Evening Star Newspaper, September 16, 1923, Page 79

Part 5—8 Pages WASHINGTON, D. C, L o i PRI ; I "/ AGAZINE SECTION oy Star. SUNDAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER .16, 1923. FEATURES Naval Academy’s Dairy and Hog Plants Produce Healthier Middies BY GEORGE H, DACY. ERHAPS you may think that a moemmoth dairy- farm .and a alatial hog plant where food ducts of best quality um sanitation are produced are queer supple- equipment of Academy u will but o through the fac nd flgures that - follow, the chances you will be convinced that Uncle Sam acted well and wisely Wwhen he added agricultural activities to his matchless tralning school for naval officers. A decade or so ago, sickness and disease were unwelcome. guests at the Annapolis institution entirely too fre- quently for the potential well-being of the “future admirals.”” Uncle Sam became interested fn the case—turn- ed loose his medical slevths and sani- tary detectives and finally ascertain- ed that the outstanding cause of the indiseriminate invalidism was an In- sanitary milk supply. It was just an- other application of the dietician’s na- tonal slogan, “Tell me what you eat, and T'll tell you what your are.” re- erufted to solve a'sclentific riddle. During the year ending September, 1911, there were 1,598 sick days caus- ed by serious intestinal troubles re- corded smong 759 midshipmen. The source of disease was finally traced to the milk cupply, which at:that time“ was provided by an extensive dairy farm. Sanitary examination and bacterfal tests of this milk showed that it positively teemed with objec- tionable bacterial organisms, as many &5 62,000,000 per cublc centimeter be- ing found in some of the samples. In- spection of the dalry herd indicated that at least one-half of the cattle were infected with tuberculosis. Im- mediately, Uncle Sam terminated the contract with the dairyman who was then providing milk. It was far from a simple matter to obtain a large and dependable sanl- tary milk supply In the iatitude of Annapolis in those days. The “mid- dies” consumed approximately 2560 gallons of milk dally. Dairy farmers objected to supplying the Naval Acad- emy with high-grade milk because the food product was desired regular- 1y only nine months in the vear. This meant that the producers would have to seek another market for their product during the summer quarter of the year, when mllk is always most abundant on the Baltimore and Wash- ington markets. are * * ¥ LTIMATELY, the Naval Academy b authoritles, in co-operation with the -United States Department of Agriculture, decided that the best way 1o solve the perplexing puszie was for the Naval Academy . to maintain 2 dairy herd of 1ts own &nd to produce 2 homespun pure milk supply. Con- gross supported the scheme by expe- Government Now Operates at Annapolis a'Thousand-Acre Cow Farm, With an Output of 800 Gallons of Sanitary Milk Daily, as Well as a 250-Acre Tract for Production of Pork Products—Youthsat Academy Have Greatly Benefited. Care Exercised in Purchase and Preparation of All Foodstuffs—Meat Shop, Bakery and Kitchens Models of Cleanliness. 9‘EN T ditlously appropriating $25,000. for the erection.of datry barns and the purchase of cows and equipment. A small tract of land which today is part of the golf courge at the Naval Academy was requigjtioned for.thef buildings and paddocks. Dairy stables sprang up like the offgpring of magic. Cows' of good breeding and quality and free of - disease contamination were assembled. In a few months, the hungry “middies® were consuming some of the purest milk ever produced. Nowhere In the world have more conclusive facts and figures compli- mentary to an improved milk supply ever been collected than at the United e training school for nav; The first year that the drank the milk produced by the healthy, clean and well fed naval cows sickness at the Annapolis insti- tution decreased greatly. The 860 midshipmen reported only 296 sick da; as compared with 1,588 sick days the preceding year, when the milk was purchased and when ‘the at- tendance was 13 per cent greater. Not & single case of typhold fever was recorded that year. In fact, not a single midshipman has contracted | this disease at the academy during | the last twelve years. Medical ex- perts attribute the improved health of | the youthful tars to the sanitary milk | supply. H Sickness at the Annapolis dormi- tories is always maximum during the month of November, as usually the Army-Navy foot ball game is played at Philadelphia or New York city @uring that