Semi-weekly south Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1883-1889, 1888-09-04
THE ALUMINIUM AGE.
The Metal which Is to Revolution
lie the World.

1t is reported at the Essen Krup
gun works, near Cologne, Germany
the metal alumium is being rapid
turned out in 100 pound ingots at
cost of twenty five cents per pound
says a Chicago Tribune writer 1
this is true, its full significance is no
realized by the public, for this silver.
metal is the most abundant in nature
Common clay everywhere contains
from two to ten pounds of it in every
100 pounds. 1t il, therefore, more
common than iron or all the metalI
taken together. The cost of extract
ing ii has been the great and only
hindrance to its general use. In 1855
its value was $40 per pound, and the
following year.a chemical discovery
dropped its price to S4. A steady
decrease since then has taken place to
about S. per ponnd, at which price
its uses are enormous, but nothing to
compare with the alleged Krupp
twenty-five cent value. AS iron
weighs three times as much, and is,
therefore, one-third as bulky as al
minimum, when the latter can be OBJ
tanned at three times the price of iron
that metal will be supplanted rapidly.
Even at the Krupp price it will pay
to build railroad trains of aluminium,
because of the greatly reduced weight
afforded. This dead weight of trains
is a prodigous expense to railways,
nine tenths of which could be saved
by constructed freight and passen-
ger trains of aluminium weighing
from half ton TO a ton each. The |
adaptapility for this purpose may be |
instantly seen in roughly stating al |
uminum to be far stronger than
steel and lighter than chalk. Loco
motives needing traction weight ma
terially in proportion to the dimin-
ished dead weight, or the ED engine
unchanged would be enabled to add
ten aluminium cars for each one of
the old style. 1t would be equival
ent to doubling the freighting capac-
ity by counting the weight ofpresent |
cars and their contents as equal in |
reducing the car weight to practic-
al zero.
Aluminium conducts electricity |
better than IRON the comparison be-
ing one.third as well as copper, while
iron is one. seventh, hence aluminium
will be used for telegraph lines. The
metal being so light and strong inch |
rods of it will hold up the wires
as well as the largest telegraph poles
under greatly reduced weight.
Houses could be easily constructed
by pouring the metal into ordinary
sand or metal moulds. Itmelts easier
than silver. Every part of the domi-
Gle could be cast on the spot in this
way into a solid mass of metal more
rigid and durable than stone. Nova
BILE parts such as doors, windows,
transoms, scuttles, could be made of
the same bright metal, and just as
heavy or light as desired.
Ships larger than the Great East
ern, with less draught, could be con-
structed nearly entirely of aluminium,
including the machinery and boilers,
which at present weigh down vessels
seriously.
The stone age held fast our ancestors
in a condition but little better than
that of our aboriginal progenitors,
the apes the bronze age was great
step ahead, and the iron age ushered
in civilization and made it possible.
We are now living in the latter part
of that period, and beholding the
dawn of the aluminium age, which
will confer blessing millions of times
greater than can be understood under
existing circumstances. The posi-
bilities af cheap aluminium are limit
less. Aerial navigation will be effect
ually settled, and monstrous alumni
ium airships will literally give wings
to commerce, and settle the tariff
question by rendering trade as free . s
the medium in which it will be con-
Quoted. Cities of solid aluminium
will spring up everywhere-fre proof,
indestructible, paved with the white
metal, lighted by electricity passing
over aluminium wires to towers ofthe
same substance. Railway beds,
sleepers, ties, rails, bridges and all,
will be cast solidly in their places,
with airy aluminium palace cars dane
ing over them 100 miles an hour or
more. Floating bridges can be built
upon the seas wide rivers can be
spanned by cobwebby but strong
structures al small expense, and in a
few DAYS, where years were previous
ly required. Sanitation will become
great practical possibility, and every
one, no matter how poor, can have a
home of his own, far better than the
present ordinary dwelling.
Transition stages such as this in
volve rapid and decided changes from
past modes of living, and, like all
other civilizing influencies, alumni
ium will prove to be great leveler,
for wealth will decrease in the hands
of the few and increase in those of
the many. Old-time manufacturing
producers will be killed off, and
thousands lose employment, TO be re-
employed in new industries or adap-
tations of the old to the new. Car
penteriug, cabinet making will give
away-give way TO fabricating furni-
ture, wagons, carriages, etc, from the
new metal, with the result of cheaper
ing all the implements and vehicles of
life, and secondarily all products, such
as clothing, shelter and food. Great
wealth will lose its power, and pow
eriy be practically abolished.-The