LIBRARY.

The library has acquired during the year all the important new publications of geologic interest or bearing on the work of the Survey. The European exchanges were somewhat less numerous than usual on account of the war. Altogether 12,795 books, pamphlets, and periodicals and 1,218 maps were received.

The cataloguing included current accessions and also the final cataloguing of older sections of the collection, embracing the geological surveys of Finland, Greenland, India, Mysore Province, Netherlands, Prussia, Rumania, the Transvaal, and the Union of South Africa; 60 sets of periodicals; and monographs on chemistry and on general, dynamic, structural, historical, and economic geology. The library furnished 777 title entries to the Library of Congress for printing; 11,968 cards were added to the catalogue.

Recorded loans numbered 8,069 books and 272 maps, this number not including the books and maps used in the library by 9,022 readers. The classification scheme and the catalogue have served as guides for the librarians of a number of geologic libraries, who have visited the Survey library and studied its working methods.

During the last nine months of the year about 600 books from the Washington City Public Library have been deposited in this library for recreative and educational reading by members of the Survey. From this deposit 1,713 loans were made, of which about 12 per cent were books on biography, poetry, travel, and the social sciences.

The bibliography of North American geology for 1913 was published as Bulletin 584. The bibliography for 1914 has been completed and is passing through the press as Bulletin 617. Work has continued throughout the year on the bibliography and index comprising all the published literature of American geology.

Exchange copies of Survey publications have been distributed promptly both to domestic and foreign libraries, with the exception of those for libraries in the countries now at war. These have been necessarily withheld until the Smithsonian International Exchange shipments shall be resumed.

REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF THE BUREAU

OF MINES.

NOTE.

Dr. Joseph A. Holmes, the first Director of the Bureau of Mines, through whose efforts chiefly the bureau was established and built up, died at Denver, Colo., on July 13, 1915, in his 56th year. Though failing health had compelled him to leave Washington in the summer of 1914, Dr. Holmes continued to direct the policy of the bureau, to exercise a general supervision of its investigations, and to work on plans for increasing its usefulness until a short time before he died. His illness and death can be attributed to his courage, his eagerness to lead, and his devotion to duty, which impelled him to risk his life and to overtax his strength in his efforts for the safety of the miners and the advancement of the mineral industries of this country.

As Dr. Holmes was personally known to thousands and many tributes have been and will be paid to his character and achievements, I will not attempt here to describe how strongly he labored for the public good, nor to express the respect and admiration that I felt for him; but in taking charge of the work of the Bureau of Mines I freely acknowledge the pleasure and the inspiration I have derived from being associated with him during the time that he was director. I sincerely thank all who have labored to upbuild the bureau and to advance its purpose, and I assure everyone that as director I shall constantly strive to make the bureau the great agency for the increase of safety and efficiency that Dr. Holmes wished it to be.

VAN. H. MANNING, Director.

600

REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF THE BUREAU OF MINES.

JOSEPH A. HOLMES, Director.

PURPOSE AND AIMS OF THE BUREAU OF MINES.

Safety and health for workers in the mineral industries and greater efficiency and the prevention of waste in preparing and utilizing mineral resources these are the aims of the Bureau of Mines and the purpose of the work it is doing. Thus, the inquiries and investigations it conducts are fundamental and deal with problems that are of the highest national concern.

In the conduct of its investigations the bureau's efforts are directed solely toward the advancement of the public good. It labors without bias and without prejudice, and it must of necessity be a nonpartisan organization. It does not favor the mine operator as against the miner, nor the miner as against the operator, but it does strive continually to advance the welfare of all those who labor in the mineral industries, and its work is for the benefit of those industries and for the public.

In its efforts to bring about safer and more healthful conditions and to increase efficiency and lessen waste, the bureau seeks the cooperation of all interested persons, and it welcomes the assistance of workmen's organizations, of technical societies, and of State officials and State governments in the work for the development of State mining laws and of more effective mine rules and regulations.

Under the terms of its new organic act (see page 698) the bureau is empowered to conduct investigations and inquiries that cover many different phases of the mineral industry in this country. The inquiries and investigations conducted, the results achieved, and the significance of the results are set forth in succeeding pages.

ORIGIN, DEVELOPMENT, AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF THE BUREAU.

The work now being done by the Bureau of Mines had its beginning in the testing and analyzing of fuels, as authorized by Congress, at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, Mo., in 1904, a work that was under the supervision of the United States Geological Survey.

FUEL-TESTING AND STRUCTURAL-MATERIALS INVESTIGATIONS.

The work at St. Louis, which in 1904 was in charge of E. W. Parker, J. A. Holmes, and M. R. Campbell, of the Geological Survey, early in 1905 was placed under the direction of J. A. Holmes,

as expert in charge. Analyses of coals from different fields, and steam, gas-producer, washing, coking, and briquetting tests of these coals were made; and after 1905, under appropriations made by Congress, the testing of structural materials such as cement, building stone, and clay products for buildings was undertaken. Early in 1907 all the fuel-testing equipment, except that for coking and washing tests, was moved to Jamestown Exposition buildings at Norfolk, Va., where steaming and briquetting tests of coals from the Appalachian fields, for use in the Navy, were made in 1907 and 1908. The coking and washing equipment was moved to Denver, Colo., where in 1907 and 1908 tests were conducted to determine the possibility of making high-grade metallurgical coke from western coals, especially those in Government lands. Fuel-testing laboratories were also temporarily maintained in Columbus, Ohio; Pittsburgh, Pa.; Norfolk, Va.; Denver, Colo.; and Washington, D. C., the last for analyzing coal purchased for the Government. The investigations at Denver were discontinued on June 30, 1909, because of lack of funds. FORMATION OF THE TECHNOLOGIC BRANCH OF THE UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY.

By an order of the Secretary of the Interior, dated April 2, 1907, the two groups of investigations described above-testing fuels and testing structural materials-were made a new branch of the United States Geological Survey, designated the technologic branch, J. A. Holmes, chief technologist, being in charge.

AUTHORIZATION OF MINE-ACCIDENTS INVESTIGATIONS.

As a result of a series of disastrous coal-mine explosions in December, 1907, Congress in May, 1908, authorized an investigation as to the causes of mine explosions, with a view to increasing safety in mining.

ESTABLISHMENT OF PITTSBURGH EXPERIMENT STATION.

Authority to occupy a part of the buildings and grounds of the old arsenal at Pittsburgh, Pa., having been obtained from the Secretary of War, a station for testing mining explosives was opened there in November, 1908. The first list of "permissible" explosives, those approved for use in dusty and gaseous coal mines under certain prescribed conditions, was published in 1909.

Other causes of mine explosions, as mine gases, coal dust, miners' lamps, and electrical equipment, were investigated at this station, as were the merits of various types of mine-rescue apparatus.

After the close of the Jamestown Exposition the need of a temporary home for the fuels and structural-materials investigations was manifest, and several proposed sites were considered. Finally, in 1908, under the agreement with the Secretary of War, the equipment used in the fuel investigations at Norfolk, Va., was moved to the arsenal grounds in Pittsburgh, where tests of explosives were already in progress. The equipment used in the structural-materials investigations at St. Louis, Mo., was transferred in 1909. The large number