The Wonder Book Of Knowledge Part 59

The fertilizer manufacturers mix the cyanamid with other ingredients to make a balanced plant food and so ship it to farmers for feeding their crops. In 1914 7,500,000 tons of fertilizer worth $175,000,000 were consumed in this country. This seems like a large quant.i.ty, but it allows only a scanty application per acre cultivated. Germany, on one-fourth of our cultivated acreage, uses almost twice as much fertilizer as the entire United States. As a consequence she raises 30 bushels of wheat where we average 14 bushels per acre; 52 bushels of oats where we average 30; and 196 bushels of potatoes per acre where we raise 97 bushels per acre. The explanation is simple, German farmers pay only about one-half as much for their plant food as American farmers pay. Where the German farmer gains $2.00 to $3.00 increase in crop from fertilizer that costs him $1.00 the American farmer pays $2.00 for the same fertilizer, which leaves him less profit and less incentive to use fertilizer.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CARBIDE COOLING SHED]

[Ill.u.s.tration: CYANAMID OVEN ROOM]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Photo by William H. Rau_

FOREVER RUSHING AND FOREVER WONDERFUL

Niagara Falls from Prospect Point on the American side, looking southwest, across and up the stream. The American Falls may be seen in the foreground rushing past to make their plunge of 165 feet to the rocks below.]

The air-nitrogen industry in the United States is said to be considerably handicapped because the large quant.i.ties of electricity required are not available at a low enough price. There are excellent water-power sites in the United States sufficient to furnish many times the required power, but the existing water-power laws are so burdensome that investors will not put their money into power development except on such high terms that the power is much dearer than it can be bought for in other countries. Practically every civilized country in the world, except the United States, had one or more cyanamid factories in 1916.

These include Germany, Austria-Hungary, Great Britain, France, Italy, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, j.a.pan and Canada. Their combined output is about 1,000,000 tons per annum. The cyanamid plant at Niagara Falls, Ontario, which was established in 1909, with a capacity of 10,000 tons, had a capacity of 64,000 tons per annum in 1916. It utilizes about 30,000 electrical horse-power twenty-four hours a day, and three hundred and sixty-five days a year. Germany, at the beginning of the war, produced about 30,000 tons of cyanamid; in 1916 she was making 600,000 tons a year. She is using it both to grow crops and to make explosives for her guns.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SUGAR BEET CROP FERTILIZED WITH CYANAMID MIXTURES. GROWN IN CARO, MICHIGAN]

[Ill.u.s.tration: COTTON CROP FERTILIZED WITH CYANAMID MIXTURES. GROWN IN SUMTER, S. C.]

At the time the war broke out, in August, 1914, Germany was importing nearly one million tons of nitrate of soda per annum from Chile, South America. This supply was immediately cut off by enemy fleets. Not only was her agriculture thereby threatened with a great decrease in crop production but her supply of military explosives was also threatened.

Professor Dr. Lemmermann, a famous German scientist, advised his government that unless the nitrogen shortage were made good the resulting crop shortage would amount to 3,300,000 tons of grain. But if people require food, guns require powder, and no powder can be made without nitric acid. It has been reported on good authority that Germany has consumed one and one-third million pounds of powder a day during the war. To make one pound of powder requires one and one-half pounds of nitric acid, so that Germany required for military purposes 2,000,000 pounds of nitric acid per day. From her c.o.ke ovens she indeed could derive some nitrogen, but this actually furnished only about one-fifth of her total requirements. For the other four-fifths she turned to atmospheric nitrogen. For it is also true that this remarkable compound, cyanamid, which is a food for plants, can be decomposed by high-steam pressure into the purest ammonia gas. The ammonia can in turn be oxidized to nitric acid, which is the basis of all explosives. Without the fixation of atmospheric nitrogen on a tremendous scale there is no doubt that Germany would have become helpless before her enemies within a year after the war began, for no nation can fight unless it has sufficient food for its people and powder for its guns.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TURBINE GENERATORS, NIAGARA FALLS POWER HOUSE

Eleven turbine generators in the Niagara Falls Power House, each set developing 5,000 horse-power.]

