New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-08-11
Made in America
Many Articles Now Produced Here
for the First Time

To the Editor of The Tribune.
Sir: 1t may interest your readers to know
something of some developments in the home
manufacture of supplies for chemists, which
is probably indicative of what is going on
all through our industries. Before the war
we were dependent upon Germany and other
foreign countries for many articles. Our
filters came from Sweden and Germany, our
best glass from Jena, our porcelain from
Berlin. This was not because our manufact-
urers could not make these things so much
as because the business had become estab-
lished with the aid of German importing
houses and the certainty Of destructive COM
petition if any American should push into
the market. Several disastrous affairs Of
this sort had occurred.
In one case an American firm was able
to manufacture material OF higher purity
and at lower cost than could be done IN
Germany, but all the American users Of the
material received notice TINT the American
firm would soon be put out Of business, and
those who did not at once cease to dea! with
it would be blacklisted by the German
monopoly. The threat was successful. The
American firm had to go out of business.
One of the pleasant surprises of the
American entry into the new industries made
possible as we'll as necessary by the stop
page of German trade is the superiority in
quality of the American-made goods. Glass
combustion tubing now made in America
comes in more uniform sizes, is tougher, is
more easily cut into lengths and is far more
durable at high temperatures than the best
German make We can use glass now in
ways that were never before possible.
Several American makes of blown glass
ware have come on the market, Of which the
best will stand heat as well as the best Jena
class, and has the advantage Of more uniform
and more practical shape and more uniform
thickness, and consequently less liability to
breakage. At first We were unable to get
good porcelain, and treasured up the few
crucibles of Royal Berlin and Meissen make
that we had left, but brewery firm out
West found it necessary, on account of pro-
hibition, to find new uses for its plant, and
started the manufacture of porcelain and
matted milk. How good the matted milk is |
do not know. but the crucbles, which were at
first very bad, gradually improved, and now,
while they are of slightly irregular shapes,
they stand the heat at least as we'll as ans
perhaps better than any that ever came across
the water.
The prevailing practice in Europe,
owing to the cheapness Of skilled la
Dor, was to make things in small quantities
by hand. The result was the highest excel
lence in some cases and crude shapes and
uncertain quality in others. The tendency
in America is to use machinery as much as
possible. This makes rougher shapes and
finishes for tool-handled things, but it allows
A. iva
Improvement, so that such things as glass and
porcelain are coming to be better In quality
and durability than could ever have been
made by small plants, and there is prospect
of even greater improvement in the future.
Also, while the prices of these things are
high, it will be possible after the war to meet
any foreign competition, md even to have
the distribution of scientific apparatus en-
tirely in the hands of Americans.
ARCHIBALD CRAIG.
Jersey City, N. j., Aug. 6, 1917.