The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-12-15

| value 10 the interests OF the
| United States.
| the principal machine shops of the
Santa Fe road; something more than
boarding houses and churches and So
c1ety and schools and paved streets to
make Topeka the city that it should be.
| We will add slowly to our population
and wealth year by year, but Topeka
will never become busy, hustling, rap
| idly growing city, until it is made a
| manufacturing center, and it is as sure
as fate that we will not become a man
ufacturing center until we have cheaper
power, and we cannot get cheaper pow
er without cheaper fuel.
! have been much impressed by
statement made to me by the president
of one of our banking institutions, to
the effect that cheaper motive power
was absolutely essential in order to Sc
cure manufacturing industries; that
neither the Edison or any other COM
pany could furnish cheap power and
| pay $3.50 per ton for coal.
| The Edison company uses about 25,-
600 tons of coal per year; the Wolff
Packing company about 1000 tons. In
Guiding our flour mills and other in
dustries, more than 100, 900 tons of slack
coal are consumed annually.
| The building of the Hooking Valley
road into the coal fields gave. Column
bus, Ohio, cheap fuel, and the city has
grown to be a great manufacturing
center, and has increased in population
three fold since the advent of cheap
| fuel.
Indianapolis has grown to be a great
city through cheap fuel in the shape of
natural gas. The gas field is practical
| ly exhausted, but the industries are es-
tabliShed and cheap coal will replace
the cheap gas.
| 1t is being demonstrated daily that
Kansas has the greatest gas and oil
| field in America, if not in the world,
and it is inevitable that natural gas and
fuel oil will be piped out of the field for
both domestic and manufa curing pur-
poses.
An idea of the value of natural gas
for manufacturing purposes, and the
great quantity consumed may be gath
cred from the following figures taken
from the report of the Pittsburg, Penn
sy1vania, Chamber of Commerce:
Extent of the Gas.
Natural gas in the Pittsburg district
1909.
Combined capital of the Pitts
burg companies .............. $50, 100000
Miles of pipe line 4,oOO
Number of wells ........ 1000
Acres of land under lease. 100000
Daily consumption in cubic
feet ... ......... $50, 900, 900
Mills and factories supplied. 1000
Families supplied -...-....-...- 10000
Wells drilled annually - 500
All this in a district that produced in
1892, &c, 137, 346 tons of coal, or nearly
one-eighth of the entire coal product
of the United States, and more than one
the world.
The 100000 acres of land under lease
in the Pittsburg district equals $50
square miles, about one and one-half
times the area of one of the average
oil counties in southern Kansas. So 1t
will be seen that the area of the Kan
sas gas fields vastly exceeds the leased
area in the Pittsburg district. ESt1-
mating that 200 feet of gas equals one
ton of the best bituminous coal, to re-
place the loo, 900 tons of slack coal USED
Tf~r1 inc
| Topeka would require less than 1000
600 cubic feet Of gas per day, or less
than the product of many single gas
wells in the Kansas gas belt, and one
fiftieth of the daily consumption OF the
Pittsburg district.
1t is said that one Kansas company
has an output equal to 20O,OOO,OOO CUBIC
feet per day. One Topeka company mas
nroducing gas wells and productive ter
ritory leased in the gas belt sufficient
to supply a half dozen cities the size OF
Topeka with gas for both manu1actur-
| ing and domestic purposes
The Pittsburg coal is of the very best
quality, yet natural gas completes with
# at to IL cents per thousand for
manufacturing purposes and up TO 20
cents for domestic use.
| In Newark, Ohio, gas for manufactur-
ing costs cents and for domestic use
IS cents. GAINESVILLE, Ohio, brings lts
b11i1t M some of the largest industries
| in the United States.
| MANY other cities and towns have
0rofited by the use of natural gas for
manufacturing purposes. and we all
know what is happening every day IN
| the gas counties of southern Kansas
| 1t took some mighty close figuring to
use Topeka brick in the sewer now
being constructed in the Fifth ward,
as against Coffeyville brick burned
with natural gas and transported 21z
| miles by rail-
sire to read an article prepared by Mr..
II. ]. Adams of Leroy, formerly OF
1 Topeka and well known to many OF
/ our citizens as conservative, lever
| headed man of affairs, to this article
| the most careful consideration by the
| business men is invited. have no
particular plan to suggest 1t is said
| that a number of our people are in
| terested in a company or companies
| that propose to pipe natural gas into
Topeka I have no desire to antag-
onize either the Edison or Excelsior
| Coke and Gas companies, but it must
J he evident that if these companies are
! to furnish cheaper power and light,
| they must have cheaper material with
/ which to make these commodities.
( 1t may be that either or both of
| these companies can solve the prob
| lem. If not. new company or COM
| nanies should be formed especially to
furnish cheap motive power for our
| manufactures. If other cities have
cheap gas and oil, we must have them
/ or go to the wall. Our large property
| owners and business men might as
we'll face the inevitable and make up
their minds to find some one who will
put up the money and place Topeka on
| a par with our neighbors, or else go
down in their pockets and do it them
selves.
1 The Topeka money that has been