Chapter XVII: Part 17

This is an optimistic picture of one of our best farms, but compare it with the best that could be found only a few hundred years ago. The best farmer of those days held all the land for miles around and lived in a castle in the middle of it. The castle was dark and cold and was made of rough stones fitted together. The poor farmers were serfs and came two or three days out of a week to their master’s house to work. Those were the great days of their lives, for then they ate of the master’s food.

Food--that was the problem of those long tired years which dragged through the ages, when nearly everyone was a farmer, and a farmer with crude tools held in his hands. Time was when practically the whole world went to bed hungry and rose again in the morning craving food, just as half the millions of India do today because they do with their hands what a machine should do.

This photograph was taken near the summit of Pike’s Peak.]

People in the hungry, unfed ages grew so used to privation that even the philosophers accepted sorrow and woe as a matter of course and dilated upon their virtues for chastening the human soul. “It is better to go to the house of mourning than the house of mirth,” said one of the prophets, and such words brought comfort to the hungry, miserable millions who had to mourn and go hungry whether it was to their advantage or not.

This pictures the reaping hook as still used in India.]

Today the years glide by like pleasant pictures. We are fed, busy and happy. We almost let the dead bury their dead today while the living drive forward their tasks, achieving as much in a year as the old ages did in twenty. We have learned to feed ourselves and the food fills our bodies and brains with energy which must find expression in useful accomplishment. “Blessed is he who has found his work to do,” we say nowadays, “but thrice blessed is he who has found a machine to do it for him.”

Thread your way back through history to the time when the slender lives of men expanded into full and useful employment, and you will find that, so far as raising the world’s food is concerned, it all began with the invention of the reaper in only the last century. It is interesting to know something of the precarious entry of this machine and something of the dark background from which it emerged.

The blade was made larger and the handle longer so two hands could be used.]

The Reaping Hook or Sickle.

From the first pages of history we find that the reaping hook or sickle is the earliest tool for harvesting grain of which we have record. Pliny, in describing the practice of reaping wheat says, “One method is by means of reaping hooks, by which the straws are cut off in the middle with sickles and the heads detached by a pair of shears.” Primitive sickles or reaping hooks made of flint or bronze are found among the remains left by the older nations. Pictures made in 1400 or 1500 B. C. upon the tombs at Thebes in Egypt, which are still legible, show slaves reaping with sickles. This crude tool, brought into use by ancient Egypt, remained almost stationary as to form and method of use until the middle of the last century.

The scythe, which is a development from the sickle, enables the operator to use both hands instead of one. The scythe is still a familiar tool on our farms, but it serves other purposes than that of being the sole means of harvesting grain.

The Cradle.

Gradually the blade of the scythe was made lighter, the handle was lengthened, and fingers added to collect the grain and carry it to the end of the stroke. With the cradle the cut swath could be laid down neatly for drying preparatory to being bound into bundles. This tool is distinctly an American development. The colonists, when they settled in this country, probably brought with them all the European types of sickles and scythes, and out of them evolved the cradle.

With the cradle in heavy grain an experienced man could cut about two acres a day, and another man could rake and bind it into sheaves, so that two men with the cradle could do the work of six or seven men with sickles.

The American cradle stands at the head of all hand tools devised for the harvesting of grain. When it was once perfected, it soon spread to all countries with very little change in form. Although it has been displaced almost entirely by the modern reaper, yet there are places in this country and abroad where conditions are such that reaping machines are impractical and where the cradle still has work to do.

_Reproduced by permission of the Philadelphia Museums._]

The upper view shows side-hill harvesters drawn by teams of twenty-eight horses each. The machines cut the grain, and tie it up in bundles, which are dropped alongside. The machine in the lower view is self-propelling, cuts and threshes the grain, throwing out the straw, and places the grain in sacks ready for loading on the wagon.

_Reproduced by permission of the Philadelphia Museums._]

Early Attempts to Harvest with Machines.

The beginning of practical efforts in the direction of harvesting by wholly mechanical means may be said to date from the beginning of the last century, about the year 1800, although very little progress was made from that time up to the year 1831.

It is true that the Gauls made use of an instrument nearly two thousand years before, but this contrivance fell into disuse with the decline of the Gallic fields. Pliny describes this machine which was used early in the first century and which might be termed a stripping header. Palladius, four centuries later, describes the same sort of machine. This device of the Gauls had lance-shaped knives, or teeth with sharpened sides, projecting from a bar, like guard teeth, but set close together to form a sort of comb. As it was pushed forward, the stalks next the heads came between these sharp teeth and were cut or stripped off into a box attached to and behind the cutter bar and carried by two wheels. When the box was filled with heads, the machine was driven in and emptied. This is the way in which it is supposed that it was worked, and the illustration is the generally accepted representation of it as roughly reconstructed from the old Latin description of Pliny.

The tractor has 10 H. P. on the drawbar and is pulling three mowers, laying down a swath of hay 21 feet wide.]

