The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1888-04-06
VOL. x. RISING SUN, CECIL COUNTY. MDy FRID
Closing Of Rowlandville Iron
Works. 9

owned and operated for the last thirty
years by the Mccullough Iron Com
pan& and the company's predecessors.
have 6sen shut down, and in all prob
ability will not again be operated as an
iron mandatory. Since the mills and
dam were injured-almost entirely
swept away by the June flood of 1884,
the works have not paid to operate
them. This result has been from sew
eral causes, which causes are working
radical changes in the manufacture Of
iron and other products which used to
be made at a large profit. A great
many improvements and new appli-
ances have been brought into the bus
iness of iron making within the last
twenty years. The demand created by
the war of the rebellion gave Ameri-
can iron manufacture q great impetus,
and Yankee inventionout stripped the
world In labor saving machinery and
new devices by which the product was
largely cheapened as well as improved
in quality. The antiquated methods
then in vogue In England were placed
in the rear, which put the foreign
manufacturers on their metal, and they
now use many recent Improvements
and inventions in the manufacture of
iron which surpa,s the Americans
The principal fac or however at work
in cheapening the irons.prnducts Of
Great. Britain, is the wages of laoor.
Iron that costs In wages above IS. 90 a
ton to make in this country is produc-
ed in England for one half that sum, :,
and the wages of all the roustabouts
and help of various kinds necessarily
EN- ployed about large iron works is in
the same ratio Labor is abuaaiant and
the best hands are employed through.
out. Hundreds of the idle hands stand
at the doors of large establishments,
waiting for chance for employment
When one in the mill is discharged for
some cause-a very ,rifling fault is suf
ficient to forfeit a place--a man Is at
the mill door eager to fill his. place.
There is no freight paid for shipping
English iron to the Atlantic ports of
this country. Ships are cons antly
sailing from English ports to this
country i'm ballast, which Is without
freight. All such vessels must ,ake
sufficient ballast to place them in sail
ing trim, and are compelled to pur-
chase stone for the purpose If nothing
else can be had that will answer. Such
ballast has to be removed from the
wharves af.er the ship arrives in this
country and prepares to load back with
grain or other American produce. The
expense of stone ballast Is avoided by
taking on iron in England which has
only to be hoisted from the vessel and
delivered to the, purchaser in Balti
more, Philadelphia, New York or Bos-
ton. BY this means English iron costs
10 more in An American port than II
does on the wharf at Liverpool except
the duty which must be paid to the
United states government. The lower
wages in Europe more than offset our
tariff in many Instances. and the re
suit is that more foreign iron is
brought to This country each succeed
ing year. MANUFACTURER in our cities
whose business requires large con-
sumption of various kinds of iron, who
used to have their orders filled by our
iron mills, now order from England
and it is landed at the wharves of the
city where their works are flee of all
transp0 tatiOn expenses and is drayed.
to their shops by their own men and
teams.
The Mccullough Iron Company can
purchase English iron landed on the
wharf at Philadelphia, for galvenizing
cheaper than they can make it. These
are some of the reasons for the stop
gage of iron works in this country and
the Rowlandville works are among
those suspended ats tts{ 1f " i'9
If the Mills tariff bill becomes a law
iron manufacturing Ia, our Atlantic
cities will be stil more depressed, the
tariff on iron being much reduced in
the new bill. These causes fairly in
operation it Is inevitable the wages of
manufacturers must come down or the
works stop. The drift of trade and bus
iness is towards this goal all must ad.
init who have taken note of events as
they develop. The demand for hands
by manufacturers raisei wages aud se.
cured the best, which barred the farms
of their best hands. while ag icultural
products went down from several caus-
es which We have not space here to
point out. 9a, stf@ es 'H
There IL no hope that the tariff will
ever be higher than at present, with
an unmistakable and irresistible drift
toward lower rates, with the ostensible
purpose of reducing Cherevenue. But
lowering duties will probably not re-
duce revenue, for it will increase inn
portatiOns, aud thus make up in guam
tity what is lost in price.
But to retarn to the ROwlanville
works. The water power is sple. Ibid
one at that place and grand dam. If
the works are abandoned as iron mills,
there is no better location for paper
mill and the paper business is at pres
ent, when well managed apparently
profitable. Under all these threatens
Sna.s fr. ftas far ri mn