The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-07-03
HERE Is A LAND SHIP.
IT Is A GREAT THING FOR ExPLoR.
ING AFRICAN WllDS.
1t Will Be Made to Travel Over Land and
Through Water-Forests, Jungles and
Mountains VIII Offer No Distinctions.
Details Of NIr. Lemery's Plan.

slow evolution in the brain of c. NJ. Lem
cry, of East Oakland, for nearly four years.
He has completed working drawings
of a queerly contrived land ship, with
which he proposes to roam through the
undiscovered gold regions and the unex-
plored plains and depths of Africa, discov-
ering long lost deposits of riches, the source
of Solomon's gilded glories, gathering tons
of precious ivory, revealing the unknown
in books of travel and adventure, and gen.
orally winning wealth and fame if success
shall reward his hopes.
His land ship is a big car of alumni
mum, strong and light, which is to climb
mountains, jolt over logs, travel through
forests and over plains, and like duck
plunge from the banks of rivers and lakes
right into the water and speed uninter-
rupted TO opposite shores. This contriv-
anee would be at once the home, fort, shell
ter, means Of transportation and travelling
storehouse Of the exploring party.
1t is not the first attempt to combine
steam road engine and steamboat, yet the
application appears to be an original one
with Mr.. Lemery.
Mr.. Lemery seems to be neither an en-
thusiast nor an adventurer. He has no
| particular ambition to be great explorer,
/ anu Guo N1O1c 10 hin d DuSlutSS
| proposition. He is quiet hammered man,
! thirty-one years old, and is a machinest
and engineer by trade. He has been on
| the Pacific coast fifteen years, and during
| four years of that time was in business at
Reno, New. Ee has spent good deal of
| time prospecting for go d, and as a pros
! pector he spent good deal of time explor-
! ing the Sierra Madre mountains in Mexico.
ha i'm.
/ pressed with the idea that the Dark Cont
nent was the one remaining new country
| where poor man could get rich easily, and
the idea has chung to him ever since. He
| believed that there was plenty of gold in
African mountains forgotten or yet undis-
| covered, and he believes so yet
He wanted to go there to prospect for
mines, and in planning how he could travel
long distances through an almost unknown
country the idea of steam engine TO travel
On land early occurred to him.
As strength and ightness are requisites
Mr.. LeTaery proposed to build the land
ship almost entirely of aluminium, which
weighs 16S pounds to the cubic foot, while
steel weighs about AS pounds to the cubic
foot The cylinders of the engines would
be of steel and much of the fittings and
furniture inside of wood The body of the
land ship as planned is 80 feet long, Is feet
wide and feet high.
1t is to be made of aluminium plates one
fourth of an inch thick for the lower half
and one-siXteenth of an inch thick for the
upper half Of the sides and the roof. In
the rear end is a large space for wood,
which can be cut and loaded anywhere,
and the boiler stands abaft the center.
AT the forward end are two twenty-four
horse power cylinders working a shaft
which bears wheel outside the car at
each end. By an endless chain the motion
of this wheel is transmitted to a larger one
between the two main wheels, fourteen
feet in diameter, which are driven by
means of chains passing over the driving
wheel between them. The main wheels
are built like a bicycle wheel, the spokes
being aluminium rods one-fourth of an
inch in diameter. The tires of the main
wheels are eighteen inches in diameter
The large wheels have no axles connecting
with the car.
The car rests on a shaft which passes
through the driving wheels, and the main /
wheels are connected by strong aluminium
bar which supports the car and can revolve !
on the main shaft. The wheels could thus |
go over logs without eevating the car
much, and the end of the bars bearing the |
front main wheels can be hooked up
readily, making three wheeled car, easy to |
turn around. The front end of the car rests |
on a single wheel, which turns readily in !
any direction.
At the front end is q drum, on which 800 !
feet of cable, to pull the car if necessary, or |
to pull distractions out of the way, can be /
wound by a small engine for the purpose. |
The bottom of the car is a water tank, |
while another water compartment sur
rounds the outside of the car.
The interior is to provide living accom-
modationS for twenty men. As a steamer |
the body of the car or land ship resem-
bles on its bottom a fatboat or a scow
schooner. A lever connects a propeller |
shaft with the machinery, and as the land
ship climbs down into the water and be-
gins to float, the propeller sends it onward
over the CLASSY surface of some crystal
lake, rippled only by the awful hippopot-
ami If the water trip be long the land
wheels can be taken off and laid on the
roof
When wood is TO be cut the propeller is
slipped off its shaft and a little wood saw
chews up fuel in no time. The engineer
works the land ship from his pilot house
weight fifteen or twenty tons.
You see," said Mr.. Lemery, as he ex-
planned his drawings, every part will be
made so that it can be taken off very
readily. l would expect TO make from
three TO twenty miles a day with 1T, accord
ing TO the troubles met in clearing away.
They would be great in q forest, but
would avoid forests
Attached to this land ship would have
another car just like this except that it
would have no machinery, and in it / would
take a three years supply of provisions
and ammunition. The expense of an army
of portsrs would be avoided. The car
would be proof against the arrows of
hostile natives, and in it we could defy
thousands.
well, I haven't been able to figure
closely On the cost of the ship yet, but
suppose one would cost about so, 0o1
would like TO get financial backing enough
to build two Of them and two supply cars
IN New York, and ] ought TO have $4,000.
would calculate on being gone five or six
years. l would go mainly TO prospect for
gold. That country is full Of 1t. No,
don't know just where / would go TO look
for it. | would so TO most any OF the
mountains-perhaIs the Mountains OF the
Moon. No, l do not know whether they
have been pTospected or not, but / don't
think 50.
"Ob, yes, there's plenty OF gold there.
Where else did solomon get has gold; |
would take company Of strong men With
me. | would have three or four mining /
experts, doctor, q man 70 write the book, 1
a photographer and a scientific man or ,
L l. 49, -