Ladysmith news-budget. [volume] (Ladysmith, Rusk County, Wis.) 1907-1927, 1910-07-01

sometimes as much as a hundred feet in length,
depend for their effects wholly upon such paper
cylinders, no bigger than goodsized frecrackers'
stuck all over the lattice work of the skeleton
structure employed by the hre-palnter III heu' as
one might say, of canvas.
Something more in detail about these lire pic
lures will be said later on; but meanwhile 1t may
be as we'll to speak descrptively of the processes
used in the manufacture of the more simple and
familiar kinds of fireworks for example,
as roman candles, bombs, rockets, p1nWheels ana
the like All of these, excepting the bombs, are
substantially nothing more than cylinders OF
pasteboard filled with cOmbustibles and fash
toned in different ways.
One of the greatest fireworks factories in the
world is located the outskirts of Brooklyn,
but the stranger who passes by it on trolley car
on the way to Coney island would scarce sus-
meet the character Of the outfit, which is scat
tered over about twenty acres of land in a series
of small buildings, some of them being so tiny
as to accommodate only single workman. The
object of this arrangement is to minimize the
consequences of accidents If the lone man who
occupies any of the tiny houses should hap
pen to be blown up he alone would suffer.
1t naturally happens that the only building
of considerable size on the premises Is one in
which no explosives or other lively cOmbustibles
are used. Here. in fact is where all the paper is
stored, tons upon tons of it, for the outer wrap
pings of the fireworks. Pyrotechnic toys, of
course must be pretty to look at, else they would
not sell to advantage and the papers utilized for
the purpose of all coor5 Of the rainbow and
a great variety of ornamental patterns. For
extra fancy goods more or less gilt and silver
paper is employed.
Upstairs in the same building all of the pa
per cylinders are made, the process adopted be-
ing so exceedingly expeditions that one person
can turn out as many Is gross of them in
day. Of course they are of all lengths and diam
o+Op dino 70 fireworks
for which they are intended and though the
rocket cylinders are rolled by machine all Of the
others are made by hand. With the aid of long,
round stick of metal and pot of paste the oper-
ator converts sheets Of thin, brown pasteboard
into neat and compact tubes at the rate Of three
or four a minute.
A dozen work people engaged in this occu-
patton can turn out an immense number of cyl
inders in day and the manner in which they
are utilized in the manufacture of different kinds
of fireworks will presently be explained. 1t might
be we'll to say incidentally, however that in this
same department made the bombshells, which
are stamped by a machine out of papier-mache
in halves When they have become dry the
halves are joined by strips of thin canvas soaked
in paste, each sphere thus produced having
round hole at one end for loading.
Bombs are among the most interesting and
beautiful of fireworks and some of them are of
great size-as much five feet in diameter.
They are discharged from mortars and, reaching
a height of 1000 feet more, explode with
great noise, libeEatng showers Of many-colored
stars golden rain, sometimes parachutes
carrying trains of stars. Some made
small as two inches in diameter-baby ones,
suitable for family
The method of their construction is always
the same and is at once simple and ingenious.
The papermache shell is filled with stars
that is to say, with little pieces of cylindrical
oI,N
positions Beneath the shell thus loaded is at
tached and firmly glued a paper receptacle con-
tanning a l0w-burning composition similar to
gunpOwder Then fuse is fixed that being
ignited at the instant of the bombs discharge it
will burn just long enough to explode the shell
at the moment when the projectile has reached
it's greatest height in the air. When this hap
pens the paper shell is blown to pieces and the
stars, incidentally ignited are thrown far and
wide. Being light, they fall slowly and the effect
produced is very beautiful
Even the stars, you see, paper cylinders,
though only half inch perhaps in length But
they vary much in SIZE according to the to
which they are to be put. man cuts them by
the millions with small circular saw, taking
handful of paper tubes of small diameter and
using the to chop them into short pieces of
equal length. Then the little sections are filled
with chemical mixtures of various kinds nitrate
and chlorate of baryta being used for green, car
yellow and oddly enough) paris green for blue,
with various admixtures of chorate of potash,
shellac, etc.
1t should have been said that, in order to
strengthen the papier-mache shells and to en-
able them to scatter their stars more widely
when shattered, they wound with strong gro
GERS twine, outside of which the final decorative
paper cover is put There is, however, an
other and quite kind of bomb, which is made
in the shape of cylinder. 1t is so constructed
that during its flight through the air it makes
series of breaks" sometimes as many as ten,
throwing out each time shower of stars. This
as might be imagined, is a very beautiful effect
and Is achieved by dividing the containing cyn-
der into a series of compartments holding stars
each compartment being set off in It's turn.
Some of these cylindrical bombs contain par
achutes which are arranged like the parachutes
dropped from rockets. Inside of the pasteboard
case is circular piece of tissue paper, around
the circumference of which are attached series
of very long strings. To each of these strings
are fastened at intervals nU' lber of the little
paper stars already described and the arrange