The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1909-12-12
HOW SUGAR IS
MANUFACTURE
Intricate Process To Refine
Sweets We Use
PLANTS RUN CONTINUALLY
Cannot Close Down Day or Night.
White Granules Made From Dark
and Sticky Mass-An
interesting Process.

tHeCiSotfud FiSSSc~s
From the Philadelphia Record.
Did you ever stop to think, as you
dopped a cube of crystal sugar in your
coffee, or put some of the powdered
product on piece of pie, of the miracle
wrought by man in getting this from
a green stalk called sugar cane, or from
the root OF most unpromising looking
plant called the sugar beet. All the
sugar refined in Philadelphia comes
from cane. This is grown in many
parts of the world. Some of the prin-
cipai crops are estimated this year at
tho following amounts In tons: Porto Rico,
$4,000: Cuba. 100000; Hawaiian Islands.
475,oo0; British West Indias, 5000; San
Domingo and Haiti. $1,000; Mexico,
10000; Central America, 5000; South
America, 10000: Java, 1,250000; other
parts of British India, 2.100,000; Aus
tralia and Fiji. $4,000; Africa, $4,000;
Philippine Islands, 10000; Louisiana,
1880
Almost any day you can go down to
unloading the raw product from ships.
weighing, testing and storing it in the
warehouses of the refneries. Most of
the imports come from Java, the Ha-
waiian Islands, the Philippine Islands,
Porto Rice and Cuba. The last two are
only five days steaming from Phila-
delphia, but the others are on the
other side of the world and 1t is a mat
ter of months to bring the raw sugar
from its distant birthplace to the re-
finery. A steamer from the Philippine
Islands requires about 90 days to
make Philadelphia via Cape Horn, and
from the Hawaiian Islands the time is
not much less. From Java 1t takes 60
days. Recently the Drumeltan, a SAIL
ing vessel, arrived here from Iloilo.
Philippine Islands 1t was on the way
1873 days, or more than six months.
This ship is owned by the Standard
Oil Company and usually carries oil on
the outward voyage an raw sugar
coming back. 1t makes a round trip
In something more than a year. The
sailors are said to be web-footed and to
be subject to "landsickness' when they
leave the vessel. The arrival of the
Drumeltan was a notable event. because
1t was the first ship to arrive at this
port with sugar from the Philippine
Islands free of duty in consequence OF
the late tariff enactment.
Curious Packages.
The sugar is pressed from the cane
and boiled down into raw sugar in the
distant Islands where 1t grows. When
II arrives here it is packed in curious
packages. That from the Philippine
Islands, for example, is held in mats
made Of a sort OF grass. Each mat
holds about 70 pounds. The product
from Java comes In immense baskets
made of split bamboo. Each basket is
about five feet high and two in diameter
and holds 600 pounds.
The unloading of the ship is like the
unloading of any other cargo. BY
means of donkey engines and block
and tackle the sugar is raised from
the hold OF the vessel, swung out over
the dock and lowered on to trucks.
Then, IL the sugar Is dutiable, the
United States Gogeyrnment inspectors
into the packages. These are instru-
ments that take sample OF sugar
from the middle of the bag. A test
of these samples Is made and from this
test 1t Is determined what rate of duty
the cargo must pay. The sugar Is then
weighed and taken into the warehouse.
There 1t is stacked up by means of
engines, sometimes to a height of 10 or
30 feet.
Ia wv m hA cd will
s enter this process a dark brown, sticky
substance; It will come out perfectly
white and crystalline. All processes of
refinement, whether of gold, or human
character or of sugar demand heoric
i treatment. This sugar will undergo
terrific heat, SO great In fact, that 1t
| will be compelled to resolve itself into
! liquid state. 1t will be whirled around
In machines that turn a thousand times
minute. It will be imprisoned in great
watts for hours. But in the end 1t will
reap the reward which comes to those
who persevere under adversely.
In another part of this great ware
house where the sugar Is stored when
unloaded from the ships Is the place
where 1t makes it's entry into the re-
fnery. Men are pulling the packages
down from the pile with long iron hooks,
taking care not to get under that
great falling weight. Truckers haul the
packages to the machinery. There
! man with an az cuts the bomboo top to
pieces, another man fastens two hooks
of a chain near the bottom Of the basket,
| thereby inverted and the sugar falls
into a hopper provided with a CRATE to
catch fragments of the broken basket.
| From this hopper enters an endless belt
| elevator, which carries 1t to the fourth
floor Of the building.
In Boiling Watts.
We shall follow it soon but first let us
cast plying eyes on the inqusition which
| Is going on here. The helpless baskets
are tho victims. First they are cruelty
beaten with iron rods to get off adhering
| fragments of sugar and then. horrors,
| they are cast into watts of boiling water,
which dissolves the last particle of sugar.
| Every little bit helps in successful
mandatory and nothing is allowed to
escape.
The sugar. arriving at the fourth floor,
! Is discharged into the iron cylinder,
| which is about two feet in diameter and
revolves slowly in a horizontal position.
| It is provided with mixing arms. the use
| Of which is apparent when the stream of
syrup is observed flowing down on the
| At the other end of the cylinder the mag
ma, or mixture of sugar and syrup, falls
| into a large receiving vat.
| From this 1t goes through large pipes
down into the centrifugal machines of
"centrifugals" on the next floor below.
These are watts about the size of a bar
REL made of steel. all but their sides.
which are of a very fine screen. Down
,Uyn tbo Of oh ho