The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1882-07-20
Manufacturing Increases Wealth.

chanlcal power all proceed from Cn'
intelligence of man. In manufac
lures we see the highest intelligence
of man employed in applying the
greatest amount of sun power with
the utmost degree of economy. In
other words, in manufactures hu-
man labor is most abridged at the
same time that it gives the greatest
results, the ratio of production per
man reaches its highest limit; there
lis, consequently, the greatest sur
plus left over after necessary wants
have been supplied, and this sur
plus or residuum over and above
the present need is what consti-
tutes wealth. Hence, manufac-
lures produce most wealth.
Man-power, horsepower, wind
power, water, steam and electric
power, are all equally derived from
the sun. The sun produces the
food which supplies muscles with
strength; but equally it produces
the rain which supplies the water
fall, and the coal which, burnt to
turn water into vapor, yields steam
power. Coal is stored-up sun-pow-
er. You may buy three tons of
Cumberland coal for $15, and this,
when used IN connection with ma
chinery contrived by the intelli-
gence of man, will give an amount
of force equal to q strong man
working 900 days in year for 20
years. If the man earned $1.25
day, it would cost to accomplish by
his unaided labor $500 for what
can be produced for $15 with coal
and machinery. Intelligence, then,
employing sun-power in its most
economical forms and with the
most labor saving machinery, is
what yields wealth. Unaided brute
force can no more compete with
machinery than the stone hammer
can compete with the diamond dEill
and the dynamite charge.
The late NJ. Michael Chevalier,
one of the most distinguished econ
omists of the age, put in numerical
formulas some of the gains OF force
made by man through the economi-
cal adjustment of sun-power to ma
chinery. He said that machinery
had increased our power over iron,
in the course Of a century, In the
ratio of 40 to /. (And this without
counting the improvements OF Bes-
semer and of Siemeus and Martin. }
That our facilities for making
bread were 144 times as great as
they were in the days of Homer, and
that in cotton weaving we had mul-
tiplied our resources 800 times
since 1859. One Americans power
to-day in the transportation Of
goods is equal to the total force
which could be exerted by 6,659 of
Montezuma's subjects. One man,
with a mule spinner, can do as much
as 8. 3.264 natives of India spinning
by hand. Forty years ago three
men could hardly make 1000
sheets of paper. a day; now they
easily produce 10000. The old
lace makers did good work when
they produced three meshes min
ute, but a Nottingham machiue will
turn out $4,000 lmeshes in the
time. With chloride of lime the
bIeacher to-day does in an hour
what it took the old lime bleachers
eight months to do; yet, chloride OF
lime is only the suns bleaching
power adjusted to new and more
economical forms by the mechanical
contrivances of mans intelligence.
Brain power, therefore, guiding and
controlling sun-power, is the chief
source of wealth for man to-day.
A horsepower, in mechanics, rep
resepts that amount of energy
which is equivalent to the contin-
uous raising of $4,000 pounds at
the rate of foot minute. 1t rep
resents also the evaporation of Gu
bic foot of water at 60 degrees
Fahrenheit, under pressure of 15
pounds TO the Inch an hour; or
when generated by coal, and trans
mitted by machiney, with allowance
for losses, it represents the extreme
physical exertion of six men, and
it ought to be produced, with an av-
erage steam engine, at the cost Of
six pounds of coal an hour, of eigh-
ty pounds per day. With coal at
So per ton, the physical force of
man can be secured through ma
chinery at a cost of three and one
eighth cents. In 1875 the popula-
ton of Massachusetts, was about
double that of Maryland, $50, 900.
The state had 316,459 persons en-
,oloyed in manufactures, and their
labor was supplemented by ma
chinery, water and steam, yielding
an energy of 31S,748 horse power
equal to the labor of l, 1,912,60S men,
or the equivalent of q population
of 1889, 736 souls. At the same pc.
| Rod, on the basis of the census oi
1870, Maryland had about $4,000
persons engaged in manufactures
with about 10000 horse power
equal to the labor of 100000 men
or a population of 100000. Now
| If the manufacturers of Maryland
and the machinery employed by
them were as great in proportion PEI
head as those of Massachusetts,, the
state in 1875 would have had $50
600 operatives and 100000 horse
power-equal to the labor of $50
900 men, and representing a popu
lation of 100000. In other words
have had sun and man power actu
ally at work to the number OF 1,10O
600 men, or nearly 10000 NOR
than our total population of pro
ductives and unproductives.
But this is not all. In manufac
turing communities "a per cent. o
the labor employed in utilizing ma
chinery is derived from women ant
children-a source of wealth whicl
we do not have in Maryland excep
, in very limited degree. Ratini
! families at 5 persons on an average
! Maryland, to get one productive la
borer, must increase her popula
! ton Al; while Massachusetts onl
! needs to increase hers p. Thi
! radical and important difference !
j written up in the enormous savings
bank accumulations OF her indus
trial population, and in the store
| of gathered capital which are cor
, tinualiy at the service of new manJ