month-and the “middies” 1l up on “goodies” and delicacies to which they are not accustomed, The records of the last November in which contract milk was drunk at the “mid- dies’ mess” show 480 sick days, while the figures for the following Novem- ber, when the home-produced milk was a regular part of .the naval dietary, emphasized the reduction of invalidism to the small minimum of sixty sick days for the month. Despite that, latterly, the enroll- ment at the Naval Academy has in- oreased greatly, being mlmost three times as large as {t was a dozen years 280, the cases of sickness among the “Juvenile sea captains” have been held 4t a minimum. During a recent year when 2,119 midshipmen received their imail regularly at Annapolis, only 190 siok days were reported on the regis- ter for the school year. Comparing this record with' the serious -iliness that prevailed the final year that an fneanitary milk Supply was used, re- markable data in ardont support of the “Better milk, better middies” slo- gan come into the limelight. When contract milk was drunk the sickness was 841 per cent greater. ok KR F you think those midshipmen at I Annapolis do not like pure milk you just ought to drop in on them at luncheon some day. .You will surely be surprised to see the generous quan- tittes of lacteal fluid, that they stow away. A more happy and healthy gethering of young Americans you will never see anywhere. The stath tics demonstrate and the medical au< thorities report that the outstanding _well being that prevails among the “midshipmen is due largely to the ex- cellent and abundant food they eat ves | cars that travel that way or get down {In brief, you.will see five concrete | IVE HUNDRED PLUTOCRATIC HOLSTEINS OF SUPERIOR BREEDING PROVIDE MILK FOR THE MI and the regular and varied exercise they get daily. % | The' maiden effort of the nautical experts in solving the secrets of “cowology” worked out so well that the dairy farm has now been ex- panded to a bonanza project that covers 1,000 acres and includes a herd of 500 young and adult Hol- steins—aristocrats of the dairying operated under great hardships, be- cause all the feed had to be grown four to five miles from.the barns on account of lack of adequate field] annapolls, on the electric interurban Hence as soon as the Naval Academy dalry proved its true worth our na- tional legislators ratified a plan to purchase a 1,000-acre tract of land at Gambrills, Md., fourteen miles from Annapolis on the electric interurban | line, and develop there a great milk manufacturing plant. 1f you want to see bossie at her best, just hop off.one of the electric from ydur ‘automobile and inspect the mammoth: dairy plant at Gambrills. dairy stables—each barn accommo- dates fifty pure-bred Holstein cows— that look so neat and clean that you will appreciate that these banquets in a cow barn which you sometimes hear of out in Ilinols and Wisconsin, attended by governors and their fol- lowers, are not mere newspaper myths. There are two, other’ huge | barns that provide regal quarters for | about 240 calves and young stock, | A battery of five towering. silos pro- vides storage space for 1,000 tons of canned corn—the watermelon of the dalry animal's dinner menu. If you like and know good dairy cows, you | will see much to exclaim over waen you glve the sleek and silky-skinned matrons at Gambrills the official “once-over.” At this writing, the daily output of .milk_amounts to more than 800, gallons—every drop of it goes to de- | velop bone .and body, mind and| muscle, ‘sinew and stamina In our potential sea fighters, The milk is as pure, sanitary and nutritious as the application of the best scientifi¢ and practical methods of dairy manage- ment can make it. Its bacterial con- tent is 50 low that if the milk were sold on the commercial market it would grade as certified or special milk. The cows are teited regularly for| tuberculosis. The animals are -kept as clean and comfortable as possible. Every mechanical facility known 1o | modern dairying. which will abet the | production of pure milk is employed | on this master farm. A dogzen single- | unit milking machines are prominent | among the labor-saving equipment. | All the men who work on the farm are given careful medical examina- | tion once a month to see that they are not afflicted with any objection- able diseases, Every precaution is taken to insure the production of a pure food product for the “middies’ mess.” The dairy experts of the na- tional Department of Agriculture as- DDIES. t the naval officers who so