ADDRESSES
I
THE NEEDS OF THE MINING INDUSTRY BY J. F. CALLBREATH' Received February 6 . 1913
The two foundation industries of the United States are agriculture and mining. Agriculture is perhaps twice or three times as important as mining in the number of men engaged and in the value of its product. Irrespective of their relative importance, one thing stands out preeminently and t h a t is there can be no great agricultural prosperity without the prosperity of the mines. The population t h a t depends upon the mines and the manufactured products of the mines supports agriculture. Just the other day the Senate completed a piece of legislation which will give to the various State agricultural colleges the sum of three million dollars yearly for the extension of their work among the farmers. The bill was passed through both houses with comparative ease, as every one seems to have a thorough knowledge of the needs of agriculture. A report which accompanied this bill shows t h a t the National Government has spent on the agricultural experiment colleges and experiment stations in round figures $'jo,ooo,ooo:that i t now spends $3,940,000 in cash annually upon them; t h a t Congress has appropriated each year $ 1 j,ooo,ooofor carrying on the exclusively agricultural work of the Department of Agriculture. With the additional $3,000,000each year just granted, the total Federal aid given agriculture annually will be a t least $~~,ooo,ooo. The result of this generous expenditure of money by the Federal Government for agriculture is seen in the phenomenal increase in production from year to year and the final bumper harvest of last fall. These great appropriations for agriculture hare been continued for years until to-day the officers of this department declare t h a t a vast amount of valuable information is now in existence waiting some effective means of getting it into operation by the farming people of the United States. The plea for the additional $3,000,000was t o take this information direct to the farmers . What do we find the situation to be in regard to mining? The Bureau of Mines is getting one-half a million dollars a year, about as much money as is granted to the Department of -1gi-iculture for the printing and binding of its publications. The Geological Survey, in existence many years, is now getting one million and a half dollars a year, a considerable part of which is used for the benefit of agriculture and other industries. This is a total of two million dollars of Federal aid for the great mining industry with its paramount unsolved problems-problems t h a t are outside of solution by private parties. I n agriculture the men work in the open sunlight with a minimum of hazard to life. I n mining nearly joo,ooomen work in the dark caverns underground with a hazard t h a t is not equaled in any other industry. The mines and quarfies of the United States have an annual death roll of more than 4.000 men and 60,000injured. This calamity of death leaves in its trail 2 , 5 0 0 or more widow and I j,ooo fatherless children. It places upon the states the burden of caring for many of these widow and orphans, an amount that must be many hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. We know from the experience of foreign countries t h a t fully one-half of the number of deaths in the mines of the United States are unnecessary. We know t h a t the work of the Bureau of Mines has reduced this terrible death-rate in the coal mines. The deaths in 1912in the coal mines will be approximately 800 less than in the year 190j,when this work \vas first begun. 1 Secretary
of the American Mining Congress.
I
Practically nothing has been done by the Bureau in regard t o the deaths in metal mines and the rate is heavier than in the coal mines. Neither has anything been accomplished in reducing the number of deaths in the quarries which have a still higher rate than the metal mines. This work can not be taken up until Congress and the people of the United States begin t o have some adequate idea of the importance of the mining industry. So difficult has it been in the past to obtain appropriations for this humane work. t h a t those of us who are interested have learned to be extremely modest in the appropriations we have asked for. Only slight increases are asked for the coming fiscal year, when in fact the Bureau, on the basis of what i t has already accomplished, can well spend two or three million dollars each year to the benefit of the entire country, rather than the one-half million which it now has. Taking out of consideration the unusual hazard of mining and the fact that we are killing from three to five miners in this country each year where European countries are killing one and two, there is confronting Congress the question whether i t will allow Western mining to languish and grow less with a diminishing number of men employed in each state, or give t o the mining industry t h a t aid which is similarly given t o agriculture t o rehabilitate this industry and increase the prosperity of the country. When I say t h a t the Western mining industry is I anguishing, I have statistics to bear me out in the statement. In 1906,in the states of Colorado, Montana and Idaho, the value of gold, silver, copper and lead produced reached a value of $298,174,000. In 1910,the value of the production of the a loss of near same metals in the same states was $2 jI ,ooo,oco, $jo,ooo,ooo. I n 1900 Colorado employed 40,000 miners; in 1910 t h a t state employed 19,000miners. In 1906 Montana employed I j , O O O ; in 1910,14,060 miners. I n 1906,Idaho employed j , O m miners; in 1910,6,000 miners. I n Colorado, in the year 1900 