The Birmingham age-herald., 1903-08-18

Pratt City railroad was Solu TOT apoul S1, ,O50 GOO net, and the money I think went into paying dividends. l don't think one dollar went Into the steel plant.
 Washing out the lime in the ore im- proved it. We require lime for fiuxing- Ther is not enough lime in our ores to Aux them. The Minnesota and Lake Superior ores run from 50 to 63 per cent Our Alabama ore runs about to 31 per cent We have about 10 per cent of ore that runs from 43 to 50 per cent in iron The Tennessee company has some ore that runs from 43 to 50 per cent in me- tallic iron 1 don't know what the Lake Superior ore costs delivered to the furn- aces. l don't know what 1t cost last year A large portion of the ore used by the United States Steel company and by Jones Laughlin company costs>on the cars at the mines in Minnesota an aver age of 25 cents a ton royalty and 80 cents a ton freight to the lake ports. Lake carriage was less than 90 cents per ton and should be less than 40 cents a ton now An independent furnace on the lake shore owning it's own mines should get it's ore for $2 .15 per ton made up Of 70 cents royalty, 60 cents cost of mining out of mine into cars, 80 cents railroad charges and 50 cents lake freight. This would be fair average cost to such furnaces. l don't know anything about the cost of hauling on the Baltimore and Ohio railroad from Lorain The furn- aces of the United States Steel company move their orc at charge of less than three mills per ton per mile from Lake Erie ports to the furnaces.
 Most of the independent furnace own CTS own mines in the Lake Superior re- gion It costs 75 cents a ton to mine ore here It takes almost three tons of ore to make a ton of iron here. The equip ment at the mines is much the same here as in 1901. We have new compressors and one new hoisting machine. Our im- provements have been paid for with earnings. The Pennsylvania railroad stock. the stock of the New York Gem tral, the Chicago and Milwaukee and the Minnesota railroads Is all common stock and is listed in Wall street. They gam ble in it the same as in the Tennessee company stock. The common stock of the Tennessee company represents the difference in value between the bonded indebtedness of the company and it's as- sets. The fluctuations of the common stock on the Wall street market is by manipulation.
 The Capitalization.
 MT. Pearcy reads from report: The capital stock of the Tennessee company is divided into common stock, $22, .S20, and preferred, s24S0 900. MT. Percy states in answer to MT. Lewis: Good Pratt or Blockton coal lands could not be bought in any body on the line of railroad for less than $l50 per acre. You could not buy outlying lands for $15 or $20 per acre. Good undeveloped Pratt or Blockton coal land is well worth $50 per acre. The royalties on coal lands in all recent agreements are cents. Some of the Blockton land will bring $450 an acre on the royalty basis. We figure the coal at 1000 tons to the foot in thickness of the vein per acre.
 The cost of a mining plant. inclusive of houses company store, etc, Is S100, 000. This is an average plant. The acreage tributary to that plant is from 300 to 10D0 acres.
 MT. Bacon resumes
 The figures given this morning are ta ken from our books.
 Replacement Fund.
 We set aside cents per ton per year for replacement of the above ground equipment. The plant we are now put ting in on Blocton seam Is m odern plant, but 1t is without electric hauling equipment. The plant referred to in- cludes tlpple. hoisting machinery, pump ing houses and stores, offices, etc. or the s1 06 cost of coal at Blocton we will give the commission full figures.
 MT. Bacon, questioned by MT. Percy, says: I am not familiar with the details of the operations. The charge of cents for refining coke ovens Is the charge pre- pared by the company for It's own use II must ultimately cover the cost of aban- donment of the present ovens. If l looked at the price of pig iron solely l would make different price for miniag coal from that I must put on the price when 1 take into consideration the com mercal operator.
 The price of labor cannot be bound to the price of pig iron There ars many things to be taken into consideration.
 As touching the price of pig iron Mir. Bacon reads from a table showing the price at many points widely distributed. It will cost much more to ship the same tonnage from Birmingham than from Pittsburg, Youngstown or Buffalo to these various points. Most of the Ala bama product-about S7 per cent-goes north. Illinois coal cannot be coked. and the evidence of the Conellsville and the Pocahontas district wage rate Is of greatest interest in this connection. as those districts are the ones we compete with.
 Tne tennessee company was 8S well managed as any company during the nineties, yet nothing was done in re- placements and there was debt of s. GOO when l took hold in 1901.
 Superintendent Franklin.
 J. M. Franklin called by MT. Lewis. says he Is superintendent of mines for the Tennessee company. He prepared the tables On machine mining. fn connec- ton with Mir. Adams, and the figures are the best they could obtain.
 He says-I am not aware that there was not 53000,000 tons of machine mined coal produced in 1902. We gave these figures to the board as our best obtain able information. We have been offered dfferential here of seven cents, and would be willing to take an average of the differentals in Ohio Illinois, Indi- ana and Pennsylvania.
 MT Lewis states that there was less than 53,0O0000 tons of machine mined coal mined in the United States in 1902.
 MT. Franklin further states that the chain machine costs $l100 and then there Is necessary an electric installation which costs about s30,000. We would Our electric equipment there was in- stalled for hauling, pumping and ma chine mining. I think seventeen cents would be fair differential on the Pratt seam for the chain machine. The differ ential would be different in other mines. don't think the machines would do we'll on the Blocton.
 Oner,tore ConeIude