The Wallace miner. [volume] (Wallace, Idaho) 1907-current, 1921-07-07

ton may De Illustrated by an inciden
that gave us a great deal of concerI
at the time. and illustrates the ne
cessity for extreme care when en-
gagged in new work. When the test
plant was started only about one
fourth of the cells were in commits
sion and for the first few days every
thing went smoothly As more cells
were put in service poorer results
were obtained and after a week or
ten days when all of the cells were
working the results were extremely
poor The current efficiency fell off
to 40 per cent and very meagre and
ragged deposits of zinc were obtain
ed.
The research stan made every eff
fort to find the seat of the trouble
but it was a month before it was fin
ally traced to the aluminium catholics
with which the later cells were equip
ped and which instead of being pure
aluminium. were found to contain
about 3 per cent copper. At that time
no one suspected that such a per-
centage of copper in the aluminium
catholics could possibly affect the zinc
deposit for in the zinc process the
function of the aluminium plate is
similar to the function of the start
ing sheet blank in copper refining. 1t
accumulates a deposit of zinc which
is stripped off when sufficiently heavy
without itself taking any part in the
reaction.
Advantage of Trained Men.
also, and equally important, this
operation enabled a number of men
to be trained to serve subsequently
as a nucleus in the final commercial
plant. These men became the super
intendents, foremen and skilled oper-
ators without whom the large plant
would have had hard shedding no
matter how good the process and
how excellent the design.
"Only after all these preIiminaries /
could the large plant be undertaken |
with fair certainty of success. So far |
the work had been under the supervi- |
sion of the research engineer, but now
t had outgrOwn the bounds and IA
,ilities of the research department.
A separate organization was formed
o carry out the construction and OPP
grafton of the large plant. the re-
search engineer acting in the ca
)acity of adviser and the men who
operated the small plant became
prominent members of the new Or
sanitation.
Doubtless it is now apparent to
'ou why l started out by saying that
'ou must make your choice as to
What branch you wish to follow soon
fter leaving school. Given sufficient
bility and capacity for hard work
II the paths lead to the top, but OBJ
iOusly, if you get half way along
ne of these paths and decide you
want to switch over to another you
will probably have to start at the
'ottom again.
Most large mining and smelling
prefer to train their own
nen for their higher executive posi-
ions. They prefer to have men
ONE to them while they are young
nd only recently out of school, The
lew employees work is closely scrut-
nized particularly for the first six
months or a year, and his immediate
uperior is supposed to determine
within this time whether he will fit
nto the organization or not. If he
GEMS to have the necessary quail
les he is gradually given more and
nore responsibility and after awhile
5 placed in charge of Investigations
f increasing importance.
Two Absolute Essentials.
'Now there is one thing right here
hat I can not impress on you too
trongly. First: Your future in the
rganization will depend on how we'll
on accomplish each and every task
hat may be given you however in
gnificant and unimportant it may at
he moment seem to you Second:
our advancement will depend on
ow well you get on with your asso-
ates and with men who may be
orking under you. You must cult
ate a spirit of fairness and a will
lgness to cooperate You must treat
he men who may be working under
on with consideration and must
their fundamental rights
o matter how brilliant and able you
lay be, if you are a crab and con-
antly fighting with your associates
r subOrdinates you will get no.
here. Big stick methods are out 3.
date. At the same time you can -
ot afford to allow things to be put :,
YER on you. Also, if when you :,
Zach a minor executive position, you >.
ldeavor to build up your own de- :,
lrtment at the expense of another -
apartment, you are not serving the
est interests of the work as a whole
nd ultimately you will only injure u
)urself All managers realize that a
srtain amount of whole rivalry be-
veen departments is a fine thing
he rivalry must, however, be fair
nd must at all times take into con-
Iteration the general good.
when you have reached the posi-