Daily Arizona silver belt., 1910-03-17
STUPENDoUS FIGURES
Facts Regarding the Growth of Our Pe-
 troleum Production

According to the Boston Financial News, at recent inquiry, the follow ing interesting facts concerning the pe- troleum production of the United States were supplied by G. w. Pearce, an en- gineer associated with the late Major General Herman Haupt, U. s. A., who designed and constructed the large pe- troleum pipe lines. He gave the do- nestle production of petroleum last year as 1S7,000,000 barrels of 42 gallons each. The monthly production is now 10 per cent more than the annual pro- duction forty years ago. Two-thirds of the production is exported. The pipe lines in several instances, as that rom Oklahoma to New York harbor, meas ure 1,50O miles. The total length of all pipe lines is the equivalent of the dis tance from Halifax, N. S, to Portland, Ore.
 The domestic petroleum industry em- plOys 534, 1000 men and women directly, and about 100000 indirectly. The in dustry in its requirements for iron, steel, lead, zinc, copper, spelter, tin and manufactures therefrom, gives employ ment to about as many units of popula- tion as are residents of Boston. The high railroad freights on oil, because of frequent accidents to freight trains that derailed oil tanks and set the con tents afre, induced the building of pipe lines. The genius of copper mine en- gineers in designing very powerful pumps for deep mines was the chief factor in the success of the oil piping lines.
 When John D. Rockefeller and his as sOciates started the Standard Oil com, pany S7 per cent of the railroads of North America were laid with iron rails of short life and very brittle, that led to many derailments. On many roads from that time until the pipe lines were built, the cost of freighting oil ranged between 2S and 43 per cent upon the cost to producers and distrib- tutors. Today the transportation tax on pig iron is 25 per cent of its cost of production, whereas in Germany, France and Great Britain it is between 9 and 10 per cent. But for the pipe lines the enormous export, and a large part of the domestic trade in petroleum and it's numerous products, and for
 
 other fittings, would be lost.
 The witness testified that the domes tic petroleum industries and allied in terests employ capital contributed by 757,OOO persons, of whom 45 per cent are women, guardians for minors and religious and charitable institutions.
 The witness. when asked if he was on the staff of the Standard Oil com pany, said that in the past year he had been engaged eighteen days by inter ests supposed by him to be allied with the organization to report upon statis- tics, and to test certain burners and stoves of new patterns. He had been paid $l00 a day. He knew Messrs. John D. Rockefeller and Henry M. Flagler, but had not seen either for six years.
 The witness gave the opinion as be- ing held by all scientific engineers, that the building of the pipe lines and the tens of thousands of oil tank cars owned by oil distributors had served greatly to relieve the railroads of the enormous burden of low grade freight, and had thereby acted as the equiv alent of adding at least 25,O00 miles of main line to the railroads of the ma tion. and was factor i'll enabling a number of the roads to make small profits in hauling other classes of low grade freight at ruling prices, which are about one-sixth of the average rat les ruling in Great Britain.