, 1886-03-09
A LIST OF NEEDED INVENTIONS
What Was Done During the Wa-firc
arms and ExpIosives-New Materials.

What Was Done During the WAr-fire-
arms and ErpIosives-Nsw Materials.
A paper devoted to progress in praots
cal mechanics gives a list Of some thirty
inventions that are needed in the useful
arts. Singularly enough, the list of
needed inventions does not include one
~labor-saving machine or any new appli-
ance for carrying freight or passengers
or for transmitting intelligence. Appar-
emily the inventive talent Of the country
is to make n new departure labor
saving machines and appliances have en-
gagged the attention of the inventors OF
this country from the time of its first set
Element. There was much work 10 be
done, and comparatively few people do
it. The civil wal gave q great impetus
to the invention of labor-saving ma
chimes, especially those that were for
preparing the land for seeding and SOW
ing, ~cultivating the soil between the
rows of growing crops, and for harvest
ing them and preparing them for the
market. With all the waste of war,
with great armies to feed, and with
nearly 1,000, 900 of men Withdrawn from
farms, machines were needed TO do the
work previously performed by the use of
hand tools. In no time or country were
as many machines for doing farm work
ever brought out as in the United States
during the progress of the civil war.
Improved methods Of moving freight,
carrying passengers, and transmitting
intelligence have also received great at
tention in this country. II is but nat
ural that they should have received
much attention. The population of the
country was scattered over a vast extent
OF territory. Many of the most fertile
regions did not nave the advantage Of
water communication. The productions
of these fertile regions could not be taken
to distant markets with profit by the old
means of transportation. Railroads,
canals, and steamboats, were necessary
for carrying products to market.
Much attention has beer given during
the past few years to devising means and
forming materials for taking human life.
A great variety Of firearms has been in
vented. Some twenty different explo-
sives, each more powerful than gunpow-
der, have been brought into use. 1t APP
pears TO be now time for inventors to di-
rect their attention TO methods for saw
ing life g The number of lives annually
lost in mines is very large. 1t is almost
as dangerous TO enter a coal mine as to
march on a field of battle. Unless some
method is discovered for detecting the
presence of the explosive gas popularity
known as "~fre-damp," or preventing
its ignition, the working of coal mines
will become so extremely hazardous that
most persons will decline to engage in
il. Many of our industries depend on
the cheap production of coal, and h
risk that now attends the occupation OF
mining tends to add to the cost of pro
ducing. Better methods of ventilating
mines are also greatly needed. So is
cheap apparatus for determining the
presence of parasites in meat and vari-
Gus impurities in drinking-water.
New materials for street pavement,
sidewalks, and common buildings, are
also greatly needed. Lumber can not
be freely used for these purposes much
longer. The supply is not equal to the
great and growing demand. A substi-
tute for wood for building farm fences
has been found in barbed iron or steel
wire, but a substitute for n wooden fence
post is greatly desired. Brick and stone
will probably long continue to constitute
the leading building materials in cities,
but they do not meet the wants or fill he
requirements Of people living on prairie
farms. Stone, even in places where it
a be obtained, is too heavy to be hauled
over country roads, and on the great tree
less plains there is no wood for burning
brick.-Chicago Times.