the precious metal production &mounted to $jo,ooo,ooo~in 1910 the production was $32,000,000. There is a definite reason for all this. The days of bonanza mining are gone and we are now down to the treatment of low-grade ores. This has led to a series of perplexing problems-the treatment of low-grade refractory ores as varying in character as the faces of the human family. In the Rocky Mountain States we have millions of tons of these low-grade ores containing practically billions of dollars in value. The processes by which these ores may be reduced are morc complex than any of the specialized problems you have on the farms. Their solution is beyond the reach of private capacity except in the rarest instances where large combinations of capital have succeeded in perfecting certain processes, which they keep to themselves. These problems generally can be solved only through the aid of the Federal Government, and until they are solved the Western mining industry xi11 continue to decrease in the value of production and the number of men employed. The Bureau of Xines has asked for $ 2 j 0 , O o O to begin work on such problems and to take care of the safety of the miners employed in these mines. If past experience is repeated, it will be with the greatest difficulty t h a t the members of Congress can be shown the need for such a n appropriation. I n fact it will be more difficult to obtain the $2 j0,ooo for this great industry than to obtain millions for agriculture. I do not object t o agriculture obtaining the increased yearly appropriation of S3,000,000 for the extension of the work of the agricultural colleges in the states, but I am anxious to know why a bill introduced by Representative Foster, Chairman of the
House Committee of Mines and Mining, and which has the approval of the entire committee, calling for an expenditure of a maximum of $1,2000,000 yearly for mining schools in the various states, does not get a n opportunity to come before the House for passage. I want to know why agriculture which has been so adequately cared for during many years can, with such ease, obtain $3,000,000 additional funds for its work, while the bill for mining schools remains on the calendar, with the fear among its friends t h a t it may not obtain sufficient support for its passage. I want to know how Congress is to look at the proposed appropriation for one-half million dollars for buildings for the Bureau of Mines a t Pittsburgh, Pa. I may say t h a t there is no department or bureau of the Federal Government so badly and so inadequately housed as the Bureau of Mines Experiment Station in Pittsburgh. The work is being conducted under the greatest difficulties in buildings belonging t o the War Department, some of them nearly one hundred years old. Further, the \\‘ar Department is anxious t o regain possession of its property and has been continually notifying the Bureau of Mines t h a t it must get out. Here is an emergency as far as the mining industry is concerned. What will Congress do? I a m heartily in favor of the increased appropriation for agriculture, but mining also has similar rights and greater needs. There is no industry which adds so much per capita vealth to the country as the mining industry. There is no industry that, man for man, produces so much value to the country as the mining industry. It is a n industry t h a t must go hand in hand with agriculture. The prosperity of the country depends upon the success of both. Agriculture can not succeed without mining. I am at a loss to understand why mining is so little appreciated in the United States when it attains such high commanding places in every other nation of the world. THE CHEMICAL ENGINEER AND INDUSTRIAL EFFICIENCY’ B Y TV. 31. BOOTH
The chemical engineer can take his legitimate place in industrial affairs only when he begins to concern himself with values and returns and can transpose the signs and symbols of the chemist to the dollars, cents and percentages of the business world. The profession must necessarily include men lvith diversified mental attributes, experiences and education. Satural inventors, builders, executives, analysts and economists are examples of the men who will choose this branch of engineering as a life work. The first and highest type of endeavor concerns itself Tvith the invention of new processes and the perfection of these, later establishing useful industries. Relatively few men have the ability, courage and means to embark in totally new enterprises. and the larger percentage of those Tvho do so, fail, hecause these three important elements are not properly balanced. Not less important, but demanding a different type of mind, perhaps more strongly analytical in its nature, is the large and ever-increasing field open to those TI-ho are able to improve or effect economies in the processes of firms already established. Closely related to this is the examination of new enterprises t h a t seem t o have merit and which need scientific assistance and capital for development. No greater damage has ever been wrought on American investors by an>- class of men than by the “new chemical, ” “private. ” or “Secret process” promoters who have used the subtleties of the science as a basis for fraud. Irrespective of the particular division of endeavor undertaken, the chemical engineer must fortify himself against all classes of misrepresentation, and must concern himself with questions of process, cost, market, location and actual capital needed in any new industrial enterprise. No considerable investment should Paper presented a t the Fifth Aunual Meeting of the .Imerican Institute of Chemical Engineers, Detroit, December,‘1912.
