The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1919-03-16

! t1elr glass nlleO Inem-
| Another problem of conserving waste
! arose at munitions factories in con-
nection with women's gloves These
were sort of gauntlet made from very
strong cloth especially for women NUM-
tion workers. of course, they quickly
became saturated with grease and
metal grit in the operation of tools.
| In one munitions factory the proprie-
! tor found himself confronted with 112
pounds of these soiled gloves every
week. These had to be cleaned, a pro-
cess which cost almost as much as the
glove was worth. 1t was highly desir-
BILE to find a cheap and. easy way of
making them fl to wear again.
Today the problem has been solved.
The gloves are not only made thorough
ly clean and fit to wear, but the grease
with which they are sodden is recov-
cred and may be used either as cut
| ting OIL for the machines or, after re-
1ning, as fuel oil for Diesel engines.
But to go back to the boot trimmings
which 1 mentioned before:
-- USE FOR SCRAPS
The extraction of the grease was
only one part of the programme of
economy. Two large boot factories il,
Northampton collected their trimmings
carefully and sorted them. Large frag-
ments of leather trimmed off in the
making of uppers were set aside for
resale to bootmakers to be used in the
repairing of civilian boots, while the
larger pieces of sole leather were found
adaptable to the process known as
packing up during residing opera
lions. BY the time these two sorts OF
trimmings had been taken out, only
shreds and small scraps were left. 1t
was these which were used for the re-
covery of the supposedly valuable
grease, process which left them clean
and soft
The fragments from the uppers were
again gone over and the pieces picked
out which were found to be suita BILE
for devotion to an industry which had
suffered much from the war. This was
the manufacture of the small leather
discs which are used in the making of
mattresses This saved the life of the
mattress industry for the time being.
The mattress makers had been hard
at work trying to find a substitute for
the Indispensable leather tufts when
the boot factory waste was suddenly
found not only available for them but
suita BILE to their needs. Leather wash
ers were found to be easily made from
the sole trimmings and here, too. an
other industry whose life had been
threatened by the war was revived
AS for the scraps from both uppers and
soles which were found too small for
further use there were ground up for
fertilizer, use for which leather
possesses high qualities.
Thus the waste from the boot fac
tories, which was formerly thrown
away has saved the mattress and leath-
err washer trades from disaster dur
ing the war, and it will continue to be
used in both these trades. Just now
efforts are under way to assure the or
ganized collection of this waste. Three
boot factories alone are now yielding
a ton of trimmings a week
In the manufacture of civilian foot
wear, still further use is found for
waste trimmings The cloth trimmings
md ready market at the paper mills.
The cork sole cuttings which consist of
cork with cotton and wool attached are
sorted, the cotton going to the paper
mills, the wool to the shoddy mills and
the cork to the linoleum factories. Fin
ally there are the floor sweepings from
the boot factories. These consist of
leather, cloth and other materials. and
formerly it has been the practice to
hand them over at once to the city
authorities to be burned in the gar
bage incinerator. Experts, however.
have found that this waste is worth
$1O'a ton for fertilizer and in view OF
the fact that 1000 tons of these sweep
ings are recoverable from the leather
wealth of $4,000 has here been found.
Patent leather has also been founc
TO possess a high waste value. Trim
mlngs from patent feathers have not
been found BILE for the factories to
which plain trimmings have gone. but
process has been discovered for re-
covering the patent gloss in the form of
currles powder When this has been
taken off, the leather is left free to be
devoted TO the n
waste trimmings are devoted. The first
aust known as curriers' powder was
Tor long time thought to be waste
product, but lately it has been discov-
cred that certain industry which
cannot name now, but which has moth
ing to do with the manufacture of
boots. has found it valuable and If is
fairly certain now that a big demand
VIII spring up for it.
USE FOR OLD BOOTS
So thoroughly have feathers been
utilized now that use has been found
even for old and wornout boots, which
formerly were declared to have no use
whatsoever. Now however the nails
are drawn from the soles and sold as
scrap metal at SIS ton. while the
leather is ground for fertilizer and
brings $40 a ton.
Paper mills, which I have already
waste products, figure in another in
oustry whose waste products have Just
now been shown to have value 1t is
the INDUSTRY of extracting nicotine from
TOBACCO for the preparation of insect
icides.
In this Industry tobacco which canno,
oe used as it is usually used, is packet;
away In linen bags to the factory OF
course, these bags in time become clogged
with the juice and the grease of the tobac-
co leaf. In time they become unfit for
turther use and formerly they were either
burned or thrown away. One firm alone
used to accumulate these bags al the rate
Of some 1000 pounds a month.
Nowadays they are taken in hand and
subjected to Decreasing treatment in
winch steam and centrifugal acti IN
speedily whip the bags into a condition as
lean as when they were new. The nico-
s'ne- bearing grease was recovered ami
vas put to use, but far more valua ole
were the bags, which were worth from
Sl0O TO s2oO a ton at the paper mills.
10 enumerate all the industries in which
,otton waste figures would cover pages
and pages. Stalks of plumes from the
making of artificial flowers: tanSles or
DOSE ends; fragments OF silk, both mer-
'erized and otherwise, in thousand and
one forms; trimmings from velour and
felt hats; trimmings from billiard table
10th makers; wooden fragments; hun
lreds of tons of trimmings cast off in the
making of aeroplane wings; women's
ast-off hats; discarded umbrella cover
.ngs; pals of string-all these are being
'alVaged now, with the paper mill as the
Ultimate destination of a good deal of it,
The great problem in this scheme of