River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1884-09-04
A Town Run by Natural Gas.

"Our glass factory and our residences
are heated and lighted with natural
gas, said Captain James B. Ford, the
veteran plate glass manufacturer, few
days ago, to your correspondent at the
Monongahela House, Pittsburg.
''Do you mean that the furnaces of
your foundry and the CRATES of your
houses consume only gas"
Eyes. Not pound of coal or wood
is consumed at Creighton, where the
Pittsburg Plate Glass Company have
their plant. Come out and I'll show
YOU"
SO to Creighton, 90 miles north of
Pittsburg, on the Allegheny river, and
on the ''West Penn Road" as people
style it, went your correspondent. And
what saw he there? Answer, the model
community of the age
Captain. Ford, whose round form was
so familiar years ago in the cities about
the falls, met me, and, without cere-
monv, escorted me through the town of
Creighton. / win use his explanation
without quotation marks. Three years
ago, believeing that natural flow of
gas could be obtained in the valley of
the Allegheny north of Pittsburg suf-
ficlent to serve the purposes of fuel and
light for any mandatory, two hundred
acres were purchased and a well was
sunk. A we'll defined coal vein was on
the property, but coal was not wanted
gas was, and gas was struck at 1900
feet, in five-inch bore. A stream,
torrent Of pure hydrogen gas, burst out
with force of $50 pounds to the square
inch, and the establishment of plate
glass works on an economical basis be-
came fixed fact Last November the
Pittsburg Plate Glass Company was
organized.
What / saw is what ] wish to speak
about. No coal, no wood, no cinders,
no ashes, no smoke think of that, no
debris of factory to be seen anywhere.
In the furnaces a lurid, steady heat,
regulates like clock work. Overhead,
in the vast works, were gas burners
abIaze in the broad day, because, as
Captain Ford said, lit was not worth
while to turn the burners off and on,
as there was plenty of gas, and to spare.
All through this vast establishment,
with its great whirling tables loaded
with plate glass undergoing the several
processes of polishing. was observable |
the supreme power of the five-inch pipe |
of natural gas. The great engine
throbbed and moved in perfect regular |
ity all the mechanism of the establish |
ment actuated by the same simple, |
natural power. No coal, no ashes, no
cindars no smoked
"Come to the house and I'll show |
you how we get along without COAL"
said Captain Ford
Wonderingly followed.
In a charming cottage residence of |
large capacity, with CRATE and gaslights |
in every room and hall, and in the |
kitchen stove, even, were nothing but
fringes of gas jets.
Last winter, us cold as the winter |
was we didn't know what cold was"
said lady in this delightful home.
Why should they? A thumbscrew on I
. gas pipe regulated the temperature /
to absolute perfection. We live in
fast age. To primitive people, depend
emit upon coal and wood for heating
purposes, whether we get it through |
cheap stoves. CRATES, or costly furna-
ces, what a revelation this ma
ture's gas company is. / am in
clined to have mighty poor opinion
our local gas companies with their mil |
lions of capital, when | think of Cap !
tain Ford's five-inch pipe stuck in the |
hills. Just beyond the town of Creighton,
on the Allegheny river. Nature has
quietly been pressed into the most prac-