63 



be divided. But they have served their purpose if they have emphasized the fact 

 that the laboratory process gives results which can not be obtained in any other 

 way, and that these results may be relied upon to guide and direct practice in 

 engineering affairs. 



English technical papers admit that the painstaking processes of German 

 laboratories have so well guided German manufacturers that Germany not only 

 competes with England in many lines of manufactured goods, but in some has 

 driven her from her markets. We have a new country, in which large engineer- 

 ing enterprises, both public and private, are always being pushed and are calling for 

 economy in expenditures; and there is a strong national desire for an outlet of 

 manufactured goods through exportation, which can only be secured on merit, in 

 competition with the world. With these facts in mind the conclusion is obvious 

 that there is room and need in this country for research laboratories. All such 

 laboratories are but means to ends. They are not only contributors to the public 

 fund of information, but they infuse into every branch of construction and of 

 operation a spirit of accuracy and a desire for excellence. 



LoursviLLE Filtration Experiments. By Geo. W. Benton. 



The 1st of August, 1896, completed the routine work of one of the most 

 unique series of experiments the scientific world has had the privilege of wit- 

 nessing. 



The question under investigation was the chemical and bacterial con- 

 dition of the Ohio River water, as furnished the City of Louisville, Ky., and the 

 relative merits of the several systems of filtration seeking establishment there, 

 and proposing to do away with the mud and its accompanying bacterial impuri- 

 ties, so familiar to the citizens of and visitors in the great cities adjacent to the 

 Ohio, the Missouri and the Mississippi rivers. 



The peculiar yellow clay suspended in the Ohio water will not subside even 

 on standing, and ordinary schemes of filtration utterly fail in its treatment, even 

 in times of low water. 



In view of the conditions, Mr. Charles Hermany, Chief Engineer, and Mr. 

 Charles R. Long, President, of the Louisville Water Company, decided that the 

 only sure way to treat the question was by means of an experimental plant 

 erected on the gj-ound and operated for a term of months, which should give 

 them definite knowledge of the water in every stage. In accordance with this 



