'{t&m^:^:-'--'r
u ,i 'Mff
J a
- 1 ' ♦
I
ff^
'Ij-'
At*- ,f 1'
AT THE
Front Door of Canada
THE GREAT WORKS OF THE
DOMINIOW IRON AMD STEEL COMPANY,
AT SYDNEY, C. B.
The Most Favourable Situation in the World
for an \roT\ ji^dustry.
A SERIES OF ARTICLES WRITTEN FOR
The Montreal Daily Star,
, BY . -
V/ATSON GRIFFIN.
MONTREAI, :
Dominion Printing Company, 1838 Notre Dame Street.
1899.
SUMMARY OF CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION— The necessity of developing Canadinn iron and steel in-
dustries — The altitude of the Montreal Star — Iron and steel prices are the
best trade barometer and may be used as a guide in making all kinds of in-
vestments.
FIRST ARTICLE— "The Maritime Provinces of Canada the counterpart of the
British Isles as regards natural resources — Sydney, Cape Breton, where the
Dominion Iron and Steel Works are being built, is nearer to Great Britain,
France, Germany and other countries of Europe, South America, Africa,
and Asia than New Orleans, Mobile or any port on the Atlanric coast of the
United States — The establishment of the iron and steel works likely to create
an industrial revolution in these provinces.
SECOND ARTICLE— The strangest iron mine in the world on Great Bell
Island, Newfoundland— Littlj blocks of red hematite ore piled up one upon
another and side by side as children pile up woodtn blocks, so that no expen-
sive mining is required — A million dollars paid for the mine, but it is worth
many times as much— The Company also owns a mine in Cuba — Widespread
indications of iron in the Maritime Provinces.
THIRD ARTICLE — The cost of laying down iron ore at Sydney compared with
the cost at other iron making centres. Iron mines of Great Britain and con-
tinental Europe being rapidly exhausted.
FOURTH ARTICLE— Cluap fuel for the furnaces of the Dominion Iron and
Steel Company — Cape Breton coal makes excellent coke — Four hundred
modern coke ovens to be constructed at Sydney — They will save all the valu-
able volatile constituents of coal which go to waste at most of the coke ovens
of the United States — Interesting statement by Mr. Henry M. Whhney re-
garding the value of sulphate of ammonia as a fertilizer.
FIFTH ARTICLE — The Dominion Iron and Steel Company a combination of
strong men — The past achievements of the President and Directors.
SIXTH ARTICLE — Interesting description of the various processes of making
iron and steel— The difleience between cast iron, wrought iron and steel
— Basic open hearth steel superior to Bessemer steel for all structural purposes,
for shipbuilding and aimour plates. Works of the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company at Sydney.
SEVEN'] II ARTICLE— The cost of making iron and steel at Sydney, C. B.—
Highest and lowest prices of pig iron and steel at Pittsburg, Birmingham, Ala,,
Glasgow and Montreal for many years — The Dominion Iron and Steel Com-
pany likely to make very large profits —Even in periods of world wide depres-
sion with low prices prevailing iron and steel can be sold at a profit.
EIGHTH ARTICLE — Room for a big increase in Canadian production of iron
and steel — For every ton of pig iron made in Canada i6i tons are made in the
United States — Canada ought to makq,a million tons of pig iron annually, but
only made 73,039 tons last year — Favourable situation of Sydney, C. B., for
themanufactureof articles requiring iron and steel as raw materials for either
expoit or home consumption — Canada annually imports over sixteen million
dollars' worth of manufactures of iron and steel, while the United States only
imports about twelve million dollars' worth.
NINTH ARTICLE — The remarkable career of Mr. Arthur J. Moxham, manager
of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company — He has had a very wide experience
in the manufacture of iron and steel, but is still a young man. ,
^' Run ')
A BIG THING FOR CANADA.
Frcjm the Montreal Daily Star, September 15, 1899.
rOR the last thirteen years the Star has been
advocating the development of Canadian
iron and steel industries. It has long
been known to readers of geological reports that British North
America is wonderfully rich in iron, and the Star has frequently
urged the Canadian Government to take steps to secure the
development of our iron resources, because iron is the raw material
of so many manufactures that all industries depend, directly or
indirectly, upon it, and no country can be industrially independent
without a home iron industry. A study of the industrial develop-
ment of other countries showed that no country had ever
established a great iron industry without the stimulus of protective
duties or bounties. The Conservative Government, in framing
the National Policy tariff of 1879, while affording protection to
many industries, failed to apply the principle to that industry
which is the basis of nearly all others. In the year 1886 the Star
published a series of editorials calling upon the Government to
rectify this defect in the National Policy, and, as it was expected
that the tariff would be revised during the Parliamentary
session of 1887, a member of the editorial staff was sent to Cape
Breton and other coal mining sections of Nova Scotia to write up
the question of the value of an iron industry from the standpoint
of the coal mines, the purpose being to show how much the coal
miners would be benefited by the establishment of an iron industry.
A series of articles was published extending over a period of some
4
weeks, and marked copies of the Star containing these articles
were sent to every member of Parliament. Sir Charles Tupper
was then Minister of Finance. He was the first of our public
men to appreciate the necessity of developing an iron-making
industry, and in his budget speech he announced that it would be
the policy of the Govenmient, by protective duties and bounties,
to encourage the establishment of blast furnaces and steel mills.
The development of an iron industry is always a slow process
in its early stages. Mines must be opened, ores tested and trans-
portation provided. Then it requires a very large investment of
capital to carry on the industry, even upon a small scale. A
blast furnace is very costly, and it takes a long time to build one.
With all the millions at the command of the newly organized
Dominion Iron and Steel Company, it will be impossible to get a
single blast furnace in operation in a shorter period than sixteen,
and perhaps eighteen months from the time of giving out the
contract.
Although protective duties and bounties were granted in 1887
there was such bitter opposition to this policy that it was difficult
to induce capitalists to invest upon a large scale because they feared
that a change of Government might result in the abandonment of
protection before they could get their works in operation. How-
ever, it was not long before the good effects of the new policy
began to be seen. A blast furnace using coke as fuel was built
at Ferrona, in Pictou county, N. S., by the Nova Scotia Steel
Company, and a charcoal funiace at Radnor, Que., by the Canada
Iron Furnace Company, both of which produced excellent iron
that soon obtained a reputation even outside of Canada. But the
development of a great Canadian iron industry was delayed owing
to the fact that a world-wide depression existed in the iron
industry and prices were abnormally low for some years.
The Ontario Government, seeing the good effects of the Do-
minion Government's iron policy, supplemented the Dominion
duties and bounties by a provincial bounty. The first furnace to
go into blast in Ontario was the one at Hamilton which proved a
success although it had to bring both coke and ore from a distance.
Then the Rathbuns built a charcoal furnace at Deseronto and
another charcoal furnace is now being built by the Canada Iron
Furnace Company at Midland, on Georgian Bay, which is
considered a most favourable point for assembling the raw mate-
rials, as charcoal and limestone can be obtained near at hand,
while the ore can be brought in the largest lake vessels from the
north shore of Lake Superior,
The future of the Canadian iron industry is very promising.
Prices of iron and steel are now very high throughout the world,
and the best authorities are of the opinion that they will not for
many years reach the abnormally low figures which prevailed for
a few years. The Liberal Government has wisely decided to
accept the Conservative policy of encouraging the iron industry.
At the last session of Parliament Mr. Fielding, Minister of
Finance, with the hearty approval of Sir Charles Tupper, an-
nounced that the period for which bounties would be granted
would be extended until the end of the year 1907. By that time
we believe that Canada will have a number of great iron and steel
making establishments of which the Canadian people will have
reason to be proud. The greatest of them is likely to be that of
the Dominion Iron and Steel Company at Sydney, C. B. The
Star man who visited Cape Breton in 1887 was particularly
impressed with the natural advantages afforded by the proximity
of coal, limestone and iron ore, and he then predicted that some-
where in the vicinity of the coal mines tributary to the harbours
of Sydney and Louisburg a great iron and steel industry would
eventually be established. This prediction is now about to be
realized, and the Star, believing that the investment of so many
millions of dollars in Cape Breton will create an industrial revo-
lution not only in that island, but throughout the Maritime Pro-
vinces, and that all Canada will be benefited by it, proposes to
publish a series of articles under the heading ' ' At the Front
Door of Canada" describing this great undertaking, which will
be far the biggest industrial enterprise in Canada. These articles,
the first of which will appear in to-morrow's issue, should be read
by all Canadians who are interested in the development of the
country. No business man can afford to be ignorant about the
iron industry, because all lines of business are affected by it. As
the Star has already pointed out, many business men who do not
use iron, watch the prices of iron and steel, considering that they
make the best trade barometer, and use them as a guide in
making all kinds of investments.
The Wonderful Geographical Situation of
Sydney, C. B.
'Ftom the Montreal Daily Star, September i6, iSgg,
I.
INCE the building of the Canadian Pacific
Railway no enterprise has excited such gen-
eral interest in Canada as the organization
of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company,
which proposes to manufacture iron and steel at Sydney, Cape
Breton, in the Province of Nova Scotia. The immense amount
of money that is being expended in the construction of the works,
and the fact that the capital for the undertaking is being furnished
by a combination of the wealthiest men in Canada and the United
States, men who have never been known to fail in anything that
they have undertaken, has excited widespread curiosity. The
eyes of the Canadian people have heretofore been turned westward.
The development of Manitoba, the North- West territories and
British Columbia has been watched with keen interest by the
whole people and almost every man, woman and child in the
Dominion has felt a personal interest in the progress of that great
western country. There is no doubt that the people of the
eastern and central provinces will always continue to have a com-
mon national pride in the North- West, but the West will not
engage the exclusive attention of our people in the future as it
has in the past.
Those who wish to watch the development of Canada must
look to the East as well as to the West. Few Canadians as yet
realize the great natural resources of the Maritime Provinces and
the wonderful geographical advantages they possess for a world
wide commerce. These provinces have the same geographical
relation to the continent of North America that the British Isles
have to the continent of Europe. They jut out into the Atlantic
far to the east of North America just as the British Isles lie out
in the Atlantic to the west of Europe. The area is nearly as
great as that of England and Wales, and if Newfoundland be
included the area is a little greater than that of England, Wales
and Scotland. The natural resources of the Maritime Provinces
are probably almost as great as those of the British Isles before
they were developed, and greater than those of the British Isles
at the present time, itor the minerals of the United Kingdom have
been to a considerable extent exhausted, while those of the
Maritime Provinces have scarcely been touched, and their fisheries
are acknowledged to be the richest in the world. The fact that
the resources of the Maritime Provinces have been neglected,
while other parts of the continent have been developed should
not be a reason for discouragement regarding the future of these
provinces. The British Isles were undeveloped and had but a
small population at a time when some of the countries of con-
tinental Europe were rich and populous centres of industry and
commerce.
The Maritime Provinces might also be compared with the
New England States. Including Newfoundland, the area of the
Maritime Provinces is 90,414 square miles, as compared with the
62,005 square miles of the New England States. Excluding
Newfoundland and Maine, we may compare Prince Edward
Island, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, which have an area of
50,214 square miles, with Massachusetts, Rhode Island,
Connecticut, New Hampshire and Vermont, having an area of
32,1 10 square miles and a population of over four millions. The
New England States have no coal, few valuable minerals and
only limited areas of fertile land.
Prince Edward Island, the smallest province of the Dominion,
lies at the south of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and is separated frcin
the mainland by Northumberland Strait. It is 150 miles in
length, varies in width from four to thirty miles, and has an area
of 2,133 square miles, almost every foot of which is suitable fcr
cultivation. The soil is naturally very fertile and the island has
a unique advantage in the possession of inexhaustible supplies of
natural manure in the form of mussel mud, formed by the decay
of oyster, clam and mussel shells in all the bays and river mouths,
A good dressing of this mussel mud is said to have a marvellous
effect in restoring fertility to the poorest soils. The chief crop
of the island is potatoes, but all kinds of grains and vegetables
are produced in abundance and all the fruits of the North tem-
perate zone, excepting peaches and grapes can be successfully
grown. A large cheesemaking industry has been developed
within the last five years. The fisheries are valuable and the
islanders are devoting special attention to the cultivation of
oysters. The island is practically without mineral resources,
although coal is believed to exist at a great depth. The climate
is by no means severe, and the atmosphere is clear, fogs being
seldom experienced. In January and February the thermometer
sometimes registers as low as fifteen degrees below zero for a few
hours at a time, but such cold is exceptional, the average of all
temperatures during January and February for seven years being
nearly seventeen degrees above zero. The Province of Nova
Scotia is three hundred and eighty-six miles in length, by from
8
fifty to one hundred miles in width, with ain area of 210,907
scjuare miles, and extends from the 43rd to the 47th parallel of
latitude. The coasts of the mainland are rugged and uninviting
in appearance, and Mr. Herbert Crosskill has compared the
province to a splendid painting in a coarse iron frame, but the
rough-looking frame, with its minerals, its many commodious
harbours and rich fisheries, is as valuable as the fertile interior.
Owing to its almost insular position and perhaps to the
influence of the Gulf stream, which flows not far from its southern
extremity, the climate of the greater part of the province is
much more moderate than that of the neighbouring Stateof Maine.
Extreme cold is seldom experienced in any part of the province,
but the northern counties are more exposed to the influence of
the Arctic current flowing through Belle Isle than those in the
south and along the Bay of Fundy. Thus, Anna|-olis township,
where the climate averages about six degrees warmer than that
of the State of Massachusetts, is seven or eight degrees warmer
on the average than the counties in Cape Breton and along
Northumberland Strait, five or six degrees warmer than Halifax
and Colchester counties, and three or four degrees warmer than
the famed country of Evangeline along the Basin of Minas. At
Yarmouth, the most southern town in Nova Scotia, the mininum
temperature in an average winter is 1.3 degrees above zero, while
the average of all temperatures in January and February for
seven years was 25.4 degrees. But the summer temperatures are
lower than those of the Annapolis Valley. In Sydney, Cape
Breton, near the north end of the province, the thermometer
sometimes touches thirteen below zero, the average of ^ all
temperatures for January and February for seven years being
18.9 degrees above zero, while at Halifax about half way between
Yarmouth and Sydney, the greatest degree of cold experienced
in an average winter is between six and seven degrees below zero,
the average of all temperatures at that point during January and
February for seven years being twenty-two degrees above zero.
The winters are short, but except in the south-western counties
the spring is long and backward owing to the chilling influence
of the ice that drifts through Belle Isle. But there is some
compensation for the backward spring in the beautiful autumn.
The garden of Nova Scotia is in the Annapolis and
Comwallis valleys, a district about eighty miles long and from
four to twelve miles wide, protected from the summer fogs of
Fundy and the chilling ocean winds by two ranges of hills known
as the North and South Mountains. The North Mountains skirt
the south shore of the Bay of Fundy from Briar Island to the
Basin of Minas, terminating in a bold bluff called Cape Blomidon.
On the other side of Minas channel, the range is continued under
the name of the Cobequid mountains, acting as a shield against
the cold winds coming from the Gulf of St. Lawrence in the
spring. The apples of the Annapolis Valley command a higher
price in the English markets than those grown in any other
quarter of the world. In this valley and its extensions there are
already about forty thousand acres of apple trees, and it is
estimated that there are nearly four hundred thousand acres
capable of producing the very finest fruit. While the climate and
soil seem particularly adapted to the production of apples, they
are also favourable to grapes, melons and tomatoes, and peaches
have been successfully grown. King's county, the scene of
Longfellow's Evangeline, although not quite so warm as Anna-
polis township, is equally fertile, and the dyked land? 'ppear to
be as productive now after centuries of tillage, as wlien they were
cultivated by the simple Acadians. All the other counties
bordering on the Basin of Minas and those lying along Cumber-
land Strait and the Gulf are good agricultural districts. Except-
ing Yarmouth, none of the counties along the Atlantic coast are
generally well adapted for agriculture, although they contain
small tracts of excellent farming lands, and no doubt much of
the land, now considered unsuited for cultivation could be made
productive under a system of scientific farming and the use of
fertilizers.
The gold bearing rocks of Nova Scotia extend along the
Atlantic coast from Canso to Yarmouth, and are estimated to cover
about three thousand square miles. Very little capital has been
invested in their development, but nearly twenty thousand ounces
of gold are annually extracted. Silver, copper, tin, lead, man-
ganese, plumbago and g>'psum have also been found in the pro-
vince, but have not yet been extensively mined. But Nova
Scotir' has most reason to thank Nature for the stores of coal
and iron with which the province is so richly endowed. The
known productive coal fields occupy an area of 685 square miles,
the veins being of extraordinary thickness, and there are believed
to be considerable areas as yet unproved. All the different
varieties of iron ore have been found in the province, and some
of the deposits are very extensive.
Along Nova Scotia's five hundred miles of sea coast are the
breeding and feeding grounds of countless millions of fish. Pros-
perous fishing villages are found all along the rough-looking
coast, and the annual catch is greater than that of any other
Canadian province. The timber resources are great, and extensive
lumbering operations are carried on.
New Brunswick adjoins the State of Maine and is in many
respects its counterpart, but it has a much longer coast line, and
the surrounding waters tend to moderate its climate somewhat.
The most noteworthy feature of the province is its extensive
system of navigable rivers and lakes, giving almost every section
communication with the sea. The total area of the province is
seventeen million acres, and thirteen million acres are estimated
to be suitable for agriculture. Millions of acres in the most
fertile sections still remain unoccupied, and can be obtained by
settlers as free grants or purchased at very slight cost. All kinds
of grains and vegetables thrive in New Brunswick ; apples and
pears are successfully grown, while the smaller fruits, such as
cherries, raspberries and blackberries, are raised in great
ro
quantities. But the province seems to be particularly adapted
for stock raising and dairying, on account of the luxuriant pas-
turage and unfailing supplies of water.
