The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1897-02-17
THE ORE TRADE.
Horace j. Stevens Writes on the Ore Trade
rs Follows:

Horace j. Stevens Writes on the Ore Trade
rs Follows:
Ishpeming, Mich, Feb. IL. The
same old game is being worked on the
Lake Superior iron ore producers that
>1has been so successfully used on pre-
yious occasions. 1t is certain as any
thing can we'll be, Notwithstanding
S1he predictions of trade organs and
interested authorities, that more
than 10, O0o, 900 tons OF Lake Superior
ore will be consumed by the furnaces
of this country during 1897. The
amount of ore which will be required
will probably exceed the amount
stated by two million or even three
million tons. The ere market always
looks badly at this particular time or
the year, and the situation is also
always unpromising for the iron and
steel trades. 1t will take ten million
tons Of ore to supply the legitimate
demands of a hard-times year. even
should business remain as bad In
1897. as the discouraged ones predict.
ANY improvements in general business
conditions win invitably make itself
felt in a considerably increased de-
snand f)r iron and steel in the multi
farious forms in which they enter
unto modern industrial requirements,
and any such demand can be readily
responded to. for the capacity or the
mines to furnish ore, and OF the FUR
-ylaces and nillsJo turn the ore into
finished material, is at least 30 per
gent above the business actually
handled during 1896. and in but one
year that ever preceded it was more
5ron ore mined or more iron MADE
than in the year named; and that
wear OF the largest production was
one of the panic years following 1893
at that.
The actual demand for iron and
steel at present to meet the actual
needs of the country, even with the
hard times and dull business upon US,
than it ever did during the times of
our greatest prosperity. When the
panic is finally ended and business
becomes good enough to satisfy the
most exacting that We have hually
got out of the woods, there will be a
demand for iron that it will tax the
capacity of even the wonderful mines
and mills we now possess, to satisfy.
For the past fifty years the produc-
ton Of iron-and consequently the
consumption applying the law OF
general avera ges-has doubled in this
country every ten years, and this pro-
cess of doubling the output every de-
cade has gone on during Dad times as
well as during times of great pros
perity If the ratio holds good, ana
there is every reason to believe that
it will, the consumption of ironin the
United States in the year l9O0-now
but three twelve months distant-will
be fully eighteen million tons. The
first good business year that comes to
us will see a smashing of all previous
records of consumption that will
astonish the students" OF the trade
who confine their scrutiny to the two
or three years of the immediate past,
and the fortnight Immediately in the
future.
Lake Superior producers of Bes-
semer grades of iron ore are between
the devil and the deep sea, and their
predicament is one which is causing
great deal of worry to the responsible
heads of the mining corporations.
The Besssmer ore pool which regulat-
ed prices so successfully in 1895 and
1896 is moribund, and weather to
bury it or TO bring it to life for
another years duty is a question
which has terrors for those who must
solve it, The operations of the pool
in 1885 were Internationally Of great
benefit TO the producers. The benefits
in dollars and cents were trivial in
comparison with putting stop to the
inter Decentralization of the trade, as
the average gain in 1895 prices over
those of 1894 was but 10 cents a ton.
The 1895 agreement was entered into
with great hope by the various pro-
ducers, but to many of them it proved
a delusion and snare. Several of
the great steel manufacturers, notably
the Carnegie interests, are interested
in Lake Superior mines, therefore
being placed in the dual position of
vendor and purchaser, and either way
the market goes, they are bound to
share in the gain. These concerns
which own both mines and mills,
entered In the 1896 ore pool, but the