Richland beacon. [volume] (Rayville, La.) 1869-1890, 1877-03-31

partment are very curious, and daily turn
out vast quantities of thread. which j.
packed, and given through ticket to the
bleach and dye heuses. They measure of
the thread into skeins of an exact length
and size, and when they have reelcd of
just the right amount of yarn, always
stop, and unlike ssme kind of warmers,
they never forget to tell the same story
without variations. Again, after coming
from the reels,
THETHREAD Is CAREFULLY INSPECTED,
the work employing several girls, who
take all the rough and imperfect thread
from the hanks. After this second inspec
ton, We find it next in the bleach house.
The bleach and dye houses are among
the most interesting departments of this
vast establishment, although not the most
agreeable. The progress in washing ma
chinery, that is here exhibited, would
make our grandmOthers think that the
millennium had come. The baby washer,
as We call it, of this concern. is rather q
large child, whose place and uses will ap-
pear later. After the thread is sent from
the inspection department to the bleach
and dye houses, it is unpacked, counted
and put into large tanks, immense lOadsat
a time, and boiled BY steam for several
hours, which takes out the dirt and
CLEANS 1T PERFECTLY.
1t is then put through washings oft,
and preparations wonderful and curious.
The water used, we judge, would have
increased the flood just about enough to
have lifted NOah's ark from the snag on
Mount Ararat. Some of the wash tubs
are of stone, and all are on scale equal
in magnitude to any of Col. Sellers
scheme for making millions. The loads of
thread are put in and taken out of boilers.
rinsers, washers, dryers, and half dozen
other processes by machinery. Then,
after all this, it goes right back to those
huge steam boilers, and the same thing
is done over again. The dry room is
heated by seven thousand five hundred
feet of steam pipe, and can be regulated to
any desired temperature. After leaving
the Keeling department, the thread that
is to be colOred goes to the dye house, and
that which is 10 remain white, to the
bleach house. In the dye house is the
patent dying machine, used only to dye
black. 1t does the work far better than
BY hand, and is equal to the labor of more
than dozen men.
ALL COLORs OF THREAD
are made and the quantities of soaps, dye
stuffs, and other material of the kind
used, are immense. Eighty thousand
gallons Of water are consumed daily in
the bleach house alone, and one of the
Artesian wells of The Clark Thread Com
pany has capacity of one hundred and
fifty thousand GALLONS per day. This is
remarkable well, sixteen feet deep and
eight feet in diameter, of which Professor
Maynard, the New York chemist, said it
produced the purest water he ever saw.
1t makes a man thirsty to look at it, and
is absolutely free from any particles of
matter. by chemical test. The thread is
blued on big scale, which gives that
handsome tint so greatly admired by the
ladies. Then it is committed to the ten
der mercies of the baby washer, which
are cruel, and goes through it ten times.
The baby is built like the ordinary wash
ing machine, but each of the rollers weighs
a thousand pounds, and as THE thread
passes through the water into the washer
THEY HOP AND JUMP -
and pound with antics queer, but it does
the business thoroughly. This was former
ly done by the old fashioned FOUNDER and
barrel which our grandmother used to
set us at when we were boys, before going
to school in the morning. Then it is
drawn through the rinser, which is a
simple and novel machine, continually
supplied with pure Artesian well water.
The thread passes over roller into the
water, comes up again over another roller
then down into the water, and up and
down, and out and in, and out and over
the reelslinto the great boxes on wheels,
from which it is put into a large water
extractor, a perforated hollow cylinder,
revolving several thousand times per min
ute, and then it is transported to the dry
ing room. In this way FIVE hundred heads
can he rinsed in four minutes which used
to take an hour and half. After the
threat has como out of the drying room,
COLORED OR UNCOLORED.
1t goes to the warcro0ms. wnere II is
counted and put into packages to he given
out preparatory to being wound upon
spools for the market. The thread hav-
ing reached this stage of perfection, has
become very valuable and is looked after
with the greatest care. Tickets direct it
to its different departments and denote
its size, Equality, etc. The inspection
and testing of thread is one of the most
important features in its production, and
it would surprise the lady who sews day
after day with Clark's 40. n. T." Spool
Cotton, to know by what patient and con-
slant care the perfect smoothness and
regularity OF the thread was secured. 1t is
now taken to the hank winding depart
ment and wound upon large bobbins, when
it is ready for its last wind upon thespools,
from which it is taken by the consumers
for its thousand uses of necessity and util-
ity, from tying the rag on the boys whit
tied. and bloody finger. to the delicate