Near the close of the past century, the subject of grain-reaping machines again began to claim the attention of inventors. In July, 1799, the first English patent was granted to Joseph Boyce. In 1806, Gladstone of England built and patented a machine which not only attempted to cut the grain, but also to deliver it in gavels to be bound. In 1807, Plucknett and Salmon both patented machines. In 1811, Smith and Kerr took out patents. In 1822, Henry Ogle, a schoolmaster of Rennington, assisted by Thomas and Joseph Brown, invented the so-called Ogle reaper. The next, and last, reaper of this period was invented by Patrick Bell of Carmyllie, Scotland, in 1826.

Nearly all of these early reapers relied upon scythes or cutters with a rotary motion or vibrating shears. This method of cutting was essentially wrong, and none of the machines ever appeared to have gained or long retained the favor of the farmers. That these early attempts were all unsuccessful is evidenced by the fact that at the great World’s Fair in London in 1851, the United Kingdom could not present a single reaping machine. English journals and writers of that period, without a single exception, spoke of the American reapers which were exhibited as “completely successful.” For the real progress towards solving the problem of harvesting grain with machines we must turn to America.

American invention in this line, so far as there is any record, began with the patent issued to Richard French and T. J. Hawkins of New Jersey, May 17, 1803. No reliable description of this machine seems to be extant. Five patents of no importance were issued between that time and 1822, when Bailey took out a patent. Cope and Cooper of Pennsylvania obtained a patent in 1826, and Manning obtained one in 1831.

Up to 1831, no successful and practical reaper had been developed. With all the patents taken out in England, and with those taken out in America from 1803 down to 1831, we might say that nothing had been accomplished toward perfecting a reaping machine which actually worked successfully.

The First Successful Reaper.

Formerly the raker walked by the side of the machine.]

In 1831 came McCormick’s reaper, the first practical machine of its kind ever taken into the field. It was crude at first, but improved from year to year. Although McCormick’s reaper was not patented until 1834, one year after the patent granted to Obed Hussey for his reaper, young McCormick gave a public exhibition in Virginia three years before, in 1831. It was in the fall of that year when Cyrus McCormick hitched four horses to his machine, which had been built in the old blacksmith shop at Steel’s Tavern, and drove into a field of late oats on the farm of John Steele, adjoining his father’s. The reproduction of an old lithograph depicting this scene indicates the interest of the neighbors in this event. Although the United States had been established more than fifty years past, this was the first grain that had ever been cut by machinery. McCormick’s machine continued to operate to the surprise of everyone and in less than half a day had reaped six acres of oats--as much as six men would have done by the old-fashioned method.

This was not the first attempt of a McCormick to solve the problem of harvesting wheat by machinery, for Robert McCormick, the father of Cyrus, had, himself, worked on a machine of this kind as far back as 1816. His father tried it again in 1831 and abandoned it, and in that same year the son Cyrus took up the work and started the world toward cheaper bread.

The first practical reaper taken into the field in 1831 embodied the essential parts of the reaper with which we are familiar. It had a platform for receiving the grain, a knife for cutting it, supported by stationary fingers over the edge, and a reel to gather it. The driver of the machine rode one of the horses, while the man who raked off the grain walked by the side of the machine.

Development of the Reaper.

The ten years following this first instance of a successful reaper were strenuous times indeed for Cyrus McCormick, for it was not until 1840 or 1841 that he was able to make his first sale. Twenty more were sold in 1843 and fifty in 1844.

This picture shows the husker and shredder in operation with kerosene for power.]

During all these years from 1831 to 1844 Mr. McCormick was diligently at work changing, testing and experimenting. In 1845 he secured a second patent, which embodied many improvements--the principal ones referring to the cutting mechanism.

Note that an automatic raker has been substituted for the man who rode on the machine and raked off the cut grain.]

In this year, Mr. McCormick started for the western prairie, and in 1847 built his own factory in Chicago, thus starting the world’s greatest reaper works. This factory, known as “McCormick Works,” is still in progress. It covers today more than 120 acres in the heart of Chicago, and has an annual capacity of 375,000 machines of all types.

Note the two men riding on the platform and binding up the grain as delivered to them by the elevator of the machine.]

The third step in the development of the reaper was the addition to the machine of a seat for carrying the raker. The machine built in 1831 required that the raker walk by the side of the machine. In 1845 Mr. McCormick added the seat, patent for which was added in 1847. This seat which carried the raker enabled him while riding to rake the grain from the platform and deposit it in gavels on the ground. This type of reaper, patented in 1847, is the one taken by Cyrus H. McCormick to the first world’s fair held in London, England, in 1851, and about which the records of that exposition state “The McCormick reaper is the most valuable article contributed to this exposition, and for its originality and value and perfect work in the field it is awarded the council medal.”

This same reaper received the grand prize in Paris in 1855 and is the reaper which created so much surprise in the world’s fair in London that the comments made by the press demonstrated beyond a doubt that England had not as yet built a successful reaper. In 1858 the machine was further improved by substituting an automatic rake for the raker on the machine.

Many other patents were granted from time to time until 1870, when the foundation features of all reapers had been invented and substantially perfected. The reaper is still used extensively, especially in foreign countries.

The interest in this machine centers not in its development as used today, but in the fact that it led to the invention and perfection of the self-binder.

