The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-05-16
SHIPS FOR GERMANY
GREAT BUILDING YARDS OF sCHI-
 CHAU AT DANzIG.
Program for 1909 by ksisef's Gov ernment Includes Constrpctfon of Many Boats at Eibfng
 Plant.
BY pERNARD FISCHER.

Berlin. May 16.--A battieshtp of the German. program of 1909 Is to be built at the Schichau yard. Danzis. where full preparations have been mace TUT the work.
 One ship or more of every class Of the new Germany navy has been con- structed at that important establish ment. The Kaiser Barbarosa was completed there in April 1901; the Victim, of the Wittelbach class. in october, 1902; two ships of the Brauchweig class--the Eisass. in No- vember, 1904. and the Lothringens in of tho Deutschland class, In the spring Of 1908. Both at Elbing and Danzig the great shipbuilding yards and en- gineering works established by the late Ferdinand Schichau have kept pace with the expansion of the Ger ! man navy and are now fully equipped and supplied with all the resources for the building of all classes of vss- l seis.
 | Schichau's name ranks with that of | Krupp as a captain of German indus | try. The heighbofhood of the sea. the swelling volume of the commerce of Prussia, and especially the need Of dredging the shallow waters of the Eastern Baltic for the development of the trade of Danzig and Konigsberg and the towns on the system of canals behind them. made Ferdinand Schichau shipbuilder. A statue of him. as in octogenariam. stands in a garden in his native place of Elbing. which shows him with rugged countenance and long hair, as a true son of Ger many.
 His father was 6 smith and from worker at Elbing. He was born there In 1Si4. when the regeneration of Ger many from her disasters had begun and as marked by the invasion of France. He was educated first ct 6 volksschule at Elbing. but his father desired to give him a higher education than the nelghborhood afforded in technical science and industries, and he was sent to a school which had been established in Berlin, where he studded for some years.
 But England was then the home of watt. Boulton. Stephenson, Telford and other giants. and the seat of all the industries that were then developlne from the practical application of the expansive power of steam. According ly Schichau went to England to study and observe, and there seems to have entered Into his mind at the time tha intention of rivai1ing the English fin some things that they had made their own. After his "Wanderjahre'' he returned to Elbing in 1887, and there with an establishment of eight men now increased to neariy S,o0o--began to make steam engines, hydraulic presses and machinery for industrial establishments. He concerned him. self in canal work and river and coast improvements. displaying the inde- fatigable energy, perseverance, and in- | -l. a.A l |. .sw~.
 The constant necessity of removing silted material from the mouth of the vistula and the Eibing river. and of deepening the Frisches Han. the Kurisches Han and other shallow waters on the part of the German coast. caused Schichau to turn his attention to the construction of dredgers. in which he was a pioneef. One vessel of the class designed by him. and for which he made the ma. chinery, was in service until fSSe, af- ter having been In use for about for | ty-five years.
 l The Schlchau dredgers have been employed on the Baltic coasts for l nearly seventy years, and the firm is now building suction dredgers on the Fruhling system. having ten times the capacity of the older types. Bag ger VII, which can steam at ten knots, has been built for the dockyard at Wilhelmshaven. and in soft ground Is capable of dealing with $500 cubic yards per hour. and in heavy ground has excavated 4.6s0 cubic, yards per hour. sixty-ive per cent. of the solid material being raised by the pressure pipes.
 It was in the building of dredgers that Schichau began his work as a ship constructor, When the Prussian n paddle corvette Danzig was built in 1851 by J. W. KIawitter at DanziK. the machinery was supplied by SchiOhau. shortly afterwards he bought land on the Elbing river. and opened a ship- yard, at which he built in 1855 the first screw vessel ever constructed in Germany. named the Rorussia. Frou, l 1850 onward the yard was successful. ly enlarged at various times, ana fin 1860 Schichau began to build railway | locomotives.
 When Whitehead invented the for. pedos and torpedo boats were first built, he resolved to compete with inc British in the construction of these vessels. and ever since that time the Elbing yard has been chiefly special- ized in the construction of torpedo boats and destroyers. By this time Schichau had greatly enlarged his es- tablishments. and had in his service a. trained stan of engineers, ship design CTS. constructors, foremen and others, numbering in 1870 about 800
 His first boats were of the "spar" type, and were built for the Russian Government. Herr. Carl H. ziese. who married Schichau's daughter. was at LH- IaTQ nA