The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-01-18
America Sets New
 Production Pace
By HOLLAND

By HOLLAND
 New York, January 1h-tSpeclah' In 1880 a man of large business ana ln- dustrial experience in the United States visited England and took special pains to learn what the yearly output of the coal mines of Great Britain were When he had the figures at hand he made com parison with the coal output or the United States as it was at that time. lie felt that he could safely predict, as he did, before a group of English coal op- eratives, that the time was not dlstant' perhaps 9 years, or perhaps nttie longer, when the United States would pc taking from her coal beds larger amount than Great Britain did His pre- dction caused much amusement for at that time Great Britain was mining three times as much coal as the United States
 The prediction has been justified The United States is now producing many million tons more of coal year than Great Britain. It so happens that this time Great Britain is understood to nave Ia surplus of coal while the United States because of extraordinary emergencies, has no surplus or if it has any, it IS found impossible to get it speedily to places where it is needed.
 In the early nineties Abram S Hewitt when speaking before tho members Of the Steel and Iron institute of Great Britain, stated that in the course or few years the United States would be producing a considerably greater amount of steel and iron each year than Great Britain High in authority as Mr. Hewitt vas esteemed, even in Great Britain, this prediction also caused amusement. Mr. Hewitt lived long enough to see 1t l justified If he were living today he would be able to say to his English | friend that one American corporation ex- | poets to produce in the year 1918 more steel than the entire output for, the year I for Germany.
 SCHWAB'S PREDICTION l Several years ago Charles M Schwap was quoted as having said by the year | 1920 the United States would be producing at least 10000 tons of pig iron year. | Last year--three years earlier than the 1 date fixed by MT Schwab-the produc- l ton of pig iron in the United States was 1 30, 800 0O0 The production should be equal ! to or surpass the estimate of Mir Schwab | by the year 1920.
 | IT. the midyears of the past century the brass manufacturers of Connecticut were accustomed to go to Baltimore two or 1 three times year for the purpose of buying copper The chief copper smelt-
 ing works of the United States were at | tEat time located near Baltimore. The brass manufacturers entered into an | agreement which today would be a viola- 1 ton of the law. They decided among
 themselves what the price should be which
 they would pay for the copper, and they l held to that agreement and got the cop- ! per upon those terms. In that way they
 secured the copper upon even terms for all. Our reduction of copper was small
 in those years. And even as late as 1890 1 our copper mines yielded only 26O,000,000
 pounds. Now, we have reached and far surpassed the record made by any other nation as a copper producer for In 1917 mines owned by or operated by Amer jeans yielded 2,S62, ,000,000 pounds. the value of which was little in excess of 1 $500, ,000000.
 1 There are excellent reasons for sur missing that this yield will be increased,
 although the increase may not come en-
 tirely from American mines, but will nev- ertheless reflect American capital. 1 The world will be compelled to come l to the United States for copper after 1 the war is ended. Some of the experts
 are of the opinion that within a few years, or speedily after transportation
 has been perfected, Alaska alone will be found welding each year 2OO,COo0oo pounds of copper at least.
 ! Therefore, in coal, in steel, and pre- sumably in pig iron and also in copper,
 the United States has gained supremacy
 among the nations of the world in the
 production of these minerals.
 A LAWYERS GREAT ESTATE ! There continues to be much interesting discussion created by the official an-
 nouncement that the net estate of the | late Joseph H. Choate, aggregates $4,600,- l 900. There probably was not lawyer of New York city who was not aston islled when the publication of the inven- | tory of the estate was made MT. Cheats was estimated to have accumulated about
 $1, 100000 Many wondered how he found it possible to maintain himself and his embassy at London for six years in the
 style he adopted without having made
 serious inroads on his principal. Now
 they know. His income must have been
 not far from $200,000 year, certainly | for the past 15 or 20 years.
 | Yet Mir Choate was not known as
 spectacular or even as an investor in va l rious securities. Now it appears that he was one of the wisest as we'll as most secretve of investors. although it is pos | sible that he may occasionally have re- I ceived excellent advice. Presumably he began years ago to invest his income in securities and was very discreet in every transaction of that kind. Almost all Of the securities which the estate inven- toried were of high and all of them of ] fairly good grade
 1 It is commonly said that this estate of a little over s4,500,000 is the largest ever left by an American lawyer who confined l himself exclusively to the practice of his l profession. The value of the estate is i larger than that of the late John G. John- son of Philadelphia and that was thought l at the time of Mir Johnson's death to
 be the largest estate accumulated by one who devoted himself exclusively to pro-
 fessional practice. Mir. Choate's estate