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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 14, 1904)
f win ra TTCrn rr i 4 1 inr gnrrni of the "Hleotrle Mai." kT ITS liist session the New York legislature appointed a Joint leg islative commute to Investigate I ne subject or electric towage or canal boats. For two weeks past some very interesting and successful tests of the "electric mulo" have been made on the Erie canal at Schenectady for the benefit of the legislative commis sion. Significant of the larger engineering Interest attaching to these tests was the presence of representatives of the Panama Canal commission, the director of rail ways and canals of Germany and many engineers of national and International reputation. The "electric mule" is simply a development of the trolley principle, dif fering from the trolley motor only in the fact that the wheels grip the under side of sieel rails Instead of running along their surface. The trolley "mule" takes the current from a trolley wire, through a trolley pole, and pulls the canal boat by means of a long towline. The demon strations consisted of hauling three canal boats, carrying a total burden of 616 tons. Another test was a total weight of 780 tons, and a third test with 1,396 tons. Other tests consisted of overtaking and passing boats drawn by animals with the "electric mule." As the tests were highly successful, there Is little doubt that the electric towing device is destined to work a revolution In canal transporttation in this country and Europe. Diners oa Trolley Line. A trolley dining car to an Innovation about to be established by the Aurora, Elgin & Chicago Railway company. Within fifteen days the new car, which will rival a Pullman in equipment, will be placed in commission. Although at first only available to special parties, the dining car eventually will be placed in general service, making four runs dally between Chicago and the Aurora and Elgin terminals. Theater parties re turning to suburban homes after nn even ing's entertainment In the city are ex pected to find the car especially adapted to their needs, as are the golfers of the Chicago club at Wheaton. The car was built at an expense of $12,CO0, and Is named the "Carolyn." Twenty-eight persons can be accommo dated In the comfortable wicker chairs at Its tables. The length of the car Is fifty five feet, six of which are taken up by the kitchen. No attempt will be made to equal the elaborate menu of a Pullman, the Intention being to make the service more of the light buffet order. The car is equipped with a motor and can be tent out alone If necessary. Tho privilege of providing the food for the passengers will be leased by the company, and several caterers are already bidding for It Chicago Record-Herald. 8 To Protect Linemen. An international congress will bo held In Paris in June, 1905, with the object of in vestigating apparatus to Insure the greater safety of workircn employed on h'gh-ten-slon conductors. Tbo form the apparatus should take Is a device indicating safely and clearly whether any conductor Is alive or not. It must be equally applicable to direct and alternating currents of all vol tages, must be thoroughly reliable and In capable of doing damage to itself, the op erator or the distribution system under any circumstances. The congress Is being or ganized by the Association des Industrlels de France contre les Accidents du Travail, and a prize of 6.000 francs will be awarded to the exhibitor whose apparatus most nearly fulfils the conditions. Intending ex hibitors should send a foil description, with, necessary drawings, of their apparatus to the president of the association, S, Rue da Lutece, Paris, before December 21 next. All systems presented will remain the prop erty of the Inventors, who should take the necessary measures to protect their rights. Further Information may be obtained from the director of the association at the above address. "Telsjrl 7leKcb ne. An Ingenious New Yorker has evolved a clever plan for combining the business ad vantages of a telephone with' those of a stenographer and has opened a "telnglrl" exchange, the first of its sort In the or any other land. It Is the latest and newest method of meeting the demand for hand ling business quickly. Its promoters ray It will revolutionize present business methods. It Is a proposition In centralization, and In that It Is in harmony with the dominant Idea in all other lines of Industry. The "telagirl" exchange la a new business In stitution with a telephone exchange and private system of its own and half a dozen competent and rapid stenographers waiting. It was planned for the purpose of having stenographers who could take dletat'on over the telephone, and thus the half dozen telephonera would take care of the morning correspondence of forty business men all over tho city. This is how It works: When you become a subscriber to the exchange a private telephone is