Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 November 1895 — BIG SHIPS BORN THERE [ARTICLE]

BIG SHIPS BORN THERE

GREAT SIGHTS AT CRAMPS' YARDS IN PHILADELPHIA. Largest Derrick in tha World. Four* Day Staamars Daclarad Impossible. Electricity on the Ocean. Tbe first impression of the visitor at Cramps’ shipyards in Philadelphia is likely to be one of simple bewilderment. Workmen in apparently countless numbers »re everywhere busy at all sorts of strange and uoisy occupations. Some are pounding away like mad. in squads, with small hammers, upon great plates of cold iron and steel: others are using powerful steam hammers upon comparatively small bits of white-hot metal. Here and there, moving in different directions, are “teams” of six or eight men, carting metal, bars and sheets on iron trucks, and if the observer does not look sharp while watching this man-power transportation, he will find himself in the way of a locomotive crane, bustling noisily about on a winding track, picking up tons of metal in one part of the yards and depooiting the load in some other location a few minutes later, us easily as a boy might handle a stick of stovewood.

Loommg high in the air are to be seen the massive hulls of uumbers of vessels—battle ships, merchantmen, pleasure yachts—as yet unlaunched ami in various stages of construction, which fairly swarm inside, outs'de, above and below, with striving workmen. Sitting low in the water, between broad, long piers, are one or two fighting boats, which by and by will take their places in the list of American naval triumphs. After a while, details of the place begin to uufold themselves to the 9tranger. tie sees that despite the apparent chaos, there is really order everywhere. There is no aimless running to and fro, there is no confusion. Over there is the boiler shop; near it the blacksmith shop, the pattern shop, the machine shop, and so on. It is in these shops that ntauy of the yard’s mechanical wonders are to be seen, but whoever is asked concerning the most interesting machines is sure to direct the visitor to “Atlas," the great floating derrick. “This machine,” says Mr. Buell, of the executive staff, “cost more money than all the capital invested in the Crump yards forty years ago. It is the largest in the world, and it can handle 123 tons, the equivalent of two good sized locomotives. With the maximum weight at the end of the arm, tbe displacement of the ‘Atlas’ it 1,563 tons, or as much ns a fair-sized coasting steamer. The height of the mast is 116 feet 7 1-2 inches. The ‘net hoist’ is 50 feet 4 inches, and the swing of the boom is 36 feet, all of which is needed in shipping the boilers of such battleships as the lowa, with a beam of 72 feet. The ‘Atlas’ took an 80 ton boiler for the Minneapolis from the wharf, transported it 100 feet, and put it exactly in place in just twenty-seven minutes. No single appiiance in the yard saves as much labor or gives such satistactory returns as this.” If there is any place in the United States where the prospects of American shipbuilding are carefully studied, it is at Cramps’, but if there is any expectation there that the industry is about to bodm no one will acknowledge it, nor will lie admit the probability—hardly the possibility—of a practical four-day ship at Cramps’. “Undoubtedly a ship able to cross the Atlantic in four days could be built,” a recent inquirer from Tha Press was told, “but it would take such a vast amount of money for construction and operation that it would surely be a losing venture, since its cargo capacity would be almost nothing, owing to the greut quantity of coal it would have to carry. It is doubtful whether the present marine engine and boiler can ever be improved so as to economize coal consumption sufficiently to greatly increase the practical s]>ee;l of steamships over present standards. “Electricity as power for ships? We see no way to utilize it. As used, electricity is not a power, only a method of transmission. We use it to operate some of our machines, but we make the power by steam and transmit it by wire instead of belts or shafts. A steam plant for the generation of electricity on shipboard would be as expensive, as heavy and as great a coal consumer as a modern marine engine, and in addition, there would have to be electric motors to turn the screws. Ocean trolley lines are out of the question, and there would be insuperable objections td the storage battery, even if it had been brought to a reasonable degree of perfection, which it has not.” Regarding the probable influence of the building of the Nicaragua Canal and the new “canal era” generally on American ship building, it is said that little is expected from that direction at Cramps’. “Ship building and ship owning will never become dominant interests in America,” it was said further, “until more money can be made out of such ventures than manufacturing and general improvement. The United States will hardly enter the list seriously as a world’s carrier until its territory is so crowded that it must seek outlets for its products and employment for its capital other than self development. That will uot be in my day nor in yours. When it does come, there will be a tremendous contest of some kind between John Bull and Uncle Sam. for Great Britain could not exist without its shipping, and the fittest will survive.”