The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-01-23
COMPANY ID BUILD NEW COALCOLL|ERS Pratt Company to Invade Pensacola and Mobile WILL COST $1OO,OOO New Coaling Vessels Will Be Made of Steel and Will Have Capacity
 One Hundred Thousand.
 Tons Each

In order to better prepare for the ex- portation of Alabama coal at Pensacola and Mobile, the Pratt Consolidated com pany of this city announces that two coal eoliers, which with equipment will cost s100,0O0, will be constructed for service at the two gulf coast points. The oolliers will be along the lines of the ones used at New Orleans for loading ships with coal and will be put into service as quick ly as engineers can arrange the detail of plans for their construction.
 Each of the coaling vessels will be equipped to hold 1000 tons and will be made of steel. The construction of the coliers will provide facilities for the Pratt company to further invade the bunker trade at the gulf points
 The colliers will combine excellent ton mage space with efficiency of loading, which will be an improvement upon all most any collier now used at any of the gulf coast coaling stations. The boats or colllers will be run under railroad trestle at the loading station, there to re- ceive the coal later to be placed in the ships. They will be equipped with high 1 loading derricks. The derricks will hoist the coal as 1t is delivered to them by con- veyors from the storage bins and dis charged through chutes into the hatch ways of the ships being loaded. It is this process by which, while not new, the sell ing companies are enabled to load ships while the boats are discharging and talk ing on their cargoes while in their berths. When the ships under contract arrive at their various wharves the colllers are run alongside, and while tho stevedores are busy working over the cargoes the load ing equipment of the Pratt company will be dumping coal into the hatchways at a very high rate of speed.i No time will be lost in the operation and little coal will be lost while the loading Is being per formed. ,,/
 The Pfatt company believes that 1t is the rAbest time to further invade the bunker trade at New Orleans Pensacola and Mobile. At the first named place the company has already made the Pittsburg coal men sit up and take extended notice. There the company has placed over 5000 tons of coal In ships during the past few years with positive increases on that figure when business was good or the river was low, the latter exigency being the only legitimate ruse for Pittsburg shippers to get into New Orleans. l Erskine Ramsay, who is deeply inter- ested in increasing the New Orleans, Mo- bile and Pensacola trade as much as sible, is enthusiastic over supplying the ships touching at those points with their coaE He said yesterday that the com pany had at this time approximately 200 contracts with steamers to load at the points handled by the Pratt company, and he had every reason to believe that these contracts would be extended or added to as time passes and as the Br- mingham coal becomes better known among the trade. '
 What we are more anxious about than anything connected with that bunker trade is this" explained Mir Ramsay yes terday. "The ships that now ply between gulf coast points after unloading and loading get their coal to carry them back across the Atlantic at Norfolk, Newport News and elsewhere. They buy coal from this company and I dare say other com panies to run them up to the Atlantic seaboard cities where they coal up. That 1 condition should not exist by any appli- | cation of sound reasoning. If our coal will run them up to the Atlantic seaboard cities, why is it that we cannot send them across the Atlantic on straight | scoot?
 While we appreciate and will continue 1 to accept gratefully the small orders given at tho three places we operate in, at the same time we should be able to get this other business and thus help out the shippers as well as the Birmingham coal business.
 "The company that sells coal at the three gulf points for bunker purposes helps out the Birmingham commercial market to that extent. Every pound )f coal taken out of the ultra-legitimate cir cles here helps Birmingham double. l L,mean that when we sell coal for bunker purposes into new and untried field we | help Birmingham.
 l "The Pittsburg people have been work ing double time on that business for | years, and we expect to share 1t with | them"
 MT. Ramsay, in discussing the proposed celliers at Mobile and Pensacola, said they would be completed as soon as possi- l ble and placed in service. The company anticipates that bunker business between this district and shipping interests will be materially enhanced during this year