Indeed had it not been for the strike, curtailing the output of Saturday, the week of Nov. 1 would have far outstripped its predecessor. The extraordinary efforts made by the railroads to provide cars bore fruit in a rate of production during the first five days of the week which, if maintained for the 304 working days of full-time year, would yield 715,000,000 tons of coal. It is worth noting that this figure is almost identical with the 700,000,000 tons accepted early in 1918 by the Geological Survey and the Railroad Administration as representing the country's annual capacity. During these five days, therefore, the soft-coal mines were working close to actual capacity. There can be little doubt that the output on Monday, Oct. 27, was the largest ever attained in a single day. (U.S. Geol. Survey Bull.)
[3] It is the western and southern fields that are most affected by the seasonal demand. As a typical example, Illinois may be cited, with 18 per cent of the year's production in 25 per cent of the time, April, May, and June, in 1915, and 15 per cent in 1916. Retail dealers received 27 per cent of the coal from Illinois in the period from August, 1918, to February, 1919, compared with 4 per cent from the Pittsburgh, Pa., field.
[4] In every trainload of coal hauled from the mines to our coal bins, 1 carload out of every 5 is going nowhere. In a train of 40 cars, the last 8 are dead load that might better have been left in the bowels of the earth. No less an authority than Martin A. Rooney states: "Every fifth shovel full of coal that the average fireman throws into his furnace serves no more useful purpose than to decorate the atmosphere with a long black stream of precious soot. At best one-fifth of all our coal is wasted."
The first requisite toward effecting fuel economy is to secure cooperation between owners, managers, and the men who fire the coal. Mechanical devices to increase efficiency in the use of coal can not produce satisfactory results unless the operators who handle them are impressed with the importance of their duties.
It is not essential for the plant manager to be a fuel expert, but he should be familiar with the instruments that give a check on the daily operations. It is a mistake not to provide proper instruments, for they guide the firemen and show the management what has taken place daily. Instruments provided for the boiler room manifest the interest taken by the management toward conserving fuel. It indicates cooperation and encourages the firemen to work harder to increase the efficiency.
A second factor effecting fuel economy is the selection of fuel for the particular plant. It is not expected of a plant manager that he should be thoroughly informed as to the character of all fuels; but he can enlist the services of a man who is thoroughly trained In this field. The Bureau of Mines has compiled valuable information on the character and analyses of coal from almost every field in the United States. Information concerning the character and chemical constituents of the coal, together with knowledge pertaining to the equipment of the plant, makes it possible to select a fuel adapted to the equipment, thereby insuring better combustion. Hundreds of boiler plants operate at no greater than 60 per cent efficiency, and it would be a comparatively simple matter to bring them up to 70 per cent efficiency. The saving in tonnage would be more than the combined yearly coal-carrying capacity of the Baltimore & Ohio and the Southern Railway systems. The direct saving to our industries at $5 per ton would amount to $200,000,000 worth of coal per year.
[5] Assistant Secretary Herbert Kaufman before the Senate Committee on Education presented facts and figures which accentuate the seriousness of the national situation. Among other things he said:
"The South leads in illiteracy, but the North leads in non-English speaking. Over 17 per cent of the persons in the east-south Central States have never been to school. Approximately 16 per cent of the people of Passaic, N.J., must deal with their fellow workers and employers through interpreters. And 13 per cent of the folk in Lawrence and Fall River, Mass., are utter strangers in a strange land.
"The extent to which our industries are dependent upon this labor is perilous to all standards of efficiency. Their ignorance not only retards production and confuses administration, but constantly piles up a junk heap of broken humans and damaged machines which cost the Nation incalculably.
"It is our duty to interpret America to all potential Americans in terms of protection as well as of opportunity; and neither the opportunities of this continent nor that humanity which is the genius of American democracy can be rendered intelligible to these 8,000,000 until they can talk and read and write our language.