Birmingham state herald., 1896-04-19
THE BASIC OPEN HEARTH Is "the" Steel Making Process of Present and Future. OUTLINE OF ITS HISTORY It Will Enable the South to Throw Her IngotS Into tie Markets of the World-Pro-
 duction for 1895.

?. G. Shook in Southern Trade Review
 In giving a brief history of the deVel- opment and progress of the basic open hearth process for the manufacture of steel it will perhaps be well in the outset to point out that in the conduct of this process the moA popular type of furnace is the "Siemens-M Martin" deriving it's name from its inventors, pr. William Siemens of Great Britain and Messrs. Emile and Pierre Martin, natives of France. This furnace is also employed in the operations of the acid open hearth. The one and only difference in the con struction and arrangement of the fur mace for the accommodation of the two processes is that the hearth or bottom in case of the basic open hearth is com posed of basic material usually dolomite or magnesite. and in the case of the acid sand Is used, the reason for the difference being that by the former method phos- phorus in the iron as well as silicon and carbon are dealt with. while in the latter silicon and carbon only.
 The use of the basic open hearth pro- cess being of comparatively recent date, our observations of the early history of the open hearth and of the Siemens- Mar tin furnace, which will lead us up to it's adoption and commencement in this country in connection with the basic process, will, of necessity, be confined to the acid open hearth.
 The fact that the violent heat excited in the Bessemer converter depends on the oxidation or combustion of the silicon and carbon contained in the original pig. necessarily confined the employment of that process to iron containing a suf- ficent quantity to these two elements, the burning of which serves to generate the necessary heat It may be seen, there fore. that in pursuing a method of mak- ing steel by which from the nature of the materials employed it was impossible to generate the necessary heat, to resort to the use of ordinary fuel, such as pro- ducer gas, became unavoidable. It was probably this necessity which inspired MT Siemens to give the world the Sie- mensMartin regenerative furnace.
 In the year 1856 Dr. Charles William Siemens, in conjunction ith his brother, Frederick Siemens, both at that time citizens of England and residents of Lon don, met with success in perfecting this wonderful invention, in connection with which Mir. Frederick Siemens alone se- cured the first patent in the same year.
 The Bessemer process for making steel was discovered by Sir Henry Bessemer also in the year 1856, but not until 1858 was complete success achieved by him in its operat ton. His conception of the pro- cess contemplated the conversion of pig metal into steel wholly or practically de- silconized and decarbonlzed: in fact, the product was, by the nature of the pro- cess, so completely deprived of it's carbon as to render 1t of no practical or commer- cial value. On this account great impor- lance is attach to the discovery of MT. Robert F. Mushet of Cheitenham, Eng. on the 22d of September, 1856, by which carbon and manganese are restored to the