The prototype of all machines designed to bind the grain before being delivered to the ground is the Marsh harvester. It is the half-way mark, the child of the reaper and the parent of the self-binder. The original patent for this machine was granted August 17, 1858, to two farmer boys of De Kalb, Illinois, the Marsh brothers.

Previous to this time, attempts had been made to build harvesting machines which would bind the grain before delivered to the ground, but not one could be considered a success. At the time the Marsh harvester began seeking a place in the market, about 1860, reapers--hand-rakers, self-rakers, and droppers--held the trade substantially to the exclusion of any other kind of harvesting machine.

This ingenious machine is a great labor saver in the hay field. The hay can be gathered by any number of sweep rakes and dumped near the stacker, which will stack on any side and in any shape.]

The first successful Marsh harvester, built in 1858, was operated through the harvest of that year. It has never been changed materially in principle or form since. The theory of the inventors was that two men might bind the grain cut by the five-foot sickle in ordinary motion provided it could be delivered to them in the best possible position and condition for binding and if they could have perfect freedom of action. They knew that the binders must have a free swing and open chance at the grain to enable them to handle it, so they arranged the elevated delivery, the receptacle, the tables and the platform for the man with these things in view.

The second Marsh harvester was built in Chicago in 1859. Improvements were made during the years 1861, 1862 and 1863. The manufacture of the Marsh harvester began in earnest at Plano in the fall of 1863 by Stewart and Marsh, twenty-five machines being put out in 1864.

The small kerosene tractor has taken the place of horses and is drawing two wagons at a time.]

In 1875 McCormick began putting out harvesters of the Marsh type. Of straight Marsh harvesters--carrying a man to bind--there had been made up to and including 1879 over 100,000, of which about two-thirds had been produced by the Marsh combination and the rest by outsiders.

The Self-Binder.

The development of the automatic binder followed quickly after the introduction of the Marsh harvester, although attempts were made to perfect this machine as early as 1850.

This machine binds the grain with wire.]

The self-binding harvester was borne on the shoulders of the Marsh harvester. Carpenter, Locke, Gordon, Appleby and every inventor who succeeded in any measure in binding grain, first did so by placing his binding attachment upon a Marsh harvester, taking the grain from a receptacle where it fell to another receptacle where it was bound. The first record of these attempts is a patent granted to J. E. Heath, of Warren, Ohio, in 1850. Watson, Renwick and Watson secured patents in 1851 and 1853, but their machines were very complicated and never more than experiments. From that time until 1865 many patents were granted, none of which may be considered successful.

In 1865 S. D. Locke of Janesville secured a patent which ultimately developed into the Withington wire binder first put out by McCormick in 1875.

The Withington machine was an improvement on the binding device patented by Locke in 1865. McCormick built 50,000 of these machines between 1877 and 1885. It was a simple mechanism which consisted mainly of two steel fingers that moved back and forth and twisted a wire band around each sheaf of grain.

Farmers did not take kindly to the wire binder. They said that wire would mix with the straw and kill their horses and cattle.

The Twine Binder.

This is the perfected Marsh harvester with a perfected Appleby twine binding attachment and was first put out by the Deering Company in 1879.]

These machines cut a swath 40 feet wide in the grain field, gathering the grain into bundles and dropping them alongside to be picked up by the sweep rake.]

This was the situation in the harvesting industry about the time that William Deering took an active interest. He looked about for a better machine. He found John F. Appleby, who, in 1878, had perfected a twine binder attachment. When Deering saw the strong steel arms flash a cord around a bundle of grain, tie a knot, cut the cord and fling off the sheaf, he knew he had what the world needed. Appleby began working on his invention in 1858, but accomplished nothing until 1869 when he took out his first patent on a “wire binder.” In 1874 he began what is known as the Appleby twine binder, operating one in 1875 and 1876 and several in 1877. In 1879 Deering bought out Gammon, joined forces with Appleby, moved the factory from Plano to Chicago in 1880, and began putting out twine binders. In 1881 McCormick, also, and Champion began building the Appleby binder.

The modern spreader is built low and equipped with a special wide spread attachment which throws the manure well beyond the wheels.]

This drill is large enough to require the strength of four horses to pull it.]

With the development of an attachment to bind with twine, a new problem arose--where to get a cheap serviceable twine. William Deering again arose to the occasion. He met Edwin H. Fitler in Philadelphia, one of the three twine makers in the United States, and after a good deal of persuasion induced him to take an order for a single-strand binder twine. From that time on, all manufacturers have been building practically the same machine--the Appleby binding attachment on the Marsh type of harvester which, in turn, was founded on the McCormick cutting mechanism. The self-binder of today is of that type.

Other Machines Follow.

The completion of the reaper set the wheels of farm invention spinning. It was the first great battle successfully won and gave a spirit of confidence and an irresistible spirit of victory to the men who were lifting the burdens off the bodies of men. After the reaper, the mowing machine came naturally. Following the binder in easy sequences came the corn binder, push binder, header and harvester thresher.

