New-York tribune., 1918-05-03
Stock and Bond Averages

10 lndustrials.. 91.01 90.86 o4.77
Utilities. ....... 1890 o4.92 1924
20 Bonds. .......... 1885 1927 92.94
rate of production of the past three
months, about eight months rolling on
the books, and the business is being
entered almost every week at greater
te rate than it is being produced. "And
"lth the exception of some emergency
| meet material" he continued. "practi-
cally all of this is wanted immediately.
An enormous percentage Of it is needed
now. it is not only needed for our own
operations but those of our allies, We
nave o2,O00 tons to place this week
| Tor the Italian government, very urgent
~ needed for ship construction. We
ougae to give the Italian government
oZ,ooo tons, and yet we do not know
"here TO get it without seriously af-
1ectlng our own shipbuilding and nee
! essary railroad construction.
Deliveries Overdue
we have received orders for Is .OOG
TONS additional plates from the British
"hlch are coming right along. and
tnat VIII be 100000 or 100000 tons of
plate. Some of the plates which we
nave for Great Britain are now four or
tve months overdue. They are furnish
ing General Pershing an enormous tom
mage OF materials, which at the last
report approximated 100000 tons,
winch General Pershing has agreed to
replace from this country, in the lines
like plate, ard some pig iron.
'On rrojectile steel we have thrtv
SIX weeks rolling, which, of course. is
Tor the United States and Allied gov
ernments. And the forging manufact
urers have just reached the point in
their programme where their consump-
ton OF projectile steel is going to be
enormous. We will have to have at
least 100000 tons this year. We are
rolling so much projectile steel on rail
mills and the rail situation is becoming
so acute-the Director General of Rail-
ways says he will have to have 1000
ooo tons-that any increase in rail pro-
ductlon Will necessarily increase our
troubles so lar as steel is concerned.
On rails at the rate we have been roll
ing IN the last three months we have
nlnety-two weeks work ahead of us
almost year and three quarters. On
structural shapes the direct govern
ment requirements alone to-day re-
qulre fourteen weeks work On tin plate
there IS twenty-three weeks, wire pipes
and tubes twenty eight weeks. wire and
on the all-steel product report we have
thirty-one weeks operation at the pro-
duction of the past three months. which
has averaged about $4,000 tons week
"a little over 30,0000O0 tons annu
ally"
Meeting Ordered by Baruch
The immediate cause of this meet
ing was direct and positive order
Industries Board and from Mr.. Baruch
personally, and after consultation with
the transportation and the fuel people
1t was decided to go practically to the
English system OF an absolute prohibi
tlon on the consumption of any iron
or the manufacture of any steel except
Tor absolute war necessity That has
years.
"Now the idea was that the manu-
facture of iron and steel should be
limited to Glass and Glass B priori-
ties, except under special permit.
And that applied also to discard steel.
We appreciate, and particularly under
present conditions when such large
percentage OF your product is govern
ment material, with the rigidity of in
Specsion and SPECIFICATIONS, that there
IS oH,grade material, there are plates
that do not meet this test or that, and
whlch OF course must 60 into other
lines, they may be suitable for tanks
or other purposes. And of course
under those conditions, where YOU do
not have priority certificate, it would
Pc pc necessary &c to apply to Washington
That is pretty drastic and involves
and | was in hopes frankly that that
could be avoided: | received a posi-
tive order to do that, and l have asked
permission to withhold that until r
learned the results of this meeting.
Because unless we are given very
definite information from you gentle
men here that the war necessities will
have a greater order of preference and
priority than it has been given, why
that order will be put into effect i'm
mediately. We are not satisfied.
had two hours before the Senate com
mlttee couple of weeks ago, and |
received pretty drastic examination,
and l stated then that the steel in
dustry had met the situation, and
without exception they were cooperat-
ing; but the more | get into it, gen
Yemen IT requires a considerable
stretch of my imagination to be able
to say. that, because some of you have
not played the game. AS a general
rule you have. But we run against the
proposition that you are short of steel
for this and that, and you are short of
fuel and cannot operate, but somehow
that shortage seems to fall on govern
ment necessities. There are a great
many of you-practically all I will say
OF the contractors who have British
shells are far behind in delivery; some
of them for three or four months.
And we find that forge plants have
been shut down and we could not get
the steel"
Mr.. Replogle, in speaking of the
coal shortage. said that in his opinion
and the opinion of people better quail
fed than himself, the situation
on fuel this winter is going to be far
worse than it was last winter. He said
this belief was based on the general
railroad condition in the East particu-
larly where the rapid expansion OF
necessary industries and big ware
houses were complicatng the railroad
situation. Of the automobile industry
he stated that indications are that
there mnSf hn 1ari1ol o,L ir..4.. |