Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1914-11-14
A TRIBUTE TO THE
AMERICAN ENGINEERS
Every Member of American
Commission for Belgian Re-
lief Is One, Except Treas.
Graft, Banker-Difficulties
of the Work to Overcome

ASSOCIATED Press Correspondence
London. Nov with the exception
of its treasurer, Clarence Graft. who
is banker. every active member of
the American Commission for the Re-
lief of Belgians is an engineer. The
work. of these men is pointed to- as a
tribute to the thoroughness of the
American engineering colleges.
H. C. Hoover, who heads both the
American Relief Committee and the
Belgian Commission is a mining engir
neer who directs the labors of 100000
miners and smelter operatives in vari-
Gus parts of the world. Hoover is a
graduate of Leland Stanford Jr.. Uni
versity of which institution he is now
trustee having succeeded to the po-
sition on the board vacated by the
death of Whitelaw Reid
London is the Mecca of successful
American engineers, and Hoover has
gathered about him a group of men
well equipped for the work in hand,
and with considerable leisure to devote
to it, because the war has suspended
so many of the enterprises in which
they are Interested
men, who is an electrical engineer
and head of one of the largest inter-
national electrical manufacturing
groups. The other members are Will
liam Hulse, also an electrical engineer
and head of a number of engineering
companies John Beaver White. an
electrical engineer and a partner in
one of the largest contracting firms
in Europe: Willard Hunsiker, an cleo
trical engineer and for many years
one of the executives of the United
States Steel Corporation; Captain j.
F.. Lucey, a mechanical engineer and
head of large manufacturing con-
Germ doing business in the United
States and Europe; ] w. Dickson,
civil engineer; Hart o. Berg, mechani-
cal engineer; Edgar Richard, mining
engineer; and Willard Shaler,
mechanical engineer living in Brussels.
For three weeks American, Spanish
and Belgian diplomatic representatives
struggled with the question of supply
ing Belgium with food without max
ing much progress beyond securing the
promises of cooperation from the vari
GUS governments concerned. When
the need became acute and ii was
necessary to get food under way at
once the American Ambassador here
called upon Hoover to form the needed
working organization, and the result
when Hoover called for volunteers was
the existing commission with its pre-
dominant engineering personnel
The first and most serious obstacle
encountered by the commission was
% nf Er,cy lis1,
to remove it's embargo on the export
of food, even for such a necessary
work as the succor of the starving
Belgians Early in the diplomatic ne
gotiations, the British government not
only promised to allow the export of
food supplies to Belgium, but prom
Used the Belgian minister a large cash
contribution each month. Evidently
becoming alarmed over the condition
of the domestic food supply the cabi-
net reconsidered it's action and de-
clined to do more than make lump
sum contribution of a quarter of a
million dollars to be used to purchase
food for the Belgians in Holland AS
one of the members of the commission
expressed it, this was equivalent to
asking the Belgium minister to buy
food for his starving fellow country
men at the North Pole, for Holland
has not only forbidden the export of
foodstuffs, but is actually suffering
from shortage itself.
The Commission then determined
upon the bold step of buying the nee
essary foodstuffs for temporary relief
and counting on diplomatic efforts and
pressure of public opinion to force the
British government to raise the en-
barge. Within twentyfour hours of
the organization of the commission II
had purchased quarter of million
dollars worth of food supplies, char
tered the necessary ship and While the
food was being placed on board quietly