Cleveland County herald., 1918-04-11

 building the Panama canal. The con tractors profits on the several con tracts averaged only 2.eS per cent.
 Air Service.
 The air service has been called upon in the past 12 months to build an enormous structure of the most highly trained personnel and the most intricate equipment with practically no foundation to start from.
 Three large appropriations, includ- ing the S64O, GOO 900 act passed without a roll call, made total of $6o1. .Ooo, coo available for the first year. All of this has since been obligated.
 Last April the air service had an almost negligible force of e5 officers and 1,120 men, small flying fields, less than 300 second-rate planes, prac- tically no aviation industry, and only the most scanty knowledge of the ka- leidoscopic development abroad. The first two months of war were required to secure information, establish a staff, and work out the program finally adopted. The problem was twofold- first, personnel; and, second, equip ment.
 Today the personnel is over 100 times that of year ago, practically every member a skilled man who has gone through an intensive course of training. Schools of Il different kinds have been instituted, courses of instruction laid out, and instruc- tors secured, including foreign ex- perts in score of lines, as follows: |: For flyers at ground schools and flying fields; for mechanics at the flying fields and at over dozen different factories; for photographers, balloon ists, adjutants, supply officers, engineer officers, armorers, and instructors of mechanics.
 Development of Navy.
 The development of the navy during the first year of war has given the greatest satisfaction. It's growth and achievements during this period may be epitomized in the following para graphs:
 Strength of the navy today Is nearly 21,000 officers and 3S0,00O en- listed men strength year ago was 4,792 officers and 77,946 enlisted men.
 Estimated total expenditures of the navy during first year of war: Dis bursements and outstanding ebliga- tions, $1,881 100000.
 Total naval appropriations, real snd pending, $3,333, III 665 .O4.
 American destroyers arrived at q British port to assist in patrolling Eu- ropean waters 2S days after the decla7 ration of war.
 There are now four times as many vessels in the naval service as a year ago.
 Nearly 73.000 mechanics and other civilian employees are working at navy yards and stations.
 When war was declared, 123 naval vessels were building or authorized, and contracts have been placed since that time for 94s vessels.
 More thaV TOO privately owned yes sels have been purchased or chartered by the navy.
 MA LSN odlAlCIILSti are designed to be of 4 300 tons, the larg- est battleships in the world.
 Our 35,000-ton cruisers, 35 knots. will be the fastest in the world, their speed equaling the fastest destroyers.
 Prompt repairs of 109 interned Ger man ships, partially wrecked by their crews, added more than 100000 tons to our available naval and merchant tonnage.
 The navy has developed an Ameri- can mine believed to combine all the good points of various types of mines, and is manufacturing them in quanti- ties.
 During the year the latest type of naval 16-inch gun was completed for our new battleships; it throws a pro- jectile weighing 2.100 pounds
 Navy has in It's possession now stock of supplies sufficient for the average requirements for at least one year.
 Several hundred submarine chasers, built since the war, have been deliv- cred to the navy by 31 private con- cerns and six navy yards; many of these boats have crossed the Atlantic, some In severe weather.
 Naval training camps have a ca pacity of 102,O00 in summer, 94,OOO men in winter.
 Shipping Boards Progress.
 Up to date congress has authorized S2,034, GOO, of which $1, ,135, 100000 has been appropriated, for the United States Shipping board and Emergency Fleet corporation; on March 1, $353, PAY ,95537 of this sum had been expended.
 The Emergency Fleet corporation had requisitioned March 1, 425 steel vessels and contracted for 726 steel vessels making a total of 1,145 steel ships, of an aggregate dead-weight tonnage Of 8,164,5OS tons; 1t had let contracts for 490 wooden vessels, az gregating approximately 1,715,0O0 dead-weight tons; it had repaired and put in operation 798,000 dead-weight tonnage seized from Germany and