The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1917-05-21
BY SYDNEY. BROOKS.
New York Times.)

\NcW 1OIh AALhVoJ
New York.-America enters the
great war better equipped on the in
dustrial side than at any moment OF
her history. Yet when 1t broke out
she was virtually innocent of the art
Of making munitions. OF all that vast
industry, which today employs capital
by the hundred million and men by
the hundred thousand, there was, 30
months ago, practically no trace what
ever.
A few companies here and there
were engaged in the manufacture OF
war material as a side line to their
normal business; and that was about
all.
Thanks to the war orders Of the
British government, America the I'M
ready Is America the unready no
longer. Indeed, when I think Of Beth
lehem, with its output of 100000 COM
plete three-inch shells a month; Of
the DUPONT company, with an annual
production of 375, 900 pounds Of
military powder, of the Baldwin Lo-
connective company, which is turning
out 800 Pinch shells a day; Of the
American Locomotive company, which
is making 100000 loaded time fuses
q month-an incredibly intricate COM
ponent of which when the war began
1t knew nothing whatever; Of the Mid
vale Steel company, which is equally
at home with howitzers and light and
heavy shells; Of the great rifle facto-
ries at Bridgeport, lion, Eddystone,
and elsewhere, which have now a ca
pacity of $4,000 rifles a day-about 10
Or ~ times the output of the govern
ment arsenals; Of the $4,000 9.2 shells
a month, representing from 10000 to
$4,000 tons Of steel, and filling ten
freight cars a day, that n firm is
manufacturing; Of the 20 other firms
that are turning out each from $4,000
to $4,000 shells a month in all the
heavy grades between 6-inch and r.
inch, and of the 1,25O,OOO loaded time
fuses a month that are likewise being
produced here-when I think Of these
and many similar achievements, ! am
tempted to say that the war has been
not only the commercial but the mill
tary salvation Of America.
Demand for Machines.
The first effect of the war was to
raise among the manufacturers in the
allied nations a hungry demand for
machines to make the munitions. The
American machine tool manufacturers
found themselves on a sudden swamp
ed with orders. 1t was the first trick
Ing Of the stream that was soon to
become an unprecedented, overwhelm-
ing flood. Very quickly the allies dis
covered that, even If they could get
the tools, their own manufacturing re-
sources would not for many crucial
months, possibly not for a year or
more, enable them to overtake Ger
many's enormous lead. The call for
American tools was followed there
fore with another and wider call for
the American finished product, for
American guns, American rifles, shells,
cartridges, and powder. There en-
sued a literally frantic scramble for
anything America could produce in
the way Of. war material and equip
ment, not merely for munitions but
for foodstuffs, wagons, tools, shirts,
blankets, barbed wire, horses, motor
cars, trucks and ~lorries, railway ties,
c%anteens, harness and saddles, cotton
and knit goods, overcoats.
And this cataract Of orders came
pour1ng over the American continent
just at a time when all the signs
pointed to a period of severe CONNER
cial depression. Its effects were felt
not merely by the firms that actually
received the orders, but by an extra
ordinary variety Of contributory in
dustries. In the last year, while going
over some Of the principal munition
factories in the United States, / have
been struck by nothing more fOrcibly
than by the extent to which the man.
ufacture of military material is inter-
twined with and dependent upon the
productive energy Of innumerable 9th
er industries and interests.
All Sections Drawn Upon.
Take, for instance, a concern like
the Midvale Steel company Of Penn
sylvania. When 1t entered the NUM-
ton business on a large scale and Sc
cured contracts for guns, shells, and
rough forgings, its first care was to
provide itself with new facilities. 1t
needed buildings; it needed machine
tools, and 1t secured the country to
get them; it needed lathes and drill
presses, grinding and milling ma
chimes, forging presses and blooming
mills; it needed electric cranes, n.y.
draulic pumps, heating furnaces, draw
benches, electric motors, generators,
and boilers; and 1t needed ore and
minerals in %prodigious quantities. On
these and a thousand other neces-
saries 1t authorized an immediate ex-
pendlture Of some $6,0O0,000, and to
trace where the money went you
would have to travel from New Eng
land to Oregon and from Georgia to
North Dakota.
Or to 60 to one Of the colossal rifle