Every variety of haying machine, from side-delivery rake and tedder to sweep rake and loader, came eventually to make hay-making easy. The thresher, ensilage cutter, riding plow, disk harrow, cream separator, manure spreader and seeding machines succeeded in making the raising of the world’s food a profitable occupation; at the same time, they made it an easy one. Lately, the internal combustion engine, together with its application in the kerosene tractor, promises to make the farmer’s emancipation practically complete. If Herbert Casson could say “The United States owes more to the reaper than it does to the factory or the railroad or the Wall Street stock exchange,” what can be said of these myriad machines that now do the food-grower’s work for him?

Where formerly nearly all the people had to engage in food raising and even then went to bed hungry, now nearly half the people live away from the farm and there is a great abundance of bread and of food.

* * * * *

What Causes an Echo?

An echo is caused by the reflection of sound waves at some moderately even surface, such as the wall of a building. The waves of sound on meeting the surface are turned back in their course, according to the same laws that hold for reflection of light. In order that the echo may return to the place from which the sound proceeds, the reflection must be direct, and not at an angle to the line of transmission, otherwise the echo may be heard by others, but not by the transmitter of the sound. This may be effected either by a reflecting surface at right angles to the line of transmission or by several reflecting surfaces, which end in bringing the sound back to the point of issue.

Sound travels about 1,125 feet in a second; consequently, an observer standing at half that distance from the reflecting object would hear the echo a second later than the sound. Such an echo would repeat as many words and syllables as could be heard in a second. As the distance decreases the echo repeats fewer syllables till it becomes monosyllabic.

The most practiced ear cannot distinguish in a second more than from nine to twelve successive sounds, so that a distance of not less than sixty feet is needed to enable a common ear to distinguish between the echo and the original sounds. At a near distance the echo only clouds the original sounds. This often interferes with the hearing in churches and other large buildings. Woods, rocks and mountains produce natural echoes in every variety, for which particular localities have become famous.

In Greek mythology, Echo was a nymph (one of the Oreads) who fell in love with Narcissus, and because he did not reciprocate her affection she pined away until nothing was left but her voice.

The Story of the Motion-Picture Projecting Machine[69]

Few businesses have had a more spectacular rise than the motion-picture industry. It may be true that there are other industries of recent growth that are more highly capitalized than the motion-picture business. I shall not make any comparisons nor look up statistics, but will present some facts about an enterprise that, scientifically, industrially and commercially, is one of the great wonders of the world.

It is fair to estimate that more than $375,000,000 is invested in this business in the United States. It looks like an exaggeration or as if the typesetter had slipped in several extra ciphers by mistake, does it not? Nevertheless, the estimate is said to be extremely conservative. In the first place, it concerns every branch of the business, of which there are five. Taken in their natural order there are: 1. The manufacture of motion-picture cameras. 2. The manufacture of films. 3. The taking of the pictures. 4. The manufacture of the projecting machines. 5. The exhibition of the pictures.

The projecting machine is the subject of this story. One sees very little about it in the newspapers and popular magazines, in spite of the fact that it is the keystone, so to speak, of the motion-picture industry. Of the entire business, in all its ramifications, this machine is the most important not only from a technical standpoint, but as regards both the pleasure and safety of the public. Here, again, a great deal of money is invested. Its manufacture involves costly and highly specialized machinery, the most intelligent of mechanics and the constant thought and endeavor of the men at the head of the business.

The advancement in the manufacture of motion-picture projecting machines from the start has been along two avenues--to secure better projection, a sharper, clearer and steadier picture, and to eliminate the danger of fire resultant from the ignition of combustible film. Experts have watched and studied the picture machine through all its stages of development. For seventeen years they have slowly improved the machine and brought it to its present high state of mechanical perfection. The development of the fireproof magazine, the automatic fire-shutter, the loop-setter, flame shields and the famous intermittent movement have all been vital factors in the elimination of fire and also in securing perfect projection. The oldest invention was patented by W. E. Lincoln on April 23, 1867. The contrivance was a mere toy, employing no light and being merely a little machine which, when revolved, gave figures, printed in different positions, the semblance of motion. The second oldest was of an “optical instrument” patented by O. B. Brown on August 10, 1869. This was really the first American motion-picture projection machine. There was a sort of disk or moving-shutter movement which, on revolving, gave projected objects the appearance of animation. Of course, there were no films in those days and the inventor had used translucent glass to obtain the results. Yet here was the germ of our native modern machine.

A well-known moving-picture projecting machine manufacturer tells the following story: “A bet was made in 1871 by the late Senator Leland Stanford, of California, that a running horse at no time had all four feet off the ground. Edward Muybridge, an Englishman, by way of experiment, placed numerous cameras at regular intervals about the track, which, by electrical contact, were snapped by the horse in passing. It proved that the horse always had, when running, one foot on the ground. Although this was not the first record of motion pictures, it served to demonstrate their practicability.

“Development had dragged until the Muybridge experiment. In 1880 Muybridge produced, in San Francisco, the ‘Zoopraxiscope,’ which projected pictures (on glass positives) on a screen. Later Muybridge conferred with Edison regarding a combination of his machine with the phonograph, then in its infancy; about 1883 he went abroad and held frequent conferences with M. Marey of the Institute of France.