installed on your desk. You go to your office in the morning, open and read your mail, smoke a cigar and get ready to dictate your letters. You take down your telephone receiver and are at once connected with the "telagirl-' ex change. The operator connects you with the telephone at the desk of one of the stenographers. She claps an operator's head telephone on, seizes a pencil and note book and tells you to go ahead. You may bo two blocks away from her, or a mile, for that matter. When you get throujh she writes out the letters on your own pri vate stationery, which you keep in quan tity at the "telagirl" office, axd an hour later a messenger boy In uniform dlveres a big envelope, in which you find all ycur letters carefully and neatly written. Hut Process of Gnlviinizlnir, The Engineer gives publicity to a new process of galvanizing, which has now reached a commercial stage. It Is known as "Sheraidizlng." The point of interest about it is that iron and steel can bo coated with a thin even deposit of zinc at a temperature below tho melting point of zinc. Tho first step In the process is to free tho iron from Bcale and oxide by any of the well-known methods, such as dip ping in an acid solution or sand blasting. The articles to be rendered rustless are then placed In a close iron receptacle charged with zinc dust, which Is heated to a temperature of from 600 to 600 degree F. for a few hours and allowed to cool. The drum is then opened and the Iron articles removed, when they are found to be coated with a fine homogeneous cover ing of zinc, the thickness depending upon the temperature and the length of time of treatment It will be observed that the temperature required to bring about this result Is about ZOO degrees below tho melt ing point of sine The low temperature re quired makes the process cheap as com pared to the process of dipping in molten sine, snd baa the additional advantage that It does not deteriorate iron or steel of small section to the same extent as hot galvanizing. The whole of the zinc is consumed ; there is no waste of zinc as la the hot galvanising process. This new pro cess of dry galvanizing fs not limited to the coating of Iron with zinc, but It has been successfully applied to coating lion with copper, aluminum and antimony. What is Kleetrleltj T la Harper's Magazine for August, Sir Oliver Lodge presents In a popular form a view of the nature of electrclty which baa recently received much attention from scientific men. To only a limited extent, perhaps, is lie to be regarded the author of the theory here advanced. Ills belief In It though. Is noteworthy, for Sir Oliver is one of the lending authorities on elec tricity. Besides, he has a particularly happy way of discussing such subjects. Borne of the most profound thinkers Gierke Maxwell, for Instance have em ployed language which to the layman Is absolutely Incomprehensible. Hence, while clearness of statement is not evidence of sound reasoning, a man deserves public gratitude who talks and writes so intelli gibly as Sir Oliver Lodge. Text books on physics usually distinguish carefully between matter and force. The former can be recognized by man only while under the Influence, of some form of the Jalter. Again, force reveals Itself only through the medium of matter. Still, the two are to be kept separate in the mind. Whether electricity is force or matter is a question which has received a good deal of consideration. Most physicists frankly confess that they cannot tell. Electricity, they say, can be known only by its prop erties. They prefer to describe It as a "physical agent," which la manifested in certain ways. At one time there was a disposition to consider electricity as one form of force, but the opinion Is not so widely held today. SUvanus P. Thompson (of the London Technical college), whose works on this subject have been widely used in colleges and high schools, declares that electricity is "neither matter nor en ergy," though resembling both in being indestructible. In some ways, he shows. It acts like an attenuated gas; in others it behaves like an incompressible liquid. He mentions respectfully the notion that it is identical with the ether which Is supposed to extend everywhere through space, but he Is careful not to commit himself to any of these hypotheses. Sir Oliver Lodge, In his srtlcle in Harper's Mazaglne, goes further. He, too, denies that electricity Is energy, but he is even more strongly Impressed than is Silvanus P. Thompson with its similarity to matter. He will not say, in so many words, that they are identical, but he has no hesitation in affirm ing "that matter is composed of elec tricity." Sir Oliver's faith Is based on a concep tion of the atom, of which Prof. J. J. Thompson (of Cambridge university) la the chief exponent. According to this ex pert, atoms are made up of two kinds of particles. Bome are large and carry charges of positive electrclty, and some are small exceedingly