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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (March 26, 1905)
March id. I90ff, THE OMAHA ILLUSTRATED-BEE. Uncle Sam's Wonderful Bargain in the Big Panama Scrap Heap 11 -- lit H fi ' f ' f . A ' " k " " (Copyright, 106. by A.VAMA. March mm resiiondcnoe of The Bre.) When T'nclo Sam buught the runtinia canal for $4f),0W),010 ho got tho rlglit-of-way ncroBS tho Isthmus, tin- Piiiiauia railroad, a scratch through the mountain), a lot of old buildings and a per up he;ip. This letter drain with the ip heap. In others I may enow wnat lip got witn tne r'anuma ranroaa, ino liiindredH of thousands of ucrcf that crime mill tho canal, the millions of dollars orth of valuable digging represented by the scratch through the mountains, and Also tho worth of the 3.QCK; old buildings In tho work of the present. Each forma a separate part of Vnclo gam's bargain, the best he lias made since he bought Louis iana of Napoleon more than a luO years bzo. i In order to show you Just what the scrap I heap Is worth I have gone with Paymaster y Tobey, the chief of the department of ma terial and supplies, lu a special train over the lethmus, visiting warehouse nftcr ware house and yard after yard, examining the material as It lies upon the shelves and out In the open. I despair of giving you an adequate Idea of Us quantity and va riety. There are, all told, 115 great store house, fifteen enormous warehouses and forty-one parks scattered at different points up and down 1U0 square miles of territory,' teaching from tho Atlantic to tho Pacific. Tho contents of the buildings and yards ara so great that I venture they would cover, If they could bo spread out In one place, a 600-acre farm, as deep as your waist, and leave plenty over for a feuca twice as high around the edges. These materials havo all been Inventoried by the French, and in their balance sheet they aro valued at $29,000,000. This is a book estimate; but our expert" tell mo that they are really worth one-fourth that amount to us, for uso and for sale. In the purchase of the canal this stuff was not. counted, but Admiral Walker, the chair man of the commission, Insisted that it be thrown In for good measure. As a result we got H for nothing, and tho admiral thereby saved the United States Just 17,000,000. CANAL SHOrS AT KMPIRB, SIIOWINO SOME OP OL.D MACHINEBT. Frank G. Carpenter.) and the books are of great value to tho ma- 23. (Special Cor- tonal and supplies department, which has to know where everything is and be rady to furnish it at a moment's notice whether It be a pound of noils or a pair of scissors, a steam barge or a locomotive. PAYMASTER JACK BON AND ONB'OF THJ2 FRENCH IjEDQSRA 4 . 1 7 7 .Vf-! II l ': 4 5. rAJt w4"- .'' '"Hkl M ,', 2 C 1 1 , A - r ' S hi ft" I ( French Account Hooks. The Idea prevails that tho French kept no account of anything, that they took no care if their machinery and that everything wi rereived was rusted and rotten. Ihis I not so. The best of their machinery was kppt under cover, much of it wa painted with white lead, while coal oil was squirted over bolt nuts and Journal boxes to keep them from rusting. Aji to bookkeeping, I doubt whether tho French have their equals. I looked yester day over tho ledgers which contain a list of these supplies. Tho pages are like cop per plate engraving and the system of ac counts is perfect. There aro eighteen of M these books, each as high as a table, aa thick as the biggest family bible and as jieavy as a 10-year-old boy. Each Is bound with brass plates at the top and bottom, making it look more llko tho mfssal of a monastery than a business account book. To give on idea of tho size I had Pay master Jackson hold ono of the books open while I photographed it. Each ledger contains 5H) pages. There are eighteen books, so that they have, nil told, 9.000 pag'H, all covered with tlgures. Pay master Tobey says that duplicates of theao books were kept in Paris, and that the hundreds of thousands of Items scattered through the storehouses, sheds and parka are so carefully labeled to correspond with the ledgers that he can give an order from them and be sure that the supplies will be found lnj the storehouse as hero registered. The system of account keeping Is much the same as that of the United States navy, The French Kslsnre Sheet. Hefnro I take you through tho shops let) me mention some of tho larger Items on thi French balance sheet. Tho smell ones ara so many that their names alone would fill a pugo of this newspaper. We have hera on hand 57 barge. 