Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1869-10-05
Letter from the -Editor-Field of
Invention-Ho Air Engine-Ancient
and Modern Arts-Practical Age
Utilized Labor.

and the places where new inventions
are taken in hand and new machine,
turned out for practical use. In this
department of invention and discov.
cry there is perfect equality, wealth
and aristocracy being rather hind
RANGES than landmarks. For when
a man is rich or in high social posi-
ton he can do but little that is use
full or fix his mind upon practical
things.
The faculty for invention is rare
among men, there being perhaps
not above one in ten thousand pos
sessing it, and these few chiefly found
among the practical mechanics. My
attention was lately called to one of
these rare men, having fine
organism and practical turn for an
inventor, in which department he
has been singularly successful, being
credited with near fifty patents and
most of them in practical use. His
preferred field lies wlIhin the bounds
of the engine, the furnace, the foun-
dry, and apparatus for economizing
fuel and power. His latest, and
what he considers his greatest, tri-
umph is the invention of hot air
en- CINE for propelling machinery.
This,consists rather in ten or a dozen
inventions for applying air as pow
er by means of forcing several cubic
feet of cold air into tight chamber
in which there is fire, which sudden
ly heats the air and causes it to eX-
pand when it becomes a power for
driving machinery, same as steam
The fire is supplied with oxygen and
hydrogen by means of the successive
supplies of cold air forced into the
fire chamber. And as the fire ex-
hausts each successive supply of
these supporters of combustion, the
fire chamber exchanges its hot air
for cold, and so continuously-the
power consisting Of air rari6ed by
heat, just as steam power consists of
water changed into steam by heat.
The inventor, in order to economize
such power, and manage it for prac-
teal use, had to invent many parts
having expended some three years Of
his time before venturing upon trial
before the public. Two years ago
he exhibited his invention at the
Worlds Fair in Paris, where a Com
mittee of Mechanics awarded him
ono of the few first premiums to
Since then he has set
up the manufacture, and some fifty
are in use about the city-chiefy for
light work where economy or fuel is
an objective and half pounds of
coal per hour being the quantity for
a three horse power. Space requir-
ed, Axe, and height g. feet. He is
manufacturing them from two to
twenty horse power, and is at work
on one of forty horse power. This
is not at all revival of the Ericsson
Caloric Engine, in any sense, as the
latter had hot air chamber apart
from its fire chamber, the fire receiv-
ing its supports for combustion by
means of an open CRATE, and the air
heated thereby being drawn thence
into another chamber in which pro
cess the power was mostly lost, and
of course the impossibility to beget
above two or three horse power.
This machine is in no danger of ex-
plosion or setting works on fire it
requires no intelligent management,
as any boy may start and then run
it. The fuel is about sixth what is
used for steam power. No part is
liable to wear out or break, and no
repairs, except once in three months
in new packing about the cylinders,
which any boy may do. Weight of
a three horse power, 5O0fbs, and of a
six horse power, 1900. Price, 81, 900
for three horse power, or $1,000
for six. Al present these new en-
gines are being used for running tan
yards, shoe factories, turning lathes,
and for planning, saving and splitting
lumber, printing machinery, &c. |
saw one running at printing office,
and the foreman called il the grand
est triumph Of the age, the cost of
running it for ten hours being but
40 cents for fuel.
l have now noticed most valua-
BILE labor saving invention, not in
view of advertising, but as curiou.
and useful work, in which toiling
millions are to be blessed and the
public wealth augmented.
The greatest physical feature OF
our age is machinery. In this fea-
ture only, the ancients were behind
us, and there is no corresponding
one in the records of ancient great
ness to take its place. They possess
ed Immense mechanical powers, as
attested by the enormous weights
they raised for buildings. But sc
far as we know they seldom applied
such powers with reference TO com.
mon and productive purposes. They
had enterprise, courage, patriotism
talents and skill equal to our day
but these were not applied to manu-
features and the creation of wealth
Their ideas of beauty and grandeur
were above ours, but they never de
scended to invention for labor say
ing. In the drama and war, in poet
ry and oratory, and in sculptur,
and architecture they more thai
matched US. But they had no rail
roads, no steam and hot air engines
no telegraphs, no sewing machines
nor did they lend their wisdom at al
to the invention of machines 70
blowing, planting, reaping and sepa
rating from the chaff. All their Ia
ents were expended for catering t
the mobiles, none for educating an
helping forward the masses. The.
had 3 Cesar, a Pompey, Cato-bu
no Fulton, no Morse-none equal t
this inventor of the hot air engine
How strange that SO many thousan
of years should have passed ava.
before the great men went to wor
in the mechanical field! To CHEAP
en- labor, feed, clothe and care 70
the people was then as now OF fri
Importance, but nothing was though
| of tho Iika Rattlee and book writ