The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-07-30
BECAUSE OF CHAMPAGNE
Industries Which Depend Entirely on
 the Making of the Wine

From Consular and Trade Reports The champagne districts of France support a number of important indus tries directly dependent on the wine making itself. Chief among these is the manufacture of champagne bottles, whose production Is fraught with many difficulties.
 The champagne bottle has to be con structed In all it's parts of an almost mathematical even and heavy thick ! ness it's glass must be perfectly smooth and unaffected by the acids contained In the wine; it's neck must be exact in every particular to insure perfect corking, and with no grain or pro | jecting points on the inside. So much | progress has been made within the last 10 or 15 years that where formerly a | breakage of 5 per cent was considered very small at the present time the aver age breakage does not exceed 1 per cent.
 | Despite the perfection reached in the production of champagne bottle the i strain upon them caused by the pres sure they sustain and the repeated handling they undergo weakens them to such an extent that it Is considered unsafe to use the bottles a second time.
 
 making the cheaper brands, champagne | manufacturers place their wine in none but entirely new bottles.
 1 Four glass blowing establishments l in Reims, of which one is among the largest in France, and several others 1 in the northern part of the district | make almost exclusivel~ bottles for | champagne wine. They work night and day in three shifts of eight hours each and turn out about 0,o0O, 900 bot ties annually. While machinery Is now applied in the manufacture of bottles l for still wine liquors, medicine. etc. 1 no machine has as yet been invented which could supersede manual labor in the manufacture of champa gne bottles. | The men performing this difficult work are well paid.
 Another important industry entirely dependent on the wine trade is the manufacture of corks for champagne bottles. The material for these corlSs Is principally imported from Spain. The work of dressing and testing the bark and completing the cork is in the hands of very skilled workmen, most of whom are well paid Spaniards.
 Since 1t is very difficult to procure a bark thick enough to make a good cork out of one piece, a number of | the corks made nowadays are compos sed of two pieces of thin bark pasted to- gether lenghthwise. This process of pasting the pieces together is patented and since the corks thus made seem to answer in every respect the demands made upon them. a number of cork manufacturers are now working under this patent. apparently with very good | success. There are about 20 cork man. | ufacturers in this district turning out annually 100. 100000 corks. of value between si.351,o00 and s1,544o0o.
 Local woodworking establishments supply the champagne houses with the boxes in which the wine is shipped to foreign countries. These are made in a mechanical way; and while they are very substantial, they are of a superior l finish and give remunerative occupa tion to many workmen. Several large willow working manufacturers furnish champagne houses with the baskets in which the wine Is shipped to places in France and in nearby countries. Several firms make a speciality ot the straw covers in which the bottles are encased before being packed in boxes or baskets. The straw used for these covers Is cut and sewed by ma ehinery This industry encourages the cultivation of rye in this immediate neighborhood. the straw being used for the manufacture of the covers and the rye sold to other countries. mostly to 1
 Two firms in Reims and four at Ep- ernay construct special machinery for | the manipulation of champagne wine, such as automatic bottling machines. machines for cleaning, for corking, and uncorking. for wiring bottles. etc. l Presses for extracting the juice from the grapes are made by several in- portant concerns iA the same locality. Some hydraulic presses have recently been brought from the United States. One large concern makes a speciality of manufacturing metallic capsules and tinfoil for champagne bottles and num- erous Photographic establishments are engaged in producing artistically dec orated labels
 l It is safe to say that these industries l give employment to more than 50oo skilled worknen. For their future pros- perity much depends upon abundant harvests of grapes. the crops during the last five years having proved to be so insufficient that only several good yields will prevent the chsmpagn trade and it's auxiliaries from suffering a livery severe setback.
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 Vaudeville at Eden
 From Satire.