New Brunswick not only has extensive sea fisheries, but its
inland waters are full of salmon, trout and other fish which are
very attractive to sportsmen. There are millions of acres of trees
that have never been touched by the axe. These forests are so
near to navigable rivers connecting with the sea that the facilities
for exporting lumber and making pulp are unequalled. Iron ores
are found in abundance in various parts of the province while
antimony, copper, manganese, lead, silver, gold and tin have been
discovered, but very little capital has been invested in their
development and the value of the deposits is unknown.
The climate of all parts of the Maritime Provinces is remark-
ably salubrious, and it is claimed that the average of life is longer
than in any other quarter of the globe. According to the census
of 1 89 1 in a population of 880,737 for the three provinces there
were 16,961 over seventy-five years of age and 8,098 over eighty
years of age.
With such great natural resources and such a wholesome
climate, why is it that there are less than a million people in
these provinces ? The chief reason is lack of capital to develop
the resources, and lack of confidence on the part of the people.
There are few local manufacturing industries, and hundreds of
thousands have gone to the United States to seek employment.
The products of the farms are shut out of the industrial centres
of the United States by high duties, and the fact that they are
nearer to Europe than any other part of America is of little
advantage at present, because there are no great steamship lines
in summer to carry their products to the British market. In this
respect the farmers of Ontario, although much farther from
England, have an advantage for they can ship their products by
the great steamships that run from Montreal to British ports.
The announcement that great iron and steel works are to be
established at Sydney has had an extraordinary effect upon the
people throughout these provinces. A Montreal business man who
has just returned from a trip to the East says that this great
enterprise is talked of everywhere, and that a feeling of confidence
is being aroused by it that will help all lines of business. There
is a rapidly growing belief that capital is at last to flow freely
into the provinces to develop their great natural resources. Mr.
Henry M. Whitney, President of both the Dominion Coal Com-
pany and the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, has great con-
fidence in the future of the Maritime Provinces and it will be to
the interest of his companies to promote their development, for a
large population in these provinces would make a local market
for the products of the blast furnaces and steel mills. Moreover,
if steamship lines ran from Charlottetown, Halifax, Yarmouth
and St John to Sydney during the summer months the products
of all sections of the provinces might be collected at Sydney fof
shipment to Europe, South America, Africa and Asia in great cargo
ships, together with pig iron and steel, just as the lake vessels
and railways bring the products of Ontario and the North- West
to Montreal, where they are transferred to great ocean vessels.
However, the success of this great enterprise will not depend
upon the local market. In selecting a site for an iron and steel
industry, the first essential is cheap raw materials. The second
is accessibility to the markets of the world. The shrewd business
men who form the directorate of the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company confidently believe that Sydney possesses greater
advantages in these respects than any other locality in America.
The harbours of Sydney and Louisburg are the front doors
of Canada. They might be called magic doors, for they open
wonderfully into short passages to the leading markets of the
world. It is an extraordinary fact that Sydney and Louisburg,
while more than 2,200 miles nearer to Liverpool than New
Orleans and Mobile, are at the same time nearly 600 miles nearer
to Peniambuco, Rio Janeiro and Buenos Ayres, and nearly 900
miles nearer to Cape Town, South Africa. This is because ham-
shaped South America lies far to the east of North America,
while New Orleans, Mobile and other ports on the Gulf of
Mexico are a long distance west of the Atlantic ocean. Moreover
ships from Southern ports of the United States cannot take a
direct route because they have to steer cleai of the West India
Island?. Cape Breton jutting far eastward into the Atlantic, is
much nearer to a direct line drawn north from the east coast of
South America. And the gulf ports are not the only ones over
which the Cape Breton ports have an advantage. The whole
Atlantic coast of the United States slopes away to the .south west,
and Savannah, Charleston, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New
York are so far to the west of the direct routes from Sydney and
Louisburg that the Cape Breton ports, although farther north,
are much nearer to the chief ports of South America and Africa.
The most eastern point of South America is Pernambuco. All
vessels going south of that point to Rio Janeiro, Buenos Ayres or
other South American ports must pass it. The following tables
of distances in nautical miles will show the wonderful advantage
that Sydney has over all American ports for trading with Great
Britain and other countries of Europe, South America, Africa,
and Asia :
TO LIVERPOOL.
Sydney Harbour to Liverpool Miles,
(via N. Ireland) 2,283
(via S. Ireland) ., 2,307
New Orleans to Liverpool 4iSS3
Mobile •• «« 4,506
Savannah •• «« 3»57i
Charleston «« '< 3»Soo
Newport News " *• 3»'S7
Baltimore " " 3»324
Philadelphia " •« 3,160
New York ** " 3fil0
12
TO PERNAMBUCO.
Miles.
Sydney Harbour to Pernambuco 3>567
New Orleans << " 4>I46
Mobile " " 4«I33
Savannah " " 3i66o
Charleston •« •• 31631
Newport News •' •• • 3i59'
Baltimore *• " 3,758
Philadelphia " ♦• 3,746
New York " •• 3,696
TO CAPE TOWN.
Miles.
Sydn(?y Harbour to Cape Town • 6,467
New Orleans " " 7i35S
Mobile, Ala •< " 7>309
Savannah " «' 6,867
Charleston " •• 6,831
Newport News " " 6>736
Baltimore *' " 6,903
Philadelphia " " 6,870
New York •• '• 6,787
The distances from Sydney to the various points were
furnished by Capt. W. H. Smith, R.N.R., Chairman Board of
Examiners of Masters and Mates, Marine Department, Halifax,
while the distances from various American ports were compiled
by the United States Commissioner of Navigation. Louisburg
is not given in the above tables, but the distances from Sydney
and Louisburg are practically the same. Only points on the east
coast of South America and the west coast of Africa are given
for comparison, but it will be evident to all who examine the
maps that Sydney must have the same advantage of distance in
trading with the west coast of South America and the east coast
of Africa. It applies also to the whole Pacific coast of North
America, to Asia and Australia. It seems strange but it is a fact
that Sydney is nearer to San Francisco than any Atlantic or gulf
port of the United States. The distances given are for routes
for full powered steamships.
Sydney Harbour is a magnificent one, in which all the fleets
of the great powers might ride in safety without crowding one
another. It is not only long and wide, but very deep. In the
South Arm, which constitutes the port of Sydney, the general
depth is from 42 to 54 feet, except close to the shore, and at the
small wharf in front of the town of Sydney it is 30 feet deep. It
is claimed that this harbour is more easy of entrance than any
other in America, the mouth being wide and absolutely free from
rocks and shoals. There are two bars, one on each side of the
harbour at some distance from the mouth, which give absolute
protection from ocean storms to the ports of Sydney and North
13
Sydney, but the water Ijetween them is wide and deep, and the
soundings from the deep sea converge toward the inner harbour
in such a way that mariners entering these ports can have
absolute assurance that they are free from all dangers. Vessels
passing out of the harbour enter at once into the open sea, and
can go at full speed. The ocean routes from Sydney and
Louisburg are well clear of Sable Island, and vessels making for
these ports avoid all the dangers of that ' ' graveyard of the
Atlantic." The ferry boats on Sydney Harbour between the
towns of Sydney and North Sydney usually run from the 20th of
April to the 15th of January. The earliest closing in ten years
was the 7th of January, and the latest the 4th of February. The
earliest opening was the 3rd of April, and the latest the rst of
May. It would not be a difficult matter to keep the harbour
itself open all winter, but ice sometimes blocks the gulf and
Cabot strait. However, Mr. Reid's steamer Bruce, ran all last
winter between Sydney Harbour and Newfoundland, and in view
of the success of Russia in keeping up communication with its
far northern ports by means of ships that break down ice twenty
feet thick it is probable that communication between Sydney and
Europe could easily be maintained throughout the year by
keeping one such ship to break the way for other vessels.
However, the harbour of Louisburg, which possesses all the
advantages of Sydney as regards short distances from all the
markets of the world, is open throughout the year. It is a beautiful
harbour, although not as capacious as that of Sydney, and has a
depth of fiom 54 to 66 feet. It is said to be the only port this
side of the Atlantic where coal could be obtained at mine prices
in winter. I/)uisburg is connected with Sydney by a railway
about 40 miles in length, belonging to the Dominion Coal
Company, and can be used by the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company during the short period when Sydney Harbour is closed.
For nine months of the year the route to Sydney is absolutely free
from all dangers of ice, and it is claimed that its approaches are
situated north of the large fog areas indicated on the ' ' Pilot chart
of the North Atlantic," so prevalent from the Grand Banks of
Newfoundland tO Sandy Hook, and sometimes westward to the
Delaware.
Mr. George Dobson, secretary of the Sydney Harbour Board,
recently published a pamphlet advocating that the fast Atlantic
steamships on their way to Quebec or Montreal, in summer,
should make North Sydney a port of call. He argued that the
distance would be only 1 50 miles greater than by the Belle Isle
route, and that as steamships could go at full speed all the way
without fear of icebergs or fogs, better time could be made.
Mails could be landed at North Sydney and forwarded by fast
trains to the West. Sir Sanford Fleming is also an advocate of
this route.
The advantages of Sydney as a coaling port are well known
to seamen and many vessels trading between American ports and
14
Europe call there for coal. By doing so they are able to carry
larger cargoes. In the year 1898 there entered Sydney Harbour,
including the ports of Sydney and North Sydney, from the ocean
909 vessels besides 641 vessels engagea in the coasting trade. It
may be noted that the number of vessels entering Montreal from
the sea was 465 and those engaged in the coasting trade 3759.
Being the nearest point to Europe and having a cable station,
many vessels call at Sydney Harbour for orders which are cabled
by their owners.
The works of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will be
located at this magnificent harbour of Sydney close to the town
of Sydney and in the centre of one of the greatest coal fields in
the world. On the other side of the harbour directly opposite the
works are very large supplies of limestone. There are valuable
deposits of magnetic iron ore a few miles away and numerous
discoveries of other varieties of iron ore have been made in Cape
Breton, but the Company own the most remarkable iron mine in
the world on Great Bell Island, Newfoundland, and the ore can
be mined and loaded on ships so cheaply that for the present the
supplies of iron ore will be chiefly drawn from this source.
James M. Swank, secretary of the American Iron and Steel
Association, says : "From the iron ore mines of Michigan and
Minnesota to the coal of Pennsylvania the distance is 1000 miles.
Connelsville coke is taken 600 miles to the blast furnaces of
Chicago and 750 miles to the blast furnaces of St. Louis. The
average distance over which all the domestic iron consumed
in the blast furnaces of the United States is transported is not
less than 400 miles, and the average distance over which the
fuel which is used to smelt it is transported is not less than 200
miles. ' '
The first furnaces in the Pittsburg district were started on
local ores, but now almost the entire supply comes from the Lake
Superior mines. The only blast furnaces of the Unit^^d States
that have their raw materials close together are in the Southern
States. Of these the most favourably located are those of the
Birmingham district in Alabama where fuel and ore are very close
together. Moreover, the Alabama furnaces are far from the
leading markets and the freight rates on the pig iron have to be
added to the cost of production. The nearest seaport is Mobile,
276 miles by rail from Birmingham, the centre of the iron district.
It is 349 miles by rail from Birmingham to New Orleans, 448
miles to Savannah, 476 miles to Charleston, 766 miles to Newport
News, 804 miles to Baltimore, 855 miles to Philadelphia and 794
miles to Pittsburg. The freight from Birmingham to Mobile is
one dollar per ton, to New Orleans $1.40, to Savannah or Charles-
ton $1,75, to Cincinnati $2.75, to St. Louis $3.25, to Louisville,
Ky., $2.50, to Baltimore by the all rail route $5.33, or by rail and
water $3. 75, to Boston all rail $5. 83, or by rail and water $4. 10.
The iron ore of Pittsburg has to be brought from the mines
of Northern Michigan and Minnesota by rail to a Lake Superior
15
port, and there loaded on vessels, after which it must be carried
through Lake Superior, the Sault Canal, Lake Huron, Lake
St. Clair, the tortuous channel of the Detroit River and Lake
Erie to Cleveland and other Lake Erie ports, where it is trans-
ferred to railways to be transported to the furnaces. This makes
three handlings of the ore between the Lake Superior mines and
the furnaces as compared with one handling of the ore which
will be used at Sydney. When the iron and steel is made Pittsburg
is an excellent centre for distribution of the product in the central
States, but it is a considerable distance from the seaboard and
iron intended for shipment to foreign countries has to go by rail
to Philadelphia 354 miles, to New York 445 miles, or to Boston
675 miles. The distance from Pittsburg to Montreal is 710 miles
by rail as compared with the water route of about 726 miles from
the works at Sydney to Montreal, but transportation is much
cheaper by water than by rail.
The Strangest Iron Mine in the World.
From the Montreal Daily Star, September 23, i8gg.
II.
^HE Wabana iron mine which was recently pur-
chased by the Dominion Iron and Steel Company
for a million dollars, is on Great Bell Island,
in Conception Bay, Newfoundland, about 35
miles from St. John's. Experts pronounce it to be the most
remarkable iron mine in the world, and even the ordinary tourist,
who knows nothing about minerals, can appreciate its peculiar
formation. The ore bed consists of small regular blocks of red
hematite, most of them about four inches long, two inches wide
and two inches thick, but some of them considerably larger.
These blocks are piled one upon another and close together just
as a child piles up wooden blocks, making a bed of ore of an
average thickness of eight feet extending over 817 1-2 acres,
which is estimated to contain over 28,000,000 tons of available
ore besides the areas under the sea which will be referred to later
on. The ore crops up at the surface and mining in the ordinary
sense is not required. It is only necessary to shake the blocks
of ore apart and they can be shovelled into cars without trouble.
Indeed, as each of the little blocks of ore appears to be separate
from the others, although they are piled very close together, it
would probably be possible to pick them from the bed by hand,
or knock them apart with a crow-bar, but this would be a tedious
and expensive process and in order to loosen large quantities at
once dynamite is used.
The Star is indebted to Mr. R. E. Chambers, M.E., manager
at the mine, for most of the following information about the
mine. There are in all five beds of ore exposed in the cliffs upon
the northern side of Bell Island, but three of these extend over so
small an area and are so thin that they are of little commercial
value. The other two are known as the upper and lower beds,
the former, which is estimated to contain six million tons, being
still owned by the Nova Scotia Steel Company, which sold the
lower bed containing 28,000,000 tons to the Dominion Iron and
Steel Company. Both beds have the same peculiar formation.
The outcrop of the lower bed is seen in the cliffs on the north side
i8
of the island, its western extremity being at Ochre Cove and
its eastern near Gull Island head. It extends for a distance of
3 1-2 miles without any apparent dislocation of the strata, and the
ore is exposed over most of its extent, giving unusual facilities
for open cut working. There is little doubt that 200 feet of this
outcrop can be mined open cut over the greater part of this
distance, giving about three million tons of ore, and when this is
worked out many times that amount can be mined underground
with natural drainage. When the 34,000,000 tons of ore avail-
able on the island are exhiiusted, which will not be for many
years, the ore beds can be followed under the sea just as some of
the coal mines in Cape Breton extend under the sea. Mr. Cham-
bers thinks there is no doubt that enormous quantities of the ore
could be obtained by following the ore bed under the sea.
The shipping facilities are excellent. Great Bell Island is
eight miles long and two miles wide. The north side, where the
ore is situated, is exposed to northern winds, but on the opposite
side, where the shipping pier is located, there is a very good har-
bour, perfectly sheltered from the winds. The waters of the bay
are deep and free from rocks and shoals ; the bottom being mud
near the pier affords admirable anchorage. Near the island the
Admiralty charts show from 48 to 84 feet of water. The bay is
navigable from eight to nine months of the year. The mine is
connected with the pier by a double track cable tramway. This
tramway is 2-foot gauge and two miles in length, and is operated
by an endless steel cable 15-16 inch in diameter and four miles in
length. There are 377 cars. It is an interesting sight to seethe
long rows oi cars loaded with the little blocks of red ore moving
towards the pier. The pier is 45 by 65 feet, and 90 feet high,
constructed of Southern pine, which is supported upon 190
bearing piles surrounded by a crib-work of heavy timber filled
with stone. There are ten pockets of 200 tons capacity each at a
height sufficient to discharge into a steamer by gravity. The
chutes for this purpose descend at an angle of 40 degrees and are
moved by a counterbalanced winch, easily operated by one man.
The cars are dumped by an automatic tipple, upset by the weight
of the loaded car and returned to an upright position by cast iron
counterbalance weights hung upon a shaft beneath the floor. In
loading a steamer 200 tons have been discharged from one pocket
in ten minutes. Two thousand five hundred tons a day can be
shipped with the present facilities, and improvements can be made
by the Dominion Iron and Steel Company to increase the output
when required.
The depth of water at the pier is 24 feet at low tide, increas-
ing rapidly away from the shore. The access is easy, unobstruct-
ed by rocks or shoals. The cost of mining ore and loading it on
vessels is only from twenty-five to thirty cents a ton. The first
shipment of ore was made in December, 1895, and since then
about 600,000 tons have been shipped. This year 300,000 tons
have been shipped. The terms of the Newfoundland mineral act
'9
are very favourable to the operators in resjard to security of title,
the only condition being the expenditure of $6000 for each square
mile, no Govenunent royalty being demanded. In this case the
necessary expenditure has been largely exceeded in the equip-
ment of the property by the Nova Scotia Steel Company.