38 yawls and II steam launches. There aro 273 Iron cranes, S00 big pumps of various kinds, 1K9 rock drills and 4t0 steam winches. There are 14 bridges, valued at almost $1,000,000; 10 electrical ma chines, 12 planing machine, 151 punching machines and all sorts of machines for shearing Iron, riveting and bolt screwing. Thero Is ft flouting drill apparatus valued by tho French at over $30,000, a boring ma ehlno at $10,000, a section, dredge worth $7,000 and other dredges running up Into the millions. As to the ears and locomo tives, they are of every description. Thera aro thirty-four American locomotives val-. ued at $300,000 and 112 Belgian locomotives valued at $5,000,000, together with a lot of Decauvlllo locomotives for hauling dump cars over the little narrow gauge Decau vlllo track. There aro steel rails enough to lay 176 miles of standard gauge, and mora than sixty-five nillea of narrow gauge. There aro .5,000 dump cars, the most of which can bo used, and there are 6,000 trolleys for carrying dirt away from the canal. Tho most of tho railroad material Is good and tho dump cars arot now being repaired and remodeled, -,3."le .locomotive. . 'when cleaned and oiled, are found to move all right; and tho engineers tell me some of them are even better than any which can be purchased today. Our Big: French Dredges. My trip over tho canal was mado In com pany with Paymaster K. C. TTobey, the chief of the material and supplies depart ment; Paymaster V. S. Jackson, his as sistant, and Mr. Carl A. Strom, the me chanical engineer in charge of all the ma chinery on the Isthmus. . We began at Colon and traveled from Y7 " : .... ..... ;., THJD C1TT OJ" PARIS DRKDQB1, W1UCH NOW LIES IN CANAL. TEN MU.ES FROM P.NAMA-ORIOINALLT COST use In a steam launcn or tne quarantine niaeuinery. every mi m men cm it-i service, and the Jamalcnji boiler makers In our work. Thero is a vast deal of Eiffel are now working there upon a cargo lighter 110 feet long, 24 feet beam and 8 feet In depth, while In the same building other workmen are putting together n stenm launch which was brought down from the Culebra cut twelve miles away. station to station, taking plenty of time to go through the 'arger warehouses and to Investigate the condition of the materials thera stored. We examined the steam dredges lying out In tho open, both at Colon and La Boca. These are now being re paired and they will soon be doing active work on tho canal. At Colon we Inspected one dredging vessel made of steel which was 200 feet long and forty foot wide, and which Js worth to Uncle Sam as It stands $75,000. It has three enormous cranes on It, one of which will lift twenty-five tons. The barge In equipped with engines and the only repairs neoded are at different places in the hull. This Is covered with barnacles, which must be scraped off and ONE OF THE BELGIAN LOCOMOTIVES READY. FOR SEItVICB the holes made by the salt water patched uP Next tills vessel lles-a Scotch dredge with a chain of greaj. dredging buckets upon It It Is practically whole and Paymn'ster Tobey estimates that it Is .worth about $100,000. Each bucket will carry a barrel of material. The chain to which the. buckets nre fastened Is made of links .weighing, I Judge, 100 pounds each. . . Standing on this 8eotoh .dredge I counted forty other vessels belonging to tho canal from where I stood. Homo were, sunk . In the water with only their tops showing, others were floating,' but all caii bo raised and used. These vessels are worth , all tho way from $50 each for scrap iron up to J100,- 000 each, ror use In the excavation of the canal. At La Hoes, the Pacific end of the canal, we saw three great dredges lying In tha mud. Any one of them must have cost in the neighborhood of $25O,0u0. All are In good condition above the water line and all float at high tide. Some of these are now being treated so as to prevent deterioration until It Is determined whether they can be used In the canal work. In addition there aro eleven dredges In the canal which have cost altogether In the neighborhood of, 12,000,000, and there' aro also several auxiliary vessels. In the La. Boca shops a marine ' engine, which has been dragged up from the bot tom of the canal, Is being overhauled for Nhons nt t'olon. I despair of describing the warehouses. Those we visited nt Colon covered nt least ten acres, some of the buildings being 700 feet long. Thesa buildings are roofed with galvanized Iron. They are lined with shelves and divided Into sections by cases containing all sorts of materials. Some articles are carefully wrapped In paper, others stand upon the floor snd others