REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON PUBLICATION 161 



compound or manner of treatment as a remedy for the ills that may befall 

 a vineyard. The properties and relations of the sulphur fungicides are to 

 be impartially discussed, leaving the choice of materials to those who are 

 better qualified to judge. 



Before taking up the main part of the paper, a brief survey of the 

 sources of the world's supply of sulphur and particularly that of the United 

 States and an outline of refining methods may be of interest. 



SOURCE OF THE WORLD'S SUPPLY OF SULPHUR. 



iLargely abstracted from "Mineral Resources of the United States, Ca'en- 

 dar year 1913." U. S. Geological Survey. Chapter on "Sulphur, Pyrite, and 

 Sulphuric Acid," by W. C. Phalen. 



Sicily is the leading sulphur-producing country of the world, the normal 

 production of this country being about 400,000 metric tons annually. Sicily's 

 production for the year ending July 31, 1913 was 351,752 metric tons (346,213 

 long tons). The production has been gradually decreasing during the last 

 two years while that of its nearest rival, the United States, has been in- 

 creasing. The cause of the decline in the production of the Sicilian sulphur 

 is attributed to "the destruction by explosion of one of the more important 

 mines which had previously produced an average of about 30,000 metric 

 tons a year; the failure to discover new deposits of sulphur during the last 

 decade; the continual deepening of all the existing mines, with consequent 

 increased cost of mining; the working out and inundation of a number of 

 mines; the lack of labor and its increased cost due to the continuous emigra- 

 tion; and finally, the law of June 30, 1910 which restricted the granting of 

 sulphur mining concessions. All these causes lead to the belief that the 

 annual output of Sicilian sulphur in the future will not exceed 400,000 metric 

 tons." 



The United States is the second important sulphur producing country of 

 the world, having produced 311,590 long tons in 1913. Notwithstanding this 

 notable production, there was imported in the same year some 22,000 tons, 

 the Pacific Coast receiving nearly two-thirds of the imports in the form of 

 crude sulphur. Previous to 1900 the production of sulphur in the United 

 States had not exceeded 5,000 tons. The rapid increase in the production of 

 sulphur in the United States has been due to the development of immense 

 deposits of very pure sulphur in the State of Louisiana. The method of 

 mining the sulphur in this deposit is so novel and the effect upon the sulphur 

 market of the world has been so profound that a description of the process 

 may be of interest. 



This great store of sulphur was made available for the use of man by the 

 untiring efforts of Mr. Herman Frasch, who in 1912 was the recipient of the 

 Perkin Medal for distinguished services in the fields of applied chemistry. 

 The following account of the process was given by Professor C. F. Chandler 

 in his presentation address on the occasion of bestowing the medal upon 

 Mr. Frasch:i 



"On the 23rd of October, 1890, Mr. Frasch applied for a patent for an 

 epoch-marking improvement in the sulphur industry. It had long been known 



iJour. Ind. Eng. Chem., Vol. 4, No. 2, page 133. 