ever be made without a complete report from conservative men, who are familiar with the industry involved. While the basic operations of activity include agriculture, mining, transportation and manufacturing, the latter is chosen as best exhibiting the use of the chemical engineer along the lines previously pointed out. Those who have made a careful study of the splendid papers of Dr. Jlunroe’ and Dr. McKennaZ to be found in the proceedings of this Institute have been impressed with the fact that nearly all of the manufacturing of the United States is carried on east of the Mississippi River, and that more than one-third of this is confined to New Tork, S e w Jersey and Pennsylvania. The following census report shows the increase in capital and people employed from 1850 to, and including. 1909: CAPITAL I S V E S T E D I S
. ..
1850.. . . 1860.. , , . , ,
. 18iO.. . . . . , . 1880 . . . . . . . 1890.. , . . . . . 1900. . . . . , . . 1910.. . . . . .
. .
.
.
.
JIASTF.4CTURIhG
EMPLOYEES
6
957.059 1,311,246 2,053,996 2,i 3 2 , m 4 , 2 5 1,535
533,245,000 1.009,856,000 1.694,56T,000 2,790.273,000 6,525,05lI0O0 9,813,834,000 15.428,270,000
5,306,143
6,615,046
It will be seen t h a t the investment a t the latter date amounts to eighteen billion dollars and the number of employees to over six millions. To maintain the almost perpendicular increase in our manufacturing activities is the duty of the commonwealth, for no more useful type of industrial activity can be found, especially when our products can be placed in foreign markets a t a profit. The observations covered by this paper are necessarily personal and haye accumulated during twenty years, ten of which hax-e been devoted mainly to the questions now to be discussed. The observations cover fifty-three “going” plants, representing thirtyseven industries, and some others t h a t have never gone further than a prospectus distributed by a n ignorant or a dishonest promoter. Obviously. in a paper of this kind, a general outline only can be given. In looking back over the years cowred, it 11-ould seem as though the period has bren one of unexpected crises-rising wages. unsettled market conditions, and acute competition. l m o n g the fifty-three concerns above mentioned, there have been eight failures, two have withdrawn from business and one, only, has burned. The remaining industries are owned as follolvs : Private 11 Corporations 19 Trusts 12 The failures vere attributed t o the folloivinp causes: T w o t o incorrect conceptions of the c o s t s and profits cd a business. Two to dishonest employees. Two t o incompetent supervision. One t o insufficient working capital. One t o manipulation of the stock in l-ew ITork City in 1907.
The superintendents of twenty plants have been forced out or discharged for reasons such as inattention to duty, incompetenq-. lack of knowledge of the business, trust management, the introduction of new methods, inability to pay dividends on inflated stock issue, dissention among officers of the company or inability to handle help. -1s I understand the matter, a general efficiency survey of any business must recognize the following conditions: EXTERh-AL
Policy of the government toward an industm. di\-idends must be earned. Location Cost of plant and equipment.
Capital upon whlch‘
“The Chemical Industries of .Imenca,” Chas. E . Munroe. Trans.
A i n I n s t . Cheiii. Ewg., 2, 84. ‘.The Centering oi Great Industries In the S e w I‘ork Metropolitan District,” Chas. F. McKenna, T r a n s . A m , Iwsi. Clicm. Eqig., 2, 6 5 .
