THE MEN WHO MAKE. THE MAGAZINE DR. ALFRED GRADEN WITZ, the Berlin correspondent of the of the TECHNICAL WORLD, is a careful, accurate writer in the field of science. Equipped as he is, with the splendid scholarly training that Germany gives to its students, his writings have unusual value from the scientific point of view. In another way, too, he has a decided advantage. Everyone recognizes that German scientific investigators are making some of the most remarkable contributions to human knowledge. Dr. Gradenwitz, being on the ground, is able to give to the world firsthand knowledge of these discoveries. His writings are conspicuous for their conservative tone. He chooses such themes as do not necessitate his entering the fields. of the sensational to render them intensely interesting. C. H. CLAUDY. of our youngest writers, but for painstaking care in gathering his material and presenting it interestingly and convincingly, he equals many an older magazine contributor. Mr. Pratt is especially interested in the science and art of air - navigation. The TECHNICAL WORLD MAGAZINE published recently his article, the best ever printed in a magazine on the subject-"How Air-Craft are Controlled." His "Watching the Sky Pilots Go Up" was one of the most realistic and delicately humorous bits of writing seen in a long time, as TECHNI'CAL WORLD readers remember. His wife, Margaret H. Pratt, occasionally collaborates with him in his writing. EDWARD I. PFATT AND WIFE. SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA, the semi-tropic wonder of the North American Continent, furnishes excellent themes for the ready writer's pen. Charles Alma Byers, of Los Angeles, one of the quick, versatile men to take advantage of this fact, has, on many occasions, given to TECHNICAL WORLD readers hints of the wonders and marvels of that to most of us-far away land of delight. Fighting the Great Flood By M.A.Rose When what is believed to have been the greatest flood ever known in the lower Mississippi valley destroys one hundred million dollars' worth of property and takes fifty lives, decisive action by the Federal Government can no longer be delayed. The Republican national platform of this year pledges the party to take such engineering steps as may prevent a recurrence of this great calamity. Theodore Roosevelt, a little before the Chicago convention, proposed that the machinery used in digging the Panama Canal be put to work for this purpose in the periodically overflowed areas. This article by Mr. M. A. Rose is one of unusual timeliness and significance. Mr. Rose is a resident of New Orleans, and was an eye witness to some of the most dramatic incidents in connection with this fight against the Great Flood. R AIN is sloshing down, a downpour after a day-long drizzle. The water rushes in little torrents down one side of a gigantic rampart of sodded earth which zig-zags off before and behind. On the other side, the drops pelt the surface of a mile-wide stream into the semblance of brown stucco. Standing on the dike, one may study the roofs of a plantation home behind it. Turning, one can stoop and dabble a hand into the muddy river, so near is it to the top of its barrier. The smooth, true line of tawny water and green grass on the river side is broken by an ugly box of raw pine which projects into the stream an arm's length, and parallels the embankment forty feet, and into this box, negro convicts in their striped garb, free laborers, the village NEAR VIEW OF A In the background can be seen the piling which is being that will close the crevasse mayor, the village doctor, the wealthy planter, the banker, every able-bodied man within a radius of miles, is packing burlap sacks, filled with dirt. Above the queer chant of the negroes comes a shout from a convict guard, rifle in hand. Before the gaze of the toilers, a bit of the dike further upstream sinks, at first gradually, an inch, two inches, three inches. A yellow geyser spouts up in the road, forty feet behind the levee. Then the great wall of earth BREAK IN A LEVEE. extended in the effort to build the temporary framework This is a very narrow break. folds back with a groan, and with a roar Within an hour, the river has torn away both ends until the gap is two hundred feet wide. By morning, it will be four hundred feet wide, the plantation home, and a score of others, will be uninhabitable, and whites, blacks, mules and cattle will be camping on the levee, waiting rescue, while others, further back in the country, who could not be warned by couriers who rode |