Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-04-19
Georgia Cotton and Georgia
Tech: Their Vital Relation
HILE Georgia grapples with it's great

w problem of how to manufacture
within the state such raw materials
as produced therein, now are being shipped
North for manufacture and the finished
product returned here to be sold at prices
that include the cost of transportation both
ways and the manufacturers profit as we'll
King Cotton holds the throne, autocratlc
and all powerful. And, though cotton's pow
er may be lessened, it will never cease to
play magnitudinous role in the industrial
and agricultural life Of the state Georgia, II
one excerpts Texas, is the greatest producer
of all the American cotton raising states.
While Georgia dreams of a great industrial
future through realization of the promul-
gated plans for greater Georgia School OF
Technology, steamers owned and operated
by northern capital ply the sea between Sa-
vannah and New England ports loaded with
the Georgia product Long chains OF freight
cars race nOrthWards with more cotton. In
New England, many hundreds of miles from
where cotton can be produced, this southern
commodity furnishes the basis OF tremen-
dous and profitable industry supplying thou
sands upon thousands with employment and
yearly turning over vast sums of dollars.
A cotton plant growing upon the bleak
Jew England coast would be a strange phe-
nomenon. And yet, cotton more essentially
belongs to the north than to the south, it's
| natural habitat, for the reason that here in
Georgia, for example, it is treated as crop
for an extensive industry which, like tree,
is constantly sending out new shoots and
tendrils which, in time, also develop in a
smaller way, industries having cotton for
their source.
The question wide-awake Georgians are
demanding of themselves is: Why isn't Geor-
gia enjoying the full fruits of her cotton
production; why have we gone on supinely
working and producing SO that outside man
ufacturers reap the easy profits and leave us
only the labor and a few cents per pound
for this commodity that can be raised only
| in the south and manufactured anywhere?
Why have Georgians been so disaffected and
Indifferent to so vital matter involving as
it does, yearly, turn-overs Of millions Of
dollars? Georgians are fast growing to rea-
lie that they have hoed the garden long
enough and the time grows more propitious
for occupying the house, too.
To take grip successfully on the coat
tails of cotton manufacture, the first requl-
site is trained men. The Massachusetts In
stitute of Technology is grinding out finely
specialized, stabilized technicians in proper
ton to the needs of New England industry.
Such men, usually, after few years Of &C
tual experience strike out for themselves,
establishing new mills and factories, discov-
ering new essentials in some manner allied
to their special lines, and forging ahead
into the unchartered seas of research.
The Georgia School of Technology aspires
in the south to relative pOSltlOn 10 tnaC OIL
Massachusetts Tech. But with it's textile
classes overcrowded, nearly half of it's ma
chimes of obsolete or unserviceable type,
and no facilities for conducting research or
experimental work, Georgia Tech can never
hope to produce the really fine specialists
desired. This condition will be quickly OBJ
waited when Tech is given it's $5,000,O00 and
can proceed in building an tp-to-date mill
equipped with every modern mill device Ex-
perimentation and research will play no
small part in the textile engineering course
to be offered when the greater Tech has
been made reality. t,
It is claimed thu for every graduating
textile engineer in Georgia, notices. than ten
splendid mill positions are open to him.
Long ere they have completed their courses
in this subject at the present Tech, such en-
gineers in embryo are offered contracts.
This condition seems to strengthen the be-
lief that Georgia mills can absorb all Of the
young men. Tech can produce as textile en-
gineers. Mill operators naturally prefer
southern boys. They know the south and
they know southern labor, and they can
solve problems peculiar to the south where
trained, would be at a loss.
The sooner every mill in Georgia is sup
'Iied with Georgia trained executives. the
pand into more industries. And only until
reached already in the north will Georgia
reap the full benefit from her cotton crop. A
greater Georgia Tech is the first big step
toward industrial emancipation of the state.