The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-01-14
By RICHARD F. JOHNSTON

The new year is on its stride in all departm ents of activity. The &C., tive capacity is even greater than in December, which was the busiest rponth of the past year. There was no Interruption of operations. One year glided into another without other feature than increase in the already healthy pace.
 The Tennessee company mills are running this week as follows: Double turn at Bessemer rod and guide mills, single turn at plate mill; double turn at tie-plate plant and structural steel works and single turn at bloom ing mill at Fairfield; double turn at rail and blooming mills and ca pac1ty operations at ingot mill in Ensley. The Cbickasaw car shops are turning out about 25 new cars and as many old ones per diem.
 Slight decrease in thrilled tom mage of the steel corporation is ac- counted for by large production and shipments in December.
 Wire drawing millss continue full operations.
 The sanitary pipe shops are on full turn following the brisk placement of orders at the close of the year. The base remains at s60. Shops are booked for two months ahead.
 Pipe is Active
 Pressure pipe is coming actively to the fore. United States pipe is low bidder on 1000 tons for Duluth. De- troit is about to let contracts for 1000 tons. Prices have been ad- vanced to a base of s44 for four and six inch sizes and the tendency is for further advances.
 Large Iron Sales
 Large sales of Alabama iron have been recently made into the Chicago district, where 25,00e tons of north ern Alabama iron are reported as having been placed. This iron gets te Chicago by rail and water route at S2 less than the all-rail rate.
 second Quarter Sales
 The Birmingham iron base is S23 for the remainder of the first quar- ter and s24 to s25 for the second quarter. One maker has sold 5000 tons at SPA for the second quarter and retired from the market fer the present. Another maker has booked 5000 to 5000 tons at s25 for the sec ond quarter. One large foundry maker holds second quarter iron at s25. Another large maker is out of the market, but expects a s25 sec end quarter base when it enters for that delivery.
 The Alabama company expects to blow in second stack at Gadsden February l. The Tennessee company will blow in another stack soon.
 No l stack at Ensley, which was built to produce $50 tons a day, has produced as high as 6S7 tons, mCre than fulfilling expectations. It is understood that the Tennessee com- pany made a new iron-making rec ord in December.
 Coal and Coke
 Alabama coal production figures for 1922, published last week, show tetal of 16.600.0Oo tons. an increase of 25 per cent over the preceding Year. The increase is principally year The increase is principally due to the recovery of iron and steel production and partically to the west 4 ern emergency coal demand in July and August.
 Revised figures on by-product plants in Alabama show seven plants with 1.l96 ovens. which have a ca pacity of 6,543.000 tons of coal per annum and producing ca pacity of 4.500,000 tons.
 January bank clearings are mak- ing new high records. A new high days record of sS,750000 has been made. This compares with a previous high of s7,0oo,O00.
 Paint by Carload
 An industrial item of interest last week was the shipment of car load of paint by Birmingham fac tory which located here last spring. Other carload orders have been received. This new industry, like others. is already benefiting from Birminghams distributing advan- tages.
 Bnbson to Locate
 Roger W. Babson, the eminent statistician, is going to open