The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-11-28
Fairfield ''Plate and Angle Shop" for Instance, Will Be Enormous Indus
 trial Unit
OTHER SHOPS" ARE IN KEEPING WITH
 MAMMOTH PROJECT
Shops" Announced for Mo- bile Will Each Become a Great Hive of Indus
 triai Activity Also

l When President Crawford lof the Tennessee company
 announced Saturday . the
 company's plans for the ex-
 penditure of an additional
 $11,OOO,OOO for the Mobile
 shipbuilding project the
 word "shop" occurred ire
 quently.
 To the man who is not familiar i with the details of steel manufacture
 the word "shop" is usually associated with something small and insigni- cant. But when it comes to steel mak- ing "shop" becomes a tremendous industry.
 ARMY OF EMPLOYES l For instance, MT. Crawford announced that at Fairfield there will be con- structed among other things: l A plate and angle shop. ] A forge shop.
 l A foundry.
 | A machine shop.
 l This plate and angle shop will be | on such a scale that it will likely em- l ploy as many men as any other slngle l unit of industry in the state. Its func- | tion will be to finish the steel plates and angles for shipbuilding and work them into form to be utilized at the plant in Mobile Such finishing will in- clude the shaping of plates, punching l rivet holes adjusting the joints work 1 ing the plates in the proper angles to 1 fit the sides of a ship and whatever IS necessary to get the steel into form which can be utilized in fitting them 1 to ships. The new shipbuilding project | is on such big scale that plate and angle shop of sufficient size to work up the steel to be used will be very large affair.
 A forge shop such as proposed IS "blacksmith shop magnified good 1 many hundred times. Its function is to l forge the steel to work it over, to ham, l mer it into heHproper form. This, too, will be on a scale in keeping with the whole project
 | The foundry and machine shop will be what their names imply except that their size will be in keeping with the du- ties expected of them in such an enyi- ronment.
 On the new shipbuilding site at Mo- bile the following were among the units announced:
 A large power plant. A boiler shop.
 Plate and angle shops Machine shop.
 Steel metal shop. Joiner shop.
 Forge shop.
 Storehouse.
 Main office.
 WHAT THESE "SHOPS" MEAN l The boiler shop at Mobile will be utilized to build the boilers for the ships to be manufactured. These boilers are of such huge proportions that if built in the Birmingham district they could not be transported to the gulf. For that reason the steel for their con struction will be fashioned here and transported to Mobile to be put together in the boiler shop. The plate and angle shop for Mobile will, of course, be much smaller than the similar shop at Fairfield. Its func- tions will be similar, but 1t will be used only in working on such plates as can not be fashioned to the exact size and shape needed when the ship construction gets under way. After construction gets IL tain plates and angles must be worked over to meet particular conditions even though the ships to be built have been highly standardized. This shop will &C., cordingly be designed to meet such con ditions and to make such changes as are necessary after the ship construction is actually under way. The Mobile steel metal shop will be | for the purpose of working up the sheet steel parts of the vessels as distin- guished from the steel plate work. The parts of the ships in which sheet steel | is used include the ventilators, tunnels and kindred devices. All of these will be fashioned at Mobile in the sheet metal shop.
 The joiner shop will be nothing more | or less than huge carpenter shop, and will be utilized in the manufacture and construction of all of the wooden parts | of the vessels.
 The Mobile forge shop will be put to much the same purposes as the one which is to be a portion of the Fairfield works.
 MAGNITUDE OF THE WORK | From this it can be readily seen that ] a shop in the steel manufacturing ! world is a much different thing from
 the associations of the word shop in l the average layman's mind. l Judge E. H. Gary announced in New ! York Saturday that $1l.0o0,00o had been appropriated by the Steel corporation 1 for the Mobile works and for the addi- tional units required at Fairfield. This added to the 100000 which had al- ready been announced for the Fairfield works makes a total of $22000,0G0 an nounced for Alabama development with l in the past few months. It will be re- called that Judge Gary at the time of 1 his recent visit to Birmingham stated at the Country club dinner June that something like $32. coo 900 had been spent l by the corporation in the Birmingham district up to that time The new work ! thus makes total of $54.000090 for de- velopment of Alabama properties of the 1 Steel corporation.
 DAMAGE SUITS