The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-01-16

l is 10 carry on merchandising upon q yerS
 large scale, seeking foreign markets, ant
 they also reflect the ability of American
 industry to meet the rigid difficult and very great requirements which are neces l sary to meet if a contract is to be ob.
 talned and executed.
 IL Could Have Been Done at Hartford
 Here is to be discovered one of the ex.
 efaofdinary influences upon the United
 ota1es or the outbreak of the war upor | lhe continent of Europe. Had there been 1 no war, the Hartford plant would have l been ample for meeting all of the re.
 qurements involved in the Chinese and 1 the Australian contracts. But within a 1 ieW weeks after the war began there ap- peafed an extraordinary, really an emer- l eehcy, demand for American comuodf- l .ies not only food and equipment or ma 1 eerial designed for war but also for l othef commodities which are essentia, in 1 tune Of peace as, for instance hardware. l The parent corporation had facilities l TOT accepting propositions if minds nar respecting terms. The probabilities are sia. thefe was at no time any diff ouity respecting terms. England,s elheIgeney, as we'll as that of Russia oi ffanee and Of other countries. was .ihperative- In the financial district of ohls city reports have prevailed thai tnis corporation has secured a vast line or contracts although, of course. this view IS based more upon inference than any official acknowledgment But there IS something more than inference in the authoritative report which has just come rom Hartford For it would not oe necessary to acquire an additional plant Tor which as much as $500 900 wa C paid unless there had been an unusual and Imperative demand for the kind of commodities manufactured at the Pratt Nhltney plant at Hartford. So that the pufchase day or two ago of the large Pope manufacturing plant for the al- ieeed purpose of securing facilities with which to complete the Chinese contract would not have been necessary had not the Pratt Whitney company been driven to its utmost capacity in meeting the sudden demand which has come from across the sea. The plant which has just been purchased Is in neighborly proximity to the Pratt Whitney plant.
 The Great Merchants
 From another point of view the sud den opportunity which the European war created is to be of importance to the creditors of the Pope company $30O,000 is now added to the available assets and the court will be asked to permit the receiver of the Pope company to pay out this money in the form of
  of the Pope company This was an un expected realization of an asset, for in ordinary times so great @ plant as that of the Pope company might have found it difficult to secure purchaser Certainly it would have been very diff ficult to find a purchaser for that plant in the spring and summer of last year. because the manufacturing industry was then at low .bb. Manufacturers Fptranchinc and nf them cnp sidered expansion.
 Only recently has there begun to be fairly good understanding of the rela- ton to American trade which the great industries of the United States now bear. These industries, besides manu featuring commodities, are also de- veloping merchandising upon q great scale The manufacturers of the United States who are succeeding and who are gaining foreign trade are also mer chants. Of this fact there is to be a demonstration next week at the con- vention of representatives of American industries of all kids. of which James A. Farrell, now president of the United States Steel corporation, is probably the most conspicuous type.
 Another feature associated with the important transaction recently in Hart ford Is furnished by the demonstration that great business, great merchandise ing success, cannot be secured, especial ly in foreign markets unless there are CO ordinated under single supervising control subsidiary companies with am ple capital. The Niles, Bement Pond company could not have obtained re- gently two of the largest contracts given out by any foreign nation had the organization not developed from single industry established near Gin cinnati into a great one represented by the co ordination of considerable num- Der of what had been independent or gainization. That is especially true of the United States Steel corporation, which as pre-eminently great mer- chandiser was able through it's highly trained salesmen to sell in foreign lands in 10 years commodities the money value of which was a billion dollars
 The late J. Pierpont Morgan was ac- customed to ask to his friends that he looked upon himself as a merchant, add Ing that that was the view Of their vocation which was taken by the great bankers of the past in Europe, and is was also his view that the highest sue cesses possible for the United States are those which would be developed by bringing to scientific perfection the great art and true science of saleman-