Perth Amboy evening news., 1923-03-15
Geographic News
Bulletins by the
National Geographic Society
CITY OF STEEL AND SHIPS

have announced that they will wipe
out one OF the last of it's slun dis
tricts and provide instead munich
pally owned homes in the suburbs,
thus bids fair to become one of the
lew slumless great cities. Some
thing of this Scottish metropolis,
which in many ways is one of the
most interesting cities in the world,
is told in a bulletin just issued from
the Washington, d. c.. headquarters
OF the National Geographic Society.
Runner-Up for London
Glasgow is inland yet it DOM
mates the worlds shipbuilding in
dustry and has turned out more of
the great ships that daily carry the
pleasure seekers and business men,
the mails and freights, and the grim
steel engines of wal than any salt
water rival" says the bulletin. "And
IN spite of it's off-the-sea location on
stream across which, a century
tago, child could wade, the tonnage
of ships that now berth at its quays
and docks is two-th1rds that of New
| York.
Incidentally, Glasgow, though its
{name may not be quite as familiar
las other British towns, is surpassed
in size in Great Britain only by Lon
don; and with its more than mil
lion inhabitants, it, is barely out
ranked by only two ether cities in
the far-fiung British Empire-Cal-
cutta and Bombay. 1t is in easy
lreach OF becoming the second city
under the British flag
How Glasgow. relatively a small
community on a shallow stream
las daring and more successful than
Mahommet with his mountain
made the sea come to it, is one of
1.-THE most fascinating of the ro-
mances of engineering. For a long
time freight for the city was brought
N ships to a point forty miles down
on the Clyde estuary and carried the
rest of the way on pack-horses and
in carts. Later d port was estab-
iished nineteen miles away; but as
the city grew the need for a port at
its door became more apparent: The
situation seemed hopeless, but in
1873 engineers hit upon the scheme
of narrowing the channel and max
ing it dig it's bottom deeper.
Where Children Waded "Aquitanias"
Float
''The plan worked. The pitifully
meagre two-foot depth of those days
had become s feet by 1885, 20 feet
by 1900, and is now 26 feet-suffi-
cient to accommodate the huge mod
ern ocean liners. Picks, welded by
wading men started the loosening Of
the river bottom in the old days;
then came the horse e-drawn harrows.
In late years explosives and the most
modern of steam dredges have
helped the channel to its depth.
Though Glasgow's waterway is
where the river Clyde has flowed for
ages, it has been truly said that it
is as artificial as the Suez canal
Except where there are CONNER
cial quays and docks, practically
teyery foot of the Clyde waterfrnot,
from Glasgow to the estuary, is now
taken up with the worlds greatest
and busiest sllipyards. Here in a
stream, which for depth at least,
was once outranked by almost any
Isecond-rate. American creek, were
launched in recent years the giant
Acquitania," and the huge battle
iship Hood and othe: famous craft
lamong the largest ever built.
Its Middle Name Is Municipal
Ownership"
"Glasgows fame has gone the
farthest, perhaps, because of the
Wonderful record of it's city govern
ment and the somewhat unusual
, municipal enterprises which it has
} conducted for it's inhabitants. Its
numerous municipality owned and
operated services might we'll have
drawn the charge of 'bolshevsm' had
they not proved successful business
ventures long before that term was
invented. The city took over its
Waterworks at an early date and
developed them. 1t has operated its
own gas works since 1859 and even
rents cook stoves to householders
city has not only lighted the streets
from municipality operated electric
generating stations, bur has also fur
nlshed current for industry and for
lighting dwellings. The street rail-
ways have been owned since 1872
and operated since 1894 by the city.
The municipality constructed a sub
way when only London and Buda-
lest had them and operated it sue
cessfully by cable when London's
steam tube was a failure.
| There are a score or more of
city owned lighthouses and wash
houses, where family washing may
be done with modern facilities; and
Isince 1870 the city has conducted
municipal lodging houses. There is
also a municipal family home"
where children are assured good
care while their parents are at work.
In the provision of public markets,
libraries, parks and Fairgrounds, the
bands are kept busy providing music
in the parks during the summer,
while at other seasons municipal
concerts with excellent programs are
conducted in the city's eight halls
with tickets for only a few cents.
The city began clearing away it's
slums in 1866.
Prosperity Founded on American
Tobacco
America had an important part
in building up Glasgows might. Just
as trading in the spices Of the East
llnade Venice wealthy. so trading in
tobacco from the American colonies
brought great wealth to Glasgow.
The profits we're put into more ships
and the city soon was independent
of America and was trading lucra-
lively with the whole world.
''Industrially, it might be said that
Glasgow made the steam engine,
and the steam engine made Glas-
gow.' James Watt made his great
invention at Glasgow University. A
few years after Robert Fultons
'Clermont' had made its first trip
on the Hudson, the first steamboat
in Europe was operated on the
Clyde at Glasgow. Coal and iron ore
were developed nearby. Blast fur
naces and machine shops came. Now
Glasgow, having made her river,
built her ships, equipped them with
made-in Glasgow machinery, and
bunkered them with Glasgow coal,
to reap profit for the old home