"Stocks par, stocks up,Then on the wane;Everybody's troubled withOil on the brain."
"Stocks par, stocks up,Then on the wane;Everybody's troubled withOil on the brain."
In the course of a year or two, the first "gusher" was discovered. The workmen had drilled down some four or five hundred feet and were working away peacefully, when a furious stream of oil burst forth which hurled the tools high up into the air. Hundreds of barrels gushed out every day, and soon other gushers were discovered. The most famous one in the world is at Lakeview, California. For months it produced fifty thousand barrels of oil a day, and threw it up three hundred and fifty feet into the air in a black column, spraying the country with oil for a mile around. The oil flowed away in a river, and for a time no one could plan any way to stop it or store it. At last, however, a mammoth tank was built around the well and made firm with stones and bags of earth. This was soon full of oil; and with all this vast weight of oil pressing down upon it, the stream could not rise more than a few feet above the surface. Just why oil should come out with such force, the geologists are not quite certain; but it is thought to result from a pressure of gas upon the sandstone containing it. The flow almost always becomes less and less, and after a time the most generous well has to be pumped.
A CALIFORNIA OIL FIELDA CALIFORNIA OIL FIELDFor scenery, one should not go to an oil field. Looks, smell, and oil alike are unpleasant, but every oil derrick covers a fortune and helps to make our machinery run smoothly.
An "oil field" may extend over thousands of square miles; but within this field there are always "pools"; that is, certain smaller fields, where oil is found. When a man thinks there is oil in a certain spot, sometimes he buys the land if he is able; but oftener he gets permission of the owner to bore a well, agreeing to pay him a royalty; that is, a certain percentage of all the oil that is produced. When this has been arranged, he builds his derrick. This consists of four strong upright beams firmly held together by crossbeams. It stands directly over the place where the well is to be dug. It is from thirty to eighty feet in height, according to the depth at which it is hoped to find oil. There must also be an engine house to provide the power fordrilling. An iron pipe eight or ten inches in diameter is driven down through the soil until it comes to rock. Now the regular drilling begins. At the top of the derrick is a pulley. Over the pulley passes a stout rope to which the heavy drilling tools—the "string of tools," as they are called—are fastened. The drilling goes on day and night. The drill makes the hole, and the sand pump sucks out the water and loose bits of stone. When the drill has gone to the bottom of the strata which carry water, the sides of the bore are cased to keep the water out; then the drilling continues, but now the drill makes its way into the oil-bearing sandstone.
There is nothing certain about the search for oil. In some places it is near the surface, in others it is perhaps three or four thousand feet down. The well may prove to be a gusher and pour out hundreds of thousands of gallons a day; or the oil may refuse to rise to the surface and have to be pumped out even at the first. Naturally, no one is prepared for a gusher, and millions of gallons have often flowed away before any arrangements could be made for storing the oil. Sometimes a well that gives only a moderate flow can be made to yield generously by exploding a heavy charge of dynamite at the bottom, to break up the rock and, it is always hoped, to open some new oil-holding crevice that the drill has not reached.
Crude petroleum is a dark, disagreeable, bad-smelling liquid; and before it can be of much use, it must be refined. For several years it was carried inbarrels from the oil fields to Pittsburgh by wagon and boat, a slow, expensive process, and generally unsatisfactory to all but the teamsters. Then came the railroads. They provided iron tanks in the shape of a cylinder fastened to freight cars, much like those employed to-day. There was only one difficulty about sending oil by rail, and that was that it still had to be hauled by team to the railroad, sometimes a number of miles. At length, some one said to himself, "Why cannot we simply run a pipe directly from the well to the railroad?" This was done. Pumping engines were put in a few miles apart, and the invention was a success in the eyes of all but the teamsters. In spite of their opposition, however, pipe-lines increased.