“Marey first utilized the continuous film, though it was George Eastman who brought it to its present state of high perfection. A great deal of the tremendous present popularity of motion pictures is due to the invention of the translucent film. The early kodak film became the great factor in the cinematograph manufacture.

“In 1893 Lumiere produced the ‘Cinematograph,’ the first machine to project from a film. Edison in 1896 produced his ‘Vitascope.’ These machines became the models of the greatly improved article of today.

“The first real machine was brought to America in 1894. At least, that is as near as I can recollect the date. It was a Lumiere cinematograph and was exhibited at the Union Square Theater, New York City. The French manufacturing firm instructed J. B. Cole & Co. to furnish an operator. The Cole Company was interested in the sale of lanterns and slides and the foreign firm naturally turned to them for assistance.

“They furnished an operator, Edward Hadley. Although he had never seen a motion-picture machine, Hadley was a man who had been in their employ and was naturally familiar with lanterns and electricity. To the best of my belief, Hadley was the first motion-picture operator in America. He afterwards became the operator for Lyman H. Howe, the well-known pioneer traveling motion-picture exhibitor, and later became an exhibitor himself.

“The films then had one perforation on either side of each picture. That was the French method. The American method of four perforations on either side of each picture, formulated by Thomas A. Edison, was taken up later. The Edison perforation method became the standard in America and finally throughout the world. We find no more single-holed films.”

Here, for the benefit of the uninitiated, a little description of the film and the projecting head of a machine is necessary. A motion-picture film is a thin ribbon of transparent pyroxylin plastic or nitrocellulose, which is highly inflammable. The photographs on the film, one by three-fourths of an inch in size, leave a margin of five thirty-seconds of an inch on each side. In the margins are the perforations necessary to feed the film through the machine head. There are sixteen pictures to the foot.

The mechanism of the machine head moves the film over an aperture, so that the rays of light from the lamp will project an enlargement of the film picture upon the screen. The reels upon which the film is wound are mounted above and below--the upper is the feed reel and the lower is the take-up reel. Sprocket wheels control the action of the film. The top feed sprocket pulls the film from the upper feed reel, the middle intermittent sprocket (below the aperture) turns in a way to give each picture a certain time of stop over the projection aperture, and the bottom take-up sprocket assists in winding the film on the take-up reel.

“The early films were in very short lengths,” continued the manufacturer. “The average was from twenty to seventy-five feet. A hundred-foot film was considered extra long. They were mostly comic and not educational. The vast possibilities of the film had not yet dawned upon the pioneers. They aimed only to get a laugh with a crude comic picture.

“But those with more foresight realized that the film had come to stay. So the advancement began. Today the public is always looking toward something better. It has been educated up to an exceedingly high standard. The average spectator today can see a defect in an exhibited film as quickly as an expert.

“Machines in the early days were very crude, permitting only short films, which were an endless belt. They were threaded over spools contained in a box at the rear end of the lamphouse, passing over the lamphouse to the head of the machine; thence down through the head, past the projection aperture and back to the spools. This exposed the film at all times, which was extremely dangerous. About 1900, longer films came into use, which necessitated a change in handling. At the machine head, the film was piled on the floor. This being dangerous and destructive, a receptacle was devised and fastened to the frame below the reel, into which the film passed. This soon gave way to a reel known as the take-up reel, which received the film after it had passed from the upper reel through the head and before the aperture, where it was projected on the screen.

“These are a few steps in the march towards improvement. My first machine was called the ‘Peerlesscope.’ I kept continually improving it, and in 1902 changed the name to ‘Cameragraph;’ my latest machine, No. 6B, possesses every known device for safety--fire-shutters, which automatically cut off the film from the rays of the lamp while motionless; film-shields, which enclose and protect the film; fire-valves, which prevent entrance of flame into magazines; the loop-setter, which prevents breakage of the film while in motion, etc.”

Concerning projection, this manufacturer said: “Pictures cannot succeed without perfect projection, resulting in absolutely clear, flickerless pictures. The longer the period of rest of each picture on the screen, the better the detail and the clearer the picture. This I accomplished by means of an intermittent movement.

“You know that in projecting pictures the motion in the film is not continuous in front of the aperture of the machine head, each picture pausing long enough for proper projection on the screen. Through this intermittent movement I obtain a longer period of rest for each picture, which accomplishes perfect projection of pictures without flicker.

“A very annoying feature until recently has been the losing of the lower film loop, due to poor patching of the film, tearing of the perforations in the films, etc., causing the film to jump the lower sprocket, with the probable tearing and re-adjustment of the film. This I overcame with my loop-setter invention. To explain briefly--

“As the full movement at the upper and lower reel is continuous, while at the aperture it is intermittent, a loop is necessary as a feeder for the take-up or the lower sprocket. If this loop is lost, the film becomes taut, the machine stops and the film may break. The loop-setter instantly readjusts this loop automatically, keeping it always in force.”

