Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1918-10-27
Wha Il the .Amer;eam
Engineers Are Doing.
The Av;at;o', MOTOR
and I'll . Browning
Gu,,-Dyes and Fer
...s 49, - ...e- ri 49, .
t;Izers and Ne,0 Ex-
61os;ves and Gases.
Work IN Washington.

= Work in Washington.
minerals which we formerly imports
ed by. the millions Of tons. and our
o output Of ), copper: . 4; Iron and
ever before. Secretary Lane says we
can now supply all the minerals we
need for the war. 80
Our Army Of scientists is making
Before the war optical glass Of all
kinds was made BY the Germans and
shipped to our factories. When the
war broke out we had to have field
glasses for the Army and spyglasses
could furnish the glass for the lenses,
= but the scientists OF the geophysical
laboratory and the glass men of the
country went to work and we are
all Of our needs. AT that time we were
importing curved crystals for our
watches and clocks from the glass
works OF Thuringia. A. month after
the war began we were making those
disks here. and at the end Of two
months we were turning them out
cheaper than Germany. 1t is the same
with Photographic glass and photo
graphic developers and almost every
thhing under the sun along the line Of
As to the new Inventions. OF; chem
icais ana other wonders. accomplished
by Uncle Sans army OFT Bcientists
since the war began their story would
Almost every industry .ts based upon
chemical work. Every bit of fine steel
10 tested by the chemist. It is his re-
searches that. keeps our steel rails
from breaking, and the motor car
the road. The leather Tor our sSoes
p ~ nov tanned by chemical procesa.
ana the manufactured foods we eat.
the clothes we wear and our heat and
iight are based upon the sameS foun-
AT the time they went into the war
the Germans thought that they had
q monopoly Of this branch Of science.
Iney had stolen the discoveries Of
sWedes 'i ana the the a Trsnss and the
their own. The truth Is that the great
est OF chemical discoveries aid NOT
come from Germany. Some one has
counted up the famous scientists Of,
Of the t ae vss nIfSred years q those
were Germans and. the, same In true
OF the eighteenth. while most OF those
OF the ninenteenth got their trainin0
0utside Germany: .Leibig. the most
educatsd ~ me Sr German chemists. was
f'* -- II II
: = Most Of the. explosives which the
scientists Of the kaiser are adapting
to guns, hand 'grenades ana shells Of
various kinds came from foreirn
sources. Dynamite was discovered by
Noble. swede: illuminate for mer.
curry by Howard. an Englishman, and
smokeless powder by veille, q French.
man. Chlorine gas was largely dis.
covered by Cellini. an italian; and DR..
Charles E. Monroe. our well known
specialist on explosives says that tho
two leaders In the discoveries Of az
plosives have been Abel OF England and
Bertholet Of France. go .e4 -
Benzol, the father Of the most i'm.
portant dyestuffs, was discovered by
Farady in 1915. He found 1t in illu.
minating gas. Anthracene. which 10
largely used IN making turkey-red,
Franco. while picric acid, employed In
making both dyes and explosives. was
nrst prepared by q London chemist.
The nrst coaltar color was made by
another English chemist. q man
produ 1 fs sn srt MsH was an trying 70
failed as to the !quihine. but 'dlscov-
cred a mauve dye which for fiftya
years was used In English postage
stamps. That was in 1850, and In 1873
Lightfoot. also an Englishman, pro-
duced anlline black. while q little lat.
or the French discovered the first
sulphur dyes.
Our new dye making companies ara
capitalized to the amount Of 5000
100000. and last year we exported
$12.O00,O00 worth Of dyestuffs. most
OF them aniline colors which formerly
were made only in Germany. we
have now forty-seven dye factories in
New Jersey, thirty in New York,
eleven In Massachusetts, and seven in
Pennsylvania. We are making also
the synthetic indigo blues, OF which
Germany had a monopoly before the
war. We are dyeing our own seal
skins. which we used to send to
Europe. and are making vegetable
colors and mineral dyes. lakes and
pigments and other artificial coiors
of every description. All of this Ia
based on Uncle Sans army Of chem
lists. and its work is such that It is
building wall around the United
state which will make 1t independents
of the rest Of the world for most Of
our dyestuffs for all time to come.
FRANK q. CARPENTER.