The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-05-13

nc OH is used to run the fleets of our n"vF and the merchant marine, and the gasoline must be had for the automo- piles. motor trucks and airplanes. The richest oil fields of the world are now in the south. Those of Oklahoma. Texas and Louisiana are already producing one third of the oil of the world. and as write this new fields are being opened in Louisiana and Texas. along the Mexican gulf from Houston to Galveston Port Arthur. on that coast. is a great oil spgot
 into which rivers of petroleum from four Or five states are now pouring and the output from there goes in tank steamers to Europe. A sia and Africa, and. in fact to most parts of the world. The govern ment has taken this great oil factor into account and care will be used to con- serve not only the oil. but the vast quan- titles of gas that flow from the wells
 The south of the future will bulk large
 n furnishing the goods we have lacked on account of the great war in Europe They are already establishing dye works in Tennessee and other states. to free us of our dependence upon Germany In the past six months town of 5000 people has grown up at Kingsport, which is making dyes of coal tar and the by products of the coal mines are such that the quantity of coloring matter can be indefinitely increased.
 We have been suffering largely from the loss of the fertilizers of Europe. The south has vast phosphate mines, and 1t has waterpowers which will enable us to get nitrogen from the air, as they are now doing in Europe. As to sulphur. we have some of the largest deposits of the world lying under the swamps within & few hours ride of New Orleans, and another great sulphur bed has recently been discovered at Freeport In Texas so near the Gulf of Mexico that the sul- phur can be taken from the mines all most direct to the vessels. The Ameri- can product has revolutionized the sul- phur industry. Sixteen years ago Sicily had nine-tenths of the business, but now fully half of all that is mined comes out of Louisiana. and we shall have all the sulphur we need for making munitions in our great war with the Germans.
 We have also the potentialty of mak-
 ing the greatest supply of suphuric acid as by-product of our copper Afnes. One of the largest plants now n~existence
 is that of the Tennessee Copper company, which takes the sulphrr fumes from the reduction of the ores and reduces them to the acid so important in the making of munitions.
 Another industry which the war de- mand calls for is shipbuildlng. In this the south is bound to take large part, and especially in making vessels of wood. Little shipyards are already springing up along the gulf coast. There are several in western Louisiana At Orange, IS miles east of Beaumont, an Italian named Paggio is building a fleet of five-ma sted ocean sailing vessels. He has one al- ready completed, and five others under way. The first is now ready to sail, and it will take cargo of lumber to Europe I understand that he has already engaged a return cargo, and that if the round trip is successful, the profits of that trip alone will pay for the vessel. At Slidell near New Orleans, they have started to build ocean vessels. and others are being constructed on the Natchez river which will find their way out to the harbor of Port Arthur At Lake Charles,