness, a t Daytona, Florida, on Sunday, December 27, 1914. Dr. Hall mas one of our most successful chemical engineers and inventors. He was born a t Thompson, Ohio, December 6, 1863, and graduated in the classical course a t Oberlin College, 1885, a t the age of twenty-one years and six months. While in college he took special interest in the study of Chemistry, in general, and in the metal aluminum in particular. Aluminum was known to be the most abundant metal in nature (but it is never found uncombined). It was first isolated b y Woehler in 1827, in very small quantities, just sufficient t o establish its identity as the metal of alum, clay and other familiar minerals and rocks.
I n 1854 Henri St. Clair Deville, of Paris, attempted, with the financial support of Louis Napoleon, to establish the commercial extraction of aluminum. I n a certain sense he succeeded, his maximum output reaching 5,000 pounds per annum. But the cost was almost prohibitory. The first price in 1855 was $90 per pound; this was gradually reduced to $12 per pound, the lowest price reached by Deville, whose process consisted in reducing aluminum chloride by sodium. In 1886 Hamilton Y. Castner, a student in the School of Mines of Columbia University, invented a new and much cheaper process for making sodium, and also improved the process for employing this metal for reducing aluminum chloride. H e established works a t Oldbury near Birmingham, England, and by 1889 was making 500 pounds per day, and supplying i t for $4.00 per pound. Dr. Hall became interested in the aluminum problem while
