The Butler weekly times., 1917-08-09
THE WAR ADVANCES SCIENCE
Scientific Discoveries May Justify
;, the War.

Il : the War.
A writer in the Kansas City Times
demonstrates that necessity is the
mother of invention" by calling at
tention to the numerous things that
Yankee ingenuity has had to over
come since the war began.
If a farmer had been told gener-
alton ago that all he had to do was
to reach into the air and pluck a
handful of the finest fertilizer ne
probably would have thought it an
other of those gold brick schemes to
bite upon. But the great war has
made it necessary for the Germans to
get substitute for the nitrate ter
tilizers of Chile and the guano beds
of the South Pacific, and they utilized
for this purpose the greatest store
house of nitrogen known, the air. .
This is only one of hundreds OF
scientific wonders the war has
brought the world As might be ex-
pected, the Germans, shut off from
the worlds markets and lacking
many necessities from their list OF
national resources have had to tax
their ingenuity to greater extent than
other nations. But the Allies have
not. been far behind, and the United
States with more time to devote to
peaceful pursuits, has made marve-
lous strides.
The synthetic dye industry is an H.
lustration. The war had scarcely got
ten under way before the whole
country was startled by the asser-
tions that we faced ticklish situa-
ton in our coal tar dyes. 1t looked
as though we would have to wear
white clothes almost exclusively, and
what few colored ones we obtained
would be so inferior in the matter OF
fast coloring that no guarantees
would go with them.
This situation was the outgroWth
of the policy of the German govern
ment of backing infant industries re-
quiring long periods of experiment
tation, with returns so far in the tu-
ture that private interests could not
afford to enter those lines. Coal tar
dyes were experimental upon in
Germany for ten years and 20 mil
lion dollars were spent in the work
before single pound was placed up
on the market. As a consequence,
German makers of aniline dyes had
the world market to themselves.
When this supply was shut Off
from the United States, the cry arose
"Why don't American chemists make
these pigments so we won't be set
topsy-turvy like this?"
The situation was so bad the Unit
ed States government had to plead
with the Allies to let through lit
tie coloring so we could make eur
postage stamps But the American
chemists, equals Of any, came to the
rescue, and today we hear nothing
of lack of dyes, for we are now MAX
ing pigments superior to the Ger
man brands.
The extraction of nitrogen from
the air was handled on a commercial
basis in Germany before the United
States took it up, but this govern
ment is now laying plans for the in
stallation of great fixation plant.
There are two main uses for the ele-
ment, once it is procured. Nitrogen
is wonderful fertilizer. Also, in the
form of nitric acid, it is one of the
prime necessities Of powder making.
There have been two main processes
known for the extraction of nitrogen
for some years, but the difficulty of
procuring it in Germany from the
Chilean fields and the chance that the
United States might not be able to
get it on account of German sea
raiders, set both nations working on
a solution of the problem. Immense
power, such as waterfalls offer, is
necessary, for the cost of production
otherwise would be prohibitive.
There is plenty of raw material with
which to work, for the air we breathe
is composed of one-fifth oxygen and
-four-fifths nitrogen, though there
are traces of q score of other ele-
ments included in these two propor-
tions.
1t would require a column merely
to list the various articles which
have been turned out on CONNER
cial scale as substitutes for old stand
bys. The silk worm spins fine
thread that is merely dried animal
excretion. Synthetic chemistry long
ago showed how to initiate this Sc
cretion, and forcing it through small
pores made a very good imitation
of the real silk. Though the Ger
mans have had little use for silk the
last three years, they have had to
make substitute for another fabric
they did need. This was cotton.
They needed it for clothing and as
the basis of the explosive, guncotton.
Then contrived to strip the fibers
from corn stalks and similar yeRe-