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By Sheldon P. Wimpfen, Ralph H. Sweefser

FOR centuries the pumping of water has been one of the chief problems to be overcome by the persistent men who win the mineral wealth of the world. Profitable operations have often been forced to suspend activities as the mine penetrated well below the water table or when sudden rushes of water were encountered. To operate below the local water level requires continuous pumping equal in volume to the amount of water flow¬ing into the mine workings. Often the water to be removed exceeds the tonnage of valuable material produced. To be above local water level is a valuable asset. Modern mining practice permits nothing short of the extraction of the last pound of profitable ore from a mineral deposit. In the days before the development of mechanical and electrical power as we know it today. water in any quantity was a major

Jan 1, 1948

By Hugh H. Waesche

AN adequate supply of crystalline quartz of piezoelectric grade and size continues to be of fundamental importance to the U. S. Army Signal Corps. Current electronic development programs of the Armed Forces depend upon the use of quartz crystals in all applications where accurate frequency control is necessary. In peacetime this' may not seem too significant, but in planning for possible national defense emergencies, an adequate supply of piezoelectric grade raw quartz is just as important as an adequate supply of some of the more publicized strategic minerals. Prior to World War II, the Signal Corps accepted the use of quartz crystals for frequency-control purposes in essentially all electronic communication, navigation, and radar equipment operating in the audio and radio frequency spectra up to and including the ultra-high-frequency channels. Over 4,000; 000 lb of radio-grade quartz was required between January 1942 and V.J Day. Use of such a large quantity of crystal units was necessary in order to establish and maintain, with a minimum of effort, clear and definite frequency channels of greater stability than could be obtained by any other means. This policy was justified on the basis that quartz was without a peer as a frequency-controlling element. Military and civilian uses of quartz in the field, as well as laboratory studies, have confirmed this premise and no means of highly stable frequency control, superior to quartz, has been discovered. It appears certain that the demand for use of quartz for frequency control purposes will continue at a high level.

Jan 1, 1948

By Kirtley F. Mather

FROM almost every point of view, petroleum was "strategic mineral number one" during the World War that ended in 1945. Even the spectacular advent of the atomic bomb in the final days of the conflict did not displace it from its position of prime importance, although within a few years uranium will almost certainly be the "number one" material in the minds of military strategists, if it is not even now in that position. But both as fuel and as raw material for chemical industries, petroleum will hold the center of the stage for many years to come. Hardly any other substance illustrates so fully the manner in which science and technology may be combined to achieve the utmost success in contributing to human efficiency and comfort. Fundamental to any understanding of the problems implied by my topic

Jan 1, 1948

By Hans Lundberg

IN last year's report on the progress of geophysics, the airborne magnetometer was the featured new development. At that time only a relatively small number of surveys had been made. During 1947, the airborne magnetometer was used in making many surveys and is again one of the high lights of the year in geophysics. This report is mainly concerned with geophysics as applied to the search for minerals exclusive of petroleum. In 194,5 and 1946, the use of the magnetic method reached a peak, partly because of an active period of prospecting brought on by an active mining market, particularly in Canada.

Jan 1, 1948

By Lysle E. Shaffer

TEACHING engineering students how to write and speak effectively -is one of the greatest problems facing the technical schools today. No phase of engineering education has received more criticism, and rightly so, for the criticism is justified. Year after year we continue to graduate men that are indifferent to the use of a tool they will need every day of their lives. Our young engineers cannot write a clear, concise report, and their business letters are a disgrace to the profession that takes pride in precision. The problem is not new. The remark ascribed to Sir James Barrie, that "The man of science appears to be the only man who has something to say, just now-and the only man who does not know how to say it" is as uncomfortably true today as it was thirty years ago. The records of meetings of engineering educators and the transactions of the engineering societies show that the inability of the engineer to communicate his ideas has been discussed for years. Engineering educators, prodded by industry, have recognized that the problem exists, but they have not solved it. Instead they continue to expose the student to composition and rhetoric, hustle him through English and American literature, and then blame his high school because he does not know enough English grammar to write a clear sentence. We must face the fact that the graduate is not going to reflect on the high school, but on his college. If the high school has shirked the job, the responsibility for correction rests on the faculty of the professional school.

