The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-09-01
HELPED THE WORLD
Sir Henry Bessemer and His Proc
ess Of Making Steel
AZ First Thought by Scientists to BE Wis.,
tonery and Inprscticable, But Ulti-
mately Proved TO BE spIen-
Old Success.

The man who inaugurated the reign
of steel by 50 vastly increasing its uses.
and invented method of manufacture
which makes the product even lower
IN cost than the kind Of metal it was
destined so largely to replace, ranks
among the worlds greatest inventors,
though, says Harper's Monthly, he did
not reach his goal unaided by the skill
and genius of colaborers. The pneu-
matte process of making steel by which
Sir Henry Bessemer added more TO the
wealth of the world than any man Of
his generation furnished curious exc
ample of what Tyndall called the sci
entific use of the imagination. Bes-
semer, like Siemens and Thomas. who
share with him the honors of modern
iron metallurgy, was not a practical
worker in the metals, but unlike them,
he was absolutely ignorant OF aught
beyond superficial chemical knowledge.
When he grasped the conception of
burning out the impurities OF pig
metal by the oXidizing power of air
and thus reducing the excessively car
buried material to the malleabIe
state, he knew nothing of the tradi-
tons and science of the problem he
was daring enough to attack. Had he
been an adept is is more than probable
that he would have been so imprisoned
by the past as neS-er TO have reached
out 50 dariRgly into the unknown. He
began his experiments secretly in
small way, after having visited M
nerOus iron works to make himself
acquainted with existing processes
It was not till the end of eighteen
months that the fundamental princi-
pie of his great future success became
perfectly clear to him-that of render
ing cast iron malleable by powerful
mir blast blown throughout the charge,
and not merely on the top, as in the
old fnery and pudding furnace. The
heat developed was 50 great as to keep
even wrought iron fused, and the hap
py inventor found by and 10y that he
had succeeded in making iron IN small
quantities. II cannot be related here
how he fought through the early diff
cultics OF mis- work, and how the iron
masters Of the age were alike aston
ished and delighted at his primary re-
sA-t'- i l-G >EEsBEtA " lllC inventor WIS
scarcely less great when he discovered
that IN making iron in large quantities
his process did not answer al his an
tlcipaG0ns. His earlier successes had
been wish pig iron smelted from high
grade ores. comparatively free from
kulpifur or phosphorus. The attempt |
t. work the process commercially in
volvcd the use OF the common pig.
which made mp the bulk of the smelt- |
'HE material. The intense heat Of the 7
furnace burned ont the carbon and the /
Hihcon. but left the phosphorus and sal I
thar untouched This might have been .
r2-aadied bv using pure pigs containing }
bJt traces Of these clements; but
Craver defect attended the process. In /
many % the operations the inrot had .
20 consistency: It crumhled under the
hammer or IN the rolls. In the language
Of the shop, 1t was rotten. The pro-
cess, which. within d month Of its first
rualie cCnounccneEt ct the Chelten-
ham meeting of the Eriti-h association
IN 1896, had brought 10 it's discoverer
tue sum Of twenty-seven thousand
Pcunds sterling in advance license fees.
was now condemned by scientists and
practical men as n visionary scheme.