Evening star., 1945-05-14
Search of Records Fails to Show
Why'd. Laboratory StoysShut
(Second OF a Series.)
BY FRANCIS P. DOUGLAS.

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| (Second OF Series.)
BY FRANCIS p. DOUGLAS.
Search for an explanation why the
District highway departments test
ing laboratory, closed originally to
save money, has remained closed
ever since even though the result
was increased expense to the Dis
trict, leads up blind alley.
Going over the transcripts of Con-
gressional committee hearings at
which the testing laboratory was
discussed gives some clues. But
there is no indication how important
those clues are when you try to
figure out what moved Congress to
vote year after year to keep the
laboratory closed.
The most arresting of those clues
is clash which occurred between
Representative Cannon, Democrat,
of Missouri, then chairman of the
District Subcommittee of the House
Appropriations Committee, and
Capt. H. C. Whitehurst, director of
highways for the District. It took
place at a subcommittee hearing in
December, 1884.
Will of Congress.
The clash was over whether the
will of Congress had been carried
out to end the work at the labora-
tory at Second and Bryant streets
NV, where the District highway
department tested paving materials.
A rider on the District appropriation
bill for fiscal year 1884 had barred
the use of appropriated moneys for
the laboratory and the tests had
been transferred to the National
Bureau of Standards on the pre-
sumption by Congress the tests
would be conducted free at the
Bureau of Standards.
However, in the first year the Dis
trict laboratory was closed the Dis
trict paid out about $4,000 more for
highway department tests than the
tests had cost at the District labora-
tory the year before
This fact apparently troubled Mr..
Cannon, who had reported the clos
ing of the laboratory would save
the District $12,690.
There is no concrete statement
In the record that the clash between
Mr.. Cannon, who is now chairman
of the House Appropriations Com
mittee, and Capt. Whitehurst served
to keep the District laboratory
closed.
Charges in the Record.
But it is in the record that Mr..
Cannon charged Capt. Whitehurst
proposed to increase the cost of
testing as much as possible in an
effort to demonstrate that it cost
more to do it at the Bureau of
Standards than it did at your own
plant"
Capt. Whitehurst denied MIR. Cam
mons charge.
However. the rider on the appro-
priation bill for fiscal 1884 closing
the laboratory was mounted again
on the bill for 1885.
Likewise it has been in every ap-
preparation bill since then and, as
was told yesterday in The Star, it
has cost the District an estimated
total of $148,631, which could have
been saved. Since July /, 1888, the
District has paid out $313,631 for
tests performed at the Bureau Of
Standards.
Letter Read at Hearing.
At a House Appropriations SUBJ
committee hearing on December II,
1884, Mr.. Cannon questioned Capt.
Whitehurst closely about the duties
of several highway department en-
ployes he named. Then Mr.. Cam
non produced letter which charged
the ban on the District laboratory
had not been observed. The letter,
printed in the record of the hear
ing, went on to say:
THE laboratory has been in con-
slant use since the enactment of
this law by my own personal obser-
vation, and is now in use with the
knowledge and consent of the Com
missioners and has been constantly
used by the following-named en-
ployes."
There followed a table giving the
names of employees, their salaries
and their duties. No signature to-
the letter was given in the record.
What have you got to say about
that?" Mr.. Cannon asked.
Whitehurst's Reply.
Capt. Whitehurst replied that
after the passage of the appropria-
ton bill the previous spring instruc-
tions had been issued, effective
July /, 1888, to close the laboratory ;,
to grease and put away the machin-
cry and to leave the laboratory
rooms unused. He said: There has
been absolutely no testing there"
He said later that during fiscal
1884 the District highway depart
ment paid the Bureau of Standards
s29,277, and that the departments
laboratory the year before had done
the work for $11,133.
The questioning brought out that
Capt. Whitehurst and the late Mai.
D. j. Donovan, District auditor, had
gone to Mr.. Cannon's Office to dis
cuss the Bureau of Standards prices
for testing and the possibility of
reopening the Districts own labora-
tory-discussing the subjects very
exhaustively," as Mr.. Cannon put it.
Exchange Followed.
There followed this exchange:
Mr.. Cannon - Immediately after
you left my Office I took it up with
the Department of Commerce, the
Bureau Of Standards, and they told
me they had accustomed to doing