Before this it had been necessary to build the refineries as near the oil regions as possible in order to save the expense of carrying the oil; but now they could be built wherever it was most convenient. To-day oil can be brought at a small expense from west of the Mississippi River to the Atlantic seaboard, refined, and distributed throughout that part of the country, or loaded into "tankers,"—that is, steamships containing strong tanks of steel,—and so taken across the ocean. The pipes are made of iron and are six or eight inches or more in diameter. In using them one difficulty was found which has been overcome in an ingenious fashion. Sometimes they become choked by the impurities of the oil and the flow is lessened. Then a "go-devil" is put into them. This is shaped like a cartridge, isabout three feet in length, composed of springs and plates of iron and so flexible that it can turn around a corner. It is so made that as it slips down the current of oil, it whirls around and in so doing its nose of sharp blades scrapes the pipes clean.
The pipes go over hills and through swamps. They cross rivers sometimes by means of bridges, and sometimes they are anchored to the bed of the stream. If they have to go through a salt marsh, they are laid in concrete to preserve the iron. If these lines were suddenly destroyed and oil had to be carried in the old way, kerosene would become an expensive luxury.
Getting the oil out of the ground and carried to the refineries is not all of the business by any means. The early oils crusted on the lamp wicks, their smell was unendurable, and they were given to exploding. Evidently, if oil was to be used for lighting, it must be improved, and the first step was to distil it. To distil anything means to boil it and collect the vapor. If you hold a piece of cold earthenware in the steam of a teakettle, water will collect on it. This is distilled water, and is purer than that in the kettle. Petroleum was at first distilled in a rough way; but now it is done with the utmost care and exactness. The crude oil is pumped into boilers holding six hundred barrels or more. The fires are started, and the oil soon begins to turn into vapor. This vapor passes through coils of pipe or long, straight, parallel pipes. Cold water is pumped over these pipes, the vapor turns into a liquid again, and we have kerosene oil.
This is the outline of the process, but it is a small part of the actual work in all its details. Kerosene oil is only one of the many substances found in petroleum. Fortunately, some of these substances are light, like gasoline and benzine; some, like kerosene, are heavier; and paraffin and tar are heaviest of all. There are also gases, which pass off first and are saved to help keep the furnace going. Then come the others, one by one, according to their weight. The stillman keeps close watch, and when the color and appearance of the distillate changes, he turns it off into another tank. This process is called "fractional distillation," and the various products are called "fractions." No two kinds of petroleum and no two oil wells are just alike, and it needs a skillful man to manage either.
Even after all this distillation, the kerosene still chars the wick somewhat—which prevents the wick from drawing up the oil properly—and it still has a disagreeable smell. To fit it for burning in lamps, it must be treated with sulphuric acid, which carries away some of the impurities, and then with caustic soda, which carries away others. Before it can be put on the market, it is examined to see whether it is of the proper color. Then come three important tests. The first is to see that it is of the proper weight. If it is too heavy, it will not burn freely enough; if it is too light, then there is too much of the lighter oils in it for safety. The second test is the "flash test." The object of this is to see how hot the oil must be before it gives off a vaporwhich will burn. The third, the "burning test," is to discover how hot the oil must be before it will take fire and burn on the surface. Most civilized countries make definite laws forbidding the sale of kerosene oil that is not up to a standard of safety. Oil for use in lamps should have an open flash test of at least 100° F. and a burning point of not less than 125° F.
We say that we burn oil in our lamps, but what we really do is to heat the oil until it gives off gas, and then we burn the gas. To keep the flame regular and help on the burning, we use a chimney on the lamp. The hot air rises in the chimney and the cold air underneath rushes in to take its place and brings oxygen to the flame. In a close, stuffy room no lamp will give a good clear light, because there is not oxygen enough for its flame. Let in fresh air, and the light will be brighter. If you hold a cold plate in the flame before the chimney is put on, soot or carbon will be deposited. A lamp gives light because these particles of carbon become so hot that they glow. In lamps using a "mantle," there is the glow not only of these particles, but also of the mantle. In a wax candle, we light the wick, its heat melts the wax and carries it to the flame. When the wax is made hot enough, it becomes gas, and we burn the gas, not the wax. Wax alone will melt, but not take fire even if a burning match is held to it. The reason is that the match does not give heat enough to turn the wax into gas. But put a bit of wax upon a bed of burning coals, where there is a good supply of heat, and it will turn into gas and burn.
