The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-01-28

{ ated for the most part by the touching of electric buttons.
 Within the last two years the Ensley rolling mills have shot to the front rank by making the first open hearth steel rails Prior to this, all the steel used for rails had been made by the Bessemer process. Several high authorities, includ- ing q superintendent in the employ of the steel trust told me that the new Ensley rails were "the finest in the world The heavy tonnage on many rail- roads has created a demand for higher quality of rail- and the Ensley men have been the first to supply it al a low enough price.
 How the Tennessee Coal and Iron was reconstructed-how one stern, strong and rugged man went down from Min nesota and began to transform 1t from ramshackle concern into the giant of southern corporations-is a story in itself, sparkling with adventure; and some day, let us hope, an Alabamian Sir Walter Scott will arise and tell 1t in full.
 Don H. Bacon Is the name of the man steel kings. he was graduate of the steel kings, he was a graduate to the school of toll. He began in a telegraph office. When the amazing Iron mines of Minnesota were first uncovered, Bacon was one of the crowd that surged Into the state. He was only one of the leg NedlS Idilh anu Ilt WIlti lle hiiiNtut but when he exchanged the north for the south, in 1901, he had become president of the Minnesota Iron company.
 Bacon is a man of the "Old Hickory" sort. He would sooner work than play; and he got his fill in Alabama He found that the Tennessee Coal and Iron was an immense loose jointed concern. It's ore and coal lands were vast but it's equip ment was medley of makeshffts In New York 1t was looked upon as a Wall street football It's stock went up and down with every breeze of rumor Its finances were a puzzle. The whole com pany had been slung together in a very slipshod way.
 Bacon was not allowed to have a free hand in his work of reconstruction. The company had passed into the control of T. Woodward, an able New York banker. who knew much about finance but nothing about iron. In spite of thsi handicap, Bacon began his house clean ing with a vim that startled the whole state out of it's easy-going way. He fought two-year battle with the coal miners union and won He imported Huns, SlaVs, Greeks, Servians, Italians, and Films to replace in part, the unre- liable negroes. And, although he was miner rather than a steel maker, he worked out a new duplex process of mak- ins steel-a combination of the Bessemer
 
 to reduce costs.
 For five strenuous years Bacon worked like a Hercules. Then the control of the company fell into other hands, and he was displaced At present he is enjoying his first long vacation by making a tour of the world,
 The new owners of the Tennessee Coal and Iron are a syndicate of northern cap itaists, with four men in control-John ". Gates, Grant B. Schley. a conserva- tive Wall street broker Leonard C. Han ma. a brother of the late Senator Hanna, and Earl w. Oglesbay, a veteran ore man of Cleveland. George A. Kessler. the New York wine importer, has a large block of stock, but he is content to let Gates, SchIey, Hanna and Oglesbay do the work.
 This new syndicate looms large in the steel world Next to the steel trust. it is the most powerful iron and steel combin- ation in the world. It has bought control of two big companies-the Tennessee Coal and Iron and the Republic Iron and Steel so that it can now march hundred millions to the field of battle It has a GOO men on it's pay rolls With thirty four blast furnaces, twenty-five steel mills and a hundred mines of coal and iron ore. this powerful aggregation Is su- perior to anything that the iron cities of Europe can show.
 One man has been placed at the head of the two eompanies--John A. Topping, who began as an office boy in the Youngstown district and climbed to the highest rungs of the ladder in Wheeling. Topping is less rugged than Bacon, but equally viz