Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-10-10
FIRE PROOFIN C FRAME

Daily Letter by Frederic J. Haskin

WASHINGTON, Oct. IA new
type of frame building construction
which, without the use of any of
the so-called fire-proofing materials
at ali will cut in two the fire hazard
to which wood dwelling houses are
exposed, has been evolved by enGi-
neers employed by the lumber IN
dustry of America. The announce
ment comes from the National Lum-
Der Manufacturers Association, OF
Washington, a Scientific bureau de-
voted to the solution of problems
affecting the industry which main
ta3ns it.
Not only will the new frame con-
struction greatly add to the safety,
financial and physical, of the future
hcme-builders who adopt 1t, it is
| claimed, but the discovery will have
a profound effect upon city bu..d-
ing regulations. With some further
refnements not deemed necessary
in dwelling houses, the new CON
struction has been adapted to fac
tory and business buildings. These
| plans have been approved by the
fire insurance underwriters, and as
e. result some of the largest cities
in the country, New York among
them. are considering re-admitting
frame construction into fire districts
for years barred to wooden build
inas of n sort.
The evolution of fire-resistlve
frame construction was incidental
to a campaign inaugurated some
years ago by the lumber Industry
to remove from wood the single
disadvantage under which 1t com
peted for business in the building
materials market. For many years
ever since the invention OF NE
| proof building construction in fact
lumber has beer subjected to me
attacks of the makers OF hre-proot
materials. Nobody could gainsay
the cheapness of wood, nor its
beauty and comfort. nor even It's
durability, since many of the oId
colonial mansions still in existence
are made of wood. But there has
been no getting around the fact nat
wood will burn. If you built of
woodland three-fourths of all
home builders do use wood-you
simply risked losing your building
| by fire. Many an owner of a beau
tiful and commodious frame house
has wished regretfully that he colid
have afforded to build his home OF
hre-proof materials.
In ascribing an undue fire haz-
ard to frame construction, the pro-
| ducers of fire-proofing invented no
rev argument. They merely useo
what for years has been common
beliet-namely, that there Is a d.
rect relation between the ~xtensiv
use of frame construction in the
United States and the enormous
annual fire losses to which th4s
country is subjected. Three of every
four buildings in American cities
ere made of wood throughout. Tie
United States a the greatest an
nual fire loss of any country in the
world. To assume that n OF these
facts results from the other seems
to be only putting two and two to-
gether.
Science and Fire Hazards
But like some other American in
dustries producing standard com
modities which suffer from adverse
popular opinion, the hewers n
sellers of wood have been turning
the cool ~searchlight of science upon
the alleged fire hazard resting upon
frame construction. In this column
not SO long ago it was shown how
successfully the scientist has refut-
ed the opinion that 1t is dangerous
to eat canned food. Now another
group of scientists has demon
strated beyond argument the sur
prising fact that the frame build
ipgs, even as they are constructed
today. ere not nearly so subject to
fire as buildings OF other sorts, in
GLIDING the steei-frame buildings
which are known as fire-proof.
To make this demonstration. the
scientists of the Technical and Re-
search Department of the National
Lumber Manufacturers Association
took the 1921 figures on fires In
eighty-three of the largest Ameri-
can cities as compiled by the Ma
tional Board of Fire Underwriters
These figures. to he sure. show that
over half the fires In those cities
bthat year occurred in frame build
ings, but the figure loses its appar-
ent significance when 1t is sci
down beside the fact that three
fourths of all the bulldogs in the
eighty-three cities are of frame con-
struction. To every thousand frame
buildings there was a fraction In
excess of sixteen fires, but the fire'
IN brick and stone buildings rar
lover twenty-four TO the Thousand
and IN all sorts of buildings Other
than frame twenty-five to the thou,
sand.