New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1916-08-03

chemical; but this has been an axiom
for many years in the laboratory.
Understanding is yet imperfect of
the fact that a country is not self
agriculturally, economi-
cally, or, in the large sense, politi-
cally, unless it has enormous facili-
ties for the fixation Of nitrogen and
can obtain unlimited quantities of
nitric acid and its salts from the
atmosphere. "The great adaptability
of certain parts Of our country
u electro-chemical manufacturing"
says DR.. Bacon, ION account Of the
water power available, may soon in
troduce this air fertilizer industry"
1t ought now to be fourishing.
Attitudes.
The attitude Of American industry
toward chemical research has been
one Of immediate expediency. Prob
lens have been solved only as they
have arisen, upon the incentive Of
necessity; few have been anticipated.
The future is expected to take care
Of itself. Therefore, there does not
exist any great accumulation Of re-
serve knowledge to be drawn upon
in emergencies or to form the plans
and undertakings that might be con-
ceived in a spirit Of providence. If
such body Of knowledge had ex-
listed many Of the problems suddenly
created by the war would have been
much easier and more quickly solved.
Problems which now may be
clearly foreseen are disregarded be-
cause they are too far away. There
is, for instance, only one coal com
pany in the Pennsylvania region
that has intelligently considered
ways and means to meet the pro-
gressive exhaustion of existing fuel
supplies. The corporations that are
reinyesting in chemical research
iaore than an infnitesimal portion Of
their profits can be counted on the
fingers. After you have named the
General Electric, the General Chemi-
cal, the Eastman Kodak, the United
States Steel and the du Pont Powder
companies, the list narrows off sud
denly to corporations maintaining
small research laboratories at an ex-
pense of few thousand dollars a
year, and Of these there are perhaps
fewer than 200 in all this country.
The Inspiration.
These facts throw the work Of the
Mellon Institute into high relief.
There are thousands OF manufact-
urers in Pittsburgh who do not know
of its existence, or who. having
heard of it, were not sufficiently in
terested to remember. II did not
originate in Pittsburgh. It was be
gun as recently as 1907 in the Uni
versity Of Kansas. by DR.. Robert
Kennedy Duncan. who. while attend
ing the Sixth International Congress
OF Applied Chemistry, in Rome, the
year before, was so impressed by
the results obtained in Europe from
the cooperation Of science and in
duStry that he returned home with
ar idea Of bringing about similar CO.
operation in this country. He took
.he chair Of industrial chemistry in
the Kansas University ard estab-
lished there an industrial fellowship
scheme, whereby manufacturer
could very simply and cheaply en-
dow intensive chemical research
in his own exclusive behalf and i'm
mediately appropriate the results.
/, succeeded in Kansas, but the work
was handicapped by its distance
from the region of great industrial
activity. and i'm 1911 Dr. Duncan
transferred it to Pittsburgh. Hence
the Mellon Institute. A baking COM
pany that desired to improve It's
product was the first to buy fell
lowship-a baking company in the
greatest steel producing region of
the world the first TO avail itself
of this opportunity to command IN
Gustrial chemical research,
The American manufacturers
habit has been to think that new and
improved processes would somehow
evolve themselves and be for sale
when, if and as needed, like any
other merchandise, or IKE d ne"
machine, which, so long as it does
not exist, can not be missed, but
which, when introduced, has TO be
adopted to keep up with competition,
though it involves scrapplng all the
old equipment. The idea Of putting
money into experimental laboratory
work as a business investment
purely for the purpose of finding
new processes is still strange to him.
L. IL lil.o Lir;r O mach al paninS