The Andrew County Republican. [volume] (Savannah, Mo.) 1871-1876, 1874-05-29
4 DroN

4 DroIl
There he is,-a great rough man will
a big club, beating, pounding and
punching something up in a dark cor
ner. You'd think he was crazy, or at
least very angry, till you knew he was
only earning his living, and that was his
droll way Of doing it. And the thing
he is pounding is a big lump of gray
clay.
This isn't the only odd thing you
would see in that funny fifth story.
When the first man has pounded the
wet lump Of clay till he is satisfied, an
other man takes it on a bench, breaks
off two chunks about as big as apples,
and kneads them up, n in each hand,
as though ne a going to make clay
biscuits. Suddenly he seems to change
his mind, lays them on the bench, and
rolls them out like breakfast rolls.
You've probably-long time ago
made mud pies and buildings yourself,
but you never expected to sec a grown
up man make mud rolls, and worse still,
to know that he makes over six hun
dred A day!
Let's see what he does with them ?
He seems 10 be satisfied with the rolls
shape, and lays them down by a long
row Of similar rolls.
They're not for breakfast, though
they are TO be baked and this isn't a
house for crazy people, as you may sus-
pect, but a elay-pipe factory. Every
one Of these clay rolls will be, when a
few more hands have worked at it, a
common clay pipe such as you buy for
a penny 10 blow bubbles with.
know you are anxious TO see how a
breakfast roll can get to be a pipe, so
we'll see what they do next. The next
man takes mp a roll, sticks into one end
of it a steel rod something like a knit
ting-needle, and then goes on to draw
part of the soft clay out over the steel
rod. This is for the stem to the pipe,
and when the rod is drawn ont it leaves
a hole through which you blow.
When the stem is long enough, the
next thing to do is to make the bowl.
To do that the chunk of clay, with the
stem on, is put into a sort of press and
a stamp brought down on it. In q mo-
ment it is opened, and the lump Of clay
has become a shapely pipe bowl. 1t
has, however, two kinds of seams down
1t, because, of course, there must be a
little too much clay, in order to be sure
and have enough, and the little too
much is squeezed into the shape of two
seams.
The next one who works on it is a
woman, and she sits at a bench from
morning till night cutting off the rough
edges of the soft pipes. First she takes
a sharp knife and cuts off the rough
pieces OF the bowl ; then she smoothes
the stem and cuts the end off square ;
last, she pulls out the rod that makes
the hole, and blows down the stem to
See if the opening goes clear through
into the bowl.
From here it goes into the oven, and
a curious oven it is, where your doll and
your dishes are baked. This one is
crammed and stuffed with nothing but
pipes, hundreds and thousands of them,
IRON the floor to the roof. You'd think,
TO see them, that all the men in the
World were going to spend their lives in
smoking, and all the boys and girls in
blowing bubbles. But the bin full is /,
lothing to the heaps and piles and sacks |
N the warehouse. If one factory +,
makes 50 many, who can guess how {
many are made by all the factories in I
he world?
besides, You must remember that not {
III pipes are made OF clay. Far from