Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1911-07-19
FERTILIZER INDUSTRY.
Charleston Leads in Production
of Commercial Fertilizers
Facts and Figures of
The Industry.

wrote very interesting article tt
the Manufacturers Record entitled
Charleston Fertilizer Industry,
and as SO many of The Advertiser.
readers are large buyers of CONNER
cial fertilizers we publish the fol
lowing extracts from Mr.. Simmons
well written article:
What cloth is to Lowell, furni
ture to Grand Rapids or iron. tc
Pittsburg, fertilizers are to Char
lesion. They are the life of the
city. They keep the railroads work
ing and bring ships across the
ocean from the antipodes. Great
manufacturing plants stand in the
suburbs, and 12 of these, situated
side by side on the east bank of the
Ashley, form a city of themselves.
They represent an investment OF
millions of dollars, and employ thou
sands of hands, who annually draw
millions in wages. They utilize the
resources of widely-separated parts
of the earth, calling for pyrites
from Spain, potash from Germany
and nitrates from Chile.
The railroads carry out of Char
lesion more than 100 carloads of
fertilizers for every day of the year
except Sundays. During the busy
season, from February to May,
more than 500 carloads a day are
moved from week to week. That is
equivalent to one train over four
miles long for each day. Last years
shipments of fertilizers aggregated
6o6,7o9 tons, more than half the
freight sent out of the city. These
figures have been almost equaled al
ready this year. Up to the first of
June shipments reached 5l4, 4,634
tons, SO with seven months yet to
be heard from, the mark of 1910
will be left considerably behind.
The fertilizer industry has not
only been the mainstay of harles-
ton in her darkest commercial days,
but also the chief instrument of her
redemption and of building up for
her a foreign import trade greater
than the combined foreign importa-
tions of all the Atlantic coast cities
south of Baltimore.
And the industry is not yet so
years old. 1t had its inception in the
discovery of phosphate rock, on the
Iowlands about the city, in the sum-
mer of What had been noticed
long before by various geologists
and called mari stones" by Tom
mey were then shown by DR.. St.
Julien Ravenel of Charleston and
DR.. N. A. Pratt of Georgia to be
in reality phosphate rock, containing
from 35 to 81 per cent of bone
phosphate of lime, the basic element
"The process of manufacture is
briefly this:sThe rock, received
washed and 'Kiln-dried from the
miners, is>reduced by specially de-
signed centrifugal crushers to ali
exceedingly fine powder. The pow
der is next treated in closed mixing
pans with sulphuric acid to make
the phosphate soluble, the mixing
being made effectual by revolving
blades. The resultant semi-fuid mix
ture is then conveyed in cars to dry
ing bins, where it remains for a
day or two, and when taken out is
known to the trade as acid phos-
phate. This is the basis of all ferti-
lizers, which are completed by the
addition of nitrates, such as blood,
tankage, fish scrap and potash.
There are different formulas for
different grades, and each company
has a different formula for the
same grade. The usual proportion is
about 1900 pounds of acid phos-
phate to the 2,OOO-pound ton of fer
tilMer.
'Sulphuric acid was, as indicated
above, first produced by the reduc-
ton of crude sulphur, but that
proved too expensive method. The
acid is now secured by the reduc-
ton of iron pyrites, imported chiefly
from SPAN and Portugal. AS near
ly all of the companies make their
own acid, the demand for pyrites is
considerable, and growing. Thus in
1908, 1920 tons were imported; in
1909, 9o,l9s, and in 1910, l2O,912.
The impor.s for last May were
2o,7s5 tons, 33 per cent greater
than those of the previous May.
only about one-ifth of the
pylites imported into Charleston
is consumed by the local fertilizer
OF the 12O,912 tons
entering during 191o,, 22,615 tons
were locally reduced. The remain
Ter 9s,297 tons, was shipped to the
Both mining and manufacturing
companies multiplied after the es-
;ablishment of the pioneers, the
,ormer at first more rapidly than
he latter, the discovery of the river
.nck about the end of 1860 oiuinn