Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1916-11-19
WHAT THE GOVERNMENT Is DOING

be made. the experts say. between the
| time the leaves fall and freezing
weather.
A very exhaustive study has just
been completed by the public health
service into the
Conserving Health conservation of
of Steel Workers. n "t,,a at L. Sue. ,sa
United States. officials who undertook
this work are satisfied that the safety
first" campaign. instituted for the pre-
vention of injury and loss of human
life was an extremely timely move
ment. Public health service experts say
that the average loss of time due to
illness among the approximately 3d.
100000 workers in the United States
| 100000 working days or about 100000
working years annually. If medical
attention be estimated at 81 a day and
earnings at 81 a day this loss amounts
to nearly $SS0.000,000 annually.
These experts in the public health
| service of Uncle Sam are urging that
this safety first" movement be
tended to health first" movement,
| movement is so well established and
organized that the second step will cost
| neither much money nor much extra
work. AS a result of this urging of
, theirs and of the investigation which
they have made they make some very
interesting recommendations as to
health in steel plants and call to the
manufacturers special attention that
the efficiency of their mills depends
upon the efficiency and therefore the
health OF the employees.
For instance. the officials found that
| in many cases diseased men were
working right alongside healthy men.
They say that this is wrong and arc
urging that all employees be examined
by physician, that the sick man may
be healed and that the we'll man may
be kept so And for this reason the
public health service, through these
experts, has advised examining rooms
that the work may be carried on more
systematically and regularly 1t
also advises emergency hospitals in
connection with the mills
Lighting conditions are another thing
that the investigators took particular
ly into consideration. They found that
the efficiency of mills varied from to
10 per cent. as result of improved
from one state that in one steel plant
an efficient lighting system was in
stalled and the output at night was in
creased 10 per cent.
The bureau of ethnology of the
Smithsonian institution has recently
completed work on the
| Indian tabulation of Indian names
! No.. to meet the popular de-
mand for post Offices,
| parks. villa sites and outing organiza-
| tons. This compilation gives simpli-
fed forms in Dakota. Onama, Usage,
! Blackfeet. Cheyenne. Cherokee Chip
/ pewa and other Indian languages.
Many of the names are especially in
teresting and musical.
/ In connection with the work of this
T: bureau, officials there say that they are
i bombarded with requests for the In
! dian word for this or that. 1t APP
parently Is not generally known,
through the fact that these inquiries
continue, that there is no one Ameri-
can Indian language. on the con-
trary. the Indian experts of this bureau
| say that there are about 1000 lam
suases in the two Americas, and prac-
| ttcally 300 distinct Indian languages
north of Mexico. 1t becomes then. i'm
| possible to give the" Indian word for
| any English equivalent. and conse-
| quently it is usually chosen from the
! language of the tribe which inhabits.
of the country from which the request
co~ues
| So numerous and difficult are the In
| dian iinsuas that a committee has
recently been appointed to devise a
standard method for transcribing them
In addition to the many variations
from nation to nation, there are the &C.
centricities in speech of The individual
OF the family proper and of the camp
group, all of which tends to intrude
transient forms. in the English
speech of North America we find varia-
tons between the speech of north
erner. westerner and a southerner
| This makes it difficult for those study
ing the Indian and his work
| There were about 2,452,000 miles of
, public roads in this country, outside
) the limits of Incorporated
! Country towns and cities. January
| pa /. 1916, according to in
| 0uo' formation that has just been
compiled by Uncle Sans experts of
the office of public roads and rural
engineering OF this number, about
$4,000 miles. or l1.3 per cent, were
| improved with some form of surfacing
| 1t is said by the men who have Just
completed this survey that the mileage
| of surfaced roads has been increasing
at the rate of about 5000 miles a
year. and in 1915 approximately one
! half of this increase was maze under
the supervision of state highway de-
partments. In addition, these depart
ments supervised the maintenance of
nearly $1,000 miles of main and trunk
| line roads
An increase of from approximately
$S0,000,000 per year in 1904 to about
! 1892 100000 in 1915 has been noted in
the country for expenditures for road
and bridge work, which is an increase
of more than $50 per cent The ex-
penditure of state funds during this
same period increased from about 81
$4,000 to more than S53.o00,0o0. In
addition, more than $27000.00O of local
funds was spent under state super
vision in 1915, bringing the total road
and bridge expenditures managed by
the states to $S0,514.699. This amount
is greater than the total expenditure
for roads and bridges from all sources
in 1904, according to the experts of
the office.
Tracing the growth in Importance of
the state highway departments, the
officials found them to be rapid. The
first of these agencies created in
1891 in New Jersey, and now some
form of highway department exists in
! every state in the Union except In
diana South Carolina and Texas Since
their inception it is said that these
a bay