The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-06-24
Z MILLION MEN ARE MAKING MACHINES F0b WHOLE WORLD
Frank G. Carpenter Tells
 How Germany Is Filling The Demands Of Russia
FARM IMPLEMENTS OF ALL KINDS BEING TURNED OUT
Big Bertha" Plant Is Now Making Air Nitrate Ma
 chinery On a Big Scale

chinery On a Big Scale
 By FRANK G. CARPENTER
 Special Correspondent Birmingham
 Axe-Herald
 ESSEN. June 2a.-Stand with me on the high tower that rises above works and take a mind's-eye view of the Ruhr. We are in the heart of the largest single industrial dis trict on earth, the great coal basin of Germany. at the junction of the Rhine and the Ruhr, where all about below, reaching far down into the earth, are the beds of black diamonds, the possession of which Is now excit- ing tho nations. This little valley, only 15 miles wide and about 50 miles long, Is within hundred and fifty miles of France. within 50 miles of Belgian, and not far from the great ocean port of Rotterdam by way of the Rhine. It is one of the great railroad centers of northwestern Eur rope, where 23 double-track lines come in from and go out to all points of the compass. and where the whole country is covered with network of high power transmission wires and industrial railways.
 Cities of the Ruhr.
 Essen. which IS in plain sight from the tower, has now six hundred and fifty thousand population. It had only ten thousand in 1854 and, when the war began. it's population was less than four hunderd thousand since then 1t has gained 90 per cent, and should the troubles with the French be soon settled, it will again put on its seven league boots. Dort- mund, another manufacturing center not far away, las three hundred thousand; Duisburg, on the Rhine has a quarter of million: Gelsen- kirchen and Bochum are big cities, and the rest of the valley is so spotted with industrial villages and plants that about one in 15 of all the people of Germany live and work here. The region is one of the most thiekly settled on the globe. It is little bigger than Rhode Island, and It has more than four million peo- pie. Over two millions are said to be employed in the mines and the factories.
 The Ruhr And It's Railways.
 Now look at the little river below us. In normal times 1t is filled with barges and the caravan of traffic climbs up and down the locks which make 1t navigable to witten, about 40 miles from where 1t flows into the Rhine. That is the Ruhr. It would be little more than a creek in the United States. George Wash ington, who threw & silver dollar across the Rappahannock, could have thrown connot ball across the Ruhr and had strength to spare But the Ruhr Is one of the most important waterways of this part of the world By it's access to the Rhine 1t gives this region an outlet to the North Sea, and by means of canals the o oln1n nSf pt or-t of the western, central and southern Europe. The Rhine Is connected by the Rhine-M Marne and Rhine -Rho one canals with France, and goods from the Ruhr valley can be sent almost to the Mediterranean by water. Bel gium Is reached by canal and. through the RhineDanube canal. exports can go to the Black Sea. Germany has one of the most complete canal sys- tems of the world and the most of 1t has access to this valley.
 As to land transportation, small as the Ruhr valley Is 1t has one-eighth of the German railway system and it's trains carry about 75 per cent of the German freight traffic. Normal ly, 24,000 cars day are required for the hauling of coal, and the goods manufactured go out by the train load to all principal centers of Europe.
 I The Great Coal Mines.
 They are mining black diamonds right under this tower on which we stand and through the thick. smoky air you can see the shafts of mines which have been working for dec ades. There Is a shaft-house with whirling black wheels at our right and We can see the cars rise up high above the shaft and dump their loads into the furnaces beginning their fiery work of making steel. The whole of this Krupp plant Is founded on coal, and the city of Essen, which Is bigger than Buffalo or Pittsburg covers catacombs from which they have been taking coal for hundreds of years. Some of the tunnels are not far from the surface and some are & half mile beneath us. Lying in his bed at night in some parts of the city, one can hear the picks and the blasting of the miners digging out coal far below. The same condi- tions obtain in other parts of the valley, and the whole country Is un- derlaid with deposits said to be, next to the rBitish coal, the best in Flu rope for the making of steel.
 The Ruhr valley Is peppered with coal mines and every mine has its steel works or some other kind of industrial plant above 1t. The whole region Is an ant hill of industry and I iron nearby. that forms the founda- tion of the prosperity of Germany.
 O O O
 22o Billion Tons.
 AS to the extent of the coal of the Ruhr, I have before me some figures made by the scientists. The mines have been worked for six hundred years and so far about three billion tons of coal have been taken out of the ground. It is said that seventy six billion more tons are easily ac- cessible and that almost as mucf more coal can be mined before they begin to play out. Indeed, some of the German estimates say that the Ruhr has enough coal to last for two thousand years at the present rate of production. Others figure the amount left in the ground at 220,. 900 .000,000 tons.
 Nevertheless, the Ruhr has been giving Germany more than sixty pel cent of its coal and at the same time furnishing millions of tons for export about. In 1915 it produced two-fifths as much as Great Britain and before the French invaded the Ruhr more than a half million men were em- ployed in the mines. The production amounted to 1I5,Ooo,O 900 tons, and last year 1t had reached to within 1S,000,- 900 tons of its pre-war production At that time, in addition to the great supply given Germany and the 18,. 100000 tons furnished the allies, tn, mines sent quantities of coal to Aus tria, Poland, Hungary and Czecho Slovakia. Is it any wonder that these people object to the Frencl taking the Ruhr?
 O O O
 Billion Dollars in Factories.
 Moreover the industries are st