The Daily News. TUESDAY, MARCH 1, 1904. A MODERN COLOSSUS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVI, Issue 48, 1 March 1904, Page 2

The Daily News. TUESDAY, MARCH 1, 1904. A MODERN COLOSSUS.

The ri-mai'ka'ble growth and developmelit of the steel industry in America should cruuie more than ordinary •interest in Hi is colony in view of the probability of the largs- ironsand deposits in Ta.ranaki and at Parap-nra being workt-d by an If.ngli»h syndicate. The growth of the steel industry in tin-. United States has no parallel in the history of the world. This development is all the more rcmarkalble when it is remem'berod that it is practically the work of u cpiarter of a century. Some interesting facts in connection with this development are presented in the "iron ami steel number" of the Scientific American. In writing a history of the iron' and steel industry we have to gw to the records of Pennsylvania. In the year 178(> the Legislature of the State loaned a certain Mr Huinj/luies the sum of £3OO for the yeras to enable him "to make steel as good as in England.''' Thus on tine banks of Monongaliela was laid the foundation of the greatest industrial organisation in the history of man. In the year 1810 the total production of pig iron in the t'nitcd States was only 53,908 tons, and of this less than 1000 tons wan made into steel. The steel industry really began with the invention of the Bessemer "converter" in 18<54, which nutt-kirt the passing of the "iron age" and the advent of the "age of steel." By flits invention it was possible to convert, in a few minutes' lime and at slight expense, common east iron into steel. Simply told, the "converter' is a device by which air is forct-.l througih molten iron, burning out the silicon, sulphur, carbon ami other combustible materials, reducing it to the hard, compact metal known us "steel." ISy the ytur 1872 the total production of pig iron had increased to 2,548,713 tons. In 1880 it climbed to 3,83:5,191 tons, while in 1891. it hind jumped to the womk-rful figure of 8,279,870 tons. During the last decade it passed far lieyond the production of (!real Britain, reaching in 19(H the enormous output of 15,878,354 tons, while in the following year it climbed to u total of 17,8221,307 tons. To find the secrets of Ameritho supremacy in iron and steel one does not need to go any further than the southern and western shores of Lake Sujierior, where Nature has deposited vast beds of iron oiv, practically on the surface of the ground, where the ore is scooped up in steam shovels capable of lifting five tons of ore at a stroke and is loaJlod into cars at the rate of 800 tons uu hour. With matchless facilities for transportation, with an apparently inexhaustible supply of rich ore, and constant invention of new machinery to improve the various processes of manufacture, American supremacy in this industry seems sure and permanent.