Mabch 19, 1920] 



SCIENCE 



293 



partment of Industries of the government of 

 India in whicli chemists, botanists, zoologists, 

 and so on will be formed into distinct, water- 

 tight, graded services, each under the control 

 of a departmental head; and (&) decentraliza- 

 tion under which the scientific workers at the 

 various universities and research institutes will 

 be given as free a hand as possible. 



The policy of centralization and the crea- 

 tion of graded scientific services have been 

 strongly advocated by the Indian Industrial 

 Commission, which was presided over by Sir 

 Thomas Holland, formerly director of the Geo- 

 logical Survey of India. It is favored by a 

 number of administrators in India who con- 

 sider that some measure of of&cial control is 

 necessary for all scientific investigators, and it 

 has also received the support of several of the 

 scientific witnesses examined by the commis- 

 sion. The arguments advanced by Sir Thomas 

 Holland and his supporters in favor of cen- 

 tralized scientific services are set out in detail 

 in Chapter 15. of the Report of the Indian 

 Industrial Commission, puiblished last year. 



PORTLAND CEMENT IN 1919 



Prelimikaey estimates compiled by the 

 United States Geological Survey, Department 

 of the Interior, indicate that the production 

 and shipments of Portland cement in 1919 

 increased 13 and 21 per cent., respectively, 

 over those in 1918 and that the stocks 

 decreased 52 per cent., so that at the end of 

 1919 less than 5,000,000 barrels of Portland 

 cement was in stock at the mills. The Port- 

 land cement industry was set back consider- 

 ably in 1918, when war restrictions reduced 

 the shipments from the 90,703,474 barrels 

 shipped in 1917 to 70,915,508 barrels, but it 

 is now regaining its lost ground. Early in 

 1919 the business was even poorer than in 

 1918, and practically all the increase reported 

 was made during the latter part of 1919, so 

 that 1920 started with favorable prospects for 

 the cement industry. During 1919 the ship- 

 ments from some mills were limited by the 

 lack of freight ears. The increase in the 

 value of the cement shipped in 1919 over 

 that shipped in 1918 was about 28 per cent. 



The shipments of Portland cement in 1919 

 amounted to 85,485,000 barrels, valued at 

 $144,461,000; the production amounted to 

 80,287,000 barrels; and the stocks at the mills 

 at the end of the year amounted to 4,976,000 

 barrels. 



One new plant produced Portland cement 

 in 1919 — the Indiana Portland Cement Co., 

 at Greencastle, Ind. The total number of 

 plants that produced cement in 1919 was 110, 

 and the total number of plants that shipped 

 cement was 113. The average factory price 

 per barrel for Portland cement in bulk in 

 individual states in 1919 ranged from $1.57 

 in Kansas to $2.03 in Utah. The average 

 factory price for the whole country in 1919 

 was $1.69, an increase of only 6 per cent, over 

 1918. 



The exports of hydraulic cement from the 

 United States in 1919 amounted to 2,463,689 

 barrels, valued at $7,516,019, or $3.05 per 

 barrel, increases of about 9.27 and 16 per 

 cent., respectively, over 1918. 



THE INVESTIGATION OF FATIGUE PHE- 

 NOMENA IN METALS 



In 1915 Mr. Ambrose Swasey gave a fund 

 of several hundred thousand dollars, the in- 

 come of which was to be used " for the ad- 

 vancement of arts and sciences connected 

 with engineering and for the benefit of man- 

 kind." The income of this fund has been 

 given in small amoimts to various engineer- 

 ing investigations by the Engineering Foun- 

 dation, which is the body organized to ad- 

 minister the fund. Last spring the govern- 

 ing board of the foundation decided that it 

 would be advisable to give the bulk of the in- 

 come for the supjwrt of one major research, 

 and they asked the National Research Coun- 

 cil to recommend some piece of research to 

 be supported. 



During the war the National Research 

 Council had organized a committee to study 

 the failure of crank shafts of airplane 

 engines, of welded ship plates, and of other 

 metal parts of machines under the repeated 

 loads applied to them in service. The com- 

 mittee on fatigue phenomena in metals was 