The taking of pictures is, of course, one of the interesting phases of the business from a popular standpoint. Here we find not only large sums invested but the action, setting, plots--in fact, the entire order of pulsating life and convincing reality that give to motion pictures their remarkable hold upon the public. In vying with each other to make the most attractive films possible, the concerns in this end of the industry engage the most talented players, who are transported on long journeys so that the settings may be realistically satisfactory; while often the company includes not only two-footed actors, but horses, one or two clever dogs and sometimes a trained bear and other animals, besides all of which there is usually an array of “properties” that far exceeds in quantity and variety the list of such appurtenances carried by the average stock theatrical company or theater of the ordinary kind.

Then, too, there is the presentation of the pictures, where we find another vast outlay of money in land, buildings and equipment. And, remember, the matter of taking and presenting the pictures must not be considered only from the amusement standpoint. Motion pictures are being employed more and more every day for educational and industrial purposes.

The Story of Leather[70]

We all know that leather is the skins of animals, dressed and prepared for our use by tanning, or some other process, which preserves them from rotting and renders them pliable and tough.

The larger and heavier skins, such as those of buffaloes, bulls, oxen, horses and cows, are called “hides;” while those of the smaller animals, such as calves, sheep, pigs and goats, are called “skins.”

The tanning of raw hides taken from animals is an ancient trade. The bark of trees made into a liquor has been used for centuries in treating practically all kinds of hides.

The oak, fir, hemlock and sumach are the most familiar of the many trees from which “tannin” is obtained for this purpose.

The cow hide is used practically altogether for sole leather and is bark tanned in the majority of cases. After the hide is taken from the animal it is either dry cured, or else salted green, and packed for shipment or storage.

The first process of preparing sole leather is to cut these hides in half or sides. The sides are then run through lime vats for the purpose of loosening the hair. They are then run through the unhairing machine, in which large rollers remove the hair.

From the unhairing machine the hides pass to a fleshing machine, which cuts away all the flesh or fat on the hide. They are then trimmed and scraped by hand, after which the real tanning process begins.

The old method of tanning leather was in large vats, which were filled alternately with tan bark and hides, then filled with water and allowed to soak for a period of eight to nine months before the tanning process was complete. The extract of bark in liquor form is used today by all large tanneries.

After the hides have been all prepared for tanning they are hung on rockers in the tanning vats, where they are kept in motion both day and night so that all parts of every hide are equally tanned. They are changed from time to time from weaker into stronger liquor until the tanning process is complete.

All sole leather is filled more or less to make it wear the better.

The drying process comes next. The hides are all hung in a dry loft, where artificial heat of different temperatures is used until they are thoroughly dry. The drying of the hide is as important as the tanning. Hides that are dried too quickly become brittle, so that great care must be taken in this drying process. Even the weather conditions play an important part.

After the hides are thoroughly dried they are then oiled and ironed by large rollers having several hundred pounds pressure. This gives the grain side of the leather a finished appearance and also serves to press the leather together compactly.

Before this leather can be cut into sole leather it has to be again dried and properly edged to secure the best results.

Bark-tanned leather that is used for upper stock in shoes is tanned practically the same way as the bark sole leather, except lighter hides are used and the finishing processes are of a nature to make it softer and smoother.

The above tannage is what is called vegetable tannage. There is also a tannage made from minerals that is called chrome. This is used mostly in tanning soft, glovey upper leather, which when finished makes a very tough yet soft and pliable leather for footwear.

Ninety to one hundred days are required to tan bark leathers, while the chrome tannage is very quick and on the average requires only about three weeks.

The brilliant smooth surface of patent, enameled, lacquered, varnished or japanned leather is due to the mode of finishing by stretching the tanned hides on wooden frames and applying successive coats of varnish, each coat being dried and rubbed smooth with pumice stone. There is also a process called “tawing,” which is employed chiefly in the preparation of the skins of sheep, lambs, goats and kids. In this process the skins are steeped in a bath of alum, salt and other substances, and they are also sometimes soaked in fish-oil. The more delicate leathers are treated in this manner, those especially which are used for wash-leathers, kid gloves, etc.

In currying leather for shoes the leather is first soaked in water until it is thoroughly wet; then the flesh side is shaved to a proper surface with a knife of peculiar construction, rectangular in form with two handles and a double edge. The leather is then thrown into the water again, scoured upon a stone till the white substance called “bloom” is forced out, then rubbed with a greasy substance and hung up to dry. When thoroughly dry it is grained with a toothed instrument on the flesh side and bruised on the grain or hair side for the purpose of softening the leather. A further process of paring and graining makes it ready for waxing or coloring, in which oil and lampblack are used on the flesh side. It is then sized, dried and tallowed. In the process the leather is made smooth, lustrous, supple and waterproof.

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What is a “Glass Snake”?

“Glass snake” is the name which has been given to a lizard resembling a serpent in form and reaching a length of three feet.

The joints of the tail are not connected by caudal muscles, hence it is extremely brittle, and one or more of the joints break off when the animal is even slightly irritated.

The Story in Diamond-Cutting[71]

Diamonds were known and worn as jewels (in the rough) in India 5,000 years ago and used as cutters and gravers 3,000 years ago. India was the source of supply until diamonds were discovered in Brazil about the year 1700, when Brazil became the largest producer and remained so until diamonds were found in South Africa about 1869. The African mines now produce four-fifths of the diamond supply. Previous to the discoveries in Africa, diamonds were known to originally come only from high places in the mountains, because the diamond deposits were found in India and Brazil, on high plateaus, on the sides of mountains, in the beds of mountain streams, and in the plains below; where mountain torrents had rolled them.

