News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1885-04-09
TALKS WITH THE BOYS.
Nj. QUAD TELLS THE YOUNGSTERS
SOMETHING INTERESTING ABOUT
SUGAR.
He Goes Through n Sugar Refinery Eek.
planning Things as he Coos Along.

planning Things as he Coos Along.
Take this lump Of white sugar and
hold it under your microscope and what
do you see? 1t looks like coarse. white
sandstone, but at the same time there is
such delicious look that your mouth
begins to water and you long for taste.
Take the finest powdered white sugar
so fine that it feels like flour in your
fingers-and under the microscope you
can see grains as if quartz rock had been
broken up.
Take the highest, driest brown sugar
you can find and put it under the glass
and you see damp mass, with here and
there speck of dirt. Every grain stands
out by itself, and you wonder that the
sugar did not wet your fingers.
Now, then, how are sugars made ?
"Don't know" as usual. asked boy
standing at the door of a big sugar re-
fnery in New Orleans this question, and
he replied:
"Don't know, mister never been in
there"
"Why not p
"Druther go fishing"
Let's see if the process won't be OF in
terest to the thousands of lads who have
no opportunity to get at the facts from
personal observation.
You know that sugar cane is grown the
same as corn, though it must be more
highly cultivated. It is cut in season
and carted to the sugar mill, where the
cane is crushed and the juice extracted.
The juice or sap is the --LATEST stuff you
ever tasted, and not at all like the sap
| from a sugar maple. 1t is run into pans
and boiled down until sugar is left-a
wet, coarse, dark stuff the taste of which
would disgust you.
Our Southern man seldom at
tempt to make q nice brown sugar, but
barrel up the coarse material spoke of
and send it to the refner or, rather, sell
it to him.
To go through refinery you must
Jump from the basement to the tenth
floor and follow the process down instead
| of up. The sugar goes first into the
basement and is dumped into the melt
ers. These are iron cauldrons eight or
ten feet across the top and five or six
feet deep, with perforated bottoms.
Steam pipes are used to melt the sugar,
and the liquid drops into tanks. From
these tanks it is pumped directly to the
tenth floor into CHARTERS. These are
large iron tanks, steam heated, and the
liquid is now kept at heat of 200 de-
grees. The next move takes it down to
the ninth floor. Pipes conduct it from
the CHARTERS to spouts below, and at
each spout is bag made of coarse ma
terial. Tile liquid strains through the
bags into iron tanks on the eighth floor.
These bags must be kept very clean and
the tubs to wash them are handy by.
while men, stripped to the waist, do the
washing.
The liquid runs from the eighth floor to
the seventh and falls into huge iron pots
sunk flush with the floor. Each one of
these great pots is full of bone-black-
70, 900 pounds in each pot. Comeback
is the dust of the bones of horses and
cattle and it looks and feels like coarse
blasting powder. 1t is filter and a pu-
rifier. The liquid makes its way down
through the bone black to the sixth
floor, and you notice great change in
color. It has lost its dark and muddy
look and is as clean as common water.
Iron tanks receive it as it filters through
and it is run off i'll pipes to other tanks
on the fifth floor. From here it takes a
boost back to the sixth floor, to go into
the pans to be reheated, as the liquid is
now getting cooled of. These pans are
iron tanks with steam coils inside, and
the syrup is boiled for two hours and q
half. As it comes down to the fifth
floor again it runs into the mixer and
from that into the centrifugals on the
fourth floor. These centrifugals are
open iron tanks. lined with brass and
perforated with thousands of small holes.
They make 1900 revolutions per minute
as they turn the thick, sticky stuff into a
fair grade of brown sugar. If you ever
visit steam laundry you will see them
drying clothes by the same process. The
centrifugal revol7es with such speed that
all the dampness is thrown out through
the perforations.
Close at hanri, as the iron tanks go
spinning around, axe tabs of blue water,
and the contents are ladled in TO ''tone"
the sugar and further purify it. 1t runs
now to the floor below ald comes out in
hopper in which are revolving knives.
These knives mix and turn and dry the
sugar, and il the grade is the one the re-
finery is running on, the sugar is thrown
on the floor to be barreled. If higher
grade is desired it falls into bin on the
floor below and man shovels it to an
endless elevator and it is hoisted up one
story again, and goes into the granula-
tor. This is large iron cylinder, kept
constantly hot, and revolving like cot
fee rooster. The Office of this is to sep
arate the grains and further dry the
sugar. 1t comes out hot to the touch
and runs In spouts to the floor below.
You have seen a miller place a barrel
under a spout and let it fill with -four?
But this beats the miller all hollow. He
must shake his own barrels to settle the
contents, while in this case each barrel
stands on an iron plate which keeps up
a steady jolting, fitting the barrel about
until the sugar packs as hard as sand.
One man has charge of three spouts, and
as he wheels the filed barrels off the
shaker cooper stands ready to put in
the head and crowd on the hoops. The
barrels are sent up from the sidewalk on
two endless chains, to which arms are
attached at regular distances. The bar
rel rests against these arms until it is
carried to a certain height and it is then
dumped off and rolls to the coopar's
feet.
Now, then, you know how sugar is
made-coarse brown, light brown, pow
dered, granGlated and coffee, but three
hours tramp through such an institution
reveals many other interesting facts. 1t
is the place above all others to find
perfect system. Everything goes like
clockwork from basement to the top
floor. Every employee has certain task
to do, and there is no confusion. Steam
works here to perfection. It melts the
plantation sugar into its original state.
1t boils it, sends it journey of miles,
filters it, dries it. and transforms the
dirty brown into snow white 1t does
all the lifting, hauling and pulling-it
saves time and labor and weary steps.
And, too, you must forc,bly realize
how patiently and perseveriug men have
been before us to study and experiment
Until they brought this process to per-
lection. The most trifiEg thing of all
baffled them the longest. Without bone
black our sugars would be full of dirt;
but it was only -l-Asaaaaaeat@tha was
ever used. Who would have thought the
charred and powdered bones of our do
mestic animals a purifier for the main
in orr sweetcakes?
They are Very Lazy.