The Minneapolis journal., 1903-11-11
THE NONpAREIL MAN
First Report Of an Ashes Burner-How a
Coal Furnace May BE Made to Carry
the Ashes Out OF the Basement-An
Experiment That overthrows the
Theorists Who Deny Its Possibility.

the Ashes Out OF the Basement-An
Experiment. That overthroWs the
Theorists Who Deny It's Possibility.
Some time ago in something of the spirit
/ of the Man Who Iknows-It All, sa gentle
satire appeared in this column on the
matter of the furnace burning it's own
1 ashes. A number of intelligent people in
/ sisted that they weie burning their ashes
/ IN their furnaces, and a number of other
intelligent people, who had not tried it.
4 insisted that 1t could not be done The
/ proposition seems a foolish one at first
/ sight. but When you can verify it for
4 yourself 1t is not reasonable to rail at
4 1t until you have tried it. That is where
1 the column erred.
But the seed of the discussion, never
/ theiess fell on good ground, and the de-
4 termination was made to give the ashes
/ burning plan a fair trial on the first cold
day. If there is any way of beating the
coal game, in ever SO small a way. it is
Wei worth the experiment. "a.
One evening last week I took out the
ashes and gave them good wetting. The
next morning they had dried out a. little,
i but were damp. This was Sunday mora-
ing. The fire was well shaken down and
a good supply of hard black coal4-trtist
/ coal, worth sS.75 per-was shoveled in.
/ When this was well under way and blazing
/ all over, I threw in from four to six inches
of damp ashes. 1t looked like very
asinine and suicidal thing to do, and the
/ remark was made soto voce to the
cellar WALL,
"A man who thinks them things will
i burn ought to be kicked by a two-locomo-
1 tive power jackass.''
t. The drafts of the furnace were closed
behind and the ashbox draft was left
/ open about the width of finger nail.
All day long the house was warm and
scomfortable--in fact too warm-and the
I w ygnr Ion ,;<rl.f r
tripped lightly down the broad colonial
cellar stairway and looked into the furs
mace The ashes were all aglow with
little bright spots of fire. The sight was
SO pleasant and inspiring that nothing
was done to the furnace No coal was
added, nor was it shaken down. In the
morning the fire, after its twenty-four-
hour run, looked just as good as it did
the night before. I was mildly aston
ished, but out for blood. Now the worst
must be known. I threw on two inches
more of wet ashes-no coal-and went
down to the office. That night at
| p. M, after a thirty -six-hour run, the
! ire was still going and thu house was
warm shook the fire down thoroly
| then added coal and a little wood and
| When it was blazing merrily, in went the
wet ashes again for. another thirty-six-
/ hour run. And they are going to keep
| going in for the present
This story sounds like an exaggeration
but it is plain unvarnished fact In
place of three ''helpings'' of COAL that
furnace is now getting one. How it will
work in the coolest weather has not yet
been demonstrated, but the furnace will
certainly be given chance to show what
it can do.
Are the ashes all consumed?" some
| body asks.
That cannot beltold from my experience
yet. As fast as they come out of the
ashpit, they wander back on top of the
hre l notice no increase in their num-
Der yet.
One fact has been noted-that the ashes
Wnen wet show innumerable fine points
OF black coal that has not been consumed.
The reason for this evidently is that in
4 the Old way the ashes are under the fire
IN the new way the ashes are over the
hre. Hence anything combustible must
burn. :
Having tried this thing and found it
satisfactory, all professors Of chemistry
or doctors of philosophy who tell us that
, it can not be done are to me as strangers
ana aliens They cannot doctor my phil
a osophy Of coal furnaces and ashes burn
ings. Z. s 7 -.
, 1t is said that the first steamship thu
came across the Atlantic carried a book
proving that steamships couldn't cross
| the Atlantic.
! Our fatherses, it may be said. never
burned asheses in their furnaces and we
Fl guess that the way our fathers ran their
4 furnaces is good enough for us. There ia
/ story told somewhere of a man who for
lorsy years mad always gone down town
: leaned up against the "deepot's and
81 watched the train come in. One day the
Tailroad management sent a gang of men
and moved the depot to the next lot but
I the man came down town as usual, leaned
against the place where the station had
s Formerly stood and got a bad fall because
1t wasn't there.
The population of the whole nation of
Panama is one-eighth as large as that of
: Chicago. Our high school eleven could
march from sea to sea and tip over about
all the opposition that Showed itself.
! Stirred by the example of Patti Mr..
F1tzslmmons is talking of giving a farewell
interference with some other human pile
tdriver.
, That wholesome and maligned fruit, the
prune, sometimes known as the California
, strawberry. is elbowing its way into Our
Boarding House set
With the Panama canal dug and the
Mississippi improved, it will be prettv
near a straight line from Minneapolis to
the South American market.
paign has already begun. Tom must be-
long to the Don't Worry club.
: There is something in these stories Of
sudden wealth that comes in ways we do
, not look for that delights the mind We
always rejoice when we hear that some
person who has been struggling along
from yeai. to year, has been left $4,000 by
;; the death of a rich relative. We like to
think OF. the freedom and ease of mind
: which he thinks it brings him. was much
. interested in reading in English eX-
change yesterday the remarkable story Of
: James Waller, an Australian. He had
? never been in England until he went over
J iii 1897 to see the queens jubilee The
night he arrived in London he dreamed
: that he stood in a. large circular chamber
!, in the British Museum and that the walls
We're lined with books. He dreamed that
1 he took down book from shelf, and
: found behind it a lump of solid gold. The
!. young fellow had never been in the Brit
ish Museum in his life. but his dream was
IS so vivid that he wrote to the head lbrar-
: ian for a ticket of admission On entering
q the room he recognized it perfectly. went
: to the spot in which he had found the
d gold. took down the book, and found
nothing at all.
But, as he had always heard that
dreams went by contraries, he only smiled
lat his disappointment. Then he took q
: glance at the book in his hand. 1t was a
work on metallurgy. He sat down. opened
e lit. and began to glance thru it, Suddenly
2 his eye was caught by az description of a
gray material of great weight, the binox-
1,no he yYcp1,f