The products made from petroleum are as different in their character and uses as paraffin and naphtha. Some of them are used for oiling machinery; tar is used for dyes; naphtha dissolves resin to use in varnish; benzine is the great cleanser of clothes, printers' types, and almost everything else; gasoline runs automobiles, motors, and many sorts of engines; paraffin makes candles, seals jelly glasses, covers the heads of matches so that they are no longer spoiled by being wet, and makes the ever-useful "waxed paper"; printers' ink and waterproof roofing-paper both owe a debt to petroleum. Even in medicine, though a little petroleum is no longer looked upon as a cure-all, vaseline, one of its products, is of great value. It can be mixed with drugs without changing their character, and it does not become rancid. For these reasons, salves and other ointments can be mixed with it and preserved for years.
The most interesting mine in the world is that of Wieliczka in Poland. In it there are some thirty miles of streets and alleys; there are churches with pillars, shrines, and statues; there are stairs, monuments, and restaurants; there is a ballroom three hundred feet long and one hundred and ninety feet high, with beautiful chandeliers, and in it is a carven throne whereon the Emperor Franz Joseph sat when he visited the mine. There are lakes crossed by ferryboats. There is a railroad station for the mule trains which bear the precious mineral salt, for this is a salt mine, and shrines, statues, churches, chandeliers—everything—are all cut out of salt.
This mine has been worked for at least eight hundred years and still has salt enough to supply all Europe for ages. The mass of salt is believed to be five hundred miles long, fifty miles wide, and nearly a quarter of a mile thick. It is so pure that it is sold just as it comes from the mine, either in blocks or finely ground. This mine is a wonderful place to visit, almost like an enchanted palace, for as the torchlight strikes the crystals of salt, they flash and sparkle as if the wall was covered with rubies and diamonds.
There is nothing like an enchanted palace in anysalt mine of the United States, no statues or chapels or chandeliers. There is only a hole in the ground, where mining is carried on in much the same manner as in other kinds of mines. The shaft is sunk and lined with timbers to keep the dirt from falling in, just as in other mines. In working salt mines, however, water is almost as bad as earth, and therefore a layer of clay is put between the timbers and the earth. There are the usual galleries and pillars, with roof and floor of salt. The workmen try to get the salt out in lumps or blocks as far as possible, and so they bore in drill holes and then blast with dynamite or powder. The salt is loaded upon little cars, running on tracks, and is carried up the shaft and to the top of a breaker, usually more than one hundred feet above the surface of the ground. There it is dumped upon a screen of iron bars, which lets the fine salt fall through. The large lumps are sold without crushing or sifting, and are used for cattle and sheep.
One of the great deposits of salt is in southeastern California. It is thought that the Gulf of California used to run much farther north than it now does, and that the earth rose, shutting away part of it from the ocean. This imprisoned water was full of salt. In time it dried, and the sand blew over it till it was far underground. A better way than digging was found to work it, as will be seen later; but while digging was going on, the workmen built a cottage of blocks of salt, clear and glassy. The little rain that falls there melted the blocks only enough tounite them firmly together; and there the house has stood for many years.
Countries that have no deposits of rock salt can easily get plenty of salt from the water of the ocean if they only have a seacoast. About one thirtieth of the ocean water is salt, and if the water is evaporated, the salt can be collected without difficulty. France makes a great deal of salt in this way. When a man goes into the manufacture, or rather, the collecting of salt, he first of all buys or rents a piece of land,—perhaps several acres of it,—that lies just above high water, and makes it as level as possible. Unless it is very firm land, he covers it with clay, so that the water will not soak through it. Then he divides it into large square basins, making each a little lower than the one before it. Close beside the highest basin he makes a reservoir which at high tide receives water from the ocean. This flows slowly from the reservoir through one basin after another, becoming more and more salt as the water evaporates. At length the water is gone, and the salt remains. The workmen take wooden scrapers and push the salt toward the walls of the basins and then shovel it up on the dikes and heap it into creamy cones that sparkle in the sunshine. The dikes are narrow, raised pathways beside the basins and between them. As you walk along on top of them, you can smell a faint violet perfume from the salt. Thatch is put over the cones to protect them from the rain, and there they stand till some of the impurities drain away. This salt is not perfectly white,because the workmen cannot help scraping up a little of the gray or reddish clay with it. Most of it is sold as it is, nevertheless, for many people have an absurd notion that the darker it is the purer it is. For those who wish to buy white salt it is sent to a refinery to be washed with pure water, then boiled down and dried.