The exact way in which the ore from this Newfoundland
mine and coke made from Cape Breton coal will work together in
the furnace is not a matter of conjecture. The Nova Scotia
Steel Company has been using Cape Breton coke and Newfound-
land ore together at Fcrrona, with very great success for several
years. The coal is carried from Cape Breton to Ferrona, where
it is manufactured into coke. There are large coal mines in
Pictou county, in the vicinity of Ferrona, and Pictou coke has
been extensively used for smelting purposes, but large quantities
of Cape Breton coke have also been used. The furnace at Fer-
rona is supposed to have a capacity of eighty tons a day, but it
has been found that no tons a day can be made with Cape Bre-
ton coke and Newfoundland ore, as they work so easily together
in the furnace. As already stated, each of the four furnaces at
Sydney will have a capacity of 250 tons of pig iron per day, but
in view of the experience at Ferrona, it is thought that this may
be considerably exceeded.
At present the ore is being sent to the furnace of the Nova
Scotia Steel Company at Ferrona, to Rotterdam, Holland, to
Baltimore and other points in the United States, but when the
Dominion Iron and Steel Company's furnaces at Sydney go into
blast the ore will be reserved for their use. The four furnaces
will turn out between three and four hundred thousand tons of
pig iron annually and it takes less than two tons of iron ore to
make a ton of pig iron, so that the 28,000,000 tons of ore in this
mine would be sufficient to supply these furnaces for more than
a quarter of a century without going beneath the sea. However,
the Company will probably build other furnaces in a few years
as the demand for their products increases.
But the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will not be en-
tirely dependant upon this mine for supplies. There are many
other deposits of iron ore in Newfoundland, situated near to the
sea, and, while it is not probable that any of them can be mined
so cheaply as the peculiar ore beds of Great Bell Island, they
will no doubt compare favourably with mines in other places.
Then the Company also owns a valuable iron mine in the Santi-
ago district of Cuba, and ore from this mine can be brought to
Louisburg at all seasons of the year. There are iron ore deposits
in almost every section of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick and
some of them are of superior quality. Any one who has read
the Government geological reports and the writings of Sir Wil-
liam Dawson and other scientists who have studied the geology
of the Maritime Provinces must be impressed with the wide-
spread indications of iron in these Provinces.
20
Nothing else has contributed so much to the cheapening of
iron ore in the West as the increased size of the vessels that navi-
gate the upper lakes. It is a well known fact that the larger the
cargo a ship can take the cheaper freight rates will be. But
there is a limit to the size of boats that can go through the Sault
canals and get into the lake ports. The Sault canals would have
to be greatly enlarged and the lake harbours would have to be
deepened at enormous expense before boats drawing twenty-four
feet of water, such as can reach the pier at Great Bell Island at
low tide, could be accommodated. And most of the harbours in
the Maritime Provinces are deeper than that at Great Bell Island.
Indeed these Provinces abound in magnificent harbours capable
of accommodating not only the largest ships now on the ocean,
but much bigger ships than any yet built.
Ore from the Lake Superior mines can only be shipped by
water for about seven months of the year, lake navigation being
closed during the winter. There are thirteen harbours in New
Brunswick and Nova Scotia open throughout the year, viz. , St.
John and St. Andrews in New Brunswick and Halifax, Louis-
burg, Yarmouth, Annapolis, Barrington, Liverpool, Lockport,
Lunenburg, Parrsboro and Shelboume in Nova Scotia, besides a
host of good harbours which are open nine months of the year.
The iron ores in every section of the Maritime Provinces are
within easy reach of seaports and could be transported to
Sydney or Louisburg at all season of the year. Valuable iron
ores have been found in various sections of Quebec province,
and ores from all parts of Quebec province could be cheaply
shipped to Sydney, during the summer. But Cape Breton itself
appears to be well supplied with iron ores according to the re-
ports of the Government geologists.
In making iron it is often advantageous to mix different ores
together to get various qualities of iron. The wonderful geo-
graphical position of Sydney and Louisburg, with their deep
water harbours, nearer to all quarters of the world than any
other seaports of the American continent, will give the Dominion
Iron and Steel Company a very great advantage in bringing ore
from any outside point for such intermixture.
Value of the Great Bell Island Mine.
From the Montreal Daily Star, September aj, z8gg.
'^
T
III.
*N preceding articles of this series it has been
shown that Pittsburg, the leading iron-making
centre of the United States, gets nearly all its
iron ore from the mines south of Lake
Superior, and that the ore has to be carried first by rail, then by
water, and again by rail for about a thousand miles, involving
three handlings, before it reaches the blast furnaces, while the
ore to be used by the Dominion Iron and Steel Company in the
blast furnaces at Sydney will come from the Great Bell Island
mine in Conception Bay, Newfoundland, about 400 miles dis-
tant from Sydney, and will only have to be handled once, being
loaded at the mine upon large ships that will lay it down at the
pier of the Company right beside the blast furnaces.
It has been stated that the ore of Great Bell Island can be
mined and loaded on ships for from twentj'^-five to thirty cents
per ton. This is not a matter of conjecture, but of actual ex-
perience extending over several years in which 600,000 tons of
ore have been mined and shipped. No royalty has to be paid.
Some idea of the freight rate from Great Bell Island to Sydney
can be obtained from the freight rates on the ores shipped froni
Lake Superior ports to Oh; j ports, a much longer distance. The
average rate during 1898 on iron ore shipped from Escanaba to
Ohio ports was 50.8c ; from Marquette to Ohio ports, 59.8c ;
head of Lake Superior to Ohio ports, 6ic. The average rate dur-
ing the pfst ten years has been: From Escanaba, 67c ; from Mar-
quette, 83c ; from the head of Lake Superior, 94c. During
recent years the rates have been lowered owing to the increased
size of the boats navigating the Upper Lakes. Most of the
ore from Lake Superior was brought down to Lake Erie ports
last year in the large 6000-ton ships which were put in com-
mission in 1897. It was found that the smaller boats could not
compete with them.
Tl''' distance from Great Bell Island to Sydney being mucli
short'.r and through much deeper waters without any canals to
go tl rough, or any tortuous, narrow channels to navigate, larger
carj;oes could be carried and better time could be made, so that
the freight rate on ore should be lower. It may, therefore, be
avssumed that the cost of laying down ore it the Sydney blast
furnaces, including mining, loading, shipping and unloading,
will not exceed one dollar per ton, and it may be considerably
less. Let us compare this with the cost of ore in other places.
At Cleveland, Ohio, according to The Mineral Industry, the prices
fixed last year by the agents handling ores were as follows :
Hematite ores, Bessemer quality, $2.55 to $3.25 ; hematite ores,
non-Bessemer quality, $2.10 to $2.25. The annual statistical re-
port of the American Iron and Steel Association gives the prices
at which sales were made early in 1899, for season delivery at
Cleveland, as follows : No. i Bessemer hematites, $2.80 to $3.25 ;
soft hematites. No. i, non-Bessemer, $2.00 to $2.15. From
Cleveland to Pittsburg the iron ore has to be carried by rail and
the freight rate on ore must be added.
The Stateman's Year Book, says that in the year 1897 the
United Kingdom imported 5,968,680 tons of iron ore, the value
of which was ;^4,436,oo4, that is, 14s. lod. per ton, equal to
about $3.60 per ton, in Canadian money. From 1893 to 1897 "i-
elusive, 24,336,814 tons were imported, and the value was ;^i6,-
963,370, that is, 14s. per ton, equal to about $3.40 per ton in
Canadian money. At the present time Spanish hematite ores
laid down in Glasgow are selling at 15s. to 17s. per ton, that is,
from $3.65 to $4. 15 per ton. "The Iron and Coal Trades Re-
view," published in London, Eng., in its issue of September i,
1899, states that the price of hematite ore at the mines on the
west coast of England on August 31 was i6s. equal to $3.90.
The Nova Scotia Steel Company has been selling Great Bell
Island ore in Rotterdam at a price which amounted to $1.15 per
ton at the mine, after deducting the cost of transportation, giv-
ing them a profit of 85 or 90 cents per ton, and we understand
that the Dominion Iron and Steel Company have assurances that
they can sell ore in Rotterdam for delivery next year at from 1 5
to 16 marks per ton, which would give them from $1.65 to $1.90
at the mine, after paying the cost of mining and transportation,
making the profit on every ton of ore mined for export from
$1-35 to $1.60.
The iron ore supplies of Great Britain, Germany and other
iron manufacturing countries of Europe are rapidly becoming ex-
hausted. Great Britain has for years been drawing supplies
from Spain and other outside countries. The making of iron is
not a new thing. In the 4th chapter of Genesis Tubal- caiQ is
described as an "instructor of every artificer in brass and iron,"
and nearly all the ancient writers refer to the use of iron. In
all the ages that have passed since Tubal-cain first began to work
23
in metals, iron has been used in various industries, and when
we consider how many millions of men have lived and died since
then, it is not at all surprising that the supplies of iron ore in the
old world are running out. Great Britain has been making enor-
mous quantities of iron for generations, and great as are the
natural resources of those little islands, the supplies of the raw
materials cannot hold out much longer at the present rate of
consumption. Long before the mines of Europe are completely
exhausted the scarcity of ore is likely to enhance the price.
According to Mr. R. P. Rothwell, a well-known American
authority on iron, the production of pig-iron in the iron-making
countries of the world in 1898 required the mining and handling
of approximately 70,000,000 tons of ore. The United States
alone consumed 21,772,750 tons of iron ore in 1898, of which
14,029,683 tons were mined in the Lake Superior district, 4,980,-
000 tons in the Southern States and i ,678,500 tons i.i other states.
Besides this hoiae production of iron ores 187,219 tons were im-
ported into the United States from abroad as compared with 489,-
970 tons imported during the preceding year, tl^e decrease in
imports being largely due to the war with Spain. The great
iron manufacturers of the United States are growing alarmed lest
their supplies of ore should run short and have been buying up
iron mines. In Great Britain it is estimated that 14,000,000 tons
of ore were mined and 5,468,395 tons imported last year. In
Germany 15,893,246 metric tons of ore were mined.
The London Economist recently discussing the probability
of Great Britain losing its supremacy in the manufacture of iron
and steel, said : "It must be remembered for how long a period
the mines in this country have been worked. The output of
blackband ore in Scotland has been decreasing for 3'ears past,
and the greater portion of the pig-iron now made in that district
is from foreign ores. Cleveland which has been one of the most
prolific districts in the country, has now been worked nearly
fifty yei-^s, and the best ore having been taken out first, we may
soon have to fall back on the poorer, and consequently costlier
kinds. It has been known for some time past that the best
hematite ores in the Bilbao district in northern Spain are fast
deteriorating, and if we have to fall back on the poorer qualities,
those containing a lower percentage of iron, they will be more
costly, owing to the proportionately greater cost of carriage by
sea."
In another issue the Economist says : "As the production of
Great Britain cannot very readily be extended, owing to the dif-
ficulty of obtaining ore, it seems probable that the United States
will have to supply the bulk of the additional three million tons
of pig-iron which are likely to be required during the next three
years. ' '
It has been thought that the Lake Superior mines were in-
exhaustible, but before the boom of this year it was considered a
24
most significant fact that some of the most experienced American
companies were quietly buying ore mines, which two or three
years previously were closed down, because their ores were un-
saleable in competition with the best ores of Lake Superior.
Taking into consideration the increasing demand for iron ore
and the fact that the supplies are becoming exhausted in many
sections where they were formerly plentiful, it is evident that
the Dominion Iron and Steel Company might make a great deal
of money by simply exporting iron ore from their wonderful
Newfoundland mine, but there is more money to be made in con-
verting the ore into pig-iron and steel, and it will be far better
for Canada, as thousands of men will be employed in the coal
mines, coke ovens, blast furnaces and steel mills of Sydney, and
the industries that will grow up around them.
Cheap Coke for The Sydney Furnaces.
Prom the Montreal Daily Star, September 30, xSgg,
4'
IV.
N selecting a site for blast furnaces it is always
considered desirable to get as near to coal
mines as possible. The iron ore is usually car.
ried a long distance, but furnaces that have to bring their fuel
from a distance are at a great disadvantage. It is much
more economical to carry the iron ore to the coal than the coal
to the ore. It is true that some of the furnaces in the United
States bring both their ore and their fuel from a distance, the
Chicago blast furnaces, for example, getting their coke from
Connellsville, Pa., and their iron ore from the Lake Superior
mines, but iron can be manufactured much more cheaply when
the furnaces and the coke ovens are close to the coal mines. The
Dominion Iron and Steel Company are particularly fortunate in
having secured a site for their works in the centre of one of the
greatest coal fields of the world. The Sydney coal field occupies
an area of about 200 square miles, and has productive coal mea-
sures exceeding 6,000 feet in thickness.
It is one thing to have coal, and another thing to have coal suit-
able for fuel in making iron, but there is no doubt that at least
four of the mines owned by the Dominion Coal Company within
a short distance of the blast furnaces now being constructed by
the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, produce coal which
makes coke exceedingly well adapted for the blast furnace. This
has been shown not only by an analysis of the coal, but also by
using the coke extensively in the blast furnace at Ferrona, with
Great Bell Island ore, for several years.
The Dominion Iron and Steel Company have made most
favourable arrangements with the Dominion Coal Company for
securing any quantity of coal that may be desired at a very
satisfactory price. Mr. Henry M. Whitney is president of both
companies, and until January, 1903, the Iron and Steel Com-
pany will have the option of leasing the Dominion Coal Company,
26
including all its mines and the Sydney and Louisburg Railway,
for ninety-nine years, on condition of paying the fixed charges,
and six per cent, annually on common stock. Whether the di-
rectorate of the Iron and Steel Company decide to lease the Coal
Company or not, the contract between the two companies per-
manently assures to the Iron and Steel Co. an ample supply of
cheap fuel.
The coal of Cape Breton is bituminous. The different fuels
used in blast furnaces are charcoal, anthracite coal and coke
from bituminous coal. Charcoal is an expensive fuel, and while
it makes a superior iron, it is usually too costly to be used for
ordinary purposes. At one time all iron was made with charcoal
as fuel, and there is still a considerable demand for charcoal iron
for making car wheels and some other purposes. It is also used
to a certain extent for admixture with iron made with anthracite
or coke as fuel. But the cost of iron and steel for ordinary pur-
poses has been greatly reduced by the use of coal and coke.
Bituminous coal contains much more volatile matter than
anthracite, and it is, therefore, unsuitable for the blast furnace
until the volatile constituents are taken out of it, when it is
called coke. Dr. Joseph D. Weeks, of Pittsburg, editor of the
American Manufacturer andiron World, who has made a study of
coke and coking for years and is regarded as one of the best au-
thorities in the United States on this subject, has described the
difference between anthracite coal and coke and the process of
coking most lucidly. He says : "Anthracite coal is solid, while
coke is porous, being filled with little cells. It is this porosity,
this cell space, that makes coke a more vigorous fuel than anthra-
cite, that is, it will burn more rapidly, just the same as a pound
of shavings will burn more rapidly than a pound of solid wood.
There is the same amount of heat in the .same weight of each,
but the one burns much more freely, much more rapidly, is a
much more vigorous fuel. It is this porosity of coke combined
with its toughness and hardness that in a large measure gives it
value as a blast furnace fuel much superior to anthracite. A
modern blast furnace, say i8 feet in diameter at thebOvShes, using
anthracite coal will do good work if it makes 400 tons a week.
A furnace of the same size using coke will make four times this
amount ; and a furnace is being built at Pittsburg to use coke as
fuel that will make at least 500 tons a day, a feat that would be
utterly impossible with anthracite as fuel. In our United States
practice the value of a blast furnace fuel depends largely upon
the rapidity with which it will do its work. It is the same in
many operations. We must do our woric quickly, and to do this
where heat is used, we need a quick-acting, vigorous fuel. This
gives a porous fuel like coke its great value. I could make a fuel
in a coke oven very like anthracite, provided I did my coking
under pressure, but I would destroy one of the most valuable
features of the coke as fuel, its porosity.
27
•'Coking is simply the driving off from bituminous coals,
by the action of heat, of the volatile matter they contain. No
matter how coking is performed, whether it be in an illuminating
gas works or in a bee-hive or a by-product coke oven, what takes
place is always the same. As the heat is applied the coal begins to
swell, becomes pasty and sticky and throws ofif bubbles of gas.
In a word, the coal melts, loses all traces not only of its original
form, but of its appearance and structure as well, and the par-
ticles freed from volatile substances unite in a coherent mass or
as it is termed 'cake,' or 'coke.' As this melted coal solidi-
fies or ' cakes,' it encloses small bubbles of gas, which make
the cells like those in a piece of blast furnace coke if the ' gas-
sing * process has not been pushed too rapidly. But these
pores, these cells, can be made large or small. If the operation
is in a small body of coal and the ' gassing ' is pushed, you get
the weak coke with large cells, known as gas-hous2 coke,
that will hardly bear its own weight. But if the coking is done
under proper conditions, you get a hard, strong coke that will
bear the burden of the blast furnace. ' '
It is evident from the above that bituminous coal when
properly coked makes the best fuel for a blast furnace. The
Dominion Iron and Steel Company have already given out the
contracts for the construction of 400 Otto-Hoffman by-product
coke ovens, which will be located between the iron works and
the coal mines, in the most convenient situation that could be
desired. These coke ovens, which will cost about $1,250,000,
will be of the most modern design, and will save all the by-
products of coal which are allowed to go to waste at nearly all
the coke ovens and blast furnaces in the United States.
The coke-ovens in general use in the United States are
known as bee-hive ovens, because they are dome-shaped. The
sole object aimed at in these ovens is to make coke, all the
valuable volatile constituents of the coal being lost. A lump of
bituminous coal is a storehouse in which a great variety of
valuable chemicals are locked up. The bee-hive oven sets them
free, or destroys them, and only saves one thing — the coke. The
by-product coke-ovens, which are now univ^ersally used in
Germany, which are rapidly displacing the bee-hive ovens in
England and Scotland, and are beginning to come into use in the
United States, are designed to save everything in the coal and
make practical use of all its constituents.
