Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1918-02-04
bethlehem COMPANY OFFICIAL
SAYS 1918 LIMIT IS 100000
TONS.
LABOR PROBLEM STANDS
IN WAY OF WAR WORK
Shipping Board Has Difficult Task in
Completing Program 70 Provide Ships
For Overseas ssrvics-speeehes and
Motion Pictures Urged a. Method Of
Inspiring Workers.

Washington, Feb. 4.-Officials are
delays. The secretary Of war has
promised million men in France thi:
year if we get ships enough. This puts
it up to Chairman Hurley, Of the ship.
ping board. He promises ships enough
| if the builders will make them. Now
comes an experienced builder with the
statement that the governments shiI
building program is impossible because
labor is go per cent efficient. That
passes the buck to labor.
J. w. Powell vice president of the
Bethlehem Shipbullding Corporation
declared to the commerce committee OF
the senate that the fabricated stee
shipping program Of the emergency
fleet corporation was a great shipbuild-
Ing mistake, and asserted the combined
shipbuilding facilities OF the nation
would not produce more than 3,0080 0C
tons during the year 1918.
Mr.. Powell appeared before the com
mittee as an officer Of a concern
ninety steel merchant ships to the gov
eminent and as shipbuilder OF
grounded experience. A former naval
officer attached to the bureau Of con-
struction and repairs, he has in turn
been an executive Of the Cramp con-
Germ. in Philadelphia; president of the
Fore River Company, at Quincy, Mass,
and vice president Of the Bethlehem
concern. with headquarters at Beth
lehem, Pa.
The Bethlehem corporation is a
merger Of the Fore River Company;
Harlan & Hollingsworth, whose plant
Is at Wilmington, Del; Samuel L.
Moore & Sons, whose plant is at
Elizabethport, n. j.: the Maryland
Steel Works, at Sparrows Point, Md,
and the Union Iron Works, at San
Francisco. With Nhese facilities the
corporation now has 250 vessels under
construction, most Of them being for
the navy. Sixty merchant vessels, in
course Of construction for private own
ers at the outbreak Of the war, are
being completed for the emergency fleet
corporation, and recently the concern
accepted from the fleet corporation a
contract for thirtyf four more merchant
ships Of a total Of 100000 dead weight
capacity, These vessels are not being
made according to the fabricated pro-
gram of the fleet corporation.
Tells Trouble Of Builders.
Mr. Powell gave the committee a
frank and lucid statement Of the diff
culties besetting the shtpbuilding in
dustry and named labor as the crux
OF the entire shipping problem. Dis
claiming any intention Of criticizing
officials Of the emergency fleet cor
poration. who. he said, have tackled the
biggest job in the world, and especially
praising the organizing genius. OF
Charles A. Piez, its general manager,
the witness nevertheless made the
statement that 1t has been his expert
ence that one can transact more bus:-
ness with the navy department in two
hours than with the emergency fleet
corporation in two months"
Labor employed on shipbuilding OPP
erations today, he declared, Is 80 per
cent less efficient than before the war
made it necessary to import green
hands into the Industry. I'VE are get
ting ehoemakers, stonecutters, piano
but shipbuilders."
he said, and added that his own con-
Germ, which had $4,000 men on it's pay
rolls last week. Is enlisting 5000 new
men every week.
The transportation shortage, he as
serted, is seriously hampering the ship
ping program. His concern. he de-
clared, has loo carloads Of necessary
materials on the railroads. and the
amount arriving at the plants where it
Is needed is almost neslible. The sit
uation has become 90 tense that men
have been sent out to trail cars, and
the reports Of ono OF these men as
signed to follow and speed up a num-
Der Of cars laden with unusually i'm
portant materials show that the cars
travelled sixty miles In seventeen days.
Efficiency in eastern shipyards. he esti-
mated, has been curtailed so per cent
by the transportation situation and re-
cent weather conditions.
Workers Need Inspiration.
Mr.. Powell made stirring appeal
for action on the part Of the govern
mont to infuse q spirit Of patriotic
speed into the mass Of shipworkers,
most Of whom, he feels, do not appre-
ciate their importance In the effort Of
the country to win the war. He would
have president Wilson inaugurate a
campaign Of education involving tbs
use Of every means Of communication
to the shipworkers. send speakers into
the yards and show them motion pic
lures in, order to make them realize
that the aMccerN Of the war in a great
degree depends upon the interest they
show in the work they have to do and
the speed and correctness With which
they get 1t done.
He charged that a number Of union