Arizona republican., 1919-03-28
H0W FRUIT PITS,
 SAVED AND SENT, |. HELPED ID WIN
To What Extent the Soldiers
 Were Protected from Hor-
 TOTS of Hun Gases Is Told by Maj. Alexander Powell

(By Mai. E. Alex. Powell U. $. Al
 It is strange thing, is it not, that as a direct result of the use by Ger mans of poison gas in Flanders. dear old ladies in cities and villages all over the United States conscientiously saved the pits from the peaches and cherries which they had for breakfast and scrubbed them up with tooth- brushes as though they were jewels, and sent them to the war department by registered post? Yet that is pre- cisely what resulted from the appea; made by the chemical warfare service for fruit pits and nut shells in order to obtain for use in our gas mask a charcoal of sufficient density to af- ford our soldiers immunity from Ger man gas.
 Though the actual manufacture of poison gas did not commence in the United States until we had been at war nearly a year, the production of masks was started before the presi- dents signature on the declaration of war was fairly dry, for everyone real lLCu tLdt Out LiOoPS WhtNh "S AAA'o send overseas would be utterly help less unless provided with some ade- quate means of gas defense. Now, as most people know, the canister of the American gas respirator contains a certain amount of charcoal, through which the air breathed by the soldier is drawn, which filters that air of i'm purities just as the charcoal of an or h0 W passes through it. When we entered the war the English and French were using for this purpose ordinary wood ! charcoal, which was not, however, o1 a sufficient density to insure complete protection against some of the newer and more powerful gases.
 Asked to Save Pits
 1 After a series of experiments car ried on at American university in ths i suburbs of Washington by the expert: | of the bureau of mines it was discov' | cred that a harcoalscapable of defy ! ing almost any known gas could b, 1 produced from the pits of peaches 1 plums, apricots and cherries, the seed! of dates, and the shells of Brazil nuts hickory nuts and walnuts. So. in or | der to obtain a necessary supply O 1 this material. the government ap pealed directly to the people of tn, United States to save and send in t, the chemical warfare division of tn army the pits of the fruits and tn shells of the nuts which they ate. Tn walls of hotels, clubs, railway station and theaters blossomed with placard making the appeal; receptacles wer stationed in public places everywhere the Red Cross, the Boy Scouts an
 kindred organizations attended t
 making the collections. But, thoug
 the response was enormous, thousand , of envelopes, bags and packages c , pits and shells pouring in by ever
 mail, it was not sufficient to suppl the demand, for as seven pounds C
 pits shells are required to mak . enough chacoal for a single masl
 some idea may be had of the enormou
 quantity needed to provide gas mask
 for our army of four million men. Fur
 ther experiments showed. howeve that highly satisfactory charco;
 could be obtained from the shells (
 cocoanuts. whereupon officers of til
 gas defense division were dispatche ! post haste to the British West Indie and to the Hawaiian Islands for tt n purpose of arranging for the immed ate dispatch to the United States st
 cocoanuts in shipload lots. The shel thus obtained were burned in furnace of standard type and the charcoal wa then subjected to a severe preliminaI test to determine whether it was e sufficient density.
 Masks Tested
 f The finished masks were tested by e specially selected force, and since
 mask once tested was not tested aga. = until some American soldier put it ( g in the face of a gas attack, every e fort was made to keep both the worl n CTS and the inspectors keyed up s concert pitch.N The walls of the gre - factory at Long Island City, whe ; our masks were made, were plaster II with posters showing an America
 soldier dying from gas as the resu
 of defective mask, while undernea
 was the legend, The Final Inspe
 tor" or, Remember that your car le lessness may result in the death |, your husband, son or brother" As { additional incentive to do good wor T each of the inspectors was from tin to time sent into gas chamber wea ing a gas mask chosen at rando
 from those which he had passed hin :. self. It is gratifying tribute to tl . . skill of our scientists, to the care e ercised by the workers, and to Il
 efficiency of our chemisal welfare SC
 vice that the American forces eve seas were protected by masks whiC }, according to actual field tests, ga. 20 times the protection afforded 2 those worn by the Germans.
 The story of Americas gas mas is told in interesting fashion in t h recently published report of the dire ! tor of munitions, Benedict Grove n This report which bears the tit
 Americas Munitions, 1S17-1S1s,"
 the enthraIling story of the army b
 hind the army, the cohorts of exec
 tives and employees in American sho o and factories who turned out the tos f of warfare without which victo IT would have bee impossible. The I if port, with every phase of war produ m tion described, tells the Americ n people how the government spent t r meaey which they contributed in W IS taxes and by purchasing Libel m bonds.