June i, KjoH.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



283 



W*?^ 



Published on the 1st of each Month by 



THE INDIA RUBBER PUBLISHING GO., 



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 CABLE ADDRESS: IRWORLD. NEW YORK. 



HENRY C. PEARSON, 

 EDITOR. 



HAWTHORNE HILL, 

 ASSOCIATE. 



Vol. 38. 



JUNE 1. 1908. 



No. 3. 



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TABLE OF CONTENTS ON LAST PAGE READING MATTER. 



AUTOMOBILES AND RUBBER. 



THERP". is no reason for the rubber interest to feel 

 dubious with regard to the future so long as 

 motor cars continue to be made and used in constantly 

 increasing numbers, and this condition now appears 

 to be as permanent as any other economic factor in 

 present day life. If one were to judge of general busi- 

 ness conditions in the United States by the status of 

 the automobile industry alone, the conclusion might 

 reasonably be that in no past time had the country 

 been so prosperous. Each year adds to the number 

 of horseless carriages here more than the total num- 

 ber registered in any other country' on eartli, and every 

 indication points to the manufacture of a still greater 

 number in each year to come, until the horse-drawn 

 vehicle will be visible only in museums, alongside rel- 

 ics of Egypt and Assyria and Pompeii. 



The business depression in America during the past 

 half year has been accompanied by a concerted disposi- 

 tion on the part cf manufacturers and others who build 

 for the future tc limit production solely to immediate 

 demands. Great concerns which formerly were active 

 twelve months in the year producing goods which 

 might reasonably, judging from past experience, find a 

 market ultimately, decided to make nothing which 



was not called for in specific orders actually in hand. ■ • 



The result is that such important organizations as " '- 

 the United States Rubber Co., whose latest annual 

 report appears on another page of this issue, have in "* 

 hand to-day an exceptionally small inventory of raw 

 materials and finished goods. At the same time every 

 effort has been made by them to bring together the 

 largest possible volume of "quick assets" — cash and 

 other realizable items. The fact that these concerns 

 have been less active than in former years during the 

 winter months is by no means to be taken as evidence 

 of an unhealthy condition of trade and industry. 



On the other hand, when the whole history of the 

 year just closed comes to be written, we believe that 

 the opinion will find support that decidedly healthful ^, 

 conditions have obtained. Why go on, year after year, 

 making goods without an occasional taking of stock to 

 see whether the rate of output was not in excess of 

 the rate of development of the country? Such stock 

 taking has now occurred, and the resumption of activ- 

 ity in the rubber industry, based upon the renewed 

 liberal demand for goods of all kinds, is clearly re- ^ 

 fleeted in the recent advances in the price of raw 

 rubber. 



But we have digressed here to consider the rubber 

 industry as a whole, after starting out to discuss the 

 automobile industry, which would not exist but for 

 the rubber tire 'i'his branch of the rubber industry 

 was never so prosperous as at this moment. Not only 

 is every tire maker of importance working overtime 

 nowadays to meet the demands of customers, but the 

 manufacture of rubber tires in America is more profit- 

 able to-day than ever before. It is not so long since 

 the head of a certain rubber company declared that 

 whereas tires had represented .^5 per cent, in selling 

 value of their output for a year, the remaining 45 per 

 cent, of pi-oducts ha<l supplied ftie whole of the com- 

 pany's profits. During the past year the same com- 

 pany, with a largely increased production of automo- 

 bile tires, has derived a handsome rate of profit from 

 this line, though selling at distinctly lower prices. 



The truth is that the automobile is too new a factor 

 in life to have become definitely placed until now, and 

 the rubber man, like everybody else concerned in its 

 development, has required time in which to "find him- 

 self." The automobile is as firmly placed now, how- 

 ever, as an economic factor as the horse and wagon 

 ever were, and seems likely to hold its own in days to 

 come as long as the horse and wagon did in the past. 

 All of which points to good business for the makers 

 of rubber tires, year after year, on a scale which would 

 make Charles Goodyear and Thomas Hancock turn 

 incessantly in their graves if news could reach them 

 of the great development which has taken place in the 

 industry which they labored so long and so hard to 

 develop, with such small rewards, measured by twen>- 

 tieth centur\' conditions. 



