Evening star., 1942-01-04
u. ). Takes Over
Vast Supplies
In Car0rder
Public Faces Most
Drastic Changes Of
War to Dote
BY FRANK MACMILLES,
Associated Press Business Writer.

NEW YORK, Jan. 3.-When the
Supply Priorities and ALLEGATIONS
Board this week took complete con-
troll of the sales Of new passenger
automobiles and trucks, our war
time Government laid its hands on
the greatest single supply of vital
raw materials the country possessed.
1t also, by announcing plans were
under way to ration civilian purchas-
ing of motor vehicles, and by its
earlier rationing Of tires, FORE
shadowed the most drastic cutting
into the normal American pattern of
life that the war has yet produced.
For the American pattern of liv-
ing has been built, to an extent that
is not even remotely approached
elsewhere, around the passenger
car.
But the prize was high. and our
Government officials were unques-
tionably smart in going after this
major expenditure of vital war ma
terials, industrial men here agreed.
Vital Materials Used.
For the automobile industry, de-
voted primarily to the passenger
car and secondarily to the privately
owned truck or bus, has consumed
things like this-all vital now to
defense:
Steel-5 1893 $50 tons or 1871 per
cent of the country's output.
Rubber-473,6 500 tons of the Ma
tons supply, about 80 per cent.
Lead-228,O00 tons or 342 per cent
of the output.
Copper-228,000 tons or 342 per
cent of the output.
Copper-113,000 tons or 1877 per
cent.
Aluminum-21,0 900 tons or OF per
cent.
Tin-10,O00 tons or ia per cent.
Zinc-76,0OO tons or 121 per cent
OF the total.
Cotton-734,147 bales or 10 per
cent of the country's aggregate.
Nickel-20,000 tons or % per cent
Of all the country produces.
These figures are for 1910, the last
year in which war production had
made no material cut into the nor
NAL production schedule.
They are based on year in which
1859 ,354 motor vehicles were pro-
duced, not materially different from
the past calendar years total. The
percentages above may have shifted
down a bit lately, because the pro-
duction of most vital raw materials
has been stepped up.
But when Washington production
authorities decided on the almost
complete elimination Of passenger
car production in the year ahead in
the interests Of war, it, in effect,
made an enormous demand on the
primary transportation system of the
United States, the privately-owned
passenger automobile.
Total Tops 80 Millions.
There are something more than
80 900 900 registered motor vehicles
in the United States, of which about
27,500,0O0 are private passenger cars,
about 100000 are trucks and few
hundred thousand are buses.
Over the past 10 years, each year
has seen, on the average, 2,3380O0
vehicles sent to the Junk heap, about
1900 900 new ones bought.
OF the private cars, almost an
even half are over years old, and
about 18 per cent have seen service
of 10 years or longer.
What will be done to keep these
cars in service, or even whether the
tires, the gasoline and the necessary
repair parts will be available for
them. if owned by the ordinary citi-
zen, is still an unresolved question.
But these automobiles, old and
new, are the main method Of getting
around for the average American,
and most automobile men here
agreed that the average citizen had
better be looking for alternative
means of transportation-at least
enough of it to save wear-and-tear
on the older cars which might be-
come unserviceable.
Since World War T, industrial men
here pointed out. the country has
become enormously more dependent
on the automobile as a means of
transportation.
At the end of 1916 there were only
about 35OO.000 motor vehicles of all
kinds in the United States, of which
1927 900 were passenger cars. The
balance were trucks and buses.
But in the meantime thousands Of
miles of street railway transporta-
ton, mostly Streetcars, have diSap-
peared and been replaced in part by
buses and to an even greater ex-
tent by use of the private passenger
car.
Dependence Increased.
In the same period our increasing
decentralization in the cities, with
men moving steadily farther from
their places of work, has forced an
ever-growing dependence on the au-
tomobile and the bus.
Forty per cent of all motor We
hicles are registered from farms and
from towns of less than $500 popu-
lation, where they undoubtedly form
the backbone of local transport.
Sixty-eight per cent of all trucks
are registered in these rural" areas,
and 38 per cent of the passenger
cars.
In the truck field. 24,271 fleets Of
eight or more trucks are operated
by business concerns and by State,
county and municipal governments.
The biggest single group, totaling
$4,000 cars, is operated by various
branches of government; the second
largest, 10000 units, is in the truck
ing of freight.
But other groups totaling $4,000 or
more cars, are operated by the oil
companies, the public utilities, the
bakeries, the dairy industry, con-