So it is that the sun helps to manufacture salt. In some of the colder countries, frost does the same work, but in a very different manner. When salt water freezes, thewaterfreezes, but the salt does not, and a piece of salt water ice is almost as pure as that made of fresh water. Of course, after part of the water in a basin of salt water has been frozen out, what is left is more salt than it was at first, and after the freezing has been repeated several times, only a little water remains, and evaporation will soon carry this away, leaving only salt in the basin, waiting to be purified.
Not very many years ago one of the encyclopædias remarked that "the deposits of salt in the United States are unimportant." This was true as far as the working of them was concerned, but in 1913 the United States produced more than 34,000,000 barrels. Part of this was made by evaporation of the waters of salt springs, and a small share from Great Salt Lake in Utah. The early settlers in Utah used to gather salt from the shallow bays or lagoons where the water evaporated during the summer; but now dams of earth hold back the water in a reservoir. In the spring the pumps are put to workand the reservoir is soon filled with water. This is left to stand and give the impurities a chance to settle to the bottom. Then it is allowed to flow into smaller basins, while more water is pumped into the reservoir. When autumn comes, the crop of salt is ready to be harvested. It is in the form of a crust three to six inches thick, some of it in large crystals, and some fine-grained. This crust is broken by ploughs, and the salt is heaped up into great cones and left for the rain to wash clean. Then it goes to the mill for purifying. The water of Great Salt Lake is much more salty than that of the ocean. It preserves timber remarkably well, and often salt from the lake is put around telephone poles, seventy-five pounds being dropped into the hole for each one. It has been suggested to soak timber in the Lake, and then paint it with creosote to keep the wet out and the salt in.
Salt is also made from the waters of salt springs, which the Indians thought were the homes of evil spirits. At Salton, in California, an area of more than one thousand acres, which lies two hundred and sixty-four feet below sea level, is flooded with water from salt springs. When this water has evaporated, all these acres are covered with salt ten to twenty inches thick, and as dazzlingly white as if it was snow. This great field is ploughed up with a massive four-wheeled implement called a "salt-plough." It is run by steam and needs two men to manage it. The heavy steel ploughshare breaks up the salt crust, making broad, shallow furrows andthrowing the salt in ridges on both sides. The plough has hardly moved on before the crust begins to form again. This broken crust is worked in water by men with hoes in order to remove the bits of earth that stick to it, then piled up into cones to drain, loaded upon flat trucks, and carried to the breaker. The salt fields are wonderfully beautiful in the moonlight, but not very agreeable to work in, for the mercury often reaches 140° F., and the air is so full of particles of salt that the workers feel an intense thirst, which the warm, brackish water does not satisfy. The work is done by Indians and Japanese, for white people cannot endure the heat.
A large portion of the salt used in the United States comes directly from rock salt strata, hundreds of feet below the surface of the ground. These were perhaps the bed of the ocean ages and ages ago. There is a great extent of the beds in New York, Michigan, Ohio, Kansas, and other States. In Michigan there is a stratum of rock salt thirty to two hundred and fifty feet thick and some fifteen hundred to two thousand feet below the surface. To mine this would be a difficult and expensive undertaking, and a far better way has been discovered. First, a pipe is forced down through the surface dirt, the limestone, and the shale to the salt stratum. The drill works inside this pipe and bores a hole for a six-inch pipe directly into the salt. A three-inch pipe is let down inside of the six-inch pipe, and water is forced down through the smaller pipe. It dissolves the salt, becomes brine, and risesthrough the space between the two pipes. It is carried through troughs to some great tanks, and from these it flows into "grain-settlers," then into the "grainers" proper, where the grains of salt settle. At the bottom of the grainers are steam pipes, and these make the brine so hot that before long little crystals of salt are seen floating on the surface of the water. Crystals form much better if the water is perfectly smooth, and to bring this about a very little oil is poured into the grainer. It spreads over the surface in the thinnest film that can be imagined. The water evaporates, and the tiny crystals grow, one joining to another as they do in rock candy. When they become larger, they drop to the bottom of the grainer. They are now swept along in a trough to a "pocket," carried up by an endless chain of buckets, and then wheeled away to the packinghouse.