hang from the roof. I noticed, for Instance. I.OfV) coal oil torches for night work, tied to the rafters. Just below wan a small haystack of lamp wicks, and about a carload of glass chimneys. Along the 3lde walls wrrv bins of nails and screws and above, them several carloads of tool handles. In that one warehouse are enough brands to stock the hardware stores of New York state, and In addition hogsheads upon hogsheads of zinc tacks for roofing. Paymaster Tobey estimates that there Is at least $J5O.0Oit worth of stuff In that warehouse. In ono place I saw $10,000 worth of sheet copper In plates as large as a library tabic, and farther on piles of zinc and sheets of lead. There are tons of copper bars to be used In the repair of machinery, great quantities of brass and bale upon bale of steel and brass wire. There are ware houses at A noon which contain similar ma terial, and also at other stations along the line of the railroad. Some of the raw metal on hand Is worth from IS to 20 rents a pound, and It is remarkable that it has not been carried away. Ilearr MachlnrryVVortli Millions. Leaving Colon we walked through acres covered with car wheels and galvanized Iron water pipe to the train and went to Monkey Hill. There we visited a storehouse whlnh coat about $4,&u0 to build. It is fif teen years old, but Is In excellent shape both as to roof and floor timbers, ajid $2,C00 or $3,000 will put It in thorough" repair. Standing at the entrance ono sees a great expanse of iron plates, wheels and heavy i Instructing Nebraska Farmers in Gospel of Corn w 1IY are the railroads paying all expenses and placing at the dls losal of the professors of the titato Agricultural colleges, spe cial corn education trains to run through tho great coru-growlng states? Is It In tha hope that they will regain popu lar favor with tha farmers or" Is the mo tive purely philanthropic?" "I believe," said W. H. Manss, Indus trial commissioner of tho Uurllngton, "with licau Swift, who said4 'the man who can make two blades of grass grow where one grew beforo or two ears of corn where thoro was but one, is more of a benefactor to humanity than the whole race of poli ticians.' I' do not pretend that the rail roads are entirely philanthropic in this undertaking. Tha railway managers ex pect tho railroads will derive as much pe cuniary boiii-nt from an Increased produc tion of corn as the farmers will. "It is safo to say Chat the cereal crops of the country could bo Increased 25 per cent If only tho very beet seed was used by every grower. Not one-half of the farmers In tha whole country try to im prove their seed from one year to an other. Take corn fur Illustration. Selection of Seed Cora. "Tha usual custom la to wait till plant lug time before any attempt Is made to get seed. Then thoy gr to the crib, sort around over tho pile of corn, pick out whut seems to be best and rub It and if it ap pears sound, shell It and plant without testing the seed to sie It Is sure to grow. Tho tuis selected may not be true to uny particular type of corn Just a sort of gen eral mixture of long and short cars, smooth and rough grains, with perhaps somo white mixed In with the vllow, or ellow wKU, tho white. Under such conditions is it much wonder that wo hear so many com plaints every season about poor stands and( indifferent yields?" "The tlgures given out by the Department of Agriculture show that thp average, yield of corn In the United States for 1904 was 26.8 bushels per acre and was worth an av erage of 41.1 cents per bushel in the hands of the farmer. The total production of the 9i!.?31,5Hl acres planted to corn was 2.467. 4S0,e34 bushels, with a farm value of $1,087, 461,440. If It Is possible by tho use of tho best cd by every corn raiser In the United States to Increase the yield 25 per cent It Is high time that something radical was done to awaken every farmer to the need of giv ing proper attention to the selection of his seed corn. A 26 per cent Increase would mean 16,480,934 more bushels of corn for the farmc-rs to sell uud the railroads, to haul to market." ItitllroMUs Arc Convinced. The fact that tho railroads urn spending thousands of dollars for the running of these special corn education trains is, evi dence that the railway officials believe what the agricultural college corn specialists aro advocating is practical. One Instance csn .bo sighted to show that their, hope is not in vuln. Tho llrst cornt speiiala were run In Iowa during the winter of 1303-4 at tho suggestion and under the direction of Prof. P. G. Holden of the Iowa College of Agri culture. The professor