A FIELD FOR INVENTIVE GENIUS 



Need of a Substitute for the Wooden Railroad Tie — Description 

 of the Keystone Steel Railroad Tie 



By MRS, LYDIA ADAMS.WILLIAMS 



OF THE many forms in which 

 wood is used, railroad ties oc- 

 cupy fourth place in the total 

 yearly expenditure, sawed lumber be- 

 ing first, firewood second, and shingles 

 and laths third. It has been calculated 

 that the amount of wood used each 

 year in ties is equivalent to the prod- 

 uct of 600,000 acres of forest, and that 

 to maintain every tie in the track two 

 trees must be growing. 



In the construction of new track and 

 for renewals, the steam and street rail- 

 roads used, in 1906, over 100,000,000 

 cross ties, at an average price of 48 

 cents per tie, an approximate value of 

 over $48,000,000. 



The woods used varied, but oak large- 

 ly predominated, forty-four per cent., or 

 nearly one-half of the ties consumed, be- 

 ing made of that wood. Southern pines 

 came second, being utilized for about 

 one-sixth of all the ties laid. Other 

 woods used were, in the order of their 

 consumption, Douglas fir, cedar, chest- 

 nut, cypress, western pine, tamarack, 

 hemlock, redwood, lodgepole pine, 

 white pine, and others. 



This immense yearly drain upon the 

 forests for railroad tics alone, covering 

 a large variety of the principal woods 

 grown, emphasizes the need of inventive 

 genius to discover some substitute for 

 wood. 



With nearly 300,000 miles of railroad 

 trackage, and approximately 2,800 ties 

 to the mile, there are over 800,000 ties 

 constantly subject to wear and decay. 

 When it is considered that the service 

 of the longest-lived tie timbers in gen- 

 eral use — white oak, Douglas fir, chest- 



394 



nut, tamarack, and spruce — is but 

 seven years, while with some, as the 

 black oak, it is but four years ; and 

 when it is further considered that the 

 supply of hardwood is waning and that 

 a timber famine is almost at hand, the 

 fact becomes apparent that there is a 

 vital necessity for inventing some tie 

 to take the place of the wooden tie. 



Statistics gathered by the Forest 

 Service prove that the timber sup- 

 plies of the country, at the present rate 

 of consumption, will be exhausted in 

 thirty-three years. 



To the unscientific and untraveled 

 person who gazes with admiration al- 

 most amounting to reverence upon 

 some particularly fine stand of timber 

 which his limited vacation trip brings 

 to his attention, the widely heralded 

 fact that the timber supplies will soon 

 be exhausted seems a fallacy unworthy 

 of belief. 



What do we mean by saying that a 

 timber famine is at hand ? 



Scattered throughout the United 

 States there are from 500,000,000 to 

 700,000,000 acres of land, upon which 

 more or less timber is growing. The 

 Forest Service in its estimate of the 

 timber now standing places the highest 

 figure at 2,000,000,000,000 board feet, 

 while the lowest figure of the standing 

 timber is 1,400,000,000,000 board feet. 

 We are cutting and using timber at the 

 rate of 100,000,000,000 board feet a 

 year, while the annual growth is but a 

 third of the consumption or from thirty 

 to forty billion feet. Subtract forty 

 from 100 and we see that we are using 

 each year 60,000,000,000 more board 



