Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1899-01-12
TALLEST IN THE COUNTRY.
Chimney Erected in New York Is 353
Feet in Height.

This gigantic chimney is SO feet in
diameter at the ground, 27 feet in its
narrowest part and So feet at the top,
which flares outward from the
neck" or narrowest part. TO build
it required 100000 bricks, enough,
laid end to end, to reach clear across
the state of New York from Buffalo to
Albany. Or they would build a wall
four feet high and nineteen miles
long. If the chimney extended along
the ground instead of up into the air
load of hay or the biggest band
wagon that ever led a circus parade
could be driven through it easily.
The object of this sky-scraping
smokestacK is, OF course, to furnish a
steady draught for the giant furnaces
which will generate steam to drive the
machinery of a power plant. 1t has
been built with scientific exactness,
therefore, to secure just the right di-
mansions for the air passage. The air
heated by the furnace fires rises and
Us place is taken by fresh air. When
the flow of this air current is properly
| regulated it keeps the fires st top heat.
Attempts have been made to do away
with tall smokestacks by the use Of
mechanical blowers, but the engineers
who are building the new power-house
believe that the chimney fue still pro-
vides the most efficient draught.
The nicely with which the immense
new chimney has been perpared for it's
work may be understood from the
fact that inside its wall is a second
and separate chimney built up to a
height of $40 feet. The reason for this
is that the inner surface will expand
and lengthen under the action OF the
hot gases from the furnaces, while the
outer surface will remain as it is laid.
| The result of this process, if there was
only one wall, might be to cause the
! great structure to crack and crumble.
or even to topple over. AS it is now
constructed, nothing short of an
| earthquake will be likely to move it.
! The chimney weighs over 5000 tons,
or more than the battleship Texas. To
! support this immense weight 1,300 for
! ty-foot wooden piles were driven into
the ground as close together as they
! could be placed. On these the founda-
| tons rest, SO that the total height of
the smOkeStack counting the distance
| its supports extend into the earth, is
almost 400 feet.
| One curious fact about the great
| smokestack is that it is the only part
| Of the new power-house thus far erect
! ed. The big building, which is to
! cover more than an acre of ground
! space, will be built about the chin
| ney, which now stands in solitary
| grandeur in the middle of a city block.
| The chimney has been nearly year
in building, and is not yet entirely
completed. For the first 125 feet of it's
| height the walls were carried upwards
| by means of a wooden staging around
! the outside. Above that point the
work was carried on entirely from the
| the upper part Of the structure was
| hoisted up the fiue, and the masons
went to and from their work on a
| temporary elevator built inside the
| chimney. When it is completed one
! iron ladder will run up the inside, Civ
| ing access to the top for any repairs
that may be needed.
The tallest chimney in the world is
in Glasgow, and is over 400 feet in
height. But in other respects it is not
large. Its diameter is less, and not
nearly so much material was required
for it's cOnStructiOn-Cleye
Leader.