In his lectures em phasizes three important points, to-wit: First The testing of the vitality or germ inating powers of every ear of corn in tended for planting, so that those cars showing poor germinating qualities can be rejected. If the kernels from ears of low vitality are mixed with those of strong germinating power, the result must neces sarily be a poor stand and a reduced yield. Experiments show that all tho kernels from an ear generally possess approximately tha same degree of vigor, and therefore the vl. tallty of an ear can generally be determ ined by testing a few of Its kernels. Second Grading the seed corn to kernels $ ' pil 7 'tt$ 77;. -'7;M J - J ' ..ft ;.rV ' r' - ' - v " 7 I i v -t : : I ..... ,77 . .. o of uniform size and shape and then ad justing the planter to secure the chopping of the proper number of kernels In each hill. Mesalta Prove the Theory. Tils' results obtained in Iowa last year show that ninny of the llawkeyo farmers put - Into practice the teachings- of Prof. ITolden. In 1903 the production in com in the state was 23O,0OO.0iio bushels, which was Increased . to ;'2.),o00.t In 1M4. with no greater acreage- ' planted and no more favorable weather. Tho value of the crop in KKXI was $2,0.)0.000. It was $110,000,000 In 1904, an Increase of over tf.';0,o0u,0u0. Theso llgitres look good to railroad managers who are not in the hnblt of doing business theoretically or lor lovo of humanity. Prof. T. L. Lyon of the Nebraskd Ag ricultural college and Prof. A. D. Shauiel of tho Department of Agriculture, with Prof. Holdun. hue done inoro for the corn ralnera of tho United Stutes thai) any other dozen men. After having fully demonstrated tho practicability of what they aru teaching, with their seal and logic they have been able to get every railroad running through tha great corn states of Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska to run a special corn train. lulou Pnelfle Speeln'. The "Corn Education Speclul" run by the "'niun Pacillc was one of the most suc rcusful that has been sent out this year. The train was in chuige of Alfred Darlow, advertising ager.t of the Union Pacific, who was accompanied by the following I'nli n Pud (lo oftirlals: Charles Wnre, as sistant suerlntendent; Prank F. Thomp son, traveling freluht agi ni ; G. L. Mc Donmigh, colonization agen;, and E. II. Blossom The personnel of the corn cd.icution lecturers was; i'rofs. T. I Lyon, A. L. HaecUcr, 8. Avery, Ijiwrem.e Bruner, C, W. Pugsley of the Univeivlty of Nebraska and C. M. Levelling, Farmers' institute, Heaver City, Neb. The special train started from Lincoln at i.3J a, in. March 10 and closed the lour at Kearney at 10 p. rn. Mirch 18. About 1,000 miles were covered and over 6,000 farmers heard tho lectures. The largest crowds were at Valparaiso, Schuyler, Albion, Cedar Rapids, Madison, Platte Center, Boelu, Fleasanton and Kearney. The .eagerness of Nebraska farmers to hear the lectures was evidenced nt Klba, at which no slop had been scheduled by the Union Puclltc "corn educational train." When tho train reached that point nearly 200 farmers were gathered at the depot, having anticipated the arrival of the "edu cational special." The speclul was a trifle behind time, and in order to not disappoint those whom It was known were waiting at other points tho management felt that It could not make an exception In thia cae !iml Conductor Kiger was Instructed to start the train as soon as he hnd registered. Just as the special was pulling out of tho little town a sturdy farmur pulled the bell cord and the train was "held up" until Profs. Uruncr and Pugsley had delivered a lifteen-mlnuto uddress. St. Patrick's day was being celebrated1 when the tiHln mado Its first slop at Cedar Rapids early In the forenoon. Several hundred persons had gathered and a brass band greeted th" seed corn educators when they reached the station. Three largo meetings were held, for which business In town was suspended. Several hundred In dian students gathered at the station when the special reached Gmioa, where Is located the Indian chool. One courh loaded with government wards was addressed by Prof. Lyons. The Informational literatim) distributed by Alfred Dnrlow, advertising agent of the Union Pacllie, was among the best that has been issued by any railroad for similar use. The credit for this is due to Mr. Darlow, who personally prepared the circulars used for dlfltributlon.'whlch bore the title, "Prog ress of Agriculture In Nebraska for the I .ant Decade." Jt contained a valuable table showing the crop productions of Nebraska for the last ten