April 1, 1912.] 



h^ 



Ki. 



THE" INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



327 



The other window display, while considerably simpler, at- 

 tracted possibly just as much attention because of an exceedingly 

 unique feature. The tire shown in the center is on a track and 

 travels back and forth without any visible motive power and 

 evidently of its own volition. Pretty good tires are now being 

 made in this country but none as yet have been produced that 

 are capable of automatic movement, so there doubtless is some 

 hidden mechanism that runs the tire ; but what it is is not 

 observable to tiie man on the walk. 



These displays, of course, are more elaborate than most dealers 

 are equipped to produce, but they show what can be done in this 

 most effective form of advertising. 



GERMAN EASTER WINDOW DECORATIONS. 



With the appreciation of detail, which constitutes a feature 

 of the German character, attention has been drawn in that 

 country to the opportunities afforded by the Easter season for 

 the display of rubber goods retailers. 



To the rubber goods dealer Easter represents the period when 

 sales of spring and summer requisites once more assume im- 

 portance, particularly garden hose and articles connected with 

 outdoor sports. One of the best ways to bring such goods before 

 the notice of the public is by means of a well-arranged Easter 

 show window, attractive to the passer-by. 



In connection with this idea, a suggestion has been made to 

 cover the flooring, ceiling and walls of the showcase with green 

 cardboard or other suitable material. A further suggestion is 

 made of constructing a semi-oviform figure out of eight con- 

 verging conical strips of cardboard, of such a size as more or 

 less to occupy the upper part of the showcase. This figure is 

 then encircled with garden hose, secured by wire fastenings. 



Attached to the hose would be a varied assortment of sport- 

 ing articles, such as tennis-shoes, rackets, attractively fastened 

 v/ith ribbons, etc. ; while celluloid toilet articles and other goods of 

 attractive character, such as rain coats, etc., can also be dis- 

 played to advantage, being arranged with a certain degree of 

 freedom. 



RUBBER HOSE TO PROTECT PETROLEUM. 



AN INTERESTING FIRESTONE EXHIBIT. 



Among the many features of special interest to visitors at the 

 New York auto shows held in January, was the non-skid tire of 

 the Firestone Tire and Rubber Co. This tire has a unique heavy 

 raised lettered tread of tough rubber, making it nearly double 

 the thickness of an ordinary smooth tread 

 casing. The peculiar arrangement of this 

 lettering presents many sharp edges and 

 angles to the road and the hollows of the 

 letters create vacuums against the paving, 

 combining two well-known principles of 

 skid prevention. This tire, as are all other 

 Firestones with the exception of the regular 

 clincher pattern, is furnished with a float- 

 ing flap. 



Not content with meeting competition at 

 home, the Firestone company has gone to 

 Europe to invade the markets there with 

 its new European type of tire. This new 

 addition consists of a tough resilient rub- 

 ber tread moulded on to a hard rubber base 

 and shod with steel. It is somewhat similar 

 in appearance to the tires used abroad, but 

 has the advantage of several improvements 

 and a fine quality of rubber. 



Firestone Non- 

 Skid Tire. 



Send for Index (free) to Mr. Pearson's "Crude Rubber and 

 Compounding Ingredients." 



The accepted authority on South American rubber — "The 

 Rubber Country of the Amazon," by Henry C. Pearson. 



THERE is an active market east and west for high-grade 

 india-rubber fire hose for use at the fire stations main- 

 tained by producers and refiners of petroleum. The Standard 

 Oil plant at Bayonne, New Jersey, is a notable instance of an 

 installation of the very best procurable india-rubber hose for 

 protecting batteries of steel tanks filled with petroleum. These 

 works are connected with pipe lines as far away as Oklahoma, 

 making a pipeway 1,500 miles long from the wells to the tanks 

 at Bayonne, New Jersey, and Hunter's Point, New York. This 

 fire hose is not served with water, but with steam at the enor- 

 mous pressure of 180 pounds per square inch, being a much 

 higher pressure than exists in most of the steam engines of 

 the world. When a fire reaches a tank of crude petroleum, 

 the forcing of water thereupon is of no service whatever. In 

 several great fires at the oil works at Bayonne, the work of the 

 city fire department, though ably planned and bravely conducted, 

 was of no value whatever, the fire going from tank to tank and 

 building to building until property to the value of more than 

 two million dollars, on several occasions, was destroyed. 



Within twenty years, petroleum worth $375,000,000 has been 

 destroyed by fires where vast tonnages of water were thrown 

 on without quenching one of the fires. Most of the fires at the 

 great storage tanks of crude or refined petroleum are due to 

 lightning. Nearly all the fires at petroleum plants in the North 

 Atlantic States since 1870 resulted from lightning strokes. At 

 a petroleum storage plant it is the first ten minutes of a fire 

 which determines whether it will be a small or big one. This 

 fact makes it necessary for the fire department of the plant to 

 be ready day and night to overpower the conflagration with many 

 streams of live steam of at least 180 pounds pressure per square 

 inch. At Bayonne 48 separate lines of india-rubber hose are con- 

 stantly coupled to the steam mains. The mechanical engineers 

 for the producers and refiners of 210,000,000 barrels of petroleum 

 a year inform The India Rubber World that the fire depart- 

 ments of the vi'orks which they are in charge of use, in the ag- 

 gregate, 578 miles of the highest procurable grade of india-rub- 

 ber hose. In all cases the specifications for the fire hose are 

 drawn with rigid particularity by the mechanical engineering staffs 

 of the petroleum producers and refiners. 



India-rubber hose for fire department uses in the petroleum 

 industry is in increasing demand, because of the fact that the 

 principle of conservation in tanks is being rapidly developed, 

 where until lately much of the oil from the wells was allowed to 

 seep into the ground. In this way California has lost many 

 millions of dollars' worth of good grade petroleum that after com- 

 ing from the wells was for the lack of storage- tanks wasted in 

 seepage. Last year a well in southern California, which, when 

 newly drilled, flowed 40,000 barrels a day, ran up to 90,000 bar- 

 rels a day three months afterward; when over 600.000 barrels 

 were lost because of lack of storage tanks. Since then in that 

 zone tanks and fire department stations have been built and 

 india-rubber hose, aggregating 125 miles in length has been 

 bought for these plants. 



The belief was once general that the underground supply of 

 petroleum in this country was inexhaustible. But since four 

 once highly productive fields have become wholly exhausted 

 and others are rapidly decreasing in production, the principal 

 producers realize that all oil brought to the surface that is not 

 immediately required for the markets must be stored. It is 

 this storage movement that is giving so much occupation to 

 makers of good grade india-rubber hose. Cahfornia is now lead- 

 ing in the production of petroleum as classified by States — 

 producing a third of the national output, and in California the 

 storage capacity is small as compared with that in the mid- 

 continent zone of petroleum production. Hence, the remarkable 

 activity in the sales of india-rubber hose to California petroleum 

 producers. 