small. Indeed and are negatively electrified. Prof. Thomson calls the latter "corpuscles," says that they are far more numerous than the other kind, and adds that they are so diminutive that 1,000 of them arc required to equal In bulk a positive particle. When he thinks of the structure of an individual atom, th Cambridge physicist employs only a soli tary poaiUv element, which is made to en close, like a shell, the negative particles. Electric attraction binds the system to gether. As all atoms in the universe are supported by Mm to be built on thai plan, of course he makes electricity coexistent with matter. He also shows that elec tricity seems to possess some of the prop erties of matter. It can be removed by filtration through cotton wool. Other physicists concede that large posi tive particles and small negative ones can be detected separately, and that It is safe to guess at their size from the quantity of electrk-Ity they carry. On the other hand, very few experts are willing to evince belief In the hypothetical combina tion which Prof. Thomson makes. Judg ment on the correctness of the "electrical theory of the atom" Is at present sus pended. Consequently, any argument which has that for a foundation is just cow unconvincing. rVeverthcless, Sir Oliver's article Is valuable for the Indi cation which it affords of the trend of modern thought regarding both electricity and matter. New York Tribune. . A for tke Trolley. In Brooklyn the street railway system has drveloped a Una of business in freight carrying that gives some conception of the Infinite possibilities of city trolley lines. While in the specialty of trans porting the city population daily from the circumference to the center and then again from tho center back to the circumference, tho electric railway companies find their chief mission, time has shown that tbo city and suburban lines are adaptable to a much more varied utility than an exclusively passenger trnflle. A choice building sec tion of Brooklyn was Impossible of im provement because of an immense, rocky ten-acre hill. Tho trolley company con tracted to haul away the hill at SO cents the cubic yard. This alone was profitable, as the hill was directly on one of tho lines. But the people who were reclaim ing the Coney Island marshes were greatly in need of solid matter, and the railway company sold the Mil, at the dumping ground, for 12 cents a cubic yard. There is also a contract by the Brooklyn Street Car company with the Subway company to take the waste material from the Mg core, and also an agreement with the city to receive and dispose of the ash refuse All this material is made doubly profitable by being utilized in reclaiming marsh lands. Grawth of Trailer Llnea. The development of trolley lines la recent years Is familiar to every one. Yet It is doubtful whether most people appreciate the extent to which it has progressed. An Impressive summary of what has been ac complished with this new form of traction rs given In the Street Railway Journal. Its figures show that the mileage of elec tric railways now equals that of steam roads at the outbreak of the Civil war und that the trolley lines represent nn Invest ment of $3,0tO,C0,000.P0O. or about a quarter of the capital Invested In steam railwnys. Moreover, the extension of the electrlo roads is going on rapidly. Last year 3.5C0 miles of new lines were laid an Increase of 13 per cent Much of this reaching out has been In Interurban business. In which llus electric lines come In direct competi tion with tho railroads. An especially notable instance of this sort Is the case of the electric servlco between Indianapolis and Columbus, a distance of about 170 miles. Sleeping cars are run on the trolley lines between the two cities and are well patronized. Conditions here are aapectaly favorable because the rata of speed Is Just Efficient for that distance to give- the pas sengers a good night's rest The probabilities are that there will ba a greater increase in electric tractfcn mile age In IS4 than during the last year, and that marked progress will be made In tho substitution of electricity for steam. It is announced that plans are In contemplation or under way for the construction by the New York Central railrond of numerous electric branch lines across New York state and the substitution of electricity for steam on the West Shore line. The Rochester Post-Express says these projects mean eventually tho abandonment of accommo dation trains on the. New York Central and tho use of Its main line for through passenger service. The electric system has tmderpone such a remarkable development since Its Introduction that the scheme at tributed by common report to the New York Central Is not to be regarded as wholly Utopian. Tho substitution of elec tricity for steam on great railway lines has made little progrrss In this "country, and It may be that its feasibility will be tested on an extensive scale In the near future.