XIV 



CONTRIBUTIONS OF METALLURGY TO VICTORY. 

 HENRY M. HOWE 



IN this story of the contributions of metallurgy to victory let 

 me first tell of that which was of transcendent importance, 

 the human element, and then consider some of the technical 

 advances, of the new alloys, and of the new adaptations of old 

 ones. In the space available only a few striking and typical 

 cases can be given. To tell all that was noble or noteworthy 

 would need a shelf rather than a chapter. I have naturally 

 written of those events most familiar and readily verified. 



The metallurgist's great contributions were the wonderful 

 increase in the production of ordnance material, and the equally 

 wonderful spirit of cooperation which underlay it. It is not 

 simply that each steel-maker who knew how to make steel fit 

 for cannons turned his manufacture from peace to war prod- 

 ucts, and increased the scale of his operations, but that the few, 

 the perilously few, who had this knowledge from long and 

 costly experiments, from risking their solvency, and from every 

 kind of strenuous endeavor, deliberately gave it freely to their 

 own competitors, actual and potential. Only thus was it pos- 

 sible to create the mechanism which could make the enormous 

 quantities imperatively needed. Each owner of furnaces whose 

 lack of special knowledge had till now restricted his work to 

 the cruder kinds of steel must now be taught how to make the 

 best. Where this giving was due to patriotism it was to high 

 patriotism ; where it was to enlightened self-interest, how clear 

 was that enlightenment ! The ordnance officers who urged 

 this course had indeed the strong argument, " What good will 



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