290 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1916. 



St. Andrews, Scotland. He delivered a very interesting address in 

 which he stated that if the rate of consumption of iron ore in the 

 ITnited States did not greatly increase, we would have a supply of 

 lirst-class iron ore for only 60 or 70 years and of second-class for 30 

 years longer. Mr. Carnegie estimated our demonstrated store of 

 unmined ore at 1,000,000,000 tons. The consumption, at that time, 

 was between twenty-five and thirty millions of tons annually. All 

 persons well informed upon mining matters would infer that the 

 mining of a billion tons, now demonstrated, would reveal appreciably 

 more; and while a billion tons divided by 25 gives a life of 40 years, 

 60 or 70 years was a not unreasonable figure. Yet this period is a 

 relatively short one and the forecast justifies anxiety. Sinc€ Mr. 

 Carnegie's address was delivered, the annual output of ore has 

 doubled, and, unless relieved by other considerations, whatever ap- 

 prehensions were justified then are twice as emphatic now. 



In 1895, from three different spokesmen cam© prophecies similar 

 to those of Mr. Carnegie. Sir Robert A. Hadfield, whose words re- 

 garding the iron and steel industry should carry as great weight as 

 any man's, in a presidential address to the British Iron and Steel 

 Institute^ forecasts the call of the world's furnaces upon the mines 

 at the outset of the new century, and upon the basis of known re- 

 serves also gave good ground for apprehension. In the same year, 

 the late Prof. Tornebohm, long the chief of the Swedish Geological 

 Survey and with special experience in iron ores, made a report to the 

 Parliament of Sweden, based on a visit to this country.^ At this 

 time the Swedish Govermnent was actively sharing in the develop- 

 ment of the great bodies of iron ore in Lapland, far within the Polar 

 Circle. The importance of knowing the part which they might play 

 in the world's iron industry of the future was great, and the deter- 

 mination of the limits of annual output was a matter in which the 

 Swedish authorities felt a lively interest. 



Prof. Tornebohm credited the Mesabi Range with half a billion 

 tons; the other Lake Superior ranges, collectively, with as much 

 more ; and the Eastern brown hematites with 60,000,000. This total 

 of a little over a billion tons gave cause for anxiety, since the out- 

 put in 1905 of American mines had risen beyond forty millions, 

 and a life of 25 years w^as thus indicated. But, of course, a moment's 

 reflection shows that the estimates are incomplete, since the Clinton 

 ores of the East, and especially of Alabama, are omitted entirely. 



In the same year, 1905, the late Prof. N. S. Shaler sought to rouse 

 his countrymen to an appreciation of the situation with regard to 

 the mining industry in a paper of a popular nature on " The Ex- 



1 Proceedings, 1905, I., 27, and especially 86-60. 

 ' Reprinted In the Iron Age, Nov. 2, 1905. 



