Btvitw of Retiiem, 119106. 



A WONDERFUL AUSTRALIAN INVENTION. 



THE STORY OF STEEL AND IRON ORE CONVERTED BY 

 THE NEW DIRECT PROCESS. 



By E.M.D. 



In the realms of commerce there is no more in- 

 tciesting subject than the History of the Steel and 

 Iron industry. It is a tale possessing all those ele- 

 ments of tragedy, heroism, cowardice, knavery and 

 ever-rapid motives which most appeal to the inbred 

 lover of sensationalism of our times. Incidentally, 

 it is the storv of the Progress of the nineteenth 

 century. 



The dramatic development of the steel industry 

 is comjjrised within forty years. One generation 

 applauded the discoveries of Bessemer and witnessed 

 the flotation of the Billion Dollar Steiel Trust of 

 America. One geiieration laughed at William Kelly, 

 the inventor, as a crank, and regarded with blase 

 indifference the steel sky-scrapers of New York. The 

 genius of Bessemer and Siemens touched the world 

 like a magic wand, and the lands gave forth iron. 

 The day of stone and mortar passed away. While 

 a child grew to manhood iron ships replaced wooden, 

 steel bridges spanned the widest rivers, steel rails 

 webbed the face of the habitable globe. Armoured 

 battleships tilted the balance of power of the na- 

 tions. Great guns revolutionised the science of war. 

 While a man grew to middle age the history of the 

 world entered a new phase. The steel age had 

 come. 



In the little town of Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania, 

 John Fritz lives to-day — the maji who is the father 

 of the Steel Mill. In Louisville the white-haired 

 widow of William Kelly, who foresaw the Bessemer 

 process, keeps green the memory of her famous and 

 unfortiuiate husband. The man who rescued the 

 finances of the industry in the stormy days, the man 

 who created from a thousand warring elements the 

 mighty, unified organisation known as " The United 

 States Steel Corporation," is a hale and hearty old 

 man. Carnegie, mill bov and multi-millionaire, is 

 the visible and outward manifestation of a world's 

 transformation. The Steel Trust is the mountain 

 thrown up by a terrific upheaval — the earthquake 

 of the world's greatest industry. 



Bessemer's invention sprang from that fer- 

 tile niother — necessity. The demand for cheap iron 

 arose, and as it is a vital part of our national and 

 social development that a demand when earnest and 

 useful shall be su])i)lied, science answered the world's 

 call. The old order had served its purpose. The 

 crude process of treating iron ore by roasting, fus- 

 ing and con\ierting in an ore furnace was incom- 

 patible with the progress of the manufacturers. 

 Through century after century, from the far-off days 

 of Phoenicia, Bab\lon, Egypt, India and China, 



down to the vear 1847, men had been contented to 

 treat ore by that method. When, in that year, Kelly 

 declared that " air alone was fuel,'' he tore away 

 the veil of the ignorance of two thousand years. 

 Xo wonder his audience of iron masters, born, bred 

 and trained in the ancient craft, laughed. They 

 mocked him. They refused to deal with him. They 

 crushed and ruined him. Broken, yet unconvinced, 

 he returned to the old methods. But he had sown 

 the seed of a revolution. Ten years later Henry 

 Bessemer, the great English inventor, reaped the 

 harvest. The mar\ellous expansion of the steel in- 

 dustry began. 



New works sprang up, like Jonah's gourd, in a 

 night. Old-established factories, owned by masters 

 employing twenty or thirty hands, became huge cor- 

 porations, where thousands of men toiled day and 

 night. Steered by Carnegie, the industry weathered 

 the storm of that great boom. When he handed the 

 helm to another, the position of the Steel Trust ap- 

 peared impregnable and unassailable. No loop- 

 hole, no weakness, escaped the great Ironmaster's 

 eve. Like Napoleon, this ruler of men had gathered 

 around him, as his executive staff, the most brilliant 

 administrators of the business world. In the office 

 and the laboratory the brightest brains of the age 

 worked ceaselessly to attain a common end — the es- 

 tablishment of a perfect system and the best methods. 

 Only another upheaval such as gave it birth could 

 shake the Titan. Only in the laboratories, where 

 such men as Blair, Chenot and Siemens followed up 

 tb.e germ of a suspicion, was the idea of another 

 Revolution silentlv maintained. In the forty years 

 since Bessemer fought his patent actions, the world's 

 supply of steel and iron had gone forward with 

 giant strides. In those forty years the world's de- 

 mand had grown still faster, insatiable, ever hungry, 

 the markets were clamouring for " Iron — more Iron, 

 and Cheaper." The factories worked douljle. and 

 treble shifts. The blast furnaces roared day and 

 night. Yet the demand grew. As the old system 

 was inadequate forty years before, and was super- 

 seded, so the Bessemer process failed to satisfy the 

 precocious appetite of the giant it begat. Again 

 the inevitable law of evolution was to be fulfilled. 

 Science met the world's demand with the " Heskett- 

 Moore Direct Process " for the treatment of ferru- 

 ginous ore. The Iron, Steel and Metals Manufac- 

 turing Company registering the patents of Mr. Hcs- 

 kett's invention in all the steel-producing countries 

 of the world, signalised the nevv revolution. To con- 

 sider what this invention means to the world's com- 



