Vol. LVI. No. 2491. 
NEW YORK, OCTOBER 23, 1897. 
*1.00 PER YEAR. 
A STONE CRUSHER AT WORK. 
HOW THE WORK IS DONE IN INDIANA. 
The Great Value of Such Road Metal. 
In much of southern Indiana, there is an abundance 
of fine limestone suitable for road building, and now 
that the«good-roads fever has struck us, this stone is 
being-utilized to good advantage. There is, at this 
point, a large crusher operated by the railway com¬ 
pany, employing from 100 to 200 men, and putting out 
from 20 to 40 car-loads of crushed stone daily. See 
Fig. 289. This stone goes to cities to be used on 
streets, is used for ballast on railroads, and a good 
deal of it goes to other parts of the country to make 
roads. Where roads are built that are to serve as 
feeders along the line of railway, the [stone is laid 
down for very 
little more than 
actual cost of 
crushing, as the 
pay to the rail- 
r o a d company 
will come in by 
the increase of 
f reightage as 
the country de¬ 
velops and bet¬ 
ter facilities for 
getting farm 
products to mar¬ 
ket are provided 
Then we have 
the common 
road crusher, a 
machine of 
about 40-horse 
power, used in 
the building of 
roads across the 
country. These 
crashers are 
located along 
the lines of road 
that are in pro¬ 
cess of construc¬ 
tion, at conveni¬ 
ent points, s o 
that the crushed 
stone will not 
have to be haul¬ 
ed very far, or 
where good 
quarries can be 
found. A deep 
ledge of stone, 
where there is 
little or no 
stripping to be 
done, offers the 
best site for the 
location of a 
crusher. Sometimes a ledge is worked 30 feet deep ; 
in such case, holes are drilled down into the ledge, 
back some 12 or 15 feet from the face, and as deep as 
it is to be worked. A drill with a two-inch bit is 
used, and it takes from three to six men to handle it. 
From six to ten kegs of powder are used in one blast 
of this sort, and it is wonderful to see what results it 
accomplishes. Hundreds of tons of stone are pushed 
out with every blast, leaving immense cavities away 
down in the earth, large enough for one to crawl into. 
Much of this stone is broken up into pieces small 
enough for a man to handle, while the larger stones 
are broken into convenient sizes for loading into carts, 
that take the stones up an incline to the mouth of the 
crusher. Here it is dumped upon a platform, just 
above the crusher, and.ithe machine “ eats it’up ” as 
fast as three -men can feed it. A 40-horse power 
crusher has a capacity of 150 cubic yards of stone 
daily, and it is operated with a force of about 15 men, 
in the quarry and around the crusher. 
As the stone passes through the crusher, it falls 
into an elevator which carries it up about 30 feet, 
when it falls on a screen which is set on an incline, 
and as the stone rolls down over this screen, the dust 
and finely crushed stone are separated from the larger 
particles, and it all falls down into wagons to be 
carted on the road. About three-fourths of the stone 
is of the coarser kind, about two inches across. This 
is first dumped upon the road bed, and the fine rock 
on top. It is thus placed a foot deep, and as wide in 
the road as the contract calls for. Some of the roads 
that are being built in this county are double-track, 
but most of them single, 12 feet wide. A cubic yard 
of stone thus covers 27 feet of road surface, and the 
average cost of this cubic yard is about 65 cents. 
Teams to haul the stone from the crusher on to the 
road are paid by the load, according to the distance 
it has to be hauled. 
Five of these stone roads have been built in this 
county the past year, and five more are now in process 
of construction. The best roads we have are those 
that have been top-dressed with good gravel, instead 
of fine stone. They are smoother, freer from dust; 
wear better, and don’t wash out so badly in heavy 
rains. These roads are built by the several town¬ 
ships of the county through which they run, and are 
then turned over to the county, and their mainte¬ 
nance thereafter is a county charge. w. W. s, 
APPLE GROWING IN EGYPT, ILLINOIS. 
A NEW COUNTRY OPENING UP. 
(Continued from page 674). 
One of the men who possesses, in an eminent de¬ 
gree, the qualities that make the successful orchard- 
ist, is S. B. Harrison, and curiously enough, he is a 
R. N -Y. subscriber. His farm, or orchard, is located 
about four miles northwest of Flora, a neat little town 
in Clay County, and contains 160 acres. In this or¬ 
chard, he now has 13,000 trees, 1,500 of them being 
pears, 1,500 peaches, and 500 plums. 
Between the rows of apple trees, he grows corn and 
cow peas alternately, until the trees come into full 
bearing ; after that he uses a Cutaway harrow to keep 
down the weeds, and to form a mulch of fine soil that 
will conserve 
the moisture in 
dry seasons, and 
promote nitrifi¬ 
cation when 
showers are fre¬ 
quent. He says 
that the crops cf 
corn and cow 
peas, grown al¬ 
ternately as he 
grows them,will 
fully pay the 
cost of growing 
an orchard t o 
bearing age. He 
wants the 
ground shaded 
while the trees 
are growing, 
and these two 
crops will shade 
it. He wants it 
kept loose and 
clear of weeds ; 
the constant 
shallow culture 
given the corn 
keeps it friable 
for one season, 
and the mellow¬ 
ing action of the 
pea roots loos¬ 
ens and mellows 
it the next. He 
would like to 
keep the upper 
three inches of 
soil perfectly 
mellow all the 
time from early 
spring till the 
ground freezes. 
The thrifty con- 
dition of his 
trees shows that he knows what to do, and does it. 
“Mr. Harrison,” I asked, “what quality is most 
necessary to make a man a thoroughly successful or- 
chardist ? ” 
“ Stick-to-it-iveness! ” 
“ Is orcharding a good business for a young man, 
with the quality you mention, to engage in ? ” 
“ Good business ! One of the very best in the world!” 
“ Is’n’t it likely to be overdone? ” 
“ Not for half a century, at least! ” 
“ Where do you obtain your trees for planting ? ” 
“ From the most reliable nurserymen I know. But 
as the most reliable nurserymen make mistakes that 
are costly to the planter, I would advise every one to 
do his own grafting and budding, and grow his own 
stock, especially apples. I know that there is a big 
