The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-10-23
IN ALABAMA ONLY IS
 STEEL MADE IN THE SOUTH
Gadsden and EnsIey Have Plants. With the Lat. ter City the Center of the lndustry--G.
 Il. ShuIer Talks of Industry.

have to lay up and keep heavy stock of raw ore throughout the winter, In the Birmingham district. The ores about here are convenient and accessi- ble at all times. I may say that I think as fine a steel can be made here as anywhere in the world.
 We are now using only our own material from the time the ore is dug | from the hill until the finished products are turned into our warerooms ready for shipment Our plant at Gadsden has been in operation several months.
 That section of the State Is very rich
 in iron ore and no trouble whatever is | experienced in securing a convenient supply of iron ore. Our furnaces at Gadsden are run in connection with the steel plant there just as the fur naces of the Tennessee Coal and Iron Company here are run in connection
 with their plant here at Ensley. The
 molten pig iron is served to the steel plant hot from the furnace just as 1t
 is served here.
 Quality of Output Improved. Previous to the completion of our Gadsden plant we bought the raw steel from our neighbors over there. Since we have been making our own steel. however, I believe that the quality of our output has improved. I know that our wire drawers, skilled workmen who are paid by the amount of wire | they draw each day. have made double the amount of money they made before our own steel was used"
 The making of steel is a millionaire's business. When a man starts out to enquire into it he becomes convinced
 that million dollar figures and million dollar things go with the steel busi- ness before he gets beneath the sur face. Now. here is the Alabama Steel and Wire Company doing business in
 the State for the past seven years. This company is capitalized at $6,500,000. What the exact investment of the com pany Is not known. No manufactur-
 ing concern willingly gives the detail of its investment.
 But it may be regarded as reasonably certain that the amount the company has invested in its great property at Gadsden and at Ensley is somewhere
 in the neighborhood of S3.0O0, ,00O Those are the sort of figures that go
 with steel making. The near neigh
 Dor of this company, the steel-making plant of the Tennessee Coal and Iron Company with its great furnace near by, Is also an institution whose value Is represented in seven figures.
 These steel making plants have not only the interest of representing d heavy financial expenditure, but they always have. too, the interest of the
 picturesque. In this mill where rods and wire are made scenes that are vivid and startling to the uninftiated
 are constantly witnessed. For one
 thing he sees as fine a fireworks ex- hibit as any FourtS of July affair could
 show. It is not given to the average
 man for instance to see daily A with
 ing snake of fire ninety feet long
 squiIhing ana twisting in a danger
 ous way and at the same time lighting
 the furthest gloom of the big black building. And the common man tbe average man marvels when he aaAs .
 sturdy workman run forward and seiz-
 ing this snake of fire by the head with pair of tonss and run the head
 through narrow opening. And then
 the startled looker-on sees the entIra
 ninety feet of writhing, twistine Are drawn through the narrow aperture
 into which the head was pushed.
 Ribbon of snaly Fire.
 Again another ribbon of snakv fire
 glides over the froad floor and again
 the trained and sturdy workman runa
 forward with hiE tongs, snatchss if bv
 the head and runs the head through the
 narrow opening. A half dozen times
 this same thing is being done on one
 floor by a half dozen workmen One
 notices then the systems of rollers in
 the far corner of the room, a roller
 system that is similar to that so much
 used in the saw mills of South Ala
 bama. He observes that this roller
 system runs directly up to a big iron furnace through which a reddish-white
 heat shines. And every now and then
 from out the furnace there drops on
 the rollers a billet of steel, ret-hot to
 the core. The roller takes 1t in charge and then one notices the wonderful ductility of steel, that property of it
 which permits a billet of steel to be
 first mashed out several feet long and
 again mashed out double it's second
 length and again pressed out until,
 with a few operations. 1t becomes a
 glistening. shining ribbon nearly a
 hundred feet long. And in time that
 same piece of steel becomes a long.
 slender wire
 The plant here makes daily demand