102 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[December i, 1902. 



DEATH OF A RUSSIAN RUBBER MAN. 



IT is with regret that many readers of The India Rubber 

 World will learn of the death of Mr. Boris Kempe, of the 

 Russian American India Rubber Co., of St. Petersburg. He 

 had sulTered for about two years, being all the time under the 

 care of the best medical authorities. He went to Berlin, where 

 celebrated doctors de- 

 cided to perform an 

 operation as the only 

 means of saving his life. 

 The operation itself 

 proved a success, but 

 the patient had not 

 enough strength to pull 

 through, and he died on 

 the ninth day thereafter, 

 on October 27. The 

 body arrived in St. 

 Petersburg on Novem- 

 ber 7, and the funeral 

 took place on the 8th. 

 Mr. Kempe was a Rus- 

 sian by birth but from 

 German descent. He 

 was a graduate from 

 BORIS KEMPE. q„^ of the large Ger- 

 man universities and was a chemist of note. For many years 

 he was interested in the manufacture of glass and made 

 many important discoveries in that industry. He had long 

 been connected with the Russian-American India-Rubber Co., 

 was one of their directors and the head of their technical bu- 

 reau, and was one of the factors in the wonderful growth and 

 progress of that company. Mr. Kempe's knowledge of all 

 matters connected with the rubber trade was remarkable, and 

 the company met with a " great loss," to use their own words, 

 when death took him from them. In addition to his rubber 

 business Mr. Kempe was a director in several of the large and 

 growing industries of Russia. He was a man of education, of 

 great business capabilities, a good mechanic, and a thorough 

 rubber man ; he was a good friend and one of those rare men 

 whom to know was to love. He had traveled a great deal, had 

 made two visits to the United States, and was a great admirer 

 of our country, its institutions, and its people. 



A. M. STICKNEY. 



THE HASKELL GOLF BALL SUITS. 



' I "HE golf ball interest of to- day centers about the rubber 



1 



cored ball and the suits that have been instituted by its 



inventors, the Haskell Golf Ball Co., and manufacturers. The 

 B. F. Goodrich Co. As a preliminary it is only fair to say that 

 the Haskell company succeeded in producing a ball that was 

 far superior to any in the field, and that after spending thou- 

 sands of dollars in experiments, and in spite of the fact that 

 golf ball makers and users were profoundly and openly skep- 

 tical. When the Haskell ball had become a success, others be- 

 gan to make rubber cored balls, and as a result suits were in- 

 stituted by the Haskell company. The furthest advanced of 

 these is the American suit against the Kempshall Manufactur- 

 ing Co., which to-day looks favorable to the Haskell invention. 

 There is also a suit against Kempshall in England in which the 

 Haskell company have retained Messrs. Wilson, Bristows & 

 Carpmael as solicitors and Mr. Fletcher Moulton, k.C, as senior 

 counsel— a man who, by the way, is reputed to be the ablest 

 patent attorney in the United Kingdom. 



The Haskell Golf Ball Co. have brought suit also against 

 A. G. Spalding & Brothers in the United States circuit court in 

 the southern district of New York, retaining as counsel Mr. 

 Charles Neave of Richardson, Herrick & Neave, and still an- 

 other suit has been brought against Patrick Brothers, of New 

 York, manufacturers of the Acme Ai ball. 



It has been claimed that, as baseballs were made in which 

 some rubber thread was used, the rubber cored golf ball was no 

 novelty. The concensus of expert legal opinion, however, ap- 

 pears to be that as the rubber cored golf ball is Gutta-percha 

 covered, and as it develops two features absolutely new in 

 golf balls — the use of thread in the baseball bears no relation 

 to the new discovery. That discovery in brief was the fact 

 that the wound rubber cored ball when driven developed the 

 rubber resiliency and carried further than the solid Gutta- 

 percha ball, and on the putting green developed the Gutta- 

 percha resiliency which properly responded to the put. It is 

 on these points that the Haskell company are making a strong 

 fight and declare themselves willing to meet all comers. 



THE AMERICAN PACIFIC CABLE. 



DURING the month the president of the Commercial Pa- 

 cific Cable Co., Mr. Clarence H. Mackay, and the other 

 prnicipal officials of the company, visited Washington and 

 formally notified the government of their acceptance of the 

 conditions named by President Roosevelt, in August last, as 

 necessary to the consent of the government to the landing of 

 their cable on American soil. Mr. Mackay explained that the 

 long delay in expressing such approval had been caused by 

 protracted negotiations to secure a landmg place in China to 

 comply with the condition named by President Roosevelt, that 

 an independent American line should be constructed from Ma- 

 nila to China, thus giving an ail-American through line to the 

 Asiatic continent. The company announce their ability and 

 intention to lay a cable from Manila to Shanghai (instead of 

 Hong Kong), a distance of about 1200 miles, and to have the 

 same completed within a year. The legal officers of the cable 

 company having signed a contract embodying the conditions 

 referred to. President Roosevelt gave the same his final ap- 

 proval, on November 26. The contract is subject to revocation 

 in case the Congress should find objectionable arrangements 

 in it, but such action is not expected. Indeed, the navy depart- 

 ment has already furnished to the cable company the sound- 

 ings and profiles of the Pacific cable route made by government 

 expeditions, in return for certain concessions in rates promised 

 to the govern ment.=—=' It is expected that Christmas greetings 

 will be exchanged by cable between San Francisco and Hono- 

 lulu. The English cable steamer Silvertown is due at San Fran- 

 cisco on December 5. and it is not expected that more than 

 twelve days will be required to lay the cable to Honolulu. 



BRITISH PACIFIC CABLE COMPLETED. 



The last section of this cable was laid on October 3o,con- 

 necting the Fiji islands with Norfolk island, to which the 

 cable had already been connected from New Zealand and 

 Queensland. The first message sent over the completed line 

 across the Pacific was one of congratulation to King Edward, 

 which reached Buckingham Palace on October 31. 



The returns for the rubber industry in Massachusetts in the 

 United States census for 1900 compared with those of the state 

 bureau of statistics of labor for 1895, show an increase of 20.56 

 per cent, in the total value of goods produced. The value of 

 rubber boots and shoes alone increased from $14,229,024 in 1895 

 to $16,490,015 in 1900. 



