Popular Science Monfhh/ 



685 



Cleaning Billiard Tables by an 

 Electric Brush 



THE cloth of billiard and pool tables 

 takes up a great deal of the chalk 

 dust that drops from the cues. How can 

 it be removed without ruining the cloth 

 and without merely raising it into a cloud 

 that settles again upon the cloth? When 

 vacuum cleaners came into use, many 

 owners of billiard halls tried them upon 

 their tables, but unsuccessfully. The 

 powerful suction loosened the cement 

 between the slate plates 

 forming the bed of the 

 table and in a short time 

 wore off the nap of the 

 cloth. 



An electric brush, 

 which was invented by 

 Mr. Dolph L. Lowery 

 of Sandusky, O., avoids 

 the undesirable features 

 of the vacuum cleaner. 



The contrivance has the appearance of 

 a large flatiron and moves on swiveled 

 wheels over the cloth. A small electric 

 motor furnishes the power for a rotary 

 brush in the front part and a suction fan 

 in the housing in the rear of the motor. 

 Loosened by the 

 bristles of the brush, 

 the chalk dust is 

 drawn through a 

 tube to the center of 

 the fan and blown 

 into a bag connected 

 with the fan housing. 

 The excess air is al- 

 lowed to pass out of 

 the bag through 

 strainers which hold 

 back the dust. 



As all billiard 

 players know, it is 

 absolutely essential 

 that the surface of 

 the table shall be 

 perfectly true, and 

 great difficulty has 

 been hitherto experi- 

 enced in cleaning the 

 cloths, as even a soft 

 brush is likely to 

 raise the nap and 



cause an infinitely Patriotic women are 



small unevenness, machines to speed 



This rotary brush and vacuum cleaner 

 cleans billiard tables without damage 



which, nevertheless, may upset the ac- 

 curacy of the table to a noticeable degree. 



APair of Socks Every Thirty-Five Min- 

 utes — Red Cross Knitters Please Notice 



THE enormous 

 demand for 

 sweaters, sCarfs, 

 etc., for the Amer- 

 ican soldiers and sail- 

 ors made it clear that 

 this war work needed 

 speeding up. So the 

 Comforts Com- 

 mittee of the Navy 

 League of the United 

 States installed in its 

 headquarters several 

 knitting machines 

 and turned them 

 over to the women. 

 Even the most ex- 

 pert knitter cannot 

 knit much more than 

 one pair of socks a 

 day, while a machine 

 like that shown in 

 the picture, if skill- 

 fully operated, can 

 turn out one pair of 

 socks every thirty- 

 five minutes. 



Newspaper Union 



operating knitting 

 up the war work 