Jan 1, 1948

By AIME

A GEOLOGIST --one versed in geology, the science which treats of the history of the earth and its life, especially as recorded in the rocks; that is Webster's definition. William Embry Wrather-one of the country's foremost geologists who heads the U. S. Geological Survey; this is the 1948 President of the Institute. He has studied the geology of areas on the face of the earth as far-flung as Texas and the Balkans, and now heads the world's largest staff of geologists. Vital statistics on Dr. Wrather would show his place of birth as Brandenburg, Ky., the year 1883. He will celebrate his threescore and five years of full living the twentieth of this month. As is usual in biographical sketches of this nature, the formative years of youth, and in many ways the most important years of one's life (since professional tendencies as well as many important personal decisions are evidenced before the teens are left behind) are passed over with the mere fact noted that a degree was earned at such and such educational institution. And so we note that Dr. Wrather received his Ph.B. degree at the University of Chicago in 1907, and followed up that degree with two years of graduate study.

Jan 1, 1948

By Philip J. Shenon

IN 1947 the mining industry strove desperately to regain operating normalcy. During the first part of the year the industry in this country was plagued with labor shortages, strikes, and portal-to-portal lawsuits. Then followed the uncertainty of Government policy with respect to subsidies and tariffs; and the long and bitter controversy as to whether we are a nation of mineral "haves" or "have-nots." As the year progressed the labor supply impoved somewhat and the Taft-Hartley law brought partial relief to strike-troubled industry. The uncertainty with respect to tariffs was partly answered by President Truman on April 29 when he announced the suspension of the 4¢ import duty on copper until March 31, 1949, and later, near the close of the year, by the announcement of the tariff agreement signed by the United Nations at Geneva. By this agreement tariff rates are to be adjusted downward, or "bound" at their present levels, for three years, on commodities amounting to some 60 per cent of United States trade. Effective Jan. 1, 1948 the rate of duty will be substantially reduced on ores, concentrates, or metals of zinc, aluminum, copper, manganese, tungsten, iron, steel, barytes, nickel, cadmium, and antimony.

Jan 1, 1948

By Robert P. Koenig

FOR the first time other than on occasion of war the people of the United States are experiencing full-scale participation in world affairs. Public concern has seldom been so involved with conditions and events beyond our own continental limits. Our interest is not wholly of recent origin. Over the years the activity of the United States as a world power and an important trading nation brought about the widening of our political interests and the progressive interrelation of our economy with that of the rest of the world. Some may see in our present phase of world-wide activity the natural consequence of our continued growth. Such observers must also be aware that within recent years our importance in world affairs has been considerably increased. For within the space of an extremely short period events have occurred that have literally jet-propelled the United States into the role of a leading participant in the conduct of world affairs. Little of the choice of this role was left to us. The decline of power in western Europe, the ascendancy between the Elbe and the Pacific shore of an obviously antagonistic force, our earnest endeavor to secure international control of atomic energy, the necessity of providing relief and rehabilitation to war-ravaged areas, and the police work that must be done in occupied territories are problems which have risen in great measure without our help-but they cannot be solved without it.

Jan 1, 1948

By Cresap P. Watson

ABOUT the time this magazine reaches its readers, Cresap P. Watson will celebrate his 53d birthday. If he spends that birthday at his West Los Angeles home, he won't be far, as distance is measured today, from Santa Barbara, where he was born on July 8, 1895. He is truly a member of a petroleum family; one brother, N. O. Watson, managed Royal Dutch Shell interests in Venezuela for years and is now general manager of the Caribbean Petroleum Co. at. Maracaibo; another brother, Rex, is vice-president of the Drilling and Exploration Co., while brother-in-law Ben Belt is an executive of Gulf Oil. His own life has centered in the petroleum industry since his first job in 1913 as camp cashier for a Mexican oil field at Tampico. Down on the isthmus of Tehuantepec he advanced to tool dresser and' production foreman for the company. The first World War interrupted his Mexican experience by transforming him into an artillery officer in France. Once the Army ceased to demand his services¬by then it was 1919-he returned to the task of furthering his professional career as agent for the Amerada Petroleum Corp. By 1927 he had reached the position in which he could be called an executive in the petroleum industry, having organized and become president of the Federal Royalties Co. His activities in local and national legislation affecting the petroleum industry increased as has his advocacy of the development of oil and gas fields under sound engineering and conservation principles through unitization or other co-operative forms of operation. Considerable amounts of his time go to the promotion of industry public relations.