The preservation of food is also dependent on ammonia, which produces the refrigerating effect in the numerous cold storage houses and artificial ice plants in this country. In the cold storage plants alone the cold produced by means of ammonia is equal to 750,000 tons of ice consumed per day, while 25,000,000 tons of artificial ice are produced and sold as such per annum. Cyanamid ammonia gas is especially valuable for this purpose on account of its high degree of purity.

Then, too, the ammonia gas can be fixed in any acid desired, for instance, in phosphoric acid, making ammonium phosphate, a fertilizer of unusual merit, or ammonium sulphate, another fertilizer, or ammonium nitrate, an explosive. So, for peace or war, the fixation of atmospheric nitrogen has become a tremendous factor in the life of nations.

If the United States should be forced into war with a foreign power it would be a simple matter for an enemy fleet to cut off our large importations of nitrate of soda from Chile. These amount to about 700,000 tons per annum in normal times and at present about 900,000 tons per annum. In other words, we would be short just this quant.i.ty of nitrogen in addition to the quant.i.ty that would be required by the government for the manufacture of military explosives. It has been suggested that our c.o.ke-oven industry could be expanded to furnish a large part of this requirement, but even with the largest expansion considered practical by the c.o.ke-oven people within the next several years, the c.o.ke ovens would not be able to supply even one-third of our requirements, thus leaving a large balance which could be furnished only by the establishment of a large nitrogen industry in this country.

The expression "The King can do no wrong" has been widely used since it first caught people's fancy at the time of the explanation, made in England, that the Ministers, and not the King, were responsible for mistakes of government.

What is a Drawbridge Like Today?

We have all read of the castles in olden days into which the owner could retire and raise a drawbridge across a ditch, thus putting a barrier in the way of his enemies.

That old style drawbridge, with, of course, many improvements, has been adopted in these modern times to use in permitting navigable rivers and channels to be crossed by railroads and other kinds of transportation, without preventing the pa.s.sage of vessels up and down the rivers.

Modern drawbridges across rivers, ca.n.a.ls, the entrances of docks, etc., are generally made to open vertically, and the movable portion is called a bascule, balance or lifting bridge; a turning, swivel or swing bridge; or a rolling bridge, in accordance with the mode in which it is made to open.

Swing bridges are usually divided into two parts meeting in the middle, and each moved on pivots on the opposite sides of the channel, or they may move as a whole on a pivot in the middle of the channel.

Rolling bridges are suspended from a structure high above the water, and are propelled backwards and forwards by means of rollers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BASCULE BRIDGE OPEN[53]]

[Ill.u.s.tration: BASCULE BRIDGE CLOSED[53]

The advantages of this type of bridge are that the entire width of the channel is available for navigation, and the draw may be opened and closed more readily than the swing type.]

The Story of a Deep Sea Monster[54]

The early day was blue and silver; one of those colorful mornings peculiar to southern Florida. Sandwiched between the earth and the turquoise sky, the Atlantic lay gleaming like a huge silver wafer in the sunlight. Not the faintest suggestion of a ripple marred its shining surface.

Suddenly out of the stillness of the silver water a huge black fin was lifted, and a little group of men lounging on the deck of an idle fishing craft drew near the rail and used their gla.s.ses.

"Shark," remarked the captain pleasantly after a moment's scrutiny. "Who wants to go out with me for a little fun?"

The hastily lowered lifeboat pointed a slim nose toward the large black shape thrashing about in the shallow water. Three men were in the boat--Captain Charles H. Thompson of the yacht "Samoa," one of the yacht's crew, and a winter visitor to southern Florida. As they drew near, the sailor took one look at the gigantic creature and yelled to the captain:

"For heaven's sake, man, don't harpoon that thing; we will be crushed like an egg sh.e.l.l!"

