respirators which screen the air breathed; is further estimated that the lives of plasterers and motormen wear specta- thousands have been saved thereby, and cles which protect the eyes from dust and several times as many more protected flying particles; miners and sewer-ex- from lesser injuries. The high induscavators wear helmets attached to air- trial death-rate in Holland itself has depumps which effectually save them from creased twenty per cent since the founall danger of breathing noxious fumes; dation of the institution, while in Belchemists are ornamented

with nose- gium the decrease has been even more pieces to protect the lungs from corrod- conspicuous. ing vapors; while air filters and pumps The Amsterdam Museum has also are shown in actual operation in a score proved particularly effective in fostering of different industries. Belts and pulleys also are protected by screens so that no workman could get caught in them ; miners wear patent lamps and helmets as they delve underneath the earth; and operators in cotton and textile factories are guarded by innumerable devices.

The Amsterdam Museum of Safety is supported by government appropriations, private bequests, and by an endowment fund. Since its establishment the records show that a more general adoption of safety devices has been made in the mines and manufacturing plants of Europe. It

COURTESY AMER INST. OF SOC. SEAVICE

GLASSES TO PREVENT POISONOUS GASES AND VAPORS

FROM INJURING THE EYES.

the co-operation of employers and employees in reducing the hazard of life in all lines of occupation. Centrally located, it is accessible to the great manufacturers of England, Germany and France. The movement started in this country to establish a similar, but even more complete, Museum of Security should add to the usefulness of the Amsterdam institution, for the two would mutually co-operate and broaden along the same lines.

Backed up by the American Institute of Social Service, the employers of labor interested in the American movement to establish a Museum of Safety have made satisfactory progress toward their laudable ambition. The benefits to the state and society must prove immeasurably great. The burden of the maimed among

an

us is a drag upon civilization that impedes our progress mightily. So long as machinery is allowed to take an annual toll of thousands of cripples, the revolting sight of deformity and physical disablement must continue to torment us. As inventive nation, the problem of eliminating dangers from all occupations is not difficult of solution to America. The inventor has done his work well, but unsystematically and often blindly. The manufacturer and employer must lend encouragement. Systematic arrangement and exhibition is needed so that the busy man may see at a glance what has been accomplished in his particular line. This is the aim of the Museum of Security.

Less difficulty. has been experienced with American workmen in any class, in overcoming prejudice against safety devices for their protection, than in some foreign countries. In this country, the grade of general intelligence in the field of skilled labor is high, and the men readily recognize the value of any invention which really protects. They will test anything that promises to. guard them against injury, direct or indirect, and if it proves itself to their satisfaction they will use it. Common sense rules occupations, in search of self-defense. If most American workmen, though bra- invention keeps pace with the demand vado sometimes creeps into such matters in this country and a knowledge of it is and makes difficulty. Few men, how- spread widely by means of this new enever, who know that they are daily fac- terprise, some effect should be noted on ing danger of accidental death or of slow the frightful record of accidental deaths poisoning, will long refuse to adopt such in the United States. And such a result means as may offer to shield themselves, is devoutly hoped for by every one who and it will be found that the American gives the matter even passing considMuseum will be visited by men of many eration.

COURTESY AMER. INST. OV SOC, SERY CL

Special Cars for Live Birds

By Fred Haxton

PRIVATE

cars for the that they see the fowl alive before they feathery travelers consti- purchase it, and shipments of dressed tute a new development in poultry have decreased. the transportation field. The live-poultry car is thirty-six feet Four hundred and fifty of long, ten feet wide, and two feet higher

these special cars for live than the ordinary live stock car. Built poultry are now being used on the prin- along each side of the car are eight tiers cipal railroads, and several hundred more of coops, three feet wide and thirteen are expected to be built in 1907.

inches high. Partitions cut these into 128 A live poultry transportation company

sections, each of which will hold three operates the "traveling chicken-coops dozen fowls of large size. A carload under the same system that other private therefore contains from 4,600 to 5,000 car-lines are managed. The cars are chickens. rented by the company to the large poul- In the center of each car is a stateroom

try dealers, the railroads having no di- eight feet wide for the use of the man rect interest in the transaction beyond who travels with the birds, and an aisle collecting 'freight rates on the fowls twenty-eight inches wide extends the enshipped.

tire length of the car, for use in feeding The poultry car business has developed the fowls. Each side of the car is covwithin the last few years, and was given ered with coarse-meshed wire netting. a tremendous impetus by the recent cold Feed and water troughs, constructed so storage poultry scandal, when the city as to be pushed in out of the way like a of Chicago confiscated thirty tons of drawer when not in use, run along the dressed chickens that had been in coolers back of each row of coops, and in the nearly a year.

