The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1943-08-05
Behind the Scenes
In American Business
BY John Cruddock

being. And the strange thing
about this, to a world that FOR
most of a decade was suffering
because of falling prices, mar
kets and production, is that the
levellng off of the volume OF
business is now welcome. For
economists and business men
alike remember all too clearly
that an ever rising price scale
a continued increase in demand
and acceleration of production
must lead to initiation unless
| these three elements are eX-
actly attuned. And, when
large chunk of production Is
for the purposes of war-actu-
ally for destruction-that means
market demand is not stated by
production and prices run out
of line. That way lies initiation.
The experts find war produc-
| ton is not gaining appreciaply
from the high figures already
attained. Civilian wants are
growing, but little more than
talk has come to give indica-
ton of of an appreciable early
increase in quantities of goods
available for civilians. Retail
trade has been running sharply
! ahead of last year, in terms of
dollar sales, but physical VOL
ume is actually receding. Build
ing, a big influence on the bus
mess picture as a whole, is be-
ginning to lag as new war plant
production falls off and mater
ialS are unavailable for non
war use.
SHORT CUT RUBBER-In a
large part of the program for
production of butadine for man
ufacture of synthetic rubber, it
has been necessary to convert
grain into alcohol from which
the butadine was made. Gov
eminent production officials,
anxious to use as much grain as
possible, since it is renewable,
prefer it to making the buta-
ciene from petroleum which de-
pleteS natural resources. The
beverage distilling industry,
which for more than a year has
been converted 100 per cent to
manufacture of industrial al
cohol, has now made another
significant contribution to the
war effort by developing SIM
plified method which eliminates
the need for first converting
grain into alcohol. Instead, the
butadiene is made directly from
grain in a process demonstrated
at pilot plant recently COM
pleted by Schenley Distillers
Corp. Aside from its advantages
in seed, the new process is ex-
pected to cut the cost of but
adiene.
THINGS TO COME Nylon as
a plastic, from which will be
made zippers, springs, bearings,
luggage, and numerous other
products in the postwar period;
Flexible wall building material,
to be applied like wallpaper,
made from Formica; frameless
handbags with a box bottom;
Feather hats matched by feather
muffs.
BLUE MONDAY FOR THE AK
LS-If Mrs. Housewife, briskly
rubbing clothes on her new
glass dashboard, wonders what
happened to pre-war metal
boards, she might find they're
causing Axis powers a bit of
trouble. Statisticians of the
Blue Ridge Glass Corporation,
computing metal savings chalk
ed up by the use of their glass
in this one item alone, since
Jan. /, 1912, have reported that
the 467,777 pounds of zinc saved
could provide enough of the
metal for 38,O81 1000 cartridges
for small arms, while the 205, 1892
pounds of zinc released during
the first five months of 1913
could be used in the production
of more than 1000 B-26 planes.
BY use of glass instead of tin in
the 12.5 per cent of the wash
boards formerly made from this
metal, an amount has been re-
leased equal to what would be
required for the construction of
camp large enough to house
1876, 900 men of the armed forces
And when Mrs. America dips a
glass board instead of a brass
one into soapy suds, it's another
blue Monday for the Axis be-
cause brass freed in washboard
manufacturing alone provides
material for 1922 cartridge
cases for IS nm. shells.
DAYLIGHT TRACERS-Tracer
bullets assist gunners in esti-
mating the degree by which they
have missed a target, and there
fore in making the necessary
adjustments. They have been es-
pecially valuable at night, when
the light of the tracers has FLAIR
ed in sharp contrast to the
darkness about them, But in
broad daylight, tracers could not
be seen. This handicap has now
been overcome by the manufac-
ture of military goggles with
red plastic lenses. AS explained
by the American Optical Com
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