THE ROMANCE OF STEEL.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9068, 18 April 1908, Page 3

THE ROMANCE OF STEEL.

Is there any industrial romance so fascinating as the romance of steel? asks a London paper. Fifty years ago the moat pressing need oi the industrial world was a new metal, stronger and cheaper than iron. The railways were using iron rails that wore out in less than two years. William Kelly, an Irish-American, of Pittsburg, and Henry Bessemer, of England, gave the word what it wanted. Kelly, one learns from a new book on the romance of the industry, was the original inventor of the process which bears Bes3emer's name,, but the commercial success was due to Bussemer's machinery, perfected in Sheffield. Kelly was an ironmaker, and faced with bankruptcy for want of charcoal. One day, as he wat:hed his "finery fire," he noticed that in one spot cold air alone had made the molten iron white hot. The idea of a new process :ame to him instantly. Every ironmaker believed that cold air would chill hot iron, and Kelly was derided as a crank when he made his discovery known. "Some crank will be burning ice next," said one man. This effect of air on molten iron was the basis of a process which to-day converts 18,000,000,0001bs of iron into steel every year in America. The historian of this wonderful process calls his history the story of 1,000 millionaies. Andrew Carnegie made his money in steel, and through it Charles Schwab was receiving £20,000 a year at thirty-nine as President of the Stesl Corporation. Mr Carnegie's operations became so Napoleonic that manufacturers and financiers became alarmed. At all cost they must get rid of him. Pierpont Morgan was the negotiator, "flow much?" he asked. Mr Carnegie named terms which amounted to a ■cash price of about The sale was effected, and the Steel Trust came into being. It is not a pretty picture that is/ drawn of the lust for gold at the Carnegie works. "Partnerships were dangled before the eyes of young clerks until they were fevered with ambition. It was a system of make or break. Every .young officer who served under General Carnegie was either a millionaire ■or a physical wreck in a few years. Every superintendent was pitted against every other. The heaven of a partnership and the misery of dismissal goaded the bosses and subbosses into a furious activity that put the Carnegie Company far in advance of all its competitors." The cry was always for more. The romance of steel is partly « tragedy.