Consumers now demand top of the car is a 300-gallon water-tank, with hose connections to the troughs. the fowls in the car and feeds them, perFifty bushels of grain may be stored in haps for two or three weeks, until prices a bin under the floor, and the fowls may have advanced. be fed and watered with ease while the Shippers order the cars from their train is rounding mountain curves at local freight agent, and the latter telehigh speed. The floors of the coops slant graphs to the traffic manager of the road; to the outside, making them self-cleaning. the order is passed along to the car com

Poultry is frequently shipped in these pany, and the nearest empty car is rushed cars from San Francisco to New York, to the shipper. The demand is so great, and at the end of the journey each bird however, that a poultry dealer often has weighs from a half pound to a pound to wait a couple of weeks before he can more than it did when it started. The secure the coach. invention of these coaches was due to the The prices charged for use of the cars fact that it was almost impossible to ship vary according to the length of the shipchickens long distances in crates in or- ment, $10 being required for any disdinary cars without great loss in weight, tance up to 100 miles, $14 for 150 miles, feeding being difficult because the at- $16.50 for 200, $20 for 300 miles, and tendant could not reach all the crates

greater distances proportionately, a 1,700 when they were piled high in cars. For mile shipment costing $51. Three cents this reason long shipments of live poul- á mile is charged for each mile in excess try resulted in considerable loss in weight of 1,700 up to 2,000, and a cent a mile and in the death of many fowls by suf

for distances greater than 2,000 miles. focation.

Shipments from St. Louis to Chicago Most of the shipments are made from Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, and other states

cost $20 a carload and from Chicago to

New York $39, but the through rate in the Mississippi valley, to Chicago and New York. A single dealer at Keokuk,

from St. Louis to New York is $42. Iowa, often sends a half dozen carloads-- In the last year the country dealers 30,000 live birds—in one consignment. shipped 2,065 carloads of live poultry to If he finds the Chicago market, when the New York City. Besides this, hundreds

. chickens arrive, is not high enough to of thousands of fowls were shipped in give the expected profit, he simply holds "less-than-car-lot" consignments.

How Good Is Concrete?

By Walter Loring Webb, C. E.

A

BUILDING material that good quality of brick will withstand fire will not rust or decay and far better than stone, and is unaffected that will not be subject to by frost or the carbonic acid in the atthe attacks either of in- mosphere, but its use is absolutely limsects or of atmosphericited to supplying compressive resistance.

acids; that will be fire- The very expensive method of floor proof and earthquake-proof and capable construction, using steel I-beams with of supporting heavy loads over long small arches of brick or hollow tile, which spans—a material that has all these vir- a few years ago was considered to be the tues and still is not prohibitively costly- only method which deserved the name of such a material would be close to ideal. fireproof, has been found to be only relAnd the material that most nearly meets atively fireproof and in fact it affords but these essential requirements and that is little protection against a hot fire. It daily undergoing tests with credit is re- was one of the compensations of the Balinforced concrete. ·

timore fire that it furnished a very conThe usual building materials fal! far vincing test of the relative methods of short of the above ideal. Wood, in the various systems of fireproofing which spite of its many advantages, is subject have been devised. The old-fashioned to decay and the ravages of the teredo floors constructed of steel I-beams, connavalis, if it is placed in seawater; it must nected by brick or by hollow tiles, probe frequently repainted and it is highly vided little or ro protection to a building combustible. Steel, in spite of constant against is almost complete destruction repainting, will rust unless it is thor- by the flames. On the other hand, the oughly protected by concrete. Unless it few existing floors of reinforced concrete is thoroughly fireproofed, the heat usu- were structurally unharmed during that ally developed ty a conflagration is so trial. great that the steel will soften and yield, In strong comparison with the qualithus causing the whole structure to col- ties of the various building materials lapse. Although stone in the form of cnumerated above is the statement of the building blocks has the great advantage corresponding qualities of reinforced of architectural beauty, it cannot with- concrete. It is in no sense subject to stand fire and especially the frequent decay and when it is used in seawater for combination of the great heat of a con- the foundation of a pier or wharf it is flagration and the sudden application of unaffected by the teredo, which so a stream of cold water. The carbonic quickly destroys timber. It is not affect

. acid of the atmosphere will speedily af- ed by rust nor by the carbonic acid in fect marble and limestone fronts. Stone the atmosphere. When properly conis useless for long spans except in the structed, it requires no maintenance form of expensive arches which must charge for painting or for any other kind have a considerable rise in proportion to of protective treatment. The various tests, the span and this renders its use inappli- which have been made by the building cable for all except a limited class of ex- bureaus of great cities, as well as by the pensive structures. The recent destruc- involuntary test of great conflagrations, tion of San Francisco by earthquake have shown that its power for resisting shows how helpless the ordinary stone fire--and even a combination of fire and or brick structure is under such circum- water-is greater than that of any other stances. Brick has nearly all of the dis- known type of building construction. advantages of stone except in degree. A Although the lower layer of concrete will