The generators are of the vertical type. They are mounted above the waterwheels, each nine feet in diameter, which keep them turning at the highest permissible speed. The wheels are encased in steel, and we can see nothing but their outer shell. A muffled roar is the only sign of the mighty force they are creating. It is difficult to realize that such tremendous energy can be completely tamed and working in harness, and we shiver as we wonder what would happen if one of these mechanical Titans should suddenly break loose.
Each generator is a huge affair, as tall as a four-story house, and a rope eighty feet long would hardly reach around it. Its largest portion weighs more than three hundred tons. It reminds us somewhat of a merry-go-round, only in this case the whirling portion is all inside, and turning so fast that it seems to be standing still. It is so big that it would take thirty men, standing close together, to encircle it, and it is making one hundred and eighty-seven and one half revolutions a minute. We look through a little window in the bearing case and see a miniature lake of two hundred gallons of frothing oil that furnishes lubrication. So much heat is developed in the operation of the generator that cold air must be fed to it. In warm weather, it requires thirteen hundred and eighty thousand pounds of air every two hours and a half, or exactly as much as the total weight of the generator itself. In winter the air warmed by the generators is utilized for heating the power station.
On the trip down to Niagara Falls from Toronto I had an opportunity to see something of what cheap power has done for southwestern Ontario. I passed through Hamilton, a place of more than one hundred thousand inhabitants, with plants operated by Niagara. Here are a large number of American branch factories using electric current that costs them less than fifteen dollars per horse-power per year. As in London, Windsor, Brantford, Kitchener, and other towns, the manufacturing establishments of Hamilton are increasing in number and size, and the people say that one of the chief reasons for their prosperity is the “Hydro” power system. In riding over the country I was struck with the well-cultivated farms and the attractive homes. I passed through the heart of the Niagara fruit district, which yields rich crops of grapes, apples, peaches, and other fruits. Most of the farmers now have electricity to help them with their outdoor work and lighten the labours of their wives as well.
One of the engineers I talked with has given me a new appreciation of what development of water-power means to Canada. He tells me that each thousand horse-power developed brings an ultimate investment of eighteen hundred and sixty thousand dollars, which provides work for twenty-two hundred persons and pays them wages amounting to five hundred seventy-one thousand dollars a year. The cost of building and operating the power station itself represents only thirteen per cent. of all this; it is the application of the new energy in shops, mines, and mills that is responsible for the bulk of the investment. A new power development attracts industries; these in turn attract workers and their families; the latter bring in their train the tradesmen and the professional people needed to serve them. In this way new towns come into being, and old ones start to grow. Water-power is sometimes called “white coal.” It should be called “white magic.”
Canada is one of the richest countries in the world in its water-power. Engineers calculate that every thousand electric horse-power developed from her waterfalls eventually provides employment for more than two thousand people.
Since their discovery in 1903, the Cobalt mines have yielded silver bullion worth more than $200,000,000. These huge piles of tailings were formerly thrown away as waste. They are now being worked over again at a profit.
CHAPTER XVI
THE SILVER MINES OF NORTHERN ONTARIO
Take up your map of North America and draw a line from Buffalo to the lowest part of Hudson Bay. Divide it in half, and the middle point will just about strike Cobalt, the centre of the world’s richest silver deposits. I have come here via North Bay from Toronto, more than three hundred miles to the south, and am now clicking my typewriter over ground that has produced upward of one million dollars an acre in silver-bearing ore. For a long time it has turned out a ton of silver bullion every twenty-four hours.