40 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



and the makers certainly have succeeded in making a very present- 

 able imitation of a real wooden door, but it is still an imitation. 

 These doors have no more fireproof qualities than the most inflam- 

 mable white pine door made, and it can not be demonstrated, as 

 the makers allege, that they have the "combined qualities of being 

 absolutely fireproof and the qualities of beauty." 



The cost of this sort of an equipment is four or five times as 

 great as the very finest wool cabinet work, and when a man buys 

 this kind of equipment with the idea that he is adding to the fire- 

 proof qualities of a building, he is simply being picked up for a 

 sucker, and he is spending his money without getting a fair e(|uiva- 

 lent. 



On the market today is a type of wooden door and interior 

 finish made up of laminated woods, with a sheet of asbestos inter- 

 posed below the veneers, that has higher fire-resisting qualities 

 than any stovepipe steel door or finish that has ever been pre- 

 sented for public consideration. There is every likelihood that 

 when the public actually wakes up to its being bamboozled by 

 specious stories of the fireproof qualities of steel doors and interior 

 finish, it will occupy an important place in interior finish of high- 

 class buildings. The cost of this fire-resisting quality of wood 

 doors and finish is infinitely less than that of the cheapest type of 

 steel doors and finish. 



THE METAL BEDSTEAD CRAZE 



The advent of brass and iron bedsteads dates back to scarcely 

 more than two decades. They were discovered about the time the 

 microbe came into general publicity. The advertising man got 

 in his work by talking about the wonderful sanitary qualities of 

 brass and iron bedsteads, and the public went ' ' dafi'y ' ' over them. 

 Eelegate<l to the second-hand store and to the dump went the 

 splendid solid oak, walnut and mahogany bedsteads of the olden 

 days, and every housewife and hotel became a convert to the lac- 

 quered brass bedstead. Time developed the fact that it took more 

 of the housewife 's time to keep a brass bedstead in presentable 

 appearance than it did to do the household cooking. The lacquer 

 quickly disappeared, and relacquering was constantly necessary. 

 Again there was the discomport of the chill of the metal bedstead 

 in the one place where individuals sought the highest comfort. Then 

 when this type of bedstead was modified by the insertion of rattan 

 or fabric panels, it was discovered that it was the ideal breed- 

 ing place of such hordes of unwelcome and striped-backed insects 

 as to promptly put it into disfavor. The result is that the 

 metal bedstead craze is waning to such an extent that the fore- 

 most manufacturers of these lines have ceased their production, 

 and are utilizing their plants for other purposes. The consensus 

 of opinion in the furniture trade is that there is a decline in the 

 sale of metal bedsteads of more than fifty per cent during the last 

 three years, and the public is now going back to the wooden bed- 

 stead. 



THE STEEL CAR CRAZE 



The steel bandits who are responsible for the steel cars, and the 

 foisting of steel into use where it was illy adapted, are being thor- 

 oughly unmasked. The evidence presented before the Congres- 

 sional experts' examination of the steel trust, develops that it is 

 a very unscrupulous and greedy outfit which for nearly a decade 

 has literally sucked the life blood of America 's leading industries. 

 Investigation shows that the redoubtable .1. Pierpont Morgan was 

 slipped the modest tip of $69,.300,000 for his services as a pro 

 moter of the enterprise, which in spite of this, still manages to 

 pile up a net profit of about forty per cent on its production. This 

 does not include the millions of illegitimate profits filched from in- 

 vestors by a vast number of the promoters who manipulate the 

 stock market. It is on the ukase of the steel trust, which also 

 controls the cement industry, that steel caM were foisted on the 

 railroads and traveling public, but the railroads that are not domi- 

 nated by the trust, as well as the public are fast awakening to the 

 weakness of the steel passenger equipment, and the wanton ex 

 travagance of the steel freight cars. The steel trust apparently 

 has no regard for the lives and health of the traveling public, but 

 is solely interested in "getting the coin." 



Right now the railroad people are very sore over the efforts of 

 the steel trust to put the blame for the increased defectiveness of 

 rails upon them, and retort that the trouble with rails and the 

 cause of so much rail breakage is bad mill practice. The steel 

 people contend that they can not make better rails for twenty- 

 eight dollars a ton, and the railroad people retort that the price 

 of twenty-eight dollars is altogether too high, and in contrast with 

 other steel prices is unfairly high. They further allege that the 

 rails rolled at certain of the steel mills, especially at Gary, are 

 very unsatisfactory, and according to foremost writers on economic 

 topics, there are steel people who admit that the rolling practice 

 at some of the mills is too fast to make good rails. In any event 

 rail breakage is becoming a very serious menace to the safety of 

 the traveling public. 



This result is brought about partially on account of bad rolling 

 mill practices, and partially on account of the great increase in the 

 weight of equipment that is being put on the rails. In fact, it is 

 believed that the factor of safety is way below what it should be 

 to carry the increased weight of locomotive and increased weight 

 of steel cars that are now being pulled over American rails. 



The steel trust is on the defensive, morally, politically and 

 economically, and is about to have to deal with a more formidable 

 kind of conijietition. Independent operators are being supported 

 by railroad interests and are also making vast inroads into the 

 exclusively controlled export trade that has heretofore been en- 

 joyed by the trust. 



STEEL TRUST PUBLICITY 



It was ri-asonable to believe that the awful wreck at Warrior's 

 Kidge on the Pennsylvania, a few weeks ago, would have afforded 

 little opportunity for the trust 's publicity bureau to put out any 

 ' ' con ' ' talk about the merits of steel cars, but such is not the 

 case. This distinguished bureau refers to the wreck, "in which a 

 few persons were killed or seriously injured, although it was such 

 a wreck as might have ranked with the worst railroad disasters of 

 history had the coaches been of the ordinary type. What saved 

 the most of the passengers was the steel ears. It is right to 

 commend a corporation which takes such precautions for safety. 

 Our civilization has advanced to a proper horror of the crude com- 

 mercialism which has sacrificed, and which still sacrifices life and 

 happiness to unthinking greed — oftentimes to thinking greed." 



This and several more paragraphs of a similar nature have ap- 

 peared in duplicate editorials in hundreds of leading newspapers 

 in the country during the last fortnight. This is straight, paid ad- 

 vertising in editorial form. Think of the monumental nerve of the 

 sponsors of steel cars to publish literature of this sort in the face 

 of the fact that the wooden cars of this train safely passed the 

 curve, while the steel cars went into the ditch. It doesn't require 

 any scientific expert or any car building engineer to fully demon- 

 strate the frailties of steel cars. They have proven their weakness 

 time after time, and in no less than twelve instances on one rail- 

 road. 



The wrecks of the past six months, of serious character, have 

 all been steel car wrecks. These cars have shown their inability to 

 take curves, switches and cross-overs. They have demonstrated 

 that they were just as collapsible in side-swiping collisions as 

 wooden cars, and even more so, and that they are not proof against 

 telescoping. 



Of course there are good reasons, from a financial viewpoint only, 

 why the Pennsylvania Railroad should continue to put up this 

 fight for the continued use of steel cars, as railroad journals allege 

 that it already has in commission 588 steel coaches, 58 steel dining 

 cars, 99 steel passenger and baggage cars, 78 steel baggage cars, 

 94 steel postal cars, and 710 steel Pulman cars. In addition to 

 this it has orders out, and in process of building, for 251 steel 

 coaches, 31 steel passenger and baggage cars and 149 steel Pullman 

 cars. 



The public is fast waking up, and in spite of the immense mone- 

 tary loss, it is believed the Pennsylvania will bo obliged to aban- 

 don the use of steel cars. 