The finest salt is made by using vacuum pans. These are great cans out of which the air is pumped, and into which the brine flows. This brine, heated by steam pipes, begins to boil, and as the steam from it rises, it has to pass through a pipe at the top and is thus carried into a small tank into which cold water is flowing. The cold makes the steam condense into water, which runs off. The condensed water occupies less space than the steam and so maintains the vacuum in the pan. For a perfect vacuum the brine is boiled at less than 100° F., while in an open pan or grainer it requires 226° to boil brine. The brine is soon so rich in salt that tinycrystals begin to form. These are taken out and dried. If you look at some grains of table salt through a magnifying glass, you can see that each grain is a tiny cubical crystal. Sometimes two or three are united, and often the corners are rounded off and worn, but they show plainly that they are little cubes.
Most of the salt used on our tables is made by the vacuum process or by an improved method which produces tiny flakes of salt similar to snowflakes. The salt brine is heated to a high temperature and filtered. In the filters the impurities are taken out, and this process gives us very pure salt. The tiny flakes dissolve more easily than the cubes of salt, and thus flavor food more readily.
With a few savage tribes salt is regarded as a great luxury, but with most peoples it is looked upon as a necessity. Some of the early races thought a salt spring was a special gift of the gods, and in their sacrifices they always used salt. In later times to sit "above the salt," between the great ornamental salt cellar and the master of the house, was a mark of honor. Less distinguished guests were seated "below the salt." To "eat a man's salt" and then be unfaithful to him has always been looked upon as a shameful act; and with some of the savages, so long as a stranger "ate his salt,"—that is, was a guest in the house of any one of them,—he was safe. To "eat salt together" is an expression of friendliness. Cakes of salt have been used as money in various parts of Africa and Asia. "Attic salt" means wit,because the Athenians, who lived in Attica, were famous for their keen, delicate wit. To take a story or a statement "with a grain of salt" means not to accept it entirely, but only to believe it partially. When Christ told his disciples that they were "the salt of the earth," he meant that their lives and teaching would influence others just as salt affects every article of food and changes its flavor. Our word "salary" comes from the Latin wordsal, meaning salt; andsalarium, or "salt-money," was money given for paying one's expenses on a journey. Living without salt would be a difficult matter. Cattle that have been shut away from it for a while are almost wild to get it. Farmers living among the mountains sometimes drive their cattle to a mountain pasture to remain there through the summer, and every little while they go up to salt the animals. The cattle know the call and know that it means salt; and I have seen them come rushing down the mountain-side and through the woods, over fallen trees, through briers, and down slippery rocks, bellowing as they came, and plunging head first in a wild frenzy to get to the pieces of rock salt that were waiting for them.
35 cents net. Postpaid
An Introductory Book to Precede any Series of Arithmetics
BY
FRANKLIN S. HOYT
Formerly Assistant Superintendent of Schools, Indianapolis
AND
HARRIET E. PEET
Instructor in Methods of Teaching Arithmetic, State Normal School, Salem, Massachusetts
The work is based upon the familiar experiences and activities of children, and follows as closely as possible the child's own method of acquiring new knowledge and skill.
Thus we have lessons based on playing store, making tickets, mailing letters, fishing, etc. Every step is made interesting, but no time is wasted in mere entertainment.
By the same authors
THREE-BOOK COURSEBook One, grades II-IV.$.40Book Two, grades V-VI.40Book Three, grades VII-VIII.45TWO-BOOK COURSEBook One, grades II-IV.$.40Book Two, grades V-VIII..72Course of Study (with answers)$.25
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HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANYBOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO1901
EDITED BY
Superintendent of Schools, Springfield, Mass.
AND
Late Director of Art, Indianapolis. Formerly Principal of the Wealthy Avenue Public School, Grand Rapids, Mich.
ASSISTED BY
Instructor in Elementary Education, College for Teachers, University of Cincinnati, Formerly Supervisor of Elementary Grades, Decatur, Ill.
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HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANYBOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO1901
The List of Illustrations was added, and some of the illustrations have been moved from their original positions to avoid breaking up paragraphs of text.