years with tho yield in bushels, with value. lock stuff which is ns good as when it was laid down. It originally exist millions. A railroad track runs through thn warehouse, and It li'is all the facilities for bundling heavy materials. Lying outside It are thousands of Decau ville car wheels, rails and heavy machinery. Insldo are rheailng machines, pumps and lnthes. Thero aro ten concrete mixers with stationary engines. These hava never been used, and they are equal to Just so much money In the making of tho canal, as all sorts of dams and other concreto construc tion are demanded. Mechanical Engineer Strom tells me that two men can lu one week fit these machines for actual work, and he says that they will probably mix 100.000 barrels of cement within tha next lew years. In addition to this material the building contains three span bridges ready to be put across the Chagres or soma of its tributaries. Mr. Tobey thinks this warehouse too val uable to bo used as a shed to cover old ma chinery. Ho say Its present contents will be taken out and the structure formed Into a great warehouse for tho canal work. In MouWcy Hill Park. Not far from this is what Is known as Monkey Hill park. Tho word park was used by tho French to Indicate tho yards In which their heavy machinery was stored out of doors. Thero are a number of these park each containing about ten acres, and each covered with structural material of various kinds, worth altogether hundreds of thou sands of dollars. Here is a pile of Iron plates, and there one of steel rails laid up like cord wood; hero nre sheets of Bine, thero bars of Iron, and farther over enough galvanized Iron plates It would seem to roof Undo Sam's strip, The galvanized Iron hera Is superior to any made now. It Is better coated with zinc and will last much longer tlmn ours. That on soma of tha buildings Is twenty-five years old and still good. In these parks are to be seen acres of car wheels and Iron cars of vari ous kinds. I noticed soma poultry wire in one yard and In another a great stack of telegraph wlro. Locomotives and Cars at Ilnhlo. Everywhere we went we saw locomo tives, and In many places steel rolls. In deed, there are said to be enough steel rails here to furnish more than 00 mile of track. The railroad locomotives aro usually good, and many are already In use. Soma were mada In Belgium, and Mr. Strom says that they would now cost about $S,0O0 a piece. Some of thesn have been repaired for $250 each and they work as well as -f now. At Bohio I was shown a large locomotlva crane, of which thero afa 207 on tha Isth mus. New ones would cost at leant $6,000 a piece, but the French cranes ara In good condition, and tha mechanical engineer are adapting them to our work. In this same plnce there Is about a quar ter of a million dollars' worth of dump car trucks, and also some engines, which would cost In the neighborhood of $JO,000. The latter are lying out in the sun, but tha metal is In good condition, although the wood has been eaten away by white ants. This mochlncry will bo cleaned, repaired and put Into use. In tlio shads nearby ara boilers for engines of' various kinds. They are on wheels and can easily be moved t tho machine shops.' As I went through one warehouse I sc-ared a flock of bats out of a locomotive, and upon testing another was attacked br a swarm of yellow jackets which hod mada Its neat inside the boiler. LJzarda Includ ing Iguanas, were crawling here and thera among the cur wheels, and wa had to wall carefully for fear of the snakes. Machine Shops at Tnvernllla. At Tavernllla, a little farther on, we went thmuph a complete machine shop which was left by tho French. It has a stationary engine in one comer and la equipped with the finest of machine tools, many of which are set up and ready for work. Almost none of the machinery baa been used. It is alt painted, and It looks as though It were marshaled for sale lather than for work. Every piece Is la beled sml tlrketed. but this Is so with almost all of the machinery and supplies. In an adjoining shop we saw a lot of belt conveying machines. By means of stationary engines the excavated dirt can be thrown on these belts and thus car- Con tin ued on Pago Eight.) ' .S( r . h7V , v V$V' ::'7x7-a (-fj ' 7'77'?7?k if -r'.'P ''' ! . 'p (7y,C vy ' r '0 - - 4 i 7 '7 -CTy ' ; I B t "- ;' :rrr- v.:- FARMER AT BOELUS. Nb., WHO LISTENED TO, LECTURES ON SELECTION OF BF.ED CORN AND "OIL TILLAOU.-PhMo toy Staff Photographer.1 T. Tj. TiT SEED Averr. C M. Lewellln. lllURERS ON IMuN J ACUlO VFECLLU-Vaulu Lawrence Brunar. CL H7, putslar by tas r&otograpusr.