The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-07-03
OUR WASHINGTON LETTER {

Washington July 3-Without counterpart in the world is laundry machine in the bureau of engraving and printing, the plant where the gov ernment turns out the national SUD- ply of currency A great item of ex- pense has been the production of new bills to take the place of crumpled,
 worn and germ laden paper money. sent in for redemption. It has had sufficient use to prove it's success in taking the wrinkles and dirt and germs out of badly used cur rency. Two young ladies have been placed in charge of the laundry. One feeds the sofled money to one end of the machine and the other stacks the clean, crisp laundried notes when they come through.
 Before the machine had been placed in practical service the claims made 1 for it attracted the attention of gov ernment officials in several European l much abused currency and were de- ! lighted in the condition in which it was returned to them.
 Hundreds of people have seen the l who laughed at the inventors and others associated with him in his effort to put such a machine on the market, are today loud in their praises for the
 wonderful piece of machinery. It is estimated that in eight hours between 30,00O and 35,000 old bills can be laundred
 National bank presidents have been
 asked to sign notes from their insti- tutions in strong indelible ink, so that laundry the ink will not fade. AS it it today bank presidents sign notes with any kind of ink, from plain poke berry juice up to ordinary five cent ink. These fade in the laundry ma chine.
 Burgess Smith, a native of Macon, Ga, but for the past years a scientist at the bureau of engraving
 and printing is the designer of the ! new machine. He is rather tinid in him, and it was only after much questioning that his friends could es tablish the. fact that he was the in ventor, Samuel Elder, of Philadelphia,
 for IA years a machinist at the bu-
 reau followed the designs of Mir.
 Smith and made the machine. They
 were laughed at, but now they are
 enjoying together the victory they
 have won
 What is teachygra phy? is a query
 that popped into the minds of many
 of those who read notice given out
 recently by a government department.
 It was to the effect 'The Spanish I minister at w dllHOunC6S that the Tenth International Congress
 on Tachygraphy, organized, by the
 Spanish Photographic Federation, will
 be held at Madrid, September 26 to
 October 2, 1872. An invitation is ex-
 tended to the stenographers of the
 congress" !" Rather a remarkable experience was
 that of George E.. Diggs, head waiter
 in a fashionable apartment, who, for almost lifetime, unknowingly car ried in his anatomy piece of glass one-eighth of an inch wide and i've eights of an inch long. Although the glass had been hidden in the flesh of his jaw for a quarter of century. Diggs did not begin to feel the ef- fects of it until recently. He went toI a physician who prescribed lini- ment which had the effect of drawing the glass to the surface of the skin Feeling a hard substance in his jaw Diggs pulled it out and found. it was
 a fragment of glass. He explains that when but four years old he pulled a window down on himself and that
 pieces of glass stuck in his jaw, but
 at the time it was thought that" all or them had been removed.
 An interesting story of the conser- vation of forests in Russia comes from
 Consul John H. Grout. stationed at
 Odessa That the Russians, backward
 in many things, have long been for
 seeing in the matter of timber supply
 is told by Grout, who says: While
 the privately owned woodland of Rus-
 sia is being annually reduced in area.
 the extensive State forests are but
 gradually being brought into use, and
 for long time to come they will com
 tfnue to be an important reserve tim
 Der supply for the world. These for
 ests cover 937 O00, GOO acres, propor-
 ton of which is well stocked The i'm
 creasing utilization of state forests is
 shown by increasing receipts from the sale of timber. which have risen from
 $9, ,486, 300 in 1890 to $42, ,525,610 in 1911."
 FIRST THINGS