THE CONFERENCE PROPER 



17 



as of iron and about 800 times that of copper. 

 Aluminum is already replacing copper for 

 certain electrical purposes. A large part of 

 the power now generated at Niagara Falls is 

 distributed through aluminum castings, for 

 air ship constructions, and for utensils of 

 various kinds. The use of finely divided 

 aluminum in Goldschmidt's "thermit" process 

 of welding and casting is an important appli- 

 cation of one of the chemical properties of 

 aluminum. 



A good example of the economy accom- 

 plished by chemical investigation and dis- 

 covery is furnished in the case of ultramarine. 

 Many years ago, when this was _ made by 

 powdering the mineral lapis lazuli, it sold for 

 more than its weight in gold. Now that the 

 chemist has discovered how to make the same 

 material from such cheap substances as kaolin, 

 sodium sulphate and carbonate charcoal, sul- 

 phur and rosin, the price is only a few cents 

 per pound. 



In the field of the precious metals, chem- 

 istry has contributed, among other things, the 

 cyanide and chlorination processes, through 

 which formerly rejected low grade ores and 

 residues have been compelled to give up their 

 gold. The gold production of the world 

 between 1851 and 1907 was three times that 

 produced between 1493 and 1850. The value 

 Chi our specie, upon which every commercial 

 transaction rests, is determined by the chem- 

 ists, while the green ink used in printing our 

 bank notes, and to which we owe the name of 

 "greenbacks," was invented by a former pres- 



ident of the American Chemical Society, Dr. 

 T. Sterrey Hunt. The chemist lets nothing 

 escape unsearched. The sweepings from mints 

 and from the shops of workers in precious 

 metals, as well as the water in which the 

 workmen wash their hands, are all made to 

 relinquish the gold or silver they contain. 

 Even waste photographic solutions must dis- 

 gorge their silver before they are released. 

 The invention of electroplating led to the 

 use of plated articles instead of solid ware, 

 and thus reduced somewhat the drain upon 

 certain of our mineral resources. The supply 

 of platinum has been for years so lirnited that 

 the price has ranged high. Chemistry has 

 now put on the market vessels of transparent 

 and opaque quartz, which seem likely to re- 

 place platinum for some chemical purposes. 



Many other instances might be cited where 

 chemistry has made important contributions 

 to the economic utilization of our mineral re- 

 sources, such as the carbonyl processes of 

 Mond, for example. But there is still much 

 to be done in improving the present wasteful 

 methods of smelting certain of our ores, and 

 we may look for great advances in this direc- 

 tion through the rapidly developing and most 

 promising field of electro-metallurgy. 



Of the various factors upon which the suc- 

 cess of this conservation movement depends, 

 none, in my estimation, is more important than 

 that of awakening the producer and manu- 

 facturer to a proper realization of the value of 

 science to our industries. 



Mr. A. W. Damon, Vice-president 

 of the National Board of Fire Under- 

 writers, presented a striking address 

 on fire waste. He suggested that a fifth 

 division, or section, might well have 

 been added to the four into which the 

 Commission was originally divided — a 

 Section of Fire; and he advanced 

 strong arguments for the specific treat- 

 ment of this branch of the subject of 

 conservation. 



Mr. Damon said that the fire loss 

 in the United States for the past four 

 years was $1,257,716,955, or an annual 

 fire loss of over $251,000,000 — a daily 

 loss of about $689,160! The four-year 

 period mentioned includes the San 

 Francisco and Baltimore fires ; but the 

 annual fire loss for a ten-year period 

 has been $202,793,434, or an average 

 daily loss by fire, for every day of the 

 past ten years, of over half a millon 

 dollars — to be exact, $556,091 ! Prop- 

 erty value destroyed by fire is gone be- 

 yond recovery. Insurance only shifts 



3 



the distribution of the loss ; an irrecov- 

 erable loss it still remains. 



That this loss is altogether needless 

 and unnecessary is proven, Mr. Damon 

 said, by the extraordinary difference 

 between fire losses in European coun- 

 tries and the United States. While 

 the per capita loss in our own coun- 

 try for the past five years has been 

 $3.02 per annum, in European coun- 

 tries it has been only 33 cents per year, 

 or little more than one-tenth as much 

 as our own fire loss. It was shown 

 that nearly five times as many fires oc- 

 cur in cities of the United States as is 

 the case in European cities. 



Three principal causes exist, said 

 Mr. Damon, for this excessive differ- 

 ence. First, the difference in the point 

 of view as to responsibility of Euro- 

 pean peoples and those of the United 

 States ; second, the difference in the 

 construction of buildings, both public 

 and private ; and, third, the difference 

 in the regulations governing hazards 



