New-York tribune., 1911-11-29

pinnacle Of the monument a Gaping OK
aluminum-a rare metal. 1t Is there yet'
storm defying. undimmed, untarnished,
everlasting!
"Silyer from clay" 1t had been called
and its cost was about the same as Sill
yer, some S16 a pound.
lust at that time a student in chem
istrv in a comparatively obscure Ohio
university town-Oberlin-was bringing
10 a successful conclusion his discovery
of a cheap method Of aluminium manu-
facture through electrolytic processes
and a new industry was TO be born. To-
Idav aluminium of greater purity than
that used on the Washington Monument
is available in unlimited quantities at
price Of % cents a pound.
Although iron is the most common or
our metals, aluminium is even more
abundant in nature, for it constitutes
about s per cent Of the earth's crust
and is therefore inexhaustible in guam
tity. Aluminium is the basic metal or
ALL claws: IL enters into the composition
of nearly all rocks the ruby and the
sapphire are substantially nothing more
than pure aluminium and oxygen. The
turquoise, the topaz the garnet and the
emerald all confess their constituent
aluminium TO the analyst-and yet 1t was
only in the early part OF the nineteenth
century that its existence was barely
suspected.
It was not until 1903 that Sir Hum
phrey Davy suggested the hypothesis
that clay and many rocks Of similar for
/ nation depended on some metal as their
base. This suggestion bore slow fruit,
though worked on by many brilliant in
vestigators. such as Hare, Silliman,
Oersted and Bersilius. for It was not un-
Ill 1927 that the German chemist Fred
erick Woehler first isolated aluminium
and obtained it in the form of a powder,
and after many years Of experiment
thereafter first succeeded. in 1S45. in OBJ
tanning it in small metallic globules, be-
coming thereby the actual discoverer Of
the metal.
II was not until 1854 that the French
/
| Woehler's methods, obtained aluminium
/ in an almost pure state and determined
its true properties
/ The first metal obtained by Deville in
the form of bars was used by him in
medal of aluminium presented BY him to
, his patron, Napoleon III, who had sup
piled the funds necessary for the costly
experiments, and in the manufacture Of
a baby rattle for the infant Prince I'M
perial. and some small articles made
from aluminium at that time were placed
on the market at price Of $50 a pound.
Devile extracted in 1S56-'57 perhaps a
total Of fifty or sixty pounds Of metal
produced by costly chemical methods;
it's manufacture then and for a decade
thereafter could be deemed little more
than a laboratory experiment In 1867
we find it at the Paris Exposition in the
form Of sheets, wire, foil or finished
goods, polished. engraved and soldered; :;
we get a view Of the many difficulties
that had TO be overcome in producing it
on the modest scale then in operation;
in purifying and moulding it, After a
lapse Of another decade we see again 1t
the Paris Exposition in 1878 the matur-
ity of the industry so far as il relates TO
the production Of the metal by chemical
methods. with a prevailing price of SD
a pound-a price much too high 70 per-
mir any general use Of the new and
promising metal. This condition existed
for another decade, with a gradual
cheapening Of price due 70 improved and
cheapened sodium production. but it was
only through the radical invention Of the
student Charles NJ. Hall that aluminium
could be produced at price which would
allow it's wide and general use in COM
merce, and a new era in metallurgical
industry began when, in 1889. the Pitts
burgh Reduction Company was organ
lied and began in a small way 70 manu-
facture aluminium by steam generated
electric power in Pittsburgh under the
Hall process.
The Hall process was one through
which aluminium was directly reduced
from its oxide by electrical means, which
combine the principles OF the electric
furnace and the electrolytic bath. The
process utilizes refined aluminium oxide
obtained from bauxite, in which the
alumina is dissolved by the mingllnS
Herewith Of the stable solvent cryolte,
the aluminium so dissolved being electro
/ Iyzed out Of its bath, leaving the solvent
unaffected.
This discovery was a new and i'm
/ portant one. 1t was more than a le-
cided step forward in the art-it was a
revolution in the art. II reduced at one
step the price from So a pound TO 50
cents a pound. II laid the foundation on
which a new and great industry was to
| be based.
In 1898 the industry took another for
ward step by locating a reduction plant
in Niagara Falls as the first important
user Of electric power generated by the
newly constructed cataract plant at that
point. and from the small beginnings Of
1889. when three men were employed in
Pittsburgh. with a daily production of
fifty pounds, there has grown in the last
two decades business Of splendid pro-
portions. employing some five thousand,
with yearly output Of many millions Of
pounds.
In 1908 the Pittsburgh Reduction Com
pany became the aluminium Company OF
America. a new lame more indicative
OF its business. and this company is at
fhe nrpsppt time ODpratfnR hauNfte
mines in Arkansas and Georgia, a large
ore refining plant in East ST. Louis,
three reduction plants In Nlagara Fails