Dr. Weeks has given the following description of the two
kinds of ovens : ' ' The bee-hive oven, which takes its name from
its shape, is usually in the Connellsville region of Pennsylvania,
12 feet in diameter, by 7 feet high, with two openings, one in the
top, through which the coal is charged into the oven and through
which the burning gavSes and waste products of combustion escape
into the air ; and the larger opening or door in the front, through
which the air is admitted for combustion, and out of which the
2S
coke, after being burned and quenched, is drawn. Air is
admitted in this oven above the coal during the process of coking ;
the heat necessary for coking being derived partly from the
heat stored in the walls of the oven during the coking of the
furnace charge, but chiefly from the combustion in the oven of
the gases and a part of the coal. It requires 48 hours to coke a
charge of 5 tons of coal. The by-product oven, on the other
hand is a closed oven. No air is admitted into that portion of
the oven in which the coal is being coked. Consequently no
combustion takes place in the oven. The heat necessary for
coking comes from the combustion of gas and air in flues in the
side walls and the bottom of the oven, the heat passing through
the fire brick walls which separate these flues from the coking
chamber or oven proper. The by-product oven is a long narrow
oven, the coking chamber of which is from 25 to 33 feet long, 14
to 28 inches wide, and 5 1-2 to 7 feet high. It is charged through
two or more charging holes in the top ; the weight of the charge
being 5 to 8 net tons of coal. The time of coking is from 1 8 to
48 hours. The products that pass off are just as they come from
the coal. There is no air mixed with them at all, as there is in
the bee-hive oven. There is no waste of the carbon in the coal.
It is not so in the bee-hive oven. You burn a part of the coal in
the bee-hive oven in the process of coking the rest. The
advantage of coking without the admission of air is in the first
place that the total amount of carbon, which is in the coal, is
saved in the coke ; in the second place, a different kind of tar
and gas is produced from what would be formed in an open
bee-hive oven ; and in the third place, the action of the ovens
can be perfectly controlled, of course within limits, but the
limits are very broad. As to the by-products or those products
that go off with the volatile matter, the chief of these are
ammonia, which can be procured either as amnioniacal liquor
aqua ammonia or sulphate of ammonia ; tar, which is practically
the same as the coal tar of the illuminating gas works, making
gas from coal ; and gas which differs but little from illuminating
gas.
' ' One word only abojiit the method of collecting these by-
products. Running along the top of the bank or block of by-
product ovens is a large pipe into which the gas evolved in coking
passes. All the gas trom all the ovens passes into this one pipe,
the result being that a gas of quite uniform composition is
produced. As it passes along the tar is condensed just as it is at
an illuminating gas works. The gas freed of its tar passes
through the ammonia scrubber in which the ammonia is taken
out of it precisely as it is in an ordinary gas works, only on a
much larger scale. The gas is then either purified and enriched
if necessary, and used for illuminating or heating purposes or it
can be returned to the ovens and burned in the flues for coking
the coal. In the latter case there is more gas than is necessary
29
for coking, giving several thousand feet of tar gas, as it is called,
as well as a large amount of waste heat. ' '
Dr. Weeks was sent by the United States Government to
England, Germany, France and Belgium to examine the coke
ovens there, and he has no hesitation in saying that the by-
product coke ovens make better coke for metallurgical purposes
than the bee-hive ovens. He says : ' ' The Germans, with by-
product coke, and with an ore greatly inferior to that we use
in our blast furnaces, are doing better work than we are. They
are using fewer pounds of coke to produce a ton of pig-iron with
poorer ore and by-product coke, than we are on the average with
our rich Lake Superior ores and our Conuellsville bee-hive coke.
These by-product ovens are no experiment. There are some
4,000 of them in operation in Europe to-day. The only reason
why the number of such ovens has not vastly increavSed is that
the amount of capital invested in ovens already erected in old
coke making vsections is so large that the owners hesitate to throw
it away. There are 45,000 ovens of the bee-hive pattern in the
United States. It would be a low calculation to say that they
cost $400 apiece. That is $18,000,000. One will hesitate a
good while before throwing away this amount of money. But
as new ovens are erected abroad, by-product ovens are being
built, and this will be true of the United States also."
The Dominion Iron and Steel Company, starting with every-
thing new, are fortunately not obliged to maintain antiquated
coke ovens. But they will not have to make any experiments.
The Otto-Hoffman ovens are in use everywhere in Germany,
several plants are in successful operation in the United States,
and the New England Gas and Coke Company, organized by Mr.
Henry M. Whitney to provide a market for Cape Breton coal,
have just constructed 400 of these ovens at Everett, a suburb
of Boston, so that the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will
have the advantage of their experience. The coke made at
Everett is sold to the railways and for domestic or industrial
fuel purposes, while the gas is used to supply Boston and its
suburbs with light and heat and for gas engines. At Sydney
the surplus gas will be used in the steel mill.
As no part of the coal is consumed in the process of manu-
facturing coke with the Otto- Hoffman coke oven the output of
coke is about 1 5 per cent, greater than from the bee-hive oven
with the same quantity of coal, but the chief advantage is in the
saving of the by-products, gas, ammonia and tar, which more
than pay the cost of turning the coal into coke.
With most of the uses of liquid ammonia the readers of The
Star are well acquainted, but very few appreciate the value of
sulphate of ammonia as a fertilizer. The chief constituent of
ammonia is nitrogen ; and as everybody knows nitrogen is the
fertilizer most required to make soils productive.
30
In the course of a most interesting address advocating the
establishment of by-product coke ovens in the vicinity of Boston
before a Committee of the Massachusetts State I^egislature, Mr.
Henry M. Whitney said :
" Everybody who is familiar with agriculture knows that the
three essential elements of plant food are nitrogen, phosphoric
acid and potash. Now, we have, fortunately for this state, an
agricultural experiment station at Amherst which keeps in close
touch with the value of commercial fertilizers, of which the land
of this state and of New England is in such great need. A few
days ago I visited Amherst, and spent an evening with Prof.
Goessman, who has charge of this station. I felt certain that
while the theoretical value of barn-yard manures was a certain
quantity, yet that there was a certain amount of waste from the
time that it was dropped until it reached the field, and I was
anxious to find out what proportion of the theoretical whole was
preserved. I found that the experiment station nad made tests
[66,1 think, in all] of manures in various parts of this state to deter-
mine exactly what the manurial value in nitrogen, potash and
phosphorus is as it is put on the ground. These are Prof. Goess-
mann's conclusions :
Nitrogen, 4-10 of i per cent, equals 8 lbs,, at I2c per lb ; total value 96
Phosphoric acid, 2-10 of i per cent., or 4 lbs., at 5c per lb. ; total value . . .20
Potash, 3-10 of I per cent., or 6 lbs., at 4^c per lb. ; total value 27
Total value of one ton manure $i-43
Therefore if you were to buy commercial fertilizers contain-
ing the same amount of plant food that is found in a ton of
manure, you would pay for it $1.43. I do not undertake to say, Mr.
Chairman and Gentlemen, that there are not some other elements
in the manure that are of value to the soil, but I do undertake
to say that, so far as the experiments of the agricultural station
made with exceeding care have gone, you can purchase with $1.43
the same amount of nitrogen and potash and phosphoric acid as
you will find in a ton of manure.
* ' In every ton of bituminous coal burned to-day there is the
equivalent of 25 pounds of ammonia, which is the equivalent of
5 pounds of nitrogen, and at the same value at which it is reckoned
here as manure, there is a money value of 60 cents. The waste
of fertilizer in every six tons of bituminous coal which is burned
throughout New England, is equivalent to the manurial value of
an animal for a year. Now, what does it mean with reference
to the agricultural industry of Massachusetts, if all this nitrogen
could be saved and placed upon your soil ? It means that in the
6,000,000 tons of coal that are burned throughout New England
to-day there is a manurial value of a million of cattle. I know
of nothing more hopeful for the agriculture of this state nor of
New England, nor of the whole of this broad land, than that
capitalists are turning their attention to-day to the preserv^ation
31
of this great amount of nitrogen which is needed for your ex
hausted soils. ' '
It would be interesting to speculate upon the effect that the
saving of the nitrogen in the coal of Cape Breton may have upon
the agricultural future of the island. Cape Breton is green above
although black beneath. Its coasts do not present the rugged
appearance of the mainland of Nova Scotia. It is a hilly coun-
try, but the hills are neither high nor abrupt. Most of them
look as if they might be cultivated from top to bottom, and
some of them are. A Star man asked Mr. Hiram Donkin, resi-
dent manager of the Dominion Coal Company at Glace Bay, C.
B. , if much of the island could be successfully cultivated.
' ' There are some excellent agricultural and pastoral dis-
tricts," said Mr. Donkin, "but in the coal districts the soil lacks
one important constituent. The coal seems to have robbed it
of its nitrogen, but Mr. Whitney proposes to take the nitrogen
from the coal in his coke ovens and restore it to the soil. That
is all that is required to make it fertile. ' '
But Cape Breton will not be the sole market for the sulph-
ate of ammonia produced at the coke ovens of the Dominion Iron
and Steel Company. There should be a demand for it from
farmers in all parts of the Dominion to improve soils that have
been worn out, and no doubt the whole output could be sold in
Great Britain, where there is a brisk demand for it. A great
deal of the sulphate of ammonia produced at the coke ovens of
Germany is utilized by the farmers who grow beets for the
sugar factories, and the rapid development of beet sugar manu-
facture in the United States is likely to create a demand for it in
that country. Sir William Crooks, the well-known British
scientist, recently predicted that unless some new sources of
nitrogen should be discovered there would be a wheat famine in
a few years, as most of the wheat areas of the world are rapidly
having their nitrogen exhausted by continuously growing wheat.
At Everett, the New England Gas and Coke Company sell their
sulphate of ammonia for 2 1-2 cents per pound, and get about
30 lbs. from a ton of Cape Breton coal in the process of coking.
Assuming that only 28 lbs. of sulphate of ammonia will be ob-
tained at Sydney, and that the selling price will be only i 3-4 cts.
instead of 2 1-2 cents it will give 49 cents per ton of coal. The
by-product ovens at Everett also obtain from a ton of Cape
Breton coal about 12 1-2 gallons of tar which is sold at 2 cents
per gallon, and about 5,000 feet of gas which is sold at twenty
cents per thousand. At Sydney the surplus gas will be used in
the steel mill and it will be fair to estimate its value at the cost
of natural gas in the most prolific natural gas districts of the
United States, five cents per thousand. This will give the steel
mill as cheap fuel as if it were located in a natural gas district.
It is calculated that the quantity of gas produced at Sydney will
be somewhat less than at Everett as the coke will be treated
32
somewhat differently to suit the blast furnaces, but it will not be
less thau 3.000 feet, which at five cents per thousand would be
fifteen cents per ton of coal. The quantity of tar obtained will
be about ten gallons, which at one cent per gallon, half the price
obtained in Boston, would give ten cents. Thus the value of
the ammonia, gas and tar obtained from each ton of coal will be
not less than 74 cents, while the cost of manufacturing the coke
and by-products will only be about 40 cents. This will bring
down the cost of fuel for the blast furnaces to a very low
figure.
It may be said, "If a lump of coal is a storehouse for a
great variety of chemicals, as stated, why only mention gas, am-
monia and tar ? What becomes of the other volatile constituents of
bituminous coal ? ' ' The answer is that many of tne constituents
of coal are preserved in the tar. Coal-tar is, as described by Dr.
Lunge, ' ' an extremely complex mixture of chemical compounds. ' '
Dr. Lunge, in his work on Coal-Tar and Ammonia, gives an
enumeration of the constituents of coal-tar which fills three and
ahalf large pages, and it would occupy fully a column of the Star.
One of the most interesting constituents is aniline-benzol, which is
used for making aniline dyes. There are a great many chemical
works in Germany which utilize the tar produced at the by-
product coke ovens in connection with blast furnaces. It is not
improbable that enterprising capitalists may select Sydney as a
site for a tar distillery and chemical works, thus giving Canada
another industry The location would be most advantageous,
not only on account of the cheapness of the tar, but also on ac-
count of Sydney's nearness to all the important markets of the
world. But even without distilling, coal-tar is of value for many
purposes. It is used very extensively for the preservation of build-
ing materials of all kinds. Stones, as well as iron and wood, can
be preserved much longer and protected against atmospheric in-
fluences, by a coating of coal-tar. It is also used in the manu-
facture of roofing felt, and in making lamp-black, while owing
to its antiseptic property it is often used in England for painting
the floors of hospitals and barracks.
The President and Directors.
Vrom the Montreal Daily Star, October X4, 1899,
V.
'ANADA is about to enter upon an industrial
contest with the leading nations of the world
in exporting iron and steel, and it is a matter
for congratulation that we can truthfully say,
" We have the ore, we have the fuel, we have the flux, we have
the men, we have the money too,"
It has been shown that the Dominion Iron and Steel Co. will
have ample supplies of cheap ore and cheap fuel of the best
quality for their blast furnaces at Sydney, and it may be noted
that on the other side of Sydney harbour, directly opposite the
works, there are extensive beds of limestone which can be used
for flux. And the men ! In making iron and steel, good work-
men are as important as good and cheap raw material. A great
deal depends upon the intelligence, sobriety and health of the
workmen, and one of the many factors likely to contribute to the
success of the Dominion Iron and Steel Compan^- ' the character
of the people of the Maritime Provinces of Cam. . The writer
of these articles has visited every section of those provinces, and
everywhere he found bright, intelligent, sturdy, healthy-looking
people, temperate in their habits, honest, reliable, and quick to
understand. In the past the supply of labour has much exceeded
the demand, and thousands have emigrated to the United States.
Many of the best workmen in the cities of New England were
bom in the Maritime Provinces. There will be no difficulty in
securing good workmen for the blast furnaces, steel mills and
other industries of Sydney.
But much also depends upon the character of the men at
the head of the enterprise. What manner of men are the capital-
ists who have paid a million dollars for an iron mine and who
are expending many millions of dollars in constructing iron and
steel works on a scale that will enable them to compete with the
34
largest iron and steel industries of the world ? Are they
men who are likely to fail to take advantage ot the favourable
conditions that have been described ? No one who has read the
names of the president and directors will have much doubt upon
this point. AH of them are well known as very successful busi-
ness men ; most of them have the reputation of being gifted with
what is called "the golden touch," because everything they
handle seems to turn into money ; and some of them have already a
world-wide reputation on account of the great enterprises in
which they have taken a prominent part.
The moving spirit in the enterprise, the man who will devote
most capital, time and energy to ensure the success of the under-
taking is Mr. Henry M. Whitney, President of the Dominion
Iron and Steel Company. Mr. Whitney was born in the town of
Conway, Mass., October 22, 1839. His father. Gen. James S.
Whitney, afterwards collector of the port of Boston, kept at that
time the principal store of the place, and it was there and sub-
sequently in the Conway bank that he began his business life,
after obtaining his education in the local schools and at
the Williston Seminary. The removal of his father's family
to Boston carried him with it, and for several years he was em-
ployed, first in the Custom House, then in one of the Boston
banks, and subsequently in the shipping business in New York
City. In 1886, he became under his father, who was president
of the corporation, the agent of the Metropolitan Steamship Com-
pany, having a line of freight steamers plying between Boston
and New York, an office which he has continued to hold up to
the present time.
In 1879, on the death of his father, he became president of
the company, and in the management of its affairs he exhibited
for the first time in a broad and striking manner the indomit-
able energy and resourcefulness of mind that have been char-
acteristic of so many of his subsequent business enterprises.
He had been for several years a large operator in real estate ;
but in 1886 he conceived the idea, that if a broad boulevard were
built out from Boston, through its most attractive suburb, the town
of Brookline, and a superior system of street car servnce were pro-
vided, the result could not fail to be advantageous to the commun-
ity and beneficial to the promoter. Acting on this belief, first by
himself and afterwards in conjunction with others, he acquired
such land on the line of the proposed route as could be obtained,
and then agreed to build the boulevard himself, contributing one-
third of the cost, if the town of Brookline would pay the other two-
thirds. This offer was accepted , and the construction of the boule-
vard, one of the most attractive thoroughfares in America, was en-
tered upon. But before it was completed Mr. Whitney discovered
that the street railway companies of Boston would not permit
the cars of his projected new line to carry their passengers into
the centre of the city, thus threatening to seriously diminish the
utility of his proposed plan. A man of less determination of
35
character and originality of mind would" have been thwarted by
this stubborn resistance of strong vested interests. But with
him opposition was only an incentive to greater exertion and
more comprehensive action. His method of releasing himself
from a seemingly inextricable entanglement was startling in its
boldness. It was to use the little West End Street Railway
Company that he had organized as a medium for absorbing and
uniting into one harmonious corporation all of the different and
often conflicting street railway companies of Boston. The ob-
stacles in the way were innumerable. City and State Govern-
ments, railroad commissioners, obstinate and jealous railroad
officials and unwilling stockholders, all had to be considered and
treated with. But the courage which planned was backed by
the tact, good judgment, persuasiveness and energy needed to
carry the project through to a successful conclusion. To secure
the needed financial results, he had foreseen and counted upon
the general introduction of electricity as a motive power, and
hence when made president of the enlarged West End Company
he almost immediately began the application and utilization of
this new form of motive power. The West End Company was
the first of the street railway companies to adopt the electric
system on an extensive scale. It was the pioneer and all the
other street railways of the continent have followed its example.
