AMERICAN PRIMACY IN IRON AND STEEL 115 



orally followed, the Bossomor process and the open hearth 

 process. 'J'he use of either is determined by the quality of 

 the ore. The Bessemer process requires a high grade of ore, 

 one comparntively free from phospliorus, wliile the open 

 hearth process is adapted to the use of low grade ores. Con- 

 sequently, the abundance of high grade or Bessemer ores, 

 found at the head of the Great Lakes, made the United States 

 the home of the Bessemer process, whereas other countries 

 liaA'ing to use low grade ores have had to employ the open 

 hearth process, or some other process more expensive than the 

 Bessemer. Until recently, at any rate, the Bessemer process 

 seems to have been the only one that admitted of production 

 on the extensive scale achieved by the United States steel 

 producers. 



Both Great Britain and Germany have had to resort to 

 the use of the more expensive methods of steel production, 

 owing to the absence of ores in sufficient quantity, and of the 

 requisite quality, to make possible the employment of the 

 most economical method of manufacture. This handicap has 

 been much in favor of the United States. How long it will last 

 is a matter of speculation; but it is apparent from the progress 

 made in the open hearth method, even in the United States, 

 that strenuous efforts are being put forth to perfect processes 

 of production in which lower grade ores than the Bessemer 

 process requires may be profitably employed in competition 

 with Bessemer steel. 



The supply of rich ores of too high phosphoric content for 

 Bessemerizing is so abundant throughout the United States 

 that we only await the more perfect adaptation of some such 

 process as the Talbot continuous process of steel production, 

 or such a method of treating low grade ores by concentration 

 as that which Edison has really brought to the verge of suc- 

 cess, to open a new era in the evolution of the iron and steel 

 industry in this country. 



There is no more instructive chapter in the histor}^ of the 

 evolution of the iron industry than that which presents the 

 facts bearing on the convei'sion of the United States from 

 an iron consuming to a steel consuming country. If the pro- 

 portion of pig iron converted into steel is an index to the 



