WHERE THE WORLD GETS ITS OIL 



195 



WORKING NEAR THE FIRING-LINE 



© Underwood & Underwood 



The lineman repairing wires close to the huge oil tank, which the firemen are trying to 

 keep below the explosion temperature. This $2,000,000 fire on Long Island caused the greatest 

 call for fire apparatus that New York City has ever known. 



bunker space and fewer firemen ; and, 

 back of that, in the man-power required 

 in its mining - , preparation, and transpor- 

 tation, the advantage on the side of oil is 

 even greater. So, too, the substitute for 

 gasoline in internal-combustion engines, 

 whether alcohol or benzol, means higher 

 cost and larger expenditure of labor in 

 its production. Moreover, for alcohol 

 agricultural land would be required, and 

 for benzol in the quantities needed a far 

 greater coal consumption than is now 

 necessary. 



Again, while we fortunately have our 

 great reserve of oil shales as an inde- 



pendent source at some future date, we 

 do well to consider the practical contin- 

 gency suggested by Mr. Requa, that to 

 develop this source on a scale comparable 

 in output with our present oil supply 

 "would require an industrial organization 

 greater than our entire coal mining or- 

 ganization." Plainly, our country can not 

 afford to support another such army of 

 workers until we reach another stage in 

 our industrial development. 



The question of safeguarding Amer- 

 ica's oil supply has been prominently be- 

 fore the American people for more than 

 ten years. In September, 1909, President 



