The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1912-02-22
ROMANCE OF A RADlum MIME
ONLY SOURCE OF THE PRECIOUS SUBSTANCE IN THE UNITED
STATES HAS HAD AN INTERESTING HISTORY.

a century before. He secured a lease
on tho property for a nominal sum.
Everyone thought him crazy, for the
ore was SO low grade that 1t would
not yield $40 a ton and the western
shelters had long since ceased to pay
anything for uranium.
This man started operations quickly.
He sorted out the uranium ore-tech.
nically termed uraninite-and sent out
a shipment of twenty-five tons. He
received In return a check at the rate
OF $1,000 a ton-not so much for the
uranium it contained as for the RAJ
dunn that was hidden in it. Radtum
is estimated to be worth 100000 a
pound. There was very little radium
in a ton of this ore and not much in
a carload, but it is so extremely pre-
cious and tho demand is so great that
this man has found a ready market
for all he can produce.
The Uranium ore, after mining, is
conccntrated-that is to say, it is pull.
verified and all the lighter particles
are washed away by the action of wa
ter lowing over shaking tables, leav-
ing the heavier ore containing the
uranium, with its radium. This is ship
ped to Niagara Falls where by a spe-
cial process in the high temperature
electric furnaces in operation there,
that portion of it containing the ra-
dunn is reduced to the point where a
carload OF it can easily be placed in
a large sized valise. This is then
brought to this city, where it passes
forwarded to London. BY that time its
bulk has been reduced so it hardly
fills an ordinary cigar box. When it
leaves London for Paris the residue
may easily be carried in ones vest
pocket. 1t Paris 1t goes to the Curic
establishment. where the radium salts
are Isolated in a room entirely sur
rounded by walls of lead. As radium
constantly throws out rays by rea-
son OF its continual. disintegration it
must of necessity always lose value.
When surrounded by lead the process
OF disintegration SEEM to he arrested
and the full value Of the radium con-
tents is thus saved. Surrounded by
ANYTHING else the rays are thrown in
such minute particles that they have
no difficulty In finding their way
through the ordinary container in a
continuous invisible, though fiery bonn
bardment.
Radium is beneficial and perilous
to mankind. 1t is safe and dangerous.
III a scientist explained it. it would
be perfectly clear to him. almost clear
to some other scientists. but stepped in
mystery to the average mind. The heat
OF radium is probably created by the
| disintcgration of salts of which it is
composed. just as the mantle of a gas
lamp burns away. Or the filament of
an electric light constantly throws off
minute particles. until it snaps at one
point and is rendered useless. At one
time pretty nearly everything in the
world was moving-so one school of
scientists assert. One substance went
to pieces and combined with another.
to make now things for man to toy
with. Just as a plant that reaches its
maturity Immediately Ter to
decay and die. so with the substance
in the world. Radium is going to pieces
but instead of doing it suddenly. like
the explosion of a. boiler. causing great
damage. its energy is lost gradually
as would be the force pent up in the
boiler if several valves We're leaking.
For radium is combined with and re-
tanned in other minerals and in infini-
tesimal atoms and, while it disinte-
crates it ia retarded. and its d~estruc-
tive force absorbed in the surrounding
matriN of uranium and other MINER
ais. If the radium of a given section
or district could be concentrated into
one point in its pure Mate, 1t is prob
able that there would be an explosion
that would split a mountain with such
tremendous force that'the shock would
give the world a wrench such as the
history of nan does not reveal. but
which the science of geology records,
indelibly and for all ages in the eter-
nal rocks that form the foundation of
the world.
AS radium disintegrates. it is doubt
less thrown off in pieces fined than
anything we have m knowledge Of
in other words into the millions upon
millions of divisions hat combine to
make the atom-and the atom is so
small that the average man does not
bother about it. unconscious of the fact
that it is the aggregation Of atoms
that form the substance which, in turn.
make up the world.