Niagara Falls 



1896 It is 200 feet in length at present, and has a 50-ton Sellers elec- 

 Martin tr j c traveling crane for the placing of machinery and the handling 



of any parts that need repair. 



• • • • • 



It is a curious fact that the proposal to transmit the energy of 

 Niagara long distance over wire should have been regarded with 

 so much doubt and scepticism, and that the courageous backers 

 of the enterprise should have needed time to demonstrate that they 

 were neither knaves nor fools, but simply brave, far-seeing 

 men. 



We must not overlook some of the fantastic schemes proposed 

 for transmitting the power of Niagara before electricity was 

 adopted. One of them was to hitch the turbines to a big steel 

 shaft running through New York State from east to west, so that 

 where the shaft passed a town or factory all you had to do was 

 to hitch on a belt or some gear wheels, and thus take off all the 

 power wanted. Not much less expensive was the plan to have a 

 big tube from New York to Chicago, with Niagara Falls at the 

 center, and with the Niagara turbines hitched to a monster air 

 compressor, which should compress the air under 250 pounds 

 pressure to the square inch in the tube. 



So far as actual electrical long-distance transmission from 

 Niagara is concerned, it can only be said to be in the embryonic 

 stage, for the sole reason that for nearly a year past the Power 

 Company has been unable to get into Buffalo, and that not until 

 last year was it able to arrive at acceptable conditions, satisfactory 

 to itself and to the city. Work is now being pushed, and by June, 

 1 897, power from the Falls will, by contract with the city be in 

 regular delivery to the local consumption circuits at Buffalo. 

 Recent official investigations have shown that steam power in 

 large bulk costs today in Buffalo £10 per year per horsepower 

 and upward. Evidently Niagara power, starting at £2 on the 

 turbine shaft or say less than £4 on the line, has a good margin 

 for effective competition with steam in Buffalo. 



What this enterprise at Niagara aims to do is not to monopolise 



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