The outcome has been the building up of a system of rapid
street transportation in and around Boston, which in range and
character of service is without a rival in the world.
The next large business operation into which Mr. Whitney
entered was the formation of the Dominion Coal Company.
Having had his attention called to the existence in the Sydney
district, Cape Breton Island, of a number of independent coal
mines operated in the expensive, old-fashioned manner of coal
mining, he convinced himself, after investigation, that it would
be possible by uniting these small companies into one large cor-
poration, to profitably introduce improved labour-saving mining
machinery, and in this way not only materially reduce the cost
of mining, but greatly increase the output of the mines.
By equipping the mines with the most modern machinery,
connecting them by railway with great shipping piers, which he
had constructed at Sydney and Louisburg, reorganizing the
transportation service between Sydney and Montreal, and pro-
viding facilities for rapidly unloading the coal at this port, the
cost of mining and marketing the coal was greatly reduced. The
Canadian demand for coal was steadily increasing, but the coal
areas owned by the Dominion Coal Company being extensive
and the seams very thick, Mr. Whitney realized that the industry
was capable of immense expansion if an adequate market could
be secured. He had from the first had in mind the possibility
of securing a large market for Cape Breton coal in New Eng-
land, but he met with unexpected difficulties. He was dis-
36
appointed in his hope of securing the abolition of the American
customs duty on coal, and moreover, he found that Cape Breton
coal was not so popular in New England as some of the American
coals with which it had to compete, Ijecause it was more smoky.
It is a characteristic of Mr. Whitney that he often makes what
at first seems an insurmountable difficulty a stepping stone to
great success, and here again his business genius asserted itself.
Failure or half -success is a conclusion which he will never accept
as final. Ati outlet to the West End problem had been dis-
covered tIiroit<i^h a practical, but imaginative, foresight of the
revolution in transportation which was to be brought about by
the utilization of electricity. The Dominion coal problem found
an equally brilliant solution by a mental forecast which con-
vinced him that a large part of the use of bituminous coal in the
future was to be found in the separation and independent em-
ployment of its constituent parts. He knew that the smokiness
of bituminous coal was due to the fact that its volatile constituents
passed ofT in burning. He knew that these constituents, the gas,
ammonia and tar, were valuable for many purpo.ses, and he
reasoned that if instead of being allowed to go to waste they
were taken from the coal before it was sold they might be profit-
ably utilized, while a more satisfactory fuel could be offered to
the public.
With Mr. Whitney investigation quickly succeeds concep-
tion, and positive action follows hard upon satisfactory investi-
gation. His first step was to organize the Massachusetts Pipe
lyine Gas Company, by means of which the gas obtained by
treating the slack or culm of the Dominion Coal Company could
be sold to the various Boston Gas Companies at a price which
would comp^l its purchase. Following this came the tests of
the coke, made by some of the leading railway companies, as a
means of demonstrating its utility and advantage for locomotive
steaming purposes. The results of these tests were all that
could be desired, and the railway companies were so pleased with
the result that they offered to pay a higher price for it than for
coal, as it gave them a clean fuel, free from smoke and cinders,
possessing all the advantages and none of the disadvantages of
coal for steam purposes.
Next came the organization of the New England Gas and
Coke Company for the purpose of building coke ovens on a large
scale on the water front near Boston, in which the culm could be
treated so as to release and separate its constituent parts, the
company at the same time acquiring control of the Massachusetts
Pipe lyine, of certain of the gas companies in and around Boston,
and a contingent interest in other gas plants. This organi-
zation has now nearly completed its works, and in a short time
will use many hundreds of thousands of tons a year of coal of the
Dominion Coal Company in supplying Boston and its vicinity with
low-priced gas, and in furnishing the railroads which have their
37
terminals there and neighbouring manufacturing establishments
with the coke they need for fuel. A number of the by-product
coke ovens are already in operation and the coke has become very
popular as a domestic fuel, as well as for use on the railways and
in industrial establishments, while there is no difficulty in di.i-
posing of the tar and sulphate of ammonia at prices which more
than pay the cost of manufacturing both coke and by-products
and the customs duty on the slack coal that is used.
The idea of establishing iron and steel works on a large
scale at Sydney, near the mines, at tidewater, and within easy
reach of the immense iron ore deposits of Newfoundland, as a
means of creating an extra demand for the output of the coal
mines, ^'nd providing employment for a large number of people,
had often pressnted itself to Mr. Whitney's mind. The success
which attended the use of Cnpe Breton coke with the ore of Great
Bell Island in the blast furnace at Ferrona and the announce-
ment that the two political parties had come to an agreement in
favour of continuing the protective duties and bounties, con-
vinced him that the time had come for action. As in previous
enterprises the subject had l)een studied with the aid of scientific
experts, whose investigations confirmed his opinion that iron
and steel could be manufactured more advantageously at Sydney
than anywhere else in the world. With the data secured in
these expert investigations at his command, and the confidence
created by the great success he had achieved in all previous
undertakings, Mr. Whitney found no difficulty in enlisting the
co-operation of some of the leading capitalists of Canada and the
United States in the formation of the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company.
In these vast undertakings, each of them involving the ex-
penditure of many millions of dollars, while Mr. Whitney has
had the advice and financial assistance of others, in all cases his
has been the brain to conceive and his the hand to execute. But
for his masterful and suggestive mind, and his ability to impart
to others something of his own enthusiasm and confidence, none
of these great works would have been accomplished. It has not
been with him merely the formation of great companies by the
grouping together of existing corporations, for in almost every
work to which he has turned his hand his method has been a
distinctly creative one— that is, the formation, by the employ-
ment of scientific invention and discovery, of new industries,
which in their development would not only bring in adequate
financial returns to their promoters, but would also prove of
lasting benefit to a vast number of human beings.
Much of the information about Mr. Whitney in this sketch
was obtained by a Star man from the editor of one of the leading
daily lewspapers of Boston, who was asked to tell what he knew
about the man who is taking such a foremost part in the develop-
ment of the east-end of Canada. In conclusion, he said : " Mr.
Whitney is intellectually and physically in the prime of life. He
38
is capable, as might be assumed, of great mental endurance,
keeping himself in sound physical condition by frequent exer-
cise in the saddle, and by interesting himself in other kinds of
out-door enjoyment. His manners are simple and unaffected,
his democratic sense of human equality making him easily ap-
proachable by all ; while his kindness of heart is even too quickly
shown when an appeal is made to his generosity. A few years
ago a well-known and judicially-minded Bostonian was asked to
name the three greatest men in this community. After thinking
a few minutes he replied : ' In religion, Phillips Brooks ; in in-
tellectual pursuits, President Eliot of Harvard University ; in
business life, Henry M. Whitney,' a classification to which most
of Mr. Whitney's fellow-townsmen would readily subscribe."
The wife of one of the officials of the Dominion Coal Com-
pany in Cape Breton said to a Star man : ' ' Mr. Whitney is a
business genius, and yet he is the most unassuming man I ever
met. All his employes love him. His manner is the same to an
office boy as to a magnate. ' '
There is no doubt that Mr. Whitney is a man of great per-
sonal magnetism.
Most of the Canadian directors of the Dominion Iron and
Steel Company have been prominently before the people of Can-
ada in connection with various enterprises, and their biographies
having already been published in the Star, they will not require
such extended notice as the president.
Tating them geographically for convenience, beginning at the
west, the representatives from Toronto on the Board are : Senator
Geo. A. Cox and Mr. Elias Rogers. Hon. Mr. Cox is identified with
many of the most prominent business interests of Canada. He
is president of the Canadian Bank of Commerce, the Canada
I,ife Assurance Company, the Crow's Nest Pass Coal Company,
the Western Fire and Marine Insurance Company, and the
British American Fire and Marine Insurance Co. , and is actively
interested in several other important business enterprises,
including the Canadian General Electric Company and the
National Trust Company of Onf;ario, I^imited, (the transfer agent
for the Dominion Iron and Steel Company).
Mr. Elias Rogers is also a resident of Toronto. He is the
leading coal merchant of Ontario, and a director of the Imperial
Bank. From his past experience he is familiar not only with
coal, but also with the iron trade of Ohio, and Pennsylvania.
In Montreal reside Sir William C. Van Home, Mr. R. B.
Angus the vice-president of the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company, and Mr. James Ross. They have been so long
connected with important enterprises that the mention of their
names calls up not only the history of the Canadian Pacific
Railway from its inception to the present time, but many of the
most important Canadian industrial successes, as well as McGill
University, of which both Sir William Van Home and Mr.
Angus are governors, and the three are known throughout Eur-
ope and this continent as enlightened patrons of the fine arts.
39
Sir William C. Van Home, chairman of the Board of Directors
of the Canadian Pacific Railway, of which he was president and
general manager for many years, has a mind of extraordinary
versatility, combined with great powers of concentration. No
matter what a man's trade or profession may be. Sir William can
talk to him understandiugly about it, and business men are often
astonished at his quick insight into technical matters to which
they have themselves devoted years of study. He has a reputa-
tion as a mind reader among those who know him well, and
some remarkable stories are told about his achievements in this
direction, but this is due not to any occult influence, but to his
quick reasoning powers and his faculty of reading faces and un-
derstanding the characters of those with whom he converses,
either during business negotiations or in social intercourse. If
he were not celebrated as a railway man, he might have a repu-
tation as an artist, for he not only knows a good picture when
he sees it, but can paint pictures himself that would do credit to
artists of standing who have devoted their lives to artistic work.
He started life as an office boy in an American railway sta-
tion, and before he came to Canada at the age of 38 he had
distinguished himself as a successful railway man, having been
superintendent and general manager of several important railways
in the Western States.
Upon coming to Canada to take the management of the
Canadian Pacific Railway he was given the task of carry-
ing out the contract made with the Dominion Government to
construct a railway across the continent in ten years. He com-
pleted the work in four years and a half, less than half the time
called for in the contract. But it was as general manager and
president after the completion of the main line that Sir William
Van Home's wonderful organizing ability and power to master
the details of every line of business were most required. The
railway ran through an almost uninhabited country and it had
been predicted that the traffic would not pay for the grease on
the car wheels. It was necessary to create business for the
railway. This was accomplished by building and buying sub-
sidiary railways, establishing steamship lines, bringing in
settlers to the North- West farm lands, encouraging the establish-
ment of industrial enterprises along the line and promoting the
development of the mining resources of British Columbia and
North- Western Ontario. Few Canadians realize how much the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company under the direction of Sir
William Van Home has done to interest outside capital in the
development of Canadian resources. Passengers on the Canadian
Pacific Railway, whether rich or poor, always receive due at-
tention from the railway officials, but it has been the policy of
Sir William Van Home to particularly please the capitalists of
other countries, because he knew that Canada's wonderful
natural resources could never be developed without capital from
outside. Sir William Van Home has spent a great deal of money
and a great deal of time trying to impress the capitalists of Great
40
Britain, the United States and other countries with the resources
of Canada. Many a wealthy man has gone across the continent
in Sir William's private car, listening on the way to his eulogies
of Canada. He is an enthusiastic believer in the great future of
Canada ; a talk with him about this country is sufficient to make
even a pessimist hopeful, and there is no doubt whatever that
the mining development, which has contributed so much to the
prosperity of Canada during the last three years, is largely due
to his efforts to interest outside capitalists in Canadian resources.
The educat 11?; work done by the Canadian Pacific Railway Com-
pany hrio made it far easier for promoters to get capital for Can-
adian enterprises in both Great Britain and the United States.
His new position as chairman of the Board of Directors of the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company allows him more leisure than
he had while president of the company, and he will take an
active part in furthering the interests of the Dominion Iron and
Steel Company.
Mr. R. B. Angus is a Scotchman by birth, but came to
Canada in 1857, at the age of 27, to take a position on the staff
of the Bank of Montreal, in whose service he remained for
twenty- two years, becoming general manager in 1869, and
holding that position until 1879, when he retired in order to
take the general managership of the St. Paul, Minneapolis and
Manitoba Railway. In 1880 he joined the Canadian Pacific
Railway syndicate, which included Mr. George Stephen [now
Lord Mount Stephen] and Mr. Donald Smith [now Lord
Strathcona] and others, and he has ever since been closely
identified with the great railway. He is now a director of the
Bank of Montreal, of which he was formerly general manager,
and is interested in a number of other successful business
enterprises.
Mr. James Ross is also a Scotchman by birth, and was
educated as a civil engineer, but emigrated to the United States
in 1870, at the age of 22 years, and remained there for some
years, acting at first as resident engineer and then as chief
engineer on several railways. In 1878 he came to Canada, and
built the Credit Valley Railway, of which he afterwards became
general manager. He was consulting engineer of the Ontario
and Quebec Railway, which later on became a part of the
Canadian Pacific Railway system, and he had the contract for
the construction of some of the most difficult sections of the
Canadian Pacific Railway, including the Rocky Mountain section.
He has since built several other Canadian railways. In recent
years he has been closely identified with a number of electric
railway enterprises, having taken a leading part in re-organizing
the Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg and St. John street railways
and substituting electricity for horses. In 1896 he and Mr.
Mackenzie acquired the street railway systems of the city of
Birmingham, Eng., and introduced the electric system there,
and he was one of the syndicate of Canadian capitalists who
built electric tramways in Jamaica. He is vice-president of the
41
Montreal and Toronto Street Railway Companies, president of
the Winnipeg and St. John Street Railway Companies, and
president of the Dominion Bridge Company, while he is actively
interested in a number of other important enterprises.
Mr. Robert McKay, another Montreal director, is well
known as having succeeded his uncles in their long established
and most successful importing business, which he still carries on.
He is chairman of the Board of Harbour Commissioners of
Montreal, president of the Bell Telephone Company of Canada,
and a director of the Merchants Bank of Canada ; and, like his
Canadian colleagues on the board of this company, his name is
familiar to all the readers of the Star.
Mr. John S. McLennan is a native of Montreal, a son of
Mr. Hugh McL,ennan, well known in Canada as a man of very
high character, a prosperous merchant, and the trusted director
in many financial and business institutions, and a brother of Mr.
William McLennan, the well-known Canadian author, whose nov-
els, short stories and poems, published first in Harper's Magazine
and afterwards in book form, have been highly praised by critics
in both England and the United States. Mr. John S. McLennan
is a graduate of McGill University and also of Cambridge, Eng.
He has been identified with the mining interests of Cape Breton
for about fifteen years. Previous to the year 1 893 he was the
resident manager of the International Coal Company, displaying
signal ability in this position. On the absorption of this mine
into the organization of the Dominion Coal Company, he became
treasurer of the larger organization, and still retains his position.
No small share of the success of the coal company is due to him,
the details of the business in recent years having fallen under his
immediate supervison.
Halifax, the capital of Nova Scotia, has naturally taken a
keen interest in the development of this company, and has been
closely identified with its inception. Four of the directors are
residents of Halifax.
The Hon. David McKeen, who has lately become a resident
of Halifax, commenced his career in Cape Breton before the days
of the Reciprocity Treaty. Employed at first by the Caledonia
Coal Company, until he ultimately became its principal owner,
he saw all phases of its development, during the time of the
Reciprocity Treaty, through the dark days of the Nova Scotian
collieries, and gradually increasing prosperity with the development
of the inter-provincial trade in coal which began in 1878. The
prosperity of the Caledonia mine during the years immediately
preceding its absorption in the Dominion Coal Co. in 1893, was
in a large measure due to him, and as resident manager for tlie
new company, he had charge of its interests in Cape Breton
during the trying period of construction. From this position he
retired with ample means, remaining on the board of the Dominion
Coal Company, as well as becoming a director of the Dominion
Iron and Steel Company He is also president of the Halifax
42
Electric Tramway Company, and a director of the Merchants
Bank of Halifax.
Another director of the same bank, who is a member of the
board of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, is Mr. Michael
Dwyer. He is a native of Newfoundland, but for many years
has been a successful and prominent merchant in Halifax.
Mr. W. B. Ross, Q.C. , secretary of the company, is a
leading member of the Bar of Nova Scotia. He is also a director
of the Dominion Coal Company.
Mr. B. F. Pearson has done much to make the name of
' ' promoters ' ' respected in Nova Scotia. It was he who first
interested Mr. Whitney in the Cape Breton coal mines and
brought about the organization of the Dominion Coal Company.
He also organized the Halifax Electric Tramway Company and
has been closely idsntified with the formation of the West India
Tramway Co. , and large enterprises in process of formation in
Havana and Brazil.
The directors who reside in the United States are Mr. H. F.
Dimock and Mr. Almeric Paget, of New York. Mr. H. F.
Dimock is a brother-in-law of Mr. Whitney, and has been closely
associated with him in most of the important enterprises in which
he has been engaged. He is the manager of the Metropolitan
Steamship Co. , and a director of the Dominion Coal Co. , and
occupies in the business and social world of New York a most
enviable position. He, too, like Mr. Angus, is identified with
educational institutions, and is a governor of Yale University.
Mr. Almeric H. Paget is a young Englishman, the son of
Major-General Paget. After a successful business career in
Minnesota, he became a resident of New York. He is a son-in-law
of Mr. William C. Whitney, and by marriage a nephew of
Colonel O. H. Payne, of the Standard Oil Company. He is
president of the Chihuahua and' Pacific Railway Company and
takes an active part in the management of other corporations.
Mr. Julian Kennedy, the consulting engineer, is a man of
about 45 years, and a graduate of the Yale Scientific School.
His name still remains prominent in athletic circles, on account
of his extraordinary success as an oarsman during his college
career. But few amateurs have ever won so large a proportion
of the races in which they started as he, and the vigour and
determination to which these successes were due have helped
him in the twenty odd years of active life since that time. There
is scarcely in the United States an iron or steel works of the first
importance, which, in one form or another, does not bear the
marks, in some department, of his ability. Many of his
inventions made some years ago still remain in the most important
steel works of the United States, in spite of the extraordinary
transformation of the appliances used in this great industry.
