512 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



April 1, 1921 



were erected, increasing the capacity to 100,000 pounds of tire yarn 

 per week. A motor truck express service operating on giant 

 pneumatic cord tires was established between these mills, the 

 Akron factory and Boston branch, which has demonstrated the 

 practicability of this type of tire and haulage and materially as- 

 sisted in improving tire and truck design and construction. 



Meanwhile in 1916, some 10,000 acres of land were purchased 

 in the Salt River Valley at what is now Litchfield, Arizona, the 

 Southwestern Cotton Co. was organized and cotton raising was 

 begun on a large scale in order to ensure a fixed supply of the 

 long-staple Egyptian variety. The area had increased to 14,000 

 acres in 1919. Rubber growing was also undertaken and in 1919 

 the company had a 20,000-acre rubber plantation well under way 

 in Sumatra, half of it planted, 125 miles of good roads constructed 

 and 7,000 to 8,000 laborers employed. 



With a cotton supply in the Southwest, much crude rubber 

 coming through Pacific ports and a large business on the Coast, 

 construction was begun in 1919 on a $4,000,000 rubber manufac- 

 turing plant and a $1,500,000 cotton mill in Ascot Park, Los 

 .\ngeU'S, California, on a tract of 480 acres offering opportunity for 

 plant expansion and an industrial village and park adjoining. 

 The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. of California was incorporated 

 and capitalized at $20,000,000 and the Pacific Cotton Mills Co. at 

 $5,000,000. Plans were for a capacity of 7,500 tires daily, or 

 an annual business of $15,000,000, employing 1,500 operatives; 

 and a cotton mill of 33,000 spindles having a capacity of 75,000 

 pounds each of cord and woven fabric, or an annual business of 

 $7,500,000, employing 1.200 operatives. This tire plant began 

 operation in June, 1920. 



Among the more important construction projects contributory 

 to the industrial expansion of the company may be mentioned the 

 erection of hundreds of homes beginning in 1913, to be sold at 

 cost to employes on easy payments on a SOO-acre tract known 

 as Goodyear Heights, Akron, which was improved with streets, 

 parks, schools, churches, public utilities. In 1919 Goodyear Hall, 

 a $2,500,000 five-story club house 400 by 170 feet was erected 

 opposite the Akron plant to provide such club features as gym- 

 nasium, bowling alleys, showers, rest, reading, study, and class 

 rooms, restaurant, theatre, and to house the Goodyear Industrial 

 Republic House and Senate and Goodyear Industrial L'niversity 

 with its 600 students and faculty of 117. 



To conserve cash reserves, the quarterly dividend on Goodyear 

 common was passed in November, 1920, for the first time in 22 

 years. It had paid 12 per cent until the last meeting, when the 

 rate was reduced to 10 per cent. In December the credit demands 

 of the company necessitated borrowing $18,825,000 and it became 

 apparent that only a reorganization could avoid bankruptcy. 

 Retinancing was necessitated by the fact that the annual budget 

 was made up to meet a production of $250,000,000 worth of goods, 

 and when general business depression came the company was 

 caught with unduly large inventories of finished products, raw 

 materials and future commitments at high prices. 



The meeting of the stockholders at which the final approval of 

 the refinancing plans will be asked continues to be postponed. 

 The reason given by ofificials of the company is that more time 

 is needed for the working out of the details of the plan with the 

 bankers and merchant creditors. At every postponement, how- 

 ever, it is announced that progress is being made toward clearing 

 up the Goodyear situation which is of vital importance to the 

 rubber industry at large. 



IN DEFENSE OF THE CARBON BLACK INDUSTRY 



A vigorous protest against state IcKislation for the prohibition 

 or serious curtailment of the carbon black industry is made by 

 the Natural Gas Products Association, an organization represent- 

 ing the producers of carbon black in Virginia, Kentucky, 

 Louisiana, Montana, and Wyoming. The Association says that 

 carbon black has been made from natural gas for forty years, 

 and that the factories, wells, pipe-lines, and gasoline-extracting 

 plants represent an investment of over $25,000,000; and that not 

 only is employment given by its members to a large number of 

 people, but that the product is one of a most essential character. 

 Carbon black, it is explained, has long been as indispensable 

 (.for printers' ink) as wood pulp is in the production of material 

 for the nation's newspapers and other printed matter. So, too, is 

 it of great value in the production of paint, varnish, cement color- 

 ings, stove polish, crayons, waterproof coverings, composition 

 goods, carbon paper, typewriter ribbons, etc. 



But is is in the making of solid and pneumatic tires and other 

 rubber goods that the intrinsic merit and commercial importance 

 of carbon black have been most strikingly demonstrated. In the 

 making of a considerable part of the better class of the 35,000,- 

 000 tires produced in the United States last year, and worth some 

 $800,000,000, carbon black, as A. F. Kitchel, assistant secretary 

 of the Association points out, was used to impart greater toughness 

 and resiliency, to retard oxidation and hence lengthen tire life, 

 while lessening weight, and adding much to tire efficiency. 



The companies producing carbon black have been accused of 

 using the natural gas recklessly, and fear is expressed that the 

 entire supply will give out in a few years. Hence it is proposed 

 to forbid the use of the gas for so-called "wasteful" manufacturing 

 purposes and to conserve it and distribute it for domestic needs 

 solely. The carbon black makers deny that they are wasteful, as 

 they extract every bit of available gasoline from the gas before 

 burning the residue for the impalpable carbon, and in that way 

 they add several million gallons yearly to the nation's gasoline 

 supply, a measure of true conservation. Chemists and engineers 

 are constantly at work for the members devising better means for 

 utilizing natural gas and for conserving at the same time the 

 product on which their business vitally depends. The real wastage, 

 they say, can be blamed on oil and gas concerns that are allowing 

 natural gas to escape at the rate of 150,000,000 cubic feet a day, 

 and doing nobody any good. 



Is not the true principle that of equal opportunity and open 

 competition, which it has long been the American policy to 

 foster and encourage? The old fable of the body and its 

 members has not ceased to be true. In the laudable desire to 

 save natural gas in certain localities, we must not forget the 

 welfare or convenience of the body politic as a whole. A 

 saving would be too dearly bought if accomplished only at the 

 inconvenience and detriment of the entire public, and the rub- 

 ber industry in particular. 



The officers of the Arch Narrow Fabric Co., Auburn, Rhode 

 Island, manufacturers of elastic braids, are : Archibald E. Lewine, 

 president ; Alvin T. Sapinsley, secretary-treasurer ; and Milton 

 C. Sapinsley vice-president. The company purchased its present 

 plant in May, 1920, from the Triple A. Narrow Fabric Co. 



RUBBER TRADE OF PERU FOR 1919 

 The foreign trade of Peru for the calendar year 1919, ac- 

 cording to statistics recently made available, reached an un- 

 precedented total. Exports of india rubber totalled 3,232,211 

 pounds, valued at 473,950 Peruvian pounds or 11.531,678 Pan- 

 americanos. The Peruvian pound is worth nominally $4.8665 

 and the Panamericano, a proposed international money 

 of account, is equal to one-fifth of a dollar. Imports 

 of rubber manufactures into Peru were valued at 94,106 

 Peruvian pounds or 2,289,693 Panainericanos. The quantity 

 of rubber manufactures exported totalled 154 pounds, valued 

 139 Peruvian pounds or 3,382 Panamericanos. 



Replete with information for rubber manufacturers — II. C. 

 Pearson's '^Crude Rubber and Compounding Ingredients" and 

 "Rubber Machinery." 



