Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1912-11-03

81 OOU,UOO W LildhS OlDCIId d
mer resort, start ice famines in
Labrador, give Scotland an all
day summer, with a temperature
like Japans; change the climate
of the Atlantic coast to one like
that of Southern California, melt
all the ice on and around the north
pole and open it to truck gardening.
To do SO will be cheaper much easier
and twice as quickly done as to build
the Panama canal, says the New York
Herald
All that is necessary to accomplish
these results, some of which would re-
suit from tipping the old earth side
ways, is to build a riprap jetty about
200 miles long across the shoals ex.
tending eastward from Newfoundland,
near Cape Race. That would stop the
Labrador current, whose cold is cap
able of making 100000 tons of ice
every second. from running right into
the Gulf stream, whose heat is equal
to the burning of 100000 tons Of
coal every minute. They meet now
on the Grand Bank, where the water
is only about ESQ feet deep. The Gulf
stream is split up and spreads out
over millions of square leagues of the
Atlantic.
Sink Labrador Current.
If such jetty were built the Labra-
dor current coming down from the
Arctic would be turned eastward and
would be sunk so far when the Gulf
stream met it that the latter warm
blue river of the ocean would pass
over the great cold river from the
north pole The warm Gulf stream
would continue in almost undiminish-
Labrador current would run a mile
deep through the great depths of the
Atlantic, making the torrid zone about
the equator cooler, while the Gulf
stream would require only three
months to melt every inch of ice
around the pole.
Fantastic though this may appear,
it has received the closest interest
from the foremost men OF practical
science in America and other coun-
tries. Every detail of the as
founding enterprise has been worked
out by Carroll Livingston Riker of
Brooklyn, who has made critics swaE
low their scornful prophecies in other
enterprises. He built at 81 Dey street,
in 1874, the first mechanical refriger-
atipo uo rabOusa avar couctructad ap6
devised and constructed the refrig-
erat plant on board the steamship Gel
tic. which carried to, Liverpool the
first cargo of American dressed meats
ever landed there.
He designed and constructed the
first ice and cold air refrigerating ma
chine ever constructed. He was call
ed visionary when he proposed each
of these. which have proved pioneers
in great industrial equipment of the
world
When the federal government de-
cided to make Washington, the ma
tional capital, sanitary by dredging
the Potomac Mr. Riker designed and
built the largest and most powerful
pumping dredge ever constructed up
to that time. 1t pumped up solid
block of granite weighing 1900 pounds
as if 1t were a pebble, lifting it 80
feet above the water, and snatched a
big steel safe from the river ooze
with the same ease. Then he built
wharfs and jetties from Bar HarboI
to the Magdalena river and salved the
steamships St Paul Otranto and A. A
Shaw when they went on the beaches
4 in famous wrecks He was one of the
American government experts who ex
amined the dredging for the Gatur
dam, at Panama, he surveyed Havana
harbor for the Spanish government
and prepared the system for disposal
of Havana's sewage.
His record is not that of visionary
and the respectful interest accorded
him by his worldwide correspondents
on the Great Bank jetty project indi
Gates that he is known to the scien
tific world in no undignified aspect
Figures Not contradIcted.
In the book Power and Control oil
the Gulf Stream" just published by
Mr.. Riker, he discusses the problem OF
preserving to the universe the benev
client warmth of the Gulf stream fol-
the destruction Of the sterilizing cold
Of the Arctic, He goes into details