In Africa, for the first time, the true original home of the diamond was found at high levels in the mountains, in enormous fissures, open chasms, chimneys or pipes, extending to great and unknown depths. Into these immense chimneys, nature forced from subterranean sources, slow rivers of a peculiar blue clay, a diamondiferous earth termed “serpentine breccia” or “volcanic tuf” and now known by the latter-day name of “Kimberlite.” As this soft mixture oozed into the “chimneys” or “pipes” from the bottom, it was gradually forced upwards, filling the whole chasm from wall to wall and to the top, where its progress ended by hardening in a small mound ten to twelve feet higher than the surrounding surface.

In this blue clay or Kimberlite in these chimneys, is found nature’s most wonderful creation, the diamond crystallized from pure carbon, in intense heat, and under titanic pressure.

The greatest mines of Africa are the Jagersfontein, Wesselton, Premier and Robert Victor. The Kimberlite of the Jagersfontein mine is free from pyrites, and to that is attributed the remarkable brilliancy and purity of color for which the diamonds of this mine are celebrated. Their color includes the blue, and they command the highest prices of any diamonds.

The Wesselton mine crystals are noted for their octahedra and purity. The color and brilliancy are so superior that nearly all fine white “Rivers” are rated as Wesseltons. The Robert Victor yields a big average of fine white stones, and many of the crystals are very perfect and beautiful. The Dutoitspan diamonds mostly show color, but many are “fancy” and demand a high price. The Bulfontein crystals are usually small white octahedras of very good color, but many are flawed. The De Beers stones are good white, some color, some broken crystals and smoky stones. The Kimberly diamonds are much the same as those from the De Beers mine. The Premier is the largest diamond mine in the world. Of its diamonds some have an oily lustre and are quite blue--many are of the finest quality and color. This mine also produces a large number of “false color” stones which change color in different lights. The Voorspoed and the Koffyfontein produce fair white and some colored diamonds.

Diamonds in small quantities are also found in Borneo, British and Dutch Guiana, Australia, Sumatra, China and the United States.

One of the largest diamonds known (weight 367 carats) was found in Borneo about a century ago, and belongs to the Rajah of Mattan. One of the most celebrated is the Koh-i-noor (Mountain of Light), belonging to the British crown. It weighed originally nearly 800 carats, but by subsequent recuttings has been reduced to 103-3/4 carats. The Orloff diamond, belonging to the Emperor of Russia, weighs 195 carats; the Pitt diamond, among the French crown jewels, 136-1/2. The former, which came from India, has been thought to have originally formed part of the Koh-i-noor stone. The largest Brazilian diamond weighed 254-1/2 carats and was cut to a brilliant of 125. Some of the South African diamonds are also very large, one being found in 1893 weighing 971 carats, or nearly half a pound. More recently a much larger one has been found, weighing 3,034 carats. This has been cut into eleven pieces, the largest, a drop brilliant, weighing 516-1/2 carats. This, called the Star of South Africa, has been placed in King George’s scepter, and another, of 309-3/16 carats, in his crown.

A rough diamond is a hard-looking, luminous object, somewhat like a piece of alum, with a dull skin, called the “nyf,” over a brilliant body. The ancients wore their diamonds uncut because they could not find a substance that would grind or cut them. About 1,500 years ago, however, it was found that by rubbing or grinding one diamond against another the outer skin could be removed. At Bruges, in 1450, diamonds were first polished with diamond dust. In Holland, in 1700, diamonds were first cut with an idea of bringing out real beauty and brilliance by cutting them square with a large flat table and some small facets, ten in all, sloping to the edge of the square. From this beginning cutters gradually added additional facets to increase the brilliancy until there were thirty-four in all. Then came the English round-cut brilliants with fifty-eight facets, but the diamond was left thick and lumpy, until about seventy-five years ago, when an American cutter, Henry D. Morse, of Boston, developed the cutting of diamonds to its present perfection by fearlessly sacrificing weight to get proportion. This greatly increased the price of diamonds, but enhanced their brilliancy.

All cutters have been compelled to follow this method, and the perfectly cut brilliant of today has a depth from table to culet of six-tenths of the diameter, of which one-third is above the girdle and two-thirds below. In this form the diamond resembles two cones united at their bases, the upper one cut off a short distance from its base, the lower one having its extreme point cut off. It has fifty-eight facets, of which thirty-three, including the table, are above the girdle and twenty-five, including the culet, below the girdle. Stones which are not scientifically cut in this true proportion, if too deep, are called “lumpy,” if too shallow they are called “fish eyes.” A slightly spread stone is desirable, provided it has not lost brilliancy, and so become a “fish eye.” Looking larger than its weight indicates, it offers a larger appearing diamond for the price of a smaller perfectly cut stone. Most cutters remove as little of the rough stone as possible in cutting so as to retain weight (they sell by weight). This often results in the finished diamond being too thick at the girdle, making a lumpy stone. Many people think deep, lumpy stones are most desirable. This is not true, as they are imperfectly cut.

