Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1897-10-21
SHIPS MASTS.
From the Lofty Sticks Of Solid Wood
to the Modern Masts of Iron.

to the Modern Masts of Iron.
Ships masts were originally made
with the several parts, the lower mast,
the topmast and the topgallant mast,
each of solid stick. Big timber was
required for the large lower masts, and
when the suitable and accessible trees
had been culled out from eastern for
ests mast timber was brought from
Oregon.
The expense of bringing the logs
around from the Pacific, of course, add
ed greatly to the cost of the mast, and
sparmakers began making built-up
masts, made of considerable number
of pieces. The built-up mast has one
advantage in the material used; it is
always difficult to get solid stick Of
suitable size for a mast that is abso-
lutely free from blemish. In making
the built-up mast, composed of num-
Der of smaller pieces, it is easily posi-
bic to select only perfectly sound ma
terial. The built-up masts were usual
ly made with spindle, big, square
timber forming the center or heart, the
round of the mast being formed by slabs
laid on the sides of the spindle. And
these parts were not always each of q
single piece; sometimes the spindle, in
its length, was composed of two or three
pieces scarved, or spliced, together; and
the slabs also might be scarved; the
scarves in the slabs, however, not being
brought opposite those in the spindle.
The finished stick was banded with
hoops of iron. The built-up mast stood
the service well; it was subject only,
as solid stick might be, to decay.
Built-up masts have been made in
various ways. There have been made,
for example, masts in which the round
was formed of three pieces of timber,
instead of a spindle and slabs.
When the great modern American
schooner came out with its three and
four and sometimes more lofty masts
for some of these vessels sticks so
to 90 feet in length were required-the
demand for mast timber was greatly in
creased. With the extensive demand
prices went up, and built-up masts were
made for the big schooners; masts were
made not hoped, but bolted together,
and such masts proved perfectly serv-
iceable.
Most of the deep-water ships built
nowadays, however, have lower masts
of iron. The ships themselves are
made of iron and of steel, and their
masts are made of the same material.
Iron masts are, of course, not indie
structible, but they are longer lived
than masts of wood.
There is now lying at South street
pier fine, big American wooden ship
whose three lower masts are all differ
emit, and this came about in the simplest
way in the world. When she came from
the Maine shipyard in which she was
built her three lower masts were of
wood, built up. In the course of time
her foremost showed signs of decay and
it was condemned and taken out. She
was at that time in the port of New
York, and there was found there hand
some stick of Oregon pine, out of which
a foremost was made for her. Later
decay appeared in the mainmast. She
was in British port then, where it was
cheaper to get an iron mast, and she
was fitted with an iron mainmast. So
now her foremost is a solid stick of
timber from Oregon, her mainmast is
of iron from England and her mizzen-
mast of wood, built up, is from the
state of Maine,-N. Y. Sun.