THE MINING OF IRON. 



BY WALDON FAWCETT. 



rWaldon Fawcett, author; born Salem, Ohio, February 23, 1875; is one of the most 

 popular contributors to newspapers and periodicals on technical matters writing for 

 the most part as the result of personal investigations; in this connection he has trav- 

 eled through the United States and Europe collecting information; also syndicates 

 weekly articles on industrial topics to a large syndicate of newspapers. Author of 

 several works on economic and industrial subjects. The article here published is 

 used by arrangement with the Century Magazine.] 



If, in this age of science and invention, there was to be 

 prepared a revised category of the wonders of the world, the 

 first place would unquestionably have to be accorded to the 

 marvelous process whereby the most valuable of the earth's 

 deposits is transformed into iron and steel products for every- 

 day use. 



There are so many amazing things connected with the 

 work of taking from the ground the ore, which looks for all the 

 world like rich red earth, and eventually working it up into 

 every imaginable form, from tea-kettles to locomotives, that 

 to put your finger on any one phase of the transformation and 

 say, ''This is the most surprising," is next to impossible. Most 

 persons, if they were obliged to choose, however, would select 

 the journey of the iron from the mine to the furnace. 



Of the million men employed in the iron industry in the 

 United States it is estimated that nearly two fifths are em- 

 braced in the army engaged in the mining and transportation 

 of the ore. These men handle each year raw material which 

 has cost in the neighborhood of a billion dollars, and they re- 

 ceive for the service an aggregate annual wage of close to half 

 a billion dollars. 



The industry of mining iron ore has flourished, at one 

 time or another, in considerably more than half of the states 

 of the union; but the discovery of excessively rich deposits in 

 one locality has narrowed down the situation until now nearly 

 all the ore is derived from one region— the richest iron ore 

 field in the world — the region surrounding Lake Superior. It 

 is in the subterranean treasure houses near the northern border 



so 