In preparing to cut a diamond the rough crystal is studied until the grain is found. Along the grain another sharp-pointed diamond is ground until there is a V-shape incision or nick. The blunt end of a flat piece of steel is placed in this nick and a smart blow of a hammer divides the crystal evenly and perfectly. After this “cleavage” has removed the unnecessary portions, or they have been sawed off by the use of rapidly-revolving thin wheels charged with diamond dust, the diamond is set in a turning wheel and ground with another diamond until it takes the shape in which we know it.

The fifty-eight facets are cut and polished one at a time on a rapidly-revolving wheel charged with diamond dust and oil. It takes from two and one-half to four days to properly cut a stone. Knife-edge girdle diamonds are impractical owing to the liability of chipping the thin edge in setting or by blows while being worn. Polishing the rough edge of the girdle is rarely done and then usually to conceal a girdle which is too thick or lumpy. The principal diamond cutting centers are Amsterdam, Antwerp and New York.

Inherent flaws can be perfectly understood by imagining a pond of water frozen solidly to its center. At the shore, where the ice has been partly forced out along the banks, it will be full of grass, leaves, pebbles and sticks, and presents a broken and frosted appearance. Further out there are only traces of such débris, some bubbles, spots, etc. Out at the center is clear, transparent, unbroken, unflawed, purest blue-white ice, such as you delight to see in your glass on a hot day. So is it with diamonds; some (like the ice along the shore) are full of cracks, carbon specks, bubbles, clouds, splits and cavities; some have all of these; some only a few; others only one, and some are without flaws.

Of all the imperfections (not considering glaring cracks or nicks), carbon spots are the most discernible. They range from mere specks scarcely visible with a powerful magnifying glass, to large black spots or clusters of large or small black specks sometimes quite plain to the naked eye. These are carbon which failed to crystallize with the rest of the diamond, or intrusions of titanic iron. The blackest and often most numerous carbon specks occur in the finest white and blue-white stones. “Capes” and other yellow diamonds are usually perfect, something in the color of these stones seemingly being of a nature which helps clear and perfect crystallization. Blue-white stones of exceptionally fine color are often massed full of shaggy or jet-black carbon spots.

White specks and bubbles are common flaws, which vary in size and which may be best illustrated by looking at a pane of glass in your window. There you will find small knots, white bubbles and whitish specks. These seldom injure the brilliancy, as they are often a glittering silver color, more brilliant than the diamond.

Clouds are dark flat patches in the grain, of a brownish color, and appear as a sprinkling of dust in a small patch in the interior. This seldom injures brilliancy.

Glessen or glasses are flat sectional streaks having an icy appearance. When large or abundant they disturb or cut off the proper reflection of the interior light rays, causing an appearance known as “shivery.” When clouds or glessen occur at the surface of a diamond they appear as cracks, and if at or near the girdle are dangerous, as the stone is liable to split or crack there when being mounted or by any hard blow, which would result in the loss of a sliver or wedged-shaped piece out of the edge.

Surface flaws consist of nicks or cavities in the face of the stone either above or below the girdle. The brilliancy of the diamond hides these flaws when the diamond is clean, but when clouded with soap and dust these cavities fill up and show plainly.

Diamonds are so brilliant, the radiance from the facets so bewildering to the eye, that the flaws cannot be seen by the human eye unless the imperfection is pronounced and at the top surface of the diamond. Each facet of a diamond (by reason of the method of cutting) is a window looking down a clearly defined walled chamber, like a hall-way to the culet. With a one-inch loup or magnifying glass such as watchmakers and diamond dealers use, it is possible to clearly look down through each facet and its hall-way to the culet, and observe throughout each chamber the very slightest imperfection if one exists, thus thoroughly examining and exploring the entire diamond.

Diamond brilliancy is of two kinds: “surface brilliancy” and “internal brilliancy.” Light falling vertically on a diamond is reflected back in straight, unbroken rays. This constitutes “surface brilliancy.” Light falling in a slanting direction is partly reflected and partly enters the stone; that part which enters is refracted or bent and causes the “internal brilliancy.”

In a perfectly cut diamond, the facets are so carefully arranged that entering rays of light jump from wall to wall of this transparent enclosure and emerge again at the very point of entry. Cleverly arranged mirrors sending a ray of light from one to all the others and back again to the first will produce the same effect. Lights entering a diamond are reflected, refracted and dispersed. The dispersion of a ray of white light separates it into its component color rays. These are the spectrum colors often seen radiating from a diamond. Placing a diamond in the sun’s rays and holding a sheet of white paper at the proper angle to catch the reflections from the stone clearly shows these colors.

Brilliancy is often said to be the most important quality of a diamond, but that is not true. Yellow diamonds are more flashingly brilliant than white stones that cost much more. In each color grade, greater brilliance determines higher value over stones of the same color grade with less brilliancy. The diamond is the hardest known substance in the world, cutting and grinding all other known hard things, but itself only cut and ground by its mates.

Because of their hardness, diamonds worn by many previous generations remain as brilliant as they were in the beginning and they will continue so to the end of time.