Jan 1, 1948

By Donald H. McLaughlin

PRICES paid for goods and services in paper currencies are undoubtedly determined by many interrelated factors, but among them none is more specific in pushing prices toward higher and higher levels than the vast increase in debts and monetary obligations of our own and practically all major governments. There is nothing unorthodox in the situation in which the gold miners find themselves today. With wages and the prices of all materials required in the production of gold at the high levels characteristic of a period of prosperity, phony or otherwise, and with shortages of both men and machinery to contend with as well, the spread between the returns in paper dollars that must be accepted for gold in the United States and the cost of producing it is rather painfully small for most producers. Technical

Jan 1, 1948

By AIME

IRWIN W. ALCORN, present Chairman of the Petroleum Division, was born Sept. 5, 1899 at Marietta, Ohio, and moved with his family to Robinson, Ill., at the time of the early oil development there. This was in the days of the Star spudders, mud, mules, and Stanley steamers. Al graduated from Robinson High School after participation in basket ball, also attaining the captaincy of the football team of that school. He entered Missouri School of Mines and Metallurgy in 1918 and was ushered by the Army into the S.A.T.C. In 1920 he transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, later to return to receive his B.S. degree -in metallurgy at Rolla, also joining the AIME. On graduation, he worked for the Skelly Oil Co. at Cushing, Okla., shifting to the Moore Refining Co. at DeNoya, Okla., as superintendent of a small pipe-line system. After an interval of two years with the National Supply Co. in Tulsa, he joined the Independent Oil and Gas Co. of that city, and at various times was chief engineer of the Texas division, superintendent of the West Texas pipe-line system, chief engineer of pipe-line construction, and chief engineer of the refining division. Al organized the Company's production engineering department. In 1930 the Company was merged with the Phillips Petroleum Co. The depression was in and Al was out, 'as was true nine months later when the Smith Separator Co. whose chief engineer he had become, was liquidated. The next few years was spent with Oil Well Supply Co. as a subsurface pumping equipment engineer

Jan 1, 1948

By W. M. Myers

MINERAL Economics is the most recent profession to be recognized as a separate division of the mineral industries. It has originated from the increasing awareness of the importance of the economic aspects of industries concerned with discovery, extraction, and utilization of minerals. It is concerned with the interrelated fields of economics and technology. The individual trained in economics alone cannot qualify. The curriculum in the School of Mineral Industries at The Pennsylvania State College was approved in May 1946, and enrollment begun in September of that year. Due to the transfer of advanced students from other courses, particularly metallurgy and electrical engineering, it was possible to graduate the first seniors in June 1947. The next class was graduated in February 1948. From experience derived from placing these graduates in industry, and from information supplied by prospective employers, valuable data have been obtained in the organization and operation of the course of study.

Jan 1, 1948

By AIME

Rapid exhaustion of iron ore in Minnesota's Mesabi range has led the Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp. to develop the world's largest open quarry mine for magnetite iron ore, at Star Lake, N. Y. Already contributing more than one eighth of the total iron ore used by the Corporation, the expanding Benson mines are destined to become Jones & Laughlin's important source of ore within the next ten years. In 1947 over 650,000 long tons of high-grade ore was produced. Output this year is expected to reach 800,000 long tons and studies are under way to increase production further. The future of the Benson mines is assured as present indications show large reserves of ore. The property, briefly described in M & M for November 1943, then under

Jan 1, 1948

By W. S. Tower

STEEL is the basic metal, the main metallic prop of the modern industrial world, a good gage for measuring the state of our complex economy. Any who had doubts on that score should have had them dispelled by the many evidences of public concern over the affairs of the steel industry in recent months. I do not need to relate the various criticisms of the industry, nor the questions about its policies and performance which have come in a rising flood, especially from unthinking and irresponsible sources. But judged from the standpoint of production, or from plans to improve and expand facilities, or from technical progress, the facts about the steel industry are proof of

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By J. A. Retty

IN the Labrador iron fields two concessions, totaling nearly 24,000 square miles, have been staked out and commercial-grade deposits delineated. The Newfoundland-Labrador concession, owned by the Labrador Mining and Exploration Co. Ltd., is a 20,000-square-mile tract in the upper basins of the Hamilton and N askaupi Rivers which drain into Lake Melville. The New Quebec licensed area is 3900 square miles, owned by the Hollinger North Shore Exploration Co. Ltd., lying to the northwest of the northwestern part of the Labrador concession. It includes the upper basin of the Swampy Bay River and part of the upper basin of the Whale River, both of which drain into Ungava Bay. Both of the above-named companies are controlled by Hollinger Consolidated Gold Mines Ltd. with The M. A. Hanna Co., of Cleveland, holding a minority interest. When exploration was first undertaken in 1936, the only published map of the area was that prepared by A. P. Low in 1895. It showed only the main watercourses and gave only a rough, general idea of the geology. The numerous lakes of this vast area had to be first sketched and then mapped. Since then, extensive geological and topographical surveys have been conducted by the Labrador company, work which is normally done by Government branches. The object of the work was to examine the area and gradually eliminate unfavorable or less favorable prospecting ground. With this object in view, geological

Jan 1, 1948