Huntsville gazette., 1885-02-21
klNDLING WOOD.
A Great Industry In New York City Thas
Is Little Thought About.

And what an immense amount OF lCj
too! The fires in furnaces, stoves and
CRATES are constantly going out, and
as constantly require relighting. The
rattle of the sticks dumped from the
cart down the coal hole is sound al
most as familiar as campaign cheer.
while in front of every grocery are tall
columns of the more aristocratic kim
ding that is tied up in round punches
and piled one on top Of the other.
By the uninitiated kindling wood is
considered mere bagatelle in house
hold arrangements-a convenient do
mestic economy that utilizes all the
odds and ends of wood that will ac-
cumulate and otherwise would prove
nuisance. But the odds and ends don't
supply the demand, or begin to. The
manufacture of this insignificant article
is great and growing industry that
employs hundreds of men and con-
sumes as many cords of wood in this
city every day.
Where is it all made?
A Herald reporter went to see. Most
of the yards are on the West side, in
the vicinity of Gansevoort Market, yet
there are others, and no inconsiderable
number either, scattered along both
water fronts from the Battery to Har-
lem River.
The reporter, searching for yard,
threaded his way through those mar
row, dirty and obstructed streets that
branch out of the old Greenwich vii
lage, and are cut short in their bewild-
dering course by the North River. The
peculiar odor of pine and fresh cut
wood greeted him as he went along.
Within couple of blocks of the river
was long row of struggling sheds,
with tall brick chimney rising from
their midst. The buildings, chimney
and everything connected with the es-
tablishment was painted lead color.
Sawdust foated everywhere, and the
hum of buzz saws drowned all other
sounds. Under the caves of a one
story building were eight little roofs
projecting over eight apertures, from
which ftful streams of kindling wood
were tumbling into eight carts drawn
up underneath. In less than ten min
utes a cart was filled, and its place
quickly taken by others that were con-
stantly arriving, the streams never
stopping meanwhile. Through an
archway further down an intermittent
procession of one-horse carts was filing
up from the docks loaded with straight
grained and sound looking cord wood.
The reporter followed a cart into the
enclosure.
''Is this all going to be kindling
wood?" is the first thought that strikes
a beholder. The place was only typical
of dozens of others, A description of
one will answer for all. A large yard,
nearly filled with tiers Of cord wood,
that rise in steps from the height of
man to over a score of feet. On the
steps are laborers, with blue blouses
and overalls, passing up the sticks to
other laborers above. Under the sheds
are rows of saving machines, from
which the chunks, as they come out, are
dropped into slide that places them
into an upright position under ''split-
ter" an arrangement of crossed knives
that descend with trip hammer force
on the end of the stick. From each
cutter is revolving belt, with brackets
attached, that carries the split wood
away and dumps it in the carts out
side.
In another building are the bundlers,
the men who make up the little bundles
of short sticks. Each bundler has
reservoir in front of him with an open
ing in the bottom, from which he takes
the pieces to fill the gauge by which
they are measured. The deftness dis
played by the bundlers in picking out
sticks that fit the required crevice, and
the rapidity with which they fill the
gauges, are remarkable. When full, a
lever power is applied by the foot, and
the bunch squeezed down to dimensions
of about foot in diameter. By an in
genious arrangement cord is in con-
stant readiness to be knotted around
the bunch.
at is a rather odd economy that
kindling is made out of one of the most
expensive timbers-Virginia pine" said
an old dealer.
"What does it cost?"
''Never less than six dollars a cord.
1t is all brought up here from Virginia
in sloops. But it is getting higher and
less plentiful each year, and it is only a
question of a short time when the sup
ply will give out altogether
"What will you do thenp"
"Oh, get it from some remote point.
The center of wood supply has gradu-
ally been moving away from New York
and the consumption of wood done
away with as much as possible"
1.-THE time was" he continued, ''when
every New York family used to have an
open wood fire, and cheerful embers
glowed on many hearths-the center of
everything homelike. Now we are a
city without hearths, and with much
less of a home feeling about our abodes
than of old. In those days the fuel
was brought down from the banks of
the Hudson, and it was possible to burn
it prodigally and still not be extrava-
giant"
"How much wood is used now in
kindlingsP"
Il can only give you an idea of what
the factories use-and that will surprise
you'
ss'Thara are ahout fifty factoriac in