The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-12-28
ABOUT KEROSENE.
brushed Into a Mad WhirI 1t Be-
comes Lfghter-CoIored.

Chicago Tribune. ..--,
How many housekeepers, as they fill
their lamps with kerosene oil or their
summer stoves with gasoline, have
any idea how these oils are made?
And yet few miles from Chicago, at
Whiting, Ind, is the largest oil re-
finery in the world.
Every one knows that in it's crSde
state the oil comes out of the earth,
but it would be an utterly useless dis
cOvery were it not for the brains and
money used in the refining Of the raw
material. BY use of the brains and
money, however, not only the clear
OIL, but several other products are
drawn from the crude material.
Naphtha, benzine, gasoline and kero-
sene, the last often called coal or IL
Eliminating oil, belong to the same
family. The three first named being
lighter oils, do not require nearly SO
much handling to bring them to per-
fection as the kerosene. This, Of
course is easy to believe, but when it
is said that from the same crude oil,
after all the lighter oils have been dis
titled out, wax is made SO closely re-
sembHng the product of the bee as to
deceive even an expert, and that it is
used in chewing gum factories, candle
factories, laundries and even in candy
factories, one is often met with polite
look of doubt or an incredulous shrug
Of the shoulders.
Yet it is so. 1t is possible to go yet
further and say that hundreds OF homes in
Whiting and in Chicago have been made
comfortable this winter by the refuse that
adheres to the bottom and sides of the stills
after even the has been pressed out.
This refuse makes a good coke, is easily
lighted and is warmer, cleaner and cheaper
than coal. Hundreds of tons removed
from the stills daily before they are
charged" again, and hundreds of those who
use this fuel do not know that it was once
crude OIL dug in the Ohio fields and piped
on to Whiting. The carbon used in electric
lights is also made from this coke. Nothing
is wasted.
AS the most common, the kerosene oil is
perhaps the most interesting Of the products.
After leaving the crude stills it appears again
in the "sweetening stills or in the com
pound cylinders" which perform the same
work as the sweetening stills, but is a newer
invention and is patented by an outsider, who
allows only forty to each refinery. The sweet
eners' form an important factor in the REIN
ing of Ohio oil. Owing to the compound"
before mentioned, and the continuous friction
of the immense wire brushes which keep the
oil in a mad whirl 1t loses much of its bad
odor. 1t is again vapored OF, cooled in the
condenser boxes and passed off into the steam
stills for the next process.
In the steam mills it is treated just
the same as in the two previous pro-
cesses, with the addition Of a washing
by steam from perforated pipes pass
ing through it. 1t is "vapored" off
as before, and now one would suppose
that it was ready for use. Not quite.
The kerosene oil now passes into the
agitatOr for the final process. The
agitator is a funnel-shaped tank in
which the oil is treated with acid and
beaten and blown about by a machine
called a blower, and washed by torrents
of water until it roars like the lake in a
storm. Every particle of foreign mat
ter is thus expelled. It is then pumped
off into the storage tanks for shipping.