The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1922-12-15
ROMANCE OF THE ELECTRIC MOTOR

| spirits of turpentine made by black
men in Georgia, and also petroleum
| products from Oklahoma, which were
refined in Texas or New Jersey.
That is the story of one type of in
sulating varnish. But still the coils
are not finished.
They must be baked in furnaces
burning fuel oil piped in one long
pipe half way across the continent
For it is pumped 1920 miles from
Texas to the New Jersey refinery,
whence it came by rail to the cleo
trio works.
The ends of the wires are solder
ed together with solder which is
made of lead from Colorado or Mex
leo, mixed with tin from the East
Indies.
Then the terminals received a coat
of shellac. How many of you realize
that shellac is an animal product.
1t is deposited by tiny insects on
the twigs of trees in India. Brown
men climb high up in the trees and
break off the twigs, then scrape off
the shellac, which in the United
States is dissolved in grain alcohol
from Michigan.
Then the iron and steel.
The iron in the motor was made
from Minnesota ore, smelted in
South Chicago with Michigan lime
stone and coke made from Penn
sylvania or West Virginia coal
The round steel shaft was once
iron, but in roaring Bessemer con-
verters, or in white hot open hearth
furnaces, the iron was changed into
steel, poured into ingot moulds and
rolled time and again until it be-
came a red, from which the shaft
was cut and sized in the electric
works at Schenectady, N. Y.
Now we will have to take an
ocean steamer half way around the
world, in order to obtain metals for
the bearings in which the motor
shaft rotates. We must get tin
from Singapore, anthony from
China and copper from Montana.
The coils of wire are hidden in
slots in the armature or rotating
part of the motor. The armature is
made up of hundreds of. sheets of
special silicon steel, little thicker
than a sheet of heavy butchers
wrapping paper After the wires are
hidden away the rotating part is
bound with phosphor bronze wire. |
Each ounce of this wire involved the
carrying of its ingredients almost
10000 miles; for the Montana COP
per travelled 2.745 miles, the zinc
same 1000 miles from Oklahoma;
the tins II, 900 miles from Singa-
pore, the finished wire was then
brought 314 miles more to the cleo
trio works.
What a remarkable accomplish |
ment in transportation and manu-
facture; that those III materials |
are gathered in the four quarters |
of the world by white, black. yellow !
and brown toilers; then carried a |
distance equal to at"ip to the moon;
then assembled into simple and re-
liable electric motors; and that these |
motors are made available to the |
public on such favorable terms that |
in addition to their universal use
in dustry-mllions of women have |
learned to operate them for lessen
ing drudgery in the home. Prac-
tically the same materials are re-
quired to make radio apparatus and |
electric meters and transformers.
even the complete electric locomo-
tives that now haul railroad trains
across the Rock Maintains. one mile
above the level of the sea.
Just stop and think a few min
utes about what la wonderful thing
modern industry is. Think, not only
of the inventions themselves. such
as radio, but think of the scientists
who delved down deep into the cleo
trical mysteries Remember that
unconsciously cooperating with
them, are thousands of men who
work in distant lands, and who find,
box and carry the raw materials.
Picture the reddish brown Hindu
with perhaps no clothes above the
waist except the turban on his head. |
He is working today to help insulate
the electric apparatus of 1924. He
is partner of the inventor and the
engineer.
Remember that 10000 miles away
n brown man in Ceylon. two or |
three years ago got out of a tree
the very rubber that now covers the |
wire a few inches distant from your
hand Recall that a yellow man
made the silk, and that black man
picked the cotton. And in closing