Mr. Kennedy has been called on in consultation in the United
States, England, Russia and China.
Mr. R. G. Wells, Mr. Kennedy's representative in Cape
43
Breton, is a young man who has just returned from Russia,
where he had charge of the construction of large iron works.
Previous to this time he was associated with Mr. Kennedy, and
has been in the employment of the Illinois Steel Company.
The contractors for the greater part of this work are the
Riter-Conley Manufacturing Company of Pittsburg. They have
been pioneers of American industry. Much of the work
manufactured in their shop at Pittsburg has been taken to
Britain, Holland and other European countries, and to some of
the Australian colonies.
Mr. Riter brings to this firm a very long experience as a
successful contractor ; a reputation of great energy, judgment
and resource.
Associated with him he has a large number of able and
trained assistants, prominent among whom is Mr. W. A. Coffin,
the vice-president of the Riter-Conley Company, who will give
close personal attention to the erection of the plant at Sydney.
The capital stock of the company is $15,000,000 and
$6,000,000 of five per cent bonds will be issued. The capital is
much more than sufficient to cover the cost of the works now
being constructed extensive as they are, but it is believed that
the situation of Sydney is so favourable for reaching the markets
of the world that it will be necessary to increase the number of
furnaces very soon after those now in course of construction are
completed, and it is possible that the building of ships may be
undertaken by the company.
It is said to be the first time in industrial enterprises of
this kind when a large steel plant has been built concurrently
with so large a blast furnace plant. Indeed it is usually the
custom to build a blast furnace plant and add the steel plant
later on. The advantages of the combination are always
recognized, but it has been difficult or impossible to secure the
necessary capital for doing the whole at once. That the large
capital required for this Canadian enterprise has been obtained
so quietly, apparently so easilj', is abundant evidence of the faith
in its financial success by the men who are prominent in it as
directors and stockholders.
The capacity of the blast furnaces aggregate from 1000
to 1400 tons a day, or 400,000 tons to 500,000 tons per year.
The fixed charges being interest on $6,000,000 of bonds at 5
per cent amount to $300,000 per year or about 75c per ton of pig
iron output. This is believed to be the smallest fixed charge of
any large plant in the United States or probably elsewhere.
How Iron and Steel are Made.
From the Montreal Daily Star, October ai, rSgg,
VI.
►HE common conception of iron among those un-
acquainted with chemistry is that it is a black
substance, easily fusible and readily moulded
while liquid into any shape desired. In fact,
pure iron is white and very difficult to fuse. What we common-
ly call iron — the iron which is used as a raw material in so many
lines of industry, is a mixture of pure iron with other substances.
If iron were easily obtainable in a pure state it would be a very
simple matter to mix with it the substances required to fit it for
use in the mechanic arts, but pure iron is very rare. In nature
it is almost invariably found combined with oxygen and various
impurities in such a way that it is even more unfit for industrial
purposes than it would be in a pure state. The mineral com-
pounds of iron are called iron ores, and the whole purpose of
the complicated processes of the iron and steel works is to take
away from the iron the impurities of the ore and add to it the
substances which adapt it for the various industrial uses. Ac-
cording to a high American authority on iron-making, "iron
ores are considered rich when they contain above 50 per cent,
of iron : average when they contain between 50 and 35 per cent. ;
poor when between 35 and 25 per cent., and useless when below
25 per cent. The iron ore of Great Bell Island, which will be
used by the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, contains from 54
to 59 per cent, of metallic iron, the average being fully 55 per
cent. The iron ores of the great Cleveland iron district of Eng-
land do not contain over 42 per cent, of iron, and the Alabama
ores are said to average about 40 per cent, or a little over. The
common impurities of iron ore are alumina, magnesia, lime,
phosphorus, silica and sulphur. A certain percentage of some
of these foreign substances may be of advantage in making iron
and steel, promoting fusibility, or serving some other purpose in
the process. Sometimes a substance, which is advantageous at
one stage of the process must be eliminated at a later stage. It
has been found that most of the common impurities of iron ore
combine very readily with lime when melted and form what is
called a slag, which is lighter than iron, floats on top and can
be easily tapped off. The lime thus used is called a flux. The
laboratory in which takes place the first process of extracting
45
the impurities of the iron ore and adding carbon is called a blast
furnace, because the ore and other materials placed in it are
fused by blasts of hot air that are blown into it. It is a high
structure, the inner walls of which are built of fire bricks, the
outer walls being of ordinary brick or stone work bound with
iron. The raw materials which are called the " stock," are iron
ore, coke and limestone. They are fed into the furnace at the
top, the quantity of each requir-
^eff ed to make a ton of pig-iron de-
" pending upon the character of
the ore and fuel. Experience
at Ferrona has shown that it
takes 1.8 tons of Great Bell
Island iron ore, 1.25 tons of
Cape Breton coke and .75 of a
ton of Cape Breton limestone,
to make one ton of pig-iron.
A very good description of a
blast furnace has been given
by an American writer, Mr. R.
R. Bowker, who says : ' ' The
internal shape of the blast fur-
nace follows the general type of
two truncated cones, united at
the widest parts, the maximum
diameter being about one-third
the way up. The angle of
juncture is rounded off so that
the whole is in form not unlike
an inverted soda water bottle
with most of the neck and
conical bottom cut off. The
topmost section is known as the
throat — very properly, for it
swallows the charge. That por-
tion extending downward from
the throat to the largest dia-
meter is called the stack. The
lower portion, of narrowing
diameter, is known as the
boshes. The lowest section,
cylindrical in shape, is the
In the brick walls of this portion are
Tuytrts
Hearth
Tcfffin^-hoh
BI.AST FURNACE.
hearth or crucible. „..^.. . ^
built hollow cones of metal, from two to ten in number, called
tuyeres, which receive the nozzles of the air-pipes. In that part
of the hearth below the tuyeres the molten metal accumulates
with its accompanying floating mass of slag or cinder, before it
is tapped off. Around it is a strong cast or wrought iron
crucible jacket, kept cool by a watei spray. Towards the front
is the dam-plate, at the bottom of which a channel known as the
tapping hole taps the metal from the crucible. Over a notch in
46
the upper surface of the crucible jacket flows the dischargee of
slag. Flues and openings in the body of the masonry are pro-
vided for the free escane of gases and steam. The charging
platform, on the top of the furnace, is supported on hollow cast-
iron columns, which also serve to carry the combustible gases.
These, which would otherwise escape, can be made economically
valuable as fuel for heating the blast of the blowing machines
and for the calcination of the materials of the charge, when this
operation is effected outside of the blast furnace. There are
several devices for preventing the waste of gases at the throat,
and diverting them into the conducting pipes, the best being
known as the cup and cone, or hopper and bell, the cone or bell
being raised or lowered at will. While the above description fol-
lows the general type, the dimensions and constructions of blast
furnaces vary greatly, ranging from 50 to 90 feet in height, from
6 to 25 feet in maximum diameter, and from 500 to 40,000 cubic
feet in capacity. These differences are determined by the quality
of the ore most available for use in the district. The blast fur-
nace swallows and digests iron ore in a manner closely parallel
to the work done by the human organs. The food is prepared
before it passes down the throat ; it is fully digested by the pro-
cess of intense heat, waste matter is separated, and functions of
excretion go on in a similar fashion ; and the great fire-tower
breathes through the tuyeres analagous to the human lungs using
the oxygen and expelling carbonic acid gas. ' '
Mr. Harry Huse Campbell in his interesting work on ' ' The
Manufacture and Properties of Structural Steel " has also given
a description of the process which goes on in a blast-furnace.
He says : " The blast-furnace is kept full of stock, and the com-
bustion of the coke is constantly maintained by the introduction
of hot blasts through the tuyeres at the hearth. Immediately in
front of these tuyeres the temperature is very high, but the con-
stant tapping of the liquid products and the constant supply of
fresh stock from above prevents this high temperature from
spreading upwards, as it would do if nothing were withdrawn
from the bottom of the column. The region which is at a suf-
ficiently high temperature to liquify the stock is known as the
' zone of fusion. ' It reaches several feet above the tuyeres, the
exact extent varj'ing with several conditions of furnace practice.
When the oxygen of the blast comes in contact with the coke it
forms either carbonic acid or carbonic oxide, but if carbonic acid
does form it is instantly reduced to carbonic oxide by the next
atom of carbon, so that when the gases leave the zone of fusion
and travel upward through the stock to the top of the furnace
they may be regarded as a mixture of carbonic oxide and the
nitrogen of the blast. The carbonic oxide absorbs the oxygen
from the ore, forming carbonic acid, and leaves the iron in the
finely divided metallic state known as spongy iron. On reach-
ing the lower and hotter parts of the furnace near the zone of
fusion, the spongy iron absorbs carbon from the coke, and is
47
thus converted into 'pig-iron,' which may be regarded as car-
bide of iron, the percentage of carbon usually running from three
to four per cent. The iron also absorbs some silicon, phosphorus
and sulphur from the earthy ingredients of the charge. These
probably exist in the pig-iron as silicide, phosphide and sulphide
of iron. In addition to the coke which is charged with the ore,
a certain proportion of limestone is added. The carbonic acid of
this stone is expelled in the upper part of the furnace, and caus-
tic lime remains. In rare cases the stone has been subjected to
a preliminary calcining, but the economy of this practice is not
yet demonstrated. The amount of limestone is regulated so that
it will satisfy the silica contained in the ore and in the ash of the
coke, and give a slag which is sufficiently acid to be liquid and
run freely from the furnace, and which is also sufficiently basic
to absorb the sulphur from the coke and ore. At the top of the
furnace there is an enormous volume of escaping gas derived
from the passage of the blast through the column of burning
coke and ore. This is composed of nitrogen, together with
some carbonic acid and a larger proportion of carbonic oxide, the
percentage of the latter being sufficient to make the mixture
available as fuel. Part of this gas is burned under boilers to
furnish steam for the blowing engines, while the remainder is
used for the reheating of the blast. Formerly the air was heated
by forcing it through iron pipes which were surrounded by burn-
ing gases, but of late years it is the almost universal practice to
have a set of brick stoves, filled with long, narrow passages. By
passing burning gas through a stove for an hour or more, the
bricks are heated to a high temperature, whereupon the air is
blown through in an opposite direction and is heated to nearly
the same point. The stoves are used alternately, so that by
means of suitable valves, the action is practically continuous. In
well-equipped furnaces the temperature of the blast is maintained
between i,ooo degrees F. and 1,200 degrees F., these figures
being exceeded under favourable conditions. ' '
It should be explained that when the chemical process in the
blast furnace is completed the slag which floats on top is first
tapped off and then the melted metal is tapped either into ladles
or into moulds in sand. According to the old fashioned method
which is still generally in vogue long troughs are made in the
sand and from each of these troughs extend branches. The
main troughs are called sows, while the branches are called pigs.
The hot metal, flowing out of the furnace, runs along the main
trough until it reaches the first branch which it fills, and then
goes on to the next, and so on until pigs and sows are filled with
metal which cools in the sand. The iron thus produced is called
cast iron or pig iron. Some of the sand always sticks to the
metal. Formerly the pigs had to be broken off by hand from the
sow, but this is now done by machinery. However, this old-
fashioned method while still generally used in England and
largely in the United States is rapidly being superseded in the
48
United States by a system known as the Uehling metal convey-
ingf and casting arrangement. By this method, as described by
Mr. H. M. Howe, the cast iron is tapped from the blast furnace
directly into a large ladle, which is carried by rail to a central
casting machine, placed so as to be used for all the furnaces of
the establishment. The casting arrangement consists essentially
of a "Jacob's ladder," or common bucket elevator, of which the
buckets and their supporting belt are replaced by a series of
horizontal trough- shaped, open, cast-iron moulds, their ends sup-
ported and carried by the two parallel endless chains which form
the skeleton of the elevator. This, in rising very gradually car-
ries these moulds successively under and past the lip of the
ladle which contains the molten cast iron from the blast furnace.
The ladle tips progressively, and fills the passing moulds one
after another. They pass on slowly up the elevator, so slowly
that by the time any one of them has reached the top of the
elevator the pig which it contains has solidified. When the
mould passes the sheave at the top, the pig is dumped out upon
another conveyor, which is horizontal and partly submerged in
water. Here the pig cools off more quickly and is carried for-
ward by this conveyor, and by it in turn dumped into a railroad
car. On its return passage the elevator which carries the moulds
is sprayed with water, and, if desired, with limewash. So, too,
on its upward travel, while carrying the hot pigs, it may be
sprayed to hasten their cooling. This method has the advantage
over that of casting the pigs attached to a sow and then breaking
them up, that it saves a large expenditure of power, and the ad-
vocates of it argue that as the iron is to be used in small pieces it
should be cast in small pieces. We understand that the Sydney
works of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will be equipped
with both a sand house and the more modem apparatus for tapping
the metal into ladles, so that either method can be used as
desired.
Pig or cast iron is easily melted and as it can be readily
cast in moulds it is very useful for foundry purposes, but being
hard, rigid and brittle, it must go through other processes to
make it malleable, and upon reaching the latter condition it is
called wrought iron.
The most important difference between pig or cast iron and
wrought iron is in the quantity of carbon they contain, the per-
centage of carbon in pig-iron running from 2 1-2 to 4 per cent.,
while wrought iron generally contains less than 20-100 of i per
cent. ; and steel usually from 10-100 of i per cent, to 2 1-2 per
cent. In ordering wrought iron and steel from the manufac-
turer it is customary to specify about what percentage of carbon
is desired, i-ioo of i per cent, being accepted as the unit and
called one carbon. Steel with a very small percentage of carbon
is soft, while steel with a large percentage of carbon is hard.
Before the discovery of the Bessemer and open-hearth methods
49
of steel-making the dividing line between wrought iron and steel
was very sharply drawn according to the quantity of carbon they
contained. If iron would harden in water it was called steel.
But some varieties of steel made by the new processes are .so soft
as to closely resemble wrought iron and the distinction between
them and wrought iron is more a matter of molecular structure
due to the different processes of manufacture than of difference
in the quantity of carbon they contain.
Pig-iron is converted into wrought iron by a series of pro-
cesses, the first of which is called puddling, an operation which
is conducted in a reverberatory furnace with a fettling of iron
ore. The pig-iron is melted and the fettling is stirred into it.
The silicon, manganese, sulphur and phosphorus in the pig-iron
unite with the oxygen and iron oxide of the iron ore to form a
slag, while the carbon escapes in the form of carbonic acid and
carbonic oxide. But the particles of iron separated from the
impurities are not easily fusible and the heat of the reverberatory
furnace, although great enough to melt the pig-iron and iron ore,
not being sufficient to keep the mass liquid, it soon becomes
pasty in which state it is worked into tails. The puddled ball
as it comes from the furnace is a mass of globules of nearly pure
iron separated from each other by particles of .slag. It is .squeezed,
hammered and rolled until it becomes wrought iron. The squeez-
ing process removes a great part of the slag and more is ex-
pelled in the procesvses of hammering and rolling, but even the
finished bar of iron is permeated by minute particles of cinder.
Mr. R. R. Bowker gives a very clear description of the
difference between a bar of wrought iron and steel which reads
as follows : ' ' The wrought iron bar resembles a bunch of iron
fibres or sinews with minute particles of slag interspersed here
and there. Such iron varies in resistance according to whether
the power is applied with or against the fibre. Steel is the result
of a fusing process. It may be crucible, Bessemer or open-
hearth steel, but in all cases it has been cast from a thoroughly
melted and fluid state into an ingot mould, where it .solidifies and
is ready for subsequent treatment, such as hammering or rolling.
The slag being lighter than the steel, it rises on top of the melted
bath and does not mingle with the metal, which remains clear
and unobstructed, and after being cast in the mould cools into
a crystalline homogeneous mass in which no amount of rolling
can develop a fibre. Thus steel possesses a structure more
regular and compact than wrought iron. Its resistance to strains
and stres.ses is more equal in all directions, and its adaptability
to structural use is vastly increased."
During recent years steel has been gradually superseding
wrought iron for a great variety of purpo.ses.
Now as to the three methods of making steel. Crucible
steel is commonly made by placing small pieces of wrought iron
together with some black oxide of manganese in melting pots
so
called cnidbles made of materials containing a good deal of
carbon, charcoal being placed in the pot if the quantity of carbon
in the material of the crucible is not sufficient. The crucibles
are heated in furnaces and are removed with tongs when the
metal is melted, and the iron poured into moulds. Sometimes
the wrought iron is subjected to a process of cementation by
heating it in fine charcoal before using it in the crucible. The
process of making crucible steel is an expen.sivc one and it is only
used for making steel for razors and other purposes for which a
very high quality of steel is required.
But there are two modem methods of making steel by which
it can be produced cheaply. One is called the Bessemer process
after the name of the inventor and the other is known as the
open-hearth system. The Bessemer process consists in blowing
air into liquid pig-iron for the purpose of burning out the im-
purities in such a manner that the product is entirely fluid. The
operation is performed in a converter and the air is blown up-
ward through the metal. By the open-hearth process pig-iron,
or a mixture of pig-iron with scrap iron and scrap steel, is
exposed to the direct action of the flame in a regenerative gas
furnace, the operation being so conducted that the final product
is entirely fluid.
In both the Bessemer and open-hearth systems the extent to
which the two great enemies of steel, phosphorus and sulphur,
are eliminated depends upon the character of the lining of the
converter or of the furnace. The lining may be acid or basic.
An acid lining contains a considerable quantity of silicic acid or
silica, the substance chiefly used being fire-clay. A basic lining
consists of the alkaline oxides of earthy metals or bases, the sub-
stances generally used being dolomite, lime and magnesite.
When an acid lining is used comparative!}' little of the sulphur
and phosphorus can be eliminated, and consequently in the acid
processes only iron which is nearly free from these injurious alloys
can be used. In the basic Bessemer process the sulphur and
phosphorus are to a great extent eliminated, but the quality of
the product is uncertain. In the basic open-hearth process all
or almost all the sulphur and phosphorus are eliminated and the
character of the product can be calculated upon with certainty.
Thus the basic open-hearth process of steel-making pos-
sesses great advantages over the Bessemer. Even with pig-iron
made from inferior ore the steel made in the open-hearth furnace
is superior to that produced in the Bessemer converter, which
can only use pig-iron made with high-grade ores almost free from
phosphorus. The open-hearth process is especially advantageous
in making high-carbon steel. By the Bessemer process nearly
all the carbon is blown out, producing a soft metal, and in order
to secure high-carbon steel more carbon must be mixed in. It
is difficult to do this in such a way as to secure homogeneity.
But in the open-hearth furnace, according to Mr. H. H. Camp-
l2J ►
51
bell, *'it is possible to make regularly a steel of any carbon
desired from .05 to 1.50 per cent,, with phosphorus below .04
per cent., with manganese below .50 per cent., and sulphur
below .04 per cent." The open-hearth process is more pro-
longed than the Bessemer ; it can be interrupted at the proper
stage to secure the amount of carbon desired and no mixing of
the carbon is required.
Phosphorus causes brittle-
ness in steel when cold ; while
sulphur causes brittleness
when red hot and makes it
unweldable, so it is extremely
important that both these
substances should be got rid
of.
The BeSvSemer converter pre-
sents a brilliant sight to the
.spectator as the flames belch
forth from its mouth. There
is nothing brilliant about the
open-hearth furnace. It does
its work quietly, but the pro-
duct is better.
Open-hearth steel is pre-
ferred to Bessemer steel for all
structural purposes, for .ship-
building and armour-plates.
For rails the Bessemer steel is
used almost entirely in the
United States, but in Europe
open-hearth steel is rapidly
superseding Bessemer steel
even for rails. The reason
why Bessemer steel rails are
more generally used is because
they are cheaper, not because
they are better than open-
hearth steel rails.
In the Northern States the
process generally adopted is
the acid Bessemer, but the
open-hearth method is gaining
ground. In the South the open-hearth method is used
almost exclusively. The following table, giving the quantity of
steel produced in the United States by the different methods in
1894 and 1898, will show how rapidly the production of open-
hearth steel is increasing, as compared with other steels :
TYPE OP BI,AST FURNACE TO
BE USED AT SYDNEY.
52
PRODUCTION OF STEEL IN THE UNITED STATES.
Kinds. 1894. 1898.
Tons. Tons.
Bessemer 3>57i>3i3 6,609,017
Open-Hearth 784,936 2,230,292
Crucible 5if7o2 89,747
Mificellaneous 4i03i 3i8oi
The readers of the Star will now be able to understand a de-
scription of the works that are being constructed in Sydney,
C.B., for the Dominion Iron and Steel Company. There are to
be four blast furnaces, each having an average capacity of 250
tons of pig-iron per day under ordinary conditions, but as stated
in a previous article, it is expected in view of the experience at
Ferrona, that Great Bell Island ore and Cape Breton coke will
work so well together in the furnace that the average output
will be larger. The blast furnaces will be of the same general
type as those used in the Edgar Thompson Steel Works at
Pittsburg, Pa. The height will be eighty-five feet and the
diameter nineteen feet. In the steel mill the basic open-hearth
system will be exclusively used, but the exact type of furnace
has not been definitely decided upon. Hundreds of men are now
working at the foundations of the works, but it will be some time
before the steel mill is so far completed as to be ready for the
furnaces, so that there will be time for consideration, and the
best type of furnace with the most modern improvements that
have been tested by experience can be chosen. There will be
from ten to twelve open-hearth furnaces in the steel mill. The
material used in making steel will be practically all pig-iron or
hot metal from the blast furnaces of the company, but a small
percentage of scrap iron and steel will be used. Generally the
metal will be taken to the steel mill in a liquid state, as it comes
hot from the furnaces, but the moulded pig-iron can be used
when desired either with or without the hot liquid.
The blast furnaces will cost about $2,500,000, the steel mill
about $1,500,000; the coke ovens previously described about
$1,250,000, and wharves, discharging plant, foundations, freight,
duties and incidentals fully a million more.
Cost of Making Pig Iron at Sydney.
From the Montreal Daily Star, October 28, i8gg.
i
VII. •
OT only to the capitalists directly interested in
the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, but to
the whole Canadian people, the commercial
success of the company is a matter of great
importance. If Canada is to become a great nation the
resources of the Maritime Provinces must be developed. So long
as our Atlantic seaboard, the portion of the country nearest to
the great nations of Europe, remains sparsely settled while there
are populous centres of industry all along the Atlantic coast of the
United States, Canada will suffer by comparison with its neigh-
bour in the eyes of all Europe. The building up of a big manu-
facturing city at the front door of Canada will give our Dominion,
new importance in the eyes of the world. There are very few
countries that export iron and steel, and if Canada can take
rank among the iron exporting nations it will add greatly to
Canadian prestige.
If the capitalists who are investing so much money in es-
tablishing a great iron industry in Cape Brtton make very large
profits it will be known in England and the United States and
will create a feeling of confidence in Canadian investments which
will make it easier to obtain capital to develop the great natural
resources of every part of Canada. The fact that British capital-
ists lost so much money in the Grand Trunk Railway and some
other Canadian investments years ago greatly retarded the de-
velopment of this country by causing an immense amount of capi-
tal, which would otherwise have been invested in the Dominion,
to go to the United States, the Argentine Republic and other
countries. All investments in the United States were not suc-
cessful, British capital was lost there just as it was lost in the
Grand Trunk Railway, but there were some cases of extraordinary
profits that offset the losses and when a stockholder in some un-
successful American concern began to talk of his losses there was
always a stockholder in some successful concern to tell of the great
profits he had made. Canada until recently could show no
extraordinary commercial successes to offset a few great failures.
54
The country was prosperous, the people in general were probably
in more comfortable circumstances than those of any other nation,
but we had no striking examples of great fortunes being made in
Canadian investments to cause people of other countries to talk
about the Dominion as a land in which it would pay to invest
money. The recent improvement in the financial condition of
the Grand Tj'unk Railway, the great success of the Canadian
Pacific Railway and the rich returns from some of the mining
ventures in the Canadian West have given the investors of the
world more confidence in Canada than they ever had before, and
if the Dominion Iron and Steel Company should prove to be an
extraordinary commercial success it will have a very great in-
fluence in attracting capital not only to the Maritime Provinces,
but to all sections of Canada. The readers of the Star will
therefore be interested in knowing how much it will cost to make
iron in Cape Breton, at what price it can be sold and where it
will find a market.
The Dominion Iron and Steel Company, in making estimates
as to the cost of manufacturing iron and steel at Sydney have
the advantage of knowing what has been accomplished by the
Nova Scotia Steel Company in making pig-iron at Ferrona with
the iron ore of Great Bell Island and coke from Cape Breton
coal, and in making steel at Trenton near New Glasgow from
Ferrona pig-iron. The chief differences are that the iron ore,
coal and limestone are much closer together at Sydney than at
Ferrona and that the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will
manufacture iron and steel on a much larger scale than they
have ever been made at Ferrona and Trenton.
The Nova Scotia Steel Company have estimated that the
cost of making pig-iron in the neighbourhood of Sydney Har-
bour would be less than $5.50 per ton including fixed charges so
long as the iron ore of Great Bell Island can be mined open cut,
and when underground mining has to be resorted to that the
cost of a ton of pig-iron will not exceed $5.83 including fixed
charges. Careful estimates made by experts for the Dominion
Iron and Steel Company correspond with this estimate very
closely, so it may be assumed that the cost of making pig-iron
at Sydney with the ore of Great Bell Island will never exceed
six dollars per ton under normal conditions. During a period of
great prosperity when high prices prevail for everj'thing and
wages rise the cost of making iron and steel will no doubt be
somewhat greater than at ordinary times, but owing to the fact
that the Dominion Iron and Steel Company have iron mines of
their own and have a permanent arrangement with the Dominion
Coal Company for a supply of cheap coal, the cost of production
is not likely to vary as much in good and bad times as at iron
works which are obliged to buy their raw materials in a fluc-
tuating market.
It may be noted that in the estimate of the Dominion Iron
and Steel Company the price of iron ore is fixed at what the ore
55
of Great Bell Island will cost when underground mining has to
be resorted to. It should also be stated that in estimating the
cost of coke, the value of the by-products is deducted as the volatile
constituents of the coal, which are usually lost in making coke,
will be saved by the Otto- Hoffman by-product coke ovens as
explained in a previous article. The estimate of the Nova
Scotia Steel Company does not allow anything for the value of
by-products. It will be easily understood that the Dominion
Coal Company can afford to supply the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company with coal at a much lower price than it could be profit-
ably sold in small quantities to the general public at a dis-
tance from the mines. The constant demand for coal for use in
the iron works will enable the company to operate its mines at
their full capacity all the year around instead of closing them
partially during the period when the St. Lawrence cannot be
navigated. It is a well known law of production that the larger
the output in any industrial enterprise the cheaper the product
can be turned out. The blast furnaces of the Dominion Iron
and Steel Company will require about a million tons of coal
annually for coke, and the coal company can turn out this extra
quantity at a lower cost per ton than it can mine the present out-
put. There will be no transportation charges and no middle-
men's profits. In mining bituminous coal and handling it after-
wards a great deal of it is broken into such small fragments that
it is not saleable for ordinary purposes. This fine coal, much of
which is simply coal dust, is called slack and it used to be a
waste product of the mines, but it makes excellent coke. The
coal company will not have sufficient slack to fully supply the
iron company and a considerable quantity of larger coal must be
used, but the fact that a portion of the coal used will be slack helps
to fix the price.
Following is. the estimate of the Dominion Iron and Steel
Company in detail :
1.8 tonsofore $l 80
1.25 tons of coke 1.80
.75 ton of limestone 40
Labour, repairs and incidentals 1.50
$5-50
This estimate is for pig-iron made exclusively from the ore
of the Wabana Mine, Great Bell Island, Newfoundland. It is
probable that the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will some-
times mix small quantities of more expensive ores with the
Wabana ore in order to produce different varieties of pig-iron,
and this may slightly increase the cost per ton. As stated in a
previous article the company owns a valuable mine in Cuba, and
the works are favourably located for securing iron ores of any
quality desired by water from outside points.
To convert the pig-iron into steel billets will cost about five
dollars per ton, so that steel billets can be produced for about
$10.50.
56
Let us compare these figures with prices at Pittsburg, Pa. ,
for the last twelve years. According to the report of the
American Iron and Steel Association the average annual prices
of these articles at Pittsburg for a series of years beginning with
1887 was as follows :
PRICES OF IRON AND STEEL AT PITTSBURG.
,^ rr n IJcPsenier Bessemer
Years. Gray Forge Bessemer j^j,,, Hillets Sleel Rails
I'lg-Iron. Pig-Irui,. ^^ ^j,,^ ^^ ^j,,^^
1887 $1902 $2137 $3255 $3708
1888 1599 1738 2878 2983
1889 '5 37 1800 2945 2925
1890 15 78 18 85 30 32 3' 75
1891 1406 1595 2532 2992
1892 , 12 81 1437 2363 3000
1893 II 77 12 87 20 44 28 12
1894 9 75 II 38 16 58 24 00
1895 1094 1272 1848 2433
1896 10 39 12 14 18 83 18 00
1897 9 03 10 13 15 08 18 73
1898 918 1033 1531 1762
During the last three months according to the Iron Age the
price of gray forge pig-iron at Pittsburg has ranged from $17 to
$21.50 and the price of Bessemer pig-iron from $20.35 to $24.
Bessemer steel billets have ranged in price from $35 to $40,
while basic open-hearth steel billets have been sold from $42.50
to $45. When prices are normal basic open-hearth steel is
usually worth from one dollar to two dollars more than Bessemer
steel. The prices of all kinds of iron and steel have been ab-
normally high of late, but on the other hand they were abnor-
mally low during the period from 1892 to 1898 inclusive.
Pig-iron is made cheaper in Alabama than anywhere else
in the world. In Birmingham, the centre of the Alabama
iron district, during a period of extreme depression, the price of
No. I Foundry pig-iron has fallen as low as $7, No. 3 Foundry
pig-iron $6 and Gray Forge pig-iron $5.75, for a short time ; but
Birmingham is 276 miles from Mobile, the nearest seaport, and
that seaport is 2,199 niiles farther from Liverpool than Sydney
is. The following table shows the highest and lowest prices of
three representative grades of pig-iron in Birmingham for each
year from 1890 to 1899 inclusive:
PRICES OF PIG IRON IN BIRMINGHAM, ALA.
No. I Foundry. No. 3 Foundry. Gray Forge.
Years, Highest Lowest Highest Lowest Highest Lowest
1890 $1600 $1200 $1365 $985 $1190 $960
189I 12 65 12 10 10 75 10 50 10 75 9 30
1892 12 25 10 00 10 00 8 90 9 50 8 25
1893 II 30 925 9 35 750 9^5 690
1894 9 70 775 8 00 6 50 7 00 6 25
1895 1025 725 975 605 975 590
1896 9 25 7 75 8 90 6 20 7 15 6 00
1897 8 00 7 00 6 75 6 00 6 50 5 75
1898 8 25 7 50 7 90 6 60 6 70 6 15
1899 1850 825 1650 780 1600 700
57
Hamilton pig-iron has sold at the furnace this year as high
as $23, and in Montreal as high as $25 per ton, L,ast year
Hamilton pig-iron went as low as $12 at the furnace and $14
in Montreal. The lowest price at which Ferrona pig-iron was
ever sold in Montreal was $13.50 and the highest price $24.50.
In Montreal the average annual prices of ' ' Summerlee ' ' pig-
iron, a Scotch brand, somewhat similiar to Ferrona pig-iron,
from 1890 to 1899, inclusive, have been as follows :
PRICES OF «'SUMMERLEE" PIG IRON IN MONTREAL.
Years. Prices.
1890 $22 00
1891 21 50
1892 19 00
1893- 18 50
1 894 20 00
1895 19 25
1896 . 19 00
1 897 - 17 00
1 898 17 00
1 899 25 00
In Glasgow, Scotland, in September, 1899, the price of No.
I Summerlee pig-iron was 85s, equivalent to $20.68, while the
price of No. 3, the lowest grade of Summerlee pig-iron, was 78s,
equivalent to $18.98. Last year No. i Summerlee pig-iron in
Glasgow ranged in price from 51s to 57s. In July 1896, No. i
Summerlee pig-iron in Glasgow went as low as 49s gd, or $12. 11,
and No. 3 Summerlee as low as 47s 6d, or $11.56. At the same
time steel billets sold at £4 2s 6d, or $20.08. Steel billets have
recently been sold in Glasgow as high as /^6 5s, equivalent to
$30.42. The lowest grades of Scotch pig-iron which are collected
in the warrant yards and sold under the name of Scotch
"Warrants" have reached the price of 75s 7d, or $18.40 this year.
In 1888 Scotch "Warrants" at one time sold as low as 37s id,
or $9.03. The following table gives the highest, lowest, and
average prices of Scotch "Warrants" at Glasgow, from 1887 to
1898, inclusive, expressed in dollars and cents.
PRICES OK SCOTCH •« WARRANTS" AT GLASGOW.
Years.
1S87 $11.60
1888
1889 ,
1 890 ,
1891 ,
l8.)2
«893
1894
1895
1 896 • • • •
1897
1898
ighesl
Lowest
Average
11.60
$ 9-36
$10.28
10.58
903
9.70
15.60
9-93
11.62
15.88
10.54
12.07
14.36
10.25
11.48
11.47
9.60
10.17
12.41
9.76
10.30
10.76
10.10
10.38
11-95
9.98
10.80
12.00
10.90
11.40
11.90
10.52
11.03
12.27
II 00
11.48
Allowing $2.50 for the cost of freight from Sydney to
British ports, the pig-iron of the Dominion Iron and Steel Com-
58
pany could be laid down in Great Britain for $S and steel billets
for $13 per ton. As no pig-iron has ever been shipped from
Sydney, the exact cost of freight to Great Britain cannot be given,
but it is likely to be less than $2.50 per ton soon after the
Dominion Iron and Steel Company have established a market for
their products in Great Britain, and are able to guarantee large
shipments regularly. The freight on a ton of pig-iron from Glas-
gow to Montreal has ranged from 2s 6d to 6s per ton, while the
freight on pig-iron from Montreal to Liverpool ranges from ids
to I2S 6d. But the shipments of pig-iron from Montreal to
Great Britain have never been large, and there is no doubt that
better rates might be obtained if large shipments were regularly
made. Moreover, Montreal is 2,773 niiles from Liverpool, while
the distance from Sydney is only 2,282 miles. The Dominion
Iron and Steel Company will do bu.siness on an immense scale,
and will, therefore, be able to make most favourable terms with
steamship companies for the transportation of iron and steel to
Great Britain and other countries of Europe, South America,
Africa and Asia as well as to American and Canadian ports. The
freight on Ferrona pig-iron from New Glasgow, N.S., to Mont-
real, by water, has ranged from $1.50 to $2 per ton. By rail it
is $2.93. During the season of St. Lawrence navigation the
freight rate on pig-iron from Sydney to Montreal would be at
least as low as from New Glasgow to Montreal, for the number
of ships running on the former route is much greater.
