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INDUSTRIAL A N D ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
Vol. 15, No. 1
Personals
Industrials
Mr. M. G. Donk has reported for duty with the Chemical Division of the Tariff Commission and probably will be assigned to special work on heavy chemicals. Dr. W. Grenville Horsch has resigned as research associate in the Research Laboratory of Applied Chemistry of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to accept a responsible research position in the laboratory of the Chile Exploration Company in New York City. Dr. Peter Feiberger, a color specialist, has been appointed chief of the Dye Investigation Laboratory of the Customs Division of the Treasury Department in New York. He will be in charge of the comparative tests on coal-tar products, which are necessary under the new Tariff Act, and will also assist in the tariff standardization work. Three assistant chemists will be appointed to assist him in his work. Mr. F. W. McSperron, of Wilmington, Del., has been appointed specialist in chemical cost accounting in the Chemical Division of the Tariff Commission. Prof. Robert T. Haslam, director of the School of Chemical Engineering Practice, has been appointed director of the Research Laboratory of Applied Chemistry of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to succeed Dr. R. E. Wilson who recently resigned. Dr. J. E, Teeple will sail for Europe on January 2 on a business trip and will be gone about four weeks. Mr. J. M. Weiss, director of development of The Barrett Co., and Mr. Charles R. Downs, a t one time chief chemist of The Barrett Company and more recently research group head of the National Aniline and Chemical Co., have formed a partnership, effective January 1,with offices in New York. They will specialize in coal-tar manufacture and utilization, and in general catalytic processes. Chemical engineering will be a feature of their activities. Mr. Jerome Alexander has opened an office in the Chemists’ Building, New York City, as consulting chemist and chemical engineer, with special experience in colloid chemistry and its application. Prof. Walter G. Whitman, formerly assistant professor of chemical engineering, has been appointed assistant director of the Research Laboratory of Applied Chemistry of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Mr. A. A. Heller has taken over the management of the International Oxygen Company. He succeeds Mr. L. W. Hench, secretary and general manager, who has resigned. Mrs. Florence Burlingame, formerly research assistant with the War Trade Board, has joined the Chemical Division of the Tariff Commission. Mrs. Burlingame specialized in the chemical dye statistical work in the War Trade Board, and her work a t the Tariff Commission will be along similar lines. Mr. Gaston Du Bois, president of the Monsanto Chemical Works, sailed from New York for Europe on November 7 for a six weeks’ business trip. Mr. C. S. Gwynne has resigned as chemist in the Forest Products Laboratory to become chief chemist for the *Arrowhead Mills, rnc.; Fulton, N. Y . Dr. Victor Yngve has resigned his position with the Hydro1 Co., Niagara Falls, N. Y., to accept a research fellowship in Cryogenic Engineering a t Harvard University. Dr. Minnie A. Graham, who has been acting professor of chemistry a t Wells College during the past year has been appointed associate professor of chemistry a t Mills College in California Prof. L. A. Fitz has resigned his position a t the Kansas State Milling Department to accept a position with The Fleischmann Co., New York, N. Y . , where he will be in charge of wheat, flour, and bread research work. Mr. William C. McIndoe has joined the technical staff of the Portland Gas & Coke Company. He is also acting as assistant to the professor of mechanics and testing materials at Oregon Agricultural College. Dr. Frank C. Gephart, analytical and consulting chemist, has established a laboratory and office a t 23 East 31st St., New York, N. Y . Dr. Calvin Adam Buehler, of the Ohio State University, has been appointed assistant professor of chemistry in the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tenn.
The Board of Governors of the Synthetic Organic Chemical Manufacturers Association of the United States has elected H. F. Wilmot technical advisor to the association in matters involving administration of Customs Duties under the present Tariff Act. Mr. Wilmot was president and a director of the Tinc Tura Laboratories, Brooklyn, N. Y., and has severed his connections with that organization in order to devote his entire time to his new duties with the association. His office will be Room 1648, Equitable Building, 120 Broadway, New York City. The Supreme Court of North Carolina has rendered a decision of interest to all fertilizer concerns doing business in that state. The statutes of North Carolina provide that no claim for damage to a crop by commercial fertilizers can be maintained unless a sample of the fertilizer was properly drawn and analyzed by the state chemist. A farmer who had failed to have su-h an analysis made refused to pay his fertilizer note and brought a counterclaim against the fertilizer company for damage to his crop supposed to have been caused by the presence of borax in the fertilizer. The court decided in favor of the fertilizer company, and the decision has now been confirmed by the Supreme Court.
It is reported that Arghan, the new textile fiber discovered by Sir Henry Weckham, the pioneer of the plantation-rubber industry, has qualities unsurpassed by any other textile, being as strong as steel, bulk for bulk. Its tensile power is recorded as 50 per cent superior to that of the best flax and hemp. The cloth is very firm and takes dyes well. A German corporation has been organized, with the participation of the Badische Anilin und Soda Fabrik and a number of German textile producers of the lines which are interested in the production of high-grade substitute fabrics, to exploit in Germany and surrounding countries the textile inventions of Dr. Wilhelm Schweitzer. It is stated that an English company has been formed to exploit the processes in China and Japan. One process relates to the manufacture of a fabric similar to raw silk from vegetable substitutes claimed to be immune to water baths. The second process is intended to enable the manufacture of highgrade yarns out of all sorts of the low-grade wool and wool waste. The product is claimed to have appearance and texture of pure silk, and to have warming qualities higher than ordinary wool. The third process relates to the manufacture of artificial silk from cheap and medium-priced wool and animal fibers jn combination with waste products of the artificial silk and pure silk industry. The fourth process enables manufacturers of artificial silk to give i t the luster, feel, and appearance of highquality silk. By the fifth process, flax fibers are to be made into artificial raw silk. Agronomists of five midwestern states-Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, and Wisconsin-have agreed on a list of 13 standard fertilizer formulas in addition to straight acid phosphate, which will meet all the fertilizer requirements of their states. Each state college of agriculture is now to select 12 formulas, including acid phosphate, and to urge farmers not to buy other mixtures, nor to mix a t home in any other proportion of ammonia, phosphoric acid, and potash. Officials of 13 fertilizer companies, consulted as to the commercial practicability of the scientists’ formulas, said all could be mixed and that standardization on this list will cut costs per unit of plant food by eliminating the present multiplicity of low-analysis brands. No fertilizer on the list contains less than a total of 16 per cent ammonia, phosphoric acid, and potash.
It is reported that several fertilizer manufacturers are producing calcium arsenate as a side line, intending to sell it only for cash, preferably to their fertilizer customers, a t as low a price as possible, the purpose being not to make big profits on calcium arsenate, but to provide protection for the cotton of their customers. The Hartford-Empire Co., of Hartford, Conn., which controls the Hartford-Fairmont Co., has contracted for the control of the business and patents of the Howard Automatic Glass Feeder Company. The Hartford-Fairmont Co., which is the chief representative in the development of automatic glass feeding machines employing the new gob process, has recently been amalgamated with the Empire Machine Co., a leading representative in developing machinery for blowing and forming paste mold ware in general, and especially electric light bulbs. The company will be connected by close contract relations with the Corning Glass Works.
