THE national geographic magazine 



181 



during the same period 

 by all the shipyards of 

 the United Kingdom, 

 hitherto the world's 

 premier shipbuilding 

 nation. 



Thus far, our ship- 

 building activities 

 might well be com- 

 pared with a ship on 

 the ways a few mo- 

 ments after the con- 

 fining braces and 

 stanchions have been 

 sawn asunder. The 

 great craft is slowly 

 gaining headway and it 

 is sweeping irresistibly 

 forward. The total 

 production for 1918 

 will be more than 3,- 

 000,000 tons ; Charles 

 M. Schwab, director 

 general of the Emer- 

 gency Fleet Corpora- 

 tion, overcoming his 

 reticence with respect 

 to prophecy, has him- 

 self predicted it. 



Between August 30, 



191 7, and August 31, 



191 8, our American 

 shipyards delivered 

 to the Shipping Board 

 325 completed ships, 

 aggregating a few 

 thousand less than 

 two million tons. On 

 July 4th of this year 

 95 steel, wood, and 

 concrete ships were 

 launched, representing 



a deadweight tonnage of 475,000, and 

 that month showed a total launching of 

 126 vessels of 634,000 tons — more than 

 double the tonnage launched in any one 

 month by any other nation in the history 

 of the world. 



America is not relying solely upon the 

 production of her own shipyards. Japan 

 has been commissioned to build 45 steel 

 vessels for the Shipping Board, and the 

 first of these, the 9,000-ton cargo-carrier 

 Eastern Sun, reached our shores and was 

 placed under the American flag in June. 



© Committee on Public Information 



MARKING OUT A SHIP'S SIDE PLATE EOR THE PUNCH 



This work can be done in a score of industrial centers, and when 

 it is finished the plate is sent to the shipyard, where it is put in place 

 by the erectors and "sewed" to the hull with steel stitches in the 

 form of rivets. 



In addition to the ships now being built 

 by the Mikado's people, 23 of their steel 

 vessels of 145,000 tons have been char- 

 tered by our government. 



THE SHIPPING BOARD'S GREAT EEEET 



Of course, a great addition to our mer- 

 chant fleet came in the taking over of 

 enemy-owned vessels, 100 in number and 

 aggregating 644,000 tons. The 81 com- 

 mandeered Dutch ships also added nearly 

 half a million tons, while 878 ships be- 

 longing to foreign governments, but now 