It is evident from the above figures that the Dominion Iron
and Steel Company will be able to sell iron and steel at a profit,
even when prices are at the lowest ebb during periods of world-
wide depression. It is certain that there will be in the future,
as there have been in the past, cycles of good and bad times, and
in estimating the profits of the Dominion Iron and Steel Com-
pany it would be as unfair to take the prices that prevailed in a
period of world-wide depression as it would be to take those pre-
vailing during this year of extraordinary prosperity.
The Markets for Iron and Steel.
From the Montreal Daily Star, November 3, x8gg.
VIII.
#
^HE population of the United States is only about
thirteen times as great as that of Canada, but
in the year 1898 for every ton of pig-iron pro-
duced in Canada 161 tons were produced in
the United States. The output of the blast furnaces of the
United States was 11,773,934 tons, while only 73,039 tons were
produced in Canada. In addition to the pig iron made in this
country, Canada consumed 40,995 tons of imported pig-iron and
cast iron scrap, making a total consumption of 114,035 tons. If
the same quantity of pig-iron per head of population were used
in Canada as is used in the United States about 900,000 tons of
pig-iron would ba required. It has been said that the quantity
of iron consumed in a country per head of population is a
measure of its civilization. Is Canada so far behind the United
States in civilization as these figures would indicate ? No one
who has travelled through the two countries will think so for a
moment. The explanation is that pig-iron is simply a raw
material for a great variety of iron and steel manufactures, and
Canada imports a far greater quantity of manufactures of iron
and steel in proportion to population than the United States. In
the year 1898 the value of iron and steel and manufactures thereof
imported into Canada was $16,556,761. During the same year
the value of iron and steel and manufactures thereof imported
into the United States was only $12,473,637. If the Americans
had imported as large a quantity per capita as Canadians, the
value of their importations would have been over $215,000,000.
It is evident that Canadians are not behind the age as regards
the consumption of iron and steel, but we get from other countries
what we ought to make at home.
In the past Canadian manufacturers using iron and steel as
raw materials have been at a disadvantage because these articles
have been made in Canada in such small quantities that the
prices prevailing here have been much higher than in Great
Britain, the United States and other great iron countries. But
when the works of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company at
6o
Sydney, C. B. , are in full operation it will be possible to obtain
pig-iron and steel billets as cheaply in Canada as in any other coun-
try in the world, and there ought to be an extraordinary develop-
ment of all the industries using iron and steel as raw materials.
Even with our present population, if all the iron and steel
articles used in Canada were made in Canada from Canadian pig-
iron and Canadian steel, we would require nearly twice as much
pig-iron as the four great blast furnaces of the Dominion Iron
and Steel Company and all the other blast furnaces now in oper-
ation in Canada could produce. But Canada will not stand still
as regards population. We have entered upon a period of great
national development. Our farm lands are being rapidly settled,
our mines of gold, silver, copper, lead and nickel are being
developed, the cities and towns are growing rapidly in popu-
lation and wealth, and the demand for iron and steel is increasing
every year.
Not many years ago Canada imported nearly all iti manu-
factures of iron and steel from Great Britain. During the last
few years a great change has taken place. American iron and steel
articles have almost completely displaced the British articles in
the Canadian market. Another change is coming. Canadian
manufactures will displace American manufactures in the
Canadian market. No doubt in many cases American concerns
that now have an extensive trade in Canada will start branch
manufacturing establishments in this country. There is a
splendid field for enterprise in supplying the people of Canada
with all kinds of articles made of iron and steel. Sydney, C.B.,
will offer special advantages as a location for such industries,
and no doubt the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will do all
in their power to encourage the establishment in the vicinity of
their works of manufactories using iron and steel as raw materials,
but such industries will not be confined to any one town or any
one province. During the season of navigation pig-iron and
steel from Sydney can be laid down in Montreal very cheaply,
and as the enlargement of the St. I^awrence canals is now prac-
tically completed and boats drawing 14 feet of water will be able
to go from Sydney to the head of the great lakes, no doubt Cape
Breton iron and steel will be able to compete successfully with
the products of Pennsylvania in the markets of Ontario.
But the Dominion Iron and Steel Company will not be
entirely dependent upon Canadian demands for their products.
Indeed, it is probable that their whole output could be sold in
Great Britain, Germany, Belgium and other markets outside of
Canada. It was shown in a previous article that the supplies of
iron ore in Great Britain and other countries of Europe are
rapidly being exhausted, that Great Britain has long been de-
pendent upon Spain for iron ore, and the Spanish mines are
giving out. At the present time England is importing iron ore
from the Gellivara district of Sweden, which is considerably
north of the Arctic circle. The ore is carried by rail across
6i
Sweden and Norway to the Norwegian harbour of Ofoten, 130
miles north of the Arctic circle, where it is shipped to the British
blast furnaces.
The supplies of coke in Germany and Belgium are not suf-
ficient for their requirements, and they are obliged to import
considerable quantities of pig-iron chiefly from Great Britain.
Germany annually imports between 400,000 and 500,000 tons
of pig-iron, and Belgium about 300,000 tons. In both of these
countries the manufacture of steel is carried on very extensively,
and the output of their blast furnaces is not large enough to meet
the demands of the steel mills. It has been shown in a previous
article that Cape Breton pig-iron can be laid down in Great
Britain at a cost considerably below even the lowest prices of
British iron, so that it should have no difficulty in competing
with British pig-iron in G2rmany and Belgium. France last
year imported over two million tons of ore for use in its blast
furnaces.
While the supplies of ore in the iron-making countries of
Europe are becoming exhausted, iron is being used more exten-
sively every year for a great variety of purposes. In the En-
gineering Magazine for October, Mr. Archer Brown, of the
great iron firm of Rogers, Brown & Co., New York, has an
interesting article on the future of the American iron industry,
in which he shows that the consumption of iron and steel in the
United States doubles once in ten years. He gives figures show-
ing that the consumption of iron and steel per capita is steadily
increasing in all countries. He says : " The world's consumption
of pig-iron grows in geometrical ratio. In 1740 it did not amount
to one pound for each inhabitant. In 1856 it was about 17 pounds
p2r capita ; in 1893 it wa^ 35 pounds per capita ; in iqdd it will
probably be 60 pounds per capita. ' '
In 1893 the consumption par capita in the United States was
300 pounds, in Great Britain 250 pounds, in France, Germany
and Belgium 175 pounds.
The opening up of Africa to civilization will greatly in-
crease the demand for iron and steel, which will be required for
railways, bridges and many other purposes.
Within the last ten years the iron and steel manufacturers
of the United States have developed an important export busi-
ness. In 1880 the exports of iron and steel, and manufactures
thereof from the United States amounted in value to only $15,-
156,703, while the imports were valued at 1180,443,362. In 1898,
while the imports had decreased to $12,473,637, the exports of
iron and steel had increased to $91,844,934, including the ex-
ports of agricultural implements which were valued at $9,073,-
384. The exports of pig-iron were not large, nearly the whole
quantity exported, except what came to Canada, going from the
62
Southern States. The pig-iron exports for the year classed by
ports of shipment, were as follows ;
Tons. Value.
Norfolk S3,43S $534,397
New Orleans 5i>7o3 * 674,516
Pensacola 23>3>3 226.540
Brunswick 19,032 190,310
New York 18,620 369,651
Baltimore I4ii64 368,380
Mobile I3i295 126,690
All othec ports 69,121 778,526
Total 262,686 $3,269,010
A larger quantity of pig-iron might have been exported,
but the output was not much more than sufficient to supply the
nianufacturers of the United States.
The American iron and steel exports consist chiefly of
articles made of iron and steel, including steel rails, steel sheets
and plates, structural iron and steel, wire, nails and spikes,
tacks, car wheels, cutlery, firearms, locks, hinges and other hard-
ware, saws, tools, electrical machinery, metal working machinery,
pumps and pumping machinery, sewing machines, shoemaking
machinery, fire engines, locomotive engines, stationary engines,
parts of engines and boilers, pipes and fittings, safes, scales and
balances, stoves, ranges, agricultural machinery, bicycles, etc.,
etc.
Sydney would be an admirable location for the manufacture
of most of these articles, both for export and for the home market,
which as already shown is now supplied almost entirely by the
manufacturers of the United States. With cheap iron and steel,
cheap fuel, at tidewater with a magnificent harbour nearer to the
markets of Europe, Asia, Africa and South America than any
port of the United States manufacturers locating there should be
able to compete with those of the United States in exporting all
kinds of articles made of iron and steel. Already the Montreal
Rolling Mills Company are considering a proposal to establish
a branch at Sydney and will probably do so if satisfactory ar-
rangements can be made with the town of Sydney as regards
site and taxation.
The following table shows the distances from Sydney, C.B.,
Pittsburg, Pa. , and Birmingham, Alabama, to various markets :
, Distances From v
Sydney. Pittsburg. Birmingham. To
2,282 3<5I4 4>7S2 Liverpool
2,564 3,762 5,030 Antwerp
6,467 7,224 7,585 Cape Town
3,567 4,100 4,409 Pernambuco
5,110 5'^43 5,952 Buenos Ay res
8,331 8,864 9,173 Valparaiso
12,961 13,494 13,^03 San Francisco
13,071 13,604 13,913 Honolulu
12,350 »3,I07 13,468 Melbourne
000 675 1,275 Boston
719 iNPf ■ i»27o Montreal
63
It should be noted that the distances from Pittsburg and
Birmingham are partly by railway while from Sydney they are
by deep water all t|ie way. It is unnecessary to say that deep
water transportation is much cheaper than railway transportation.
This tabic of distances is based upon figures furnished by
Capt.W. H. Smith, R.N.R., chairman of the Board of Examiners
of Masters and Mates, Marine Department, Halifax, by the
United States Commissioner of Navigation and the United States
Bureau of Statistics at Washington, the railway distances from
Pittsburg to Philadelphia and from Birmingham, Ala., to Mobile
being added to the ocean distances. The distance from Sydney
to Montreal is taken from the table of distances in a report issued
by the Harbour Commissioners of Montreal and is measured from
lyow Point Lighthouse, at the mouth of Sydney Harbour. The
distance from the pier of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company
would be seven or eight miles greater. The distances from Pitts-
burg and Birmingham to Montreal and Boston are all rail.
One of the possibilities of the near future is the revival of
shipbuilding in the Maritime Provinces, which in the days of
wooden ships built more vessels in proportion to population than
any other country. Ship plates can probably be made more
cheaply in Sydney than anywhere else in the world and the
Dominion Iron and Steel Company contemplate their manu-
facture on an extensive scale, either for home consumption or
for export.
The Right flan for flanager.
From the Montreal Daily Star, November aa, i8gg.
n
IX.
[Lt, Canadians who have been watching the
development at Sydney, Cape Breton, of
the Dominion Iron and Steel Company's en-
terprise, which promises to make Canada
one of the leading iron and steel exporting conntries of the woild,
will be interested in knowing something about Mr. Arthur J.
Moxham, who was appointed manager of the company at the
meeting of the Board of Directors in Montreal yesterday.
Having learned from Mr. Henry M. Whitney that he hoped
to secure Mr. Moxham as manager, the Star has instituted
special enquiries among iron and steel men in the United States
to ascertain his fitness for this responsible position. Mr. Charles
Kirchoff , editor of the Iron Age, than whom there is no better
authority in the United States, being asked by a Star man what he
thought of the appointment, said : " If it is true that the Dom-
inion Iron and Steel Company have secured Mr. Arthur J. Mox-
ham as manager we may expect to see the plant in operation in
a very short time. Mr. Moxham can be depended upon to make
things go with a rush. He is a hustler and will lose no time in
pushing the works to completion. He is a man of extraordinary
force and business capacity and is noted for the success which
has attended all his enterprises. No man could be found better
fitted to take the management. He has had practical experience
in all the details of manufacturing iron and steel and is a splen-
did organizer and manager of men."
Mr. Arthur J. Moxham is an Englishman by birth, but went
from England to Kentucky in 1869, at the age of fifteen. His
family held a very good social position in England, although they
were in reduced circumstances at that time and it was thought
that he could not learn a trade in that country without injuring
the standing of the family, but he had a natural bent for mechan-
ical work and being anxious to make his own way decided to
come to America. Starting in a rolling mill in lyouisville in 1870
65
as receiving clerk, he afterwards obtained practical experience of
every department of the work and mastered all the details of the
business. Upon the failure of the company as a result of the
panic of 1873, the business went into the hands of a receiver, and
Mr. Moxham, in association with some friends, leased the works
and operated them with great success for some years. He after-
wards organized the Birmingham Rolling Mills Company, and in
1878 built rolling mills at Birmingham, Ala. The works were
completed and put into operation within eight months from the
time of the preparation of the first plans. At this time he was
only twenty-four years of age. The rolling mills practically
doubled the population of Birmingham. Wliile at Birmingham
Mr. Tom L. Johnson approached him to undertake the manufac-
ture of what was at that time a new type of rail now universally
used for tramways and street railroads, being known as the
"girder rail." He had endeavoured to secure its manufacture at
many points, but owing to the difficulties involved in rolling this
complicated shape in the state of the art as developed at that
period had secured no one willing to undertake it. Mr. Moxham
decided to experiment and after many difficulties succeeded. This
led to a partnership between Mr. Johnson and Mr. Moxham. Out
of this grew the Johnson Company, which became the largest
manufacturers of street railway supplies in the world. Works
were erected at Johnstown, Pa., for the manufacture of not only
the rails, but the switches and other essentials. The rolling
mills were built within a period of nine months from the time of
breaking ground to the time of rolling the steel. The busi-
ness continuing to grow, the erection of larger works became a
necessity.
Up to this time the company had purchased the ste2l used
in the rolling mills, but it was now decided to engage in the
manufacture of steel, and after a critical investigation into the
advantages of different points, Lorain, Ohio, on the southern
shore of Lake Erie, was selected as the best location for the new
works, and the company erected there a large Bessemer steel
plant, together with the necessary blooming mills and rail mills.
The work of construction was commenced on the first of July,
1894, and the first steel was made on the first of April, 1895, a
period of nine months, although predictions were freely made
that the plant could not be started in less than from eighteen'
months to two years. Blast furnaces for the manufacture of pig-
iron were afterward built. About 4,000 acres of land were secur-
ed and simultaneously with the construction of the works what
was practically a new town was built with all such public improve-
ments as were involved in the supply of water, laying out of
streets, building sidewalks, constructing sewers and laying water
pipes. A virgin forest had to be removed and about eighty tons
of dynamite were used in clearing away the trees alone. The
population of Lorain was increased by these works from 5,500 to
11,000 within two years and that of Elyria, an adjoining town,
66
by about 2,000. The works were afterwards greatly extended
and the number of employes largely increased.
The Lorain Steel Company's plants were sold to the Federal
Steel Company, as one of the great concerns formed by the
couvsolidation of several large steel companies is called. The
Lorain plant was the second unit, of manufacture under the
amalgamation. Mr. Moxham, who was president of the Lorain
Steel Company at the time of the amalgamation, remained with
the Federal Steel Company in the same capacity until the 22nd
of March, 1899, when he tendered his resignation and retired
for the purpose of withdrawing from all business. He had sold
his interest in the Lornin Steel Company, and having now a com-
petence determined to take a rest after thirty years of hard work.
He purchased the well-known yacht Erl King and started on a tour
of two years around the world. During the past summer he visited
the British Isles and went as far north as Norway, but happening
to stop at New York after a yachting trip of about four months,
he accidentally met Mr. Henry M. Whitney, with whom he was
well acquainted, having had extensive business dealings with him
at the time when Mr. Whitney was president of the West-End
Street Railway of Boston and inaugurated the first great electric
street railway system.
From Mr. Whitney he learned of the great developments in
progress at Sydney, Cape Breton, and having great confidence in
Mr. Whitney's business judgment he at once became greatly in-
terested in what he said about the great natural advantages of
Sydney as a location for an iron and steel industry. The course
of Mr. Moxham 's experience from 1870 to 1895 had been in a
strict line with the changed conditions of steel manufacture, each
new step having been made in what may be termed the centre of
gravity of most economical production as this changed owing to
the development of the country and the discovery of new
localities for raw materials. He was much impressed with what
he heard about the cheapness with which the raw materials for
iron-making could be assembled at Sydney and decided to make
a thorough investigation. He not only visited the locality him-
self, but sent an expert to examine the ore deposits of Great
Bell Island, and after a month's careful study of all the conditions
he came to the conclusion that iron and steel could be made more
economically at Sydney than anywhere else and decided to accept
an ofiFer to become manager of the company and invest in its
securities.
It will be a source of gratification to Canadians that a man
of such practical experience in the manufacture of iron and steel
as Mr. Moxham has formed the opinion that Canada possesses
the best location in the world for the manufacture of iron and
steel.
Canadians in general will be pleased to know that the
manager of this g^eat enterprise is a British subject, although
this fact had nothing whatever to do with his selection for the
position.
Mr. Moxham, although a resident of the United States for
thirty years, never became naturalized. This was at one time
made a matter of reproach in the United States Congress, and
Congressman Johnson, of Ohio, in defending him, said : " This
man Moxham is not a citizen of the United States, but he is a
resident of • Johnstown ; they know him there, and when that
fearful flood swept down ; when, after that awful night, twelve
thousand people were left without food or shelter, and the sun
rose on three thousand corpses, it was this Englishman, this
Arthur J. Moxham, who at the first gathering of the survivors,
was by common acclaim made dictator. It was he who in that
dreadful moment, stepped to the front, and, in the name of the
whole community, brought order out of chaos — who destroyed
whiskey and seized food, who fed the living and buried the
dead, and again set in motion the machinery of organized gov-
ernment and civilized life."