264 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 19 3 8 



Oliver Bowles, in the magazine, Stone, June 1932, gives an account 

 of the stones used in the Department of Commerce Building in Wash- 

 ington. This building covers a ground area of approximately 8 acres 

 and is one of the largest office buildings in the world. Indiana lime- 

 stone was the stone most largely used. Of this about 700,000 cubic 

 feet, or 1,100 carloads, was required. Granite from Stony Creek, 

 Conn., amounted to 75,000 cubic feet. Other interesting items about 

 this building include 7% miles of corridor floored with terrazzo chips 

 patterned with small tile; 6 miles of wall base along the corridors 

 covered with polished black Isle La Motte, Vt., marble, and more 

 than 16 miles of baseboard manufactured from slate obtained in the 

 Pen Argyl district of Pennsylvania. The stones used in this building 

 came from ten States and one foreign country. 



The figures cited show something of the nature, diversity, and 

 amount of the mineral substances that enter into the construction of 

 large modern buildings. When one considers how many new build- 

 ings, both large and small, are being constructed throughout the 

 country each year, and realizes that to obtain an idea of the total 

 quantity of minerals used in their construction the figures given 

 above must be multiplied enormously, he can better understand the 

 meaning of the statistical summaries of mineral production published 

 each year, formerly by the Geological Survey and now by the Bureau 

 of Mines. These figures, of course, include not only the costs of 

 minerals entering into building construction, usually f. o. b. mine or 

 quarry, but the entire range of industrial and commercial activity in 

 which minerals are used. For 1936, the latest year for which figures 

 have been assembled, the Bureau of Mines shows a grand total of 

 $4,582,000,000 for the value of the output of mineral products in the 

 United States. The greatest contributor was mineral fuels 

 ($2,706,300,000) followed by metallic products ($1,064,000,000). 

 nonmetallic products ($789,700,000) and "unspecified" ($22,000,000). 



It has been emphasized by geologists and economists, but will bear 

 repetition, that the mineral resources of the country are diminishing 

 assets. When once used they can only in relatively small measure 

 be reclaimed and used again. Periodic mineral inventories, therefore, 

 are essential to provide the best picture of our outlook regarding the 

 future supplies and utilization of minerals, and these inventories are 

 founded on geologic information. 



GEOLOGY IN PUBLIC RELATIONS 



Governments — Federal, State, or local — have many problems that 

 involve some relationship with minerals, in the solution of which the 

 geologist may and often does play some important part. The Federal 

 Government and some of the States, for example, Texas, own large 



