682 ANNUAL REPOET SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1918. 



purpose, the first upon the discharge from the checker brick super- 

 heaters ill a western gas Avorks wliere gas for household use is gen- 

 erated by the decomposition of crude petroleum, and the second a 

 precipitat icm unit installed on the flue from an 80-horsepower boiler 

 at the XTnited States Bureau of Mines Fuel Experiment Station, 

 in Pittsburgh. Figures 44 and 45 show the effect upon the appeai'- 

 ance of the stack from this latter unit produced by switching tlie 

 electric current off and on AAdiile carrying a badly smoking soft coal 

 fire in the furnace. 



In this connection should also be mentioned the work of the late 

 Dr. Robert Kennedy Duncan and his associates, in the Mellon Insti- 

 tute of Industrial Research, at the University of Pittsburgh. To Dr. 

 Duncan is due in a very large measure the credit for bringing to 

 public notice in a practical form the possibilities and importance of 

 more systematic and effective coojjeration between the academic and 

 industrial agencies of the country. As a part of the system of indus- 

 trial fellowships which he had built up^ and in whose further devel- 

 opment he was actively engaged at the time of his death, was one 

 group of problems centering about the smoke nuisance with some- 

 what more special reference to conditions in Pittsburgh. 



Through the public spirited interest and generosity of the Mellon 

 family of that city, these smoke investigations were enabled to as- 

 sume a very comprehensive scope, several valuable bulletins- hav- 

 ing already been issued as a result. As Prof. Duncan had the good 

 fortune to see his dreams grow to a permanent foundation in his life- 

 time we may look forward to further results of ever growing useful- 

 ness from this source. 



Among the various aspects of the smoke problem which received 

 attention at the Mellon Institute was that of electrical precipitation, 

 and as a result several papers by Dr. W. W. Strong, one of the 

 fellows," bearing particularly upon the theory of the processes, have 

 since appeared, together with patents,* upon smoke indicators and 

 recorders involving these principles. 



^ On oei'tain Problems Connected with the Present-Day Relations Between Chemistry 

 and Manufacture In America, by Robert Kennedy Duncan, Jour. Ind. and Eng, Chem.. 

 vol. 3, pp. 177-180, March, 1911. 



2 Mellon Institute of Industrial Research and School of Specific Industries, University 

 of Pittsburgli : RuU. No. 1, Outline of the Smoke Investigation; Bull. No. 2, Bibliography 

 of Smoke and Smoke Prevention, by Ellwood II. McClelland ; Bull. No. ?., Psychological 

 Aspects of the Problem of Atmospheric Smoke Pollution, by J. E. Wallace Wallin ; Bull. 

 No. 4, The Economic Cost of the Smoke Nuisance to Pittsburgh ,by .John .1. O'Connor, Jr. : 

 Bull. No. 5, The Meteorological Aspect of the Smoke Problem, by Herbert H. Kimball : 

 Hull. No. <o. Papers on the Eft'ect of Smoke on Building Materials, by Raymond C. Benner : 

 Bull. No. 7, The Effect of the Soot in Smoke on Vegetation, by J. F. Clevenger. 



3 The Electrical Precipitation of Suspended Matter in Gases, by W. W. Strong, Jour. 

 Franklin Inst., vol. 174, pp. 2.30-263, September, 1912; The Positive and the Negative 

 Corona and Electric Precipitation, by W. W. Strong, Proc. Amer. Inst. Elec. Eng., June 

 27. lOi;;, vol. ?,2. pp. 1305-1314; The Theory of the Removal of Suspended Matter from 

 Gases, by W. W. Strong, Jour, of Industrial and Eng. Chem., vol. 5. pp. 85.S-860, 

 October, lUi::. 



*U. S. Pats. 1070550, 1071532, and 1096705. 