Poised in the bow of the boat, harpoon in hand, stood the captain, and as they drew alongside there was a flash; the steel glittered for a moment in the sunlight, then sank into the huge black bulk.

Simultaneously the little boat spun around and shot out toward the Gulf Stream like an agitated and very erratic rocket, flinging great sheets of spray high into the air as it sped.

Thus began a thirty-nine hours' ride filled with wildest thrills, during which time Captain Thompson battled with the fish, the sailor bailed the boat unceasingly, lest they be swamped, and the tourist raised an anxious and eloquent voice to high heaven. The men were without food the entire time, sharing only a small bottle of water among them.

The news of the struggle spread rapidly, and soon hundreds of interested spectators gathered on the trestle of the East Coast sea-extension railway. Scores of times the men in the boat escaped death only by a miracle, as the wildly thrashing black tail missed them but by a hair's breadth. Finally, after two days and one night, the monster was worn out, and the triumphant captor managed to fasten it to the trestle work on Knight's Key, where, after a few hours' rest, it wigwagged a festive tail, smashing the large pilings as though they were toothpicks. After another battle the fish was firmly tied up once more, this time to the yacht "Samoa;" and again it waved a wicked tail, disabling the thirty-ton yacht by smashing her propeller and breaking the cables. A tug was then summoned, and the big fellow was towed one hundred and ten miles to Miami, Florida, where it was viewed by thousands of people.

Five harpoons and one hundred and fifty-one bullets were used in subduing the monster, and it took five days to finally kill it.

It was thought at first the creature was a whale, but later it was cla.s.sified as a fish, for it breathed through gills of which there were five in number. Upon careful examination it seemed probable that it was a baby of its species, as the backbone was of a cartilaginous nature, a condition found only in a young creature; in a full-grown one this develops into true bone. That it was a deep-sea fish was indicated by the small eye, which was about the size of a silver dollar. The pressure of the water is so great at the bottom of the ocean that were the eyes large they would be ruptured. That the pupil did not dilate and contract seems additional proof that the fish must have lived at a depth of probably fifteen hundred or two thousand feet, where there is little light.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Photograph by Capt. Chas. H. Thompson_

DEEP SEA MONSTER CAPTURED OFF FLORIDA

So far as the scientific world is concerned, this is the only fish of its kind ever captured. Length, 45 feet; weight, 30,000 pounds; circ.u.mference, 23 feet 9 inches; diameter 8 feet 3 inches; mouth (open), 31 inches; mouth, 38 inches wide; mouth, 43 inches deep; tongue, 40 inches long; several thousand teeth; hide, three inches thick, no scales; had swallowed an animal weighing 1,500 pounds; tail measures 10 feet from tip to tip; pectoral fin, 5 feet long, 3 feet wide; dorsal fin, 3 feet long, 2 feet 9 inches wide; gills, 4 feet; the liver weighed 1,700 pounds.]

It is generally believed that some volcanic eruption drove the fish to the surface where, owing to the difference in water pressure, the swim-bladders burst, making it impossible for him to return to his level.

What is an Armored Railway Car Like?

The armored car shown in this picture is the first of a new type of armored car to be constructed by the United States. It was designed under the direction of the Board of Engineers of the U. S. Army, and was constructed by the Standard Steel Car Company, Pittsburgh, Pa., at their Hammond, Ind., plant. The car was designed and built within twenty-seven days.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE RAPID FIRE-GUN HERE SHOWN IS A MODEL OF A THREE-INCH FIELD GUN MOUNTED UPON A SPECIAL CARRIAGE. THE WELL IN WHICH THE GUN IS LOCATED MAY ALSO BE USED AS A FIGHTING TOP FOR TROOPS ARMED WITH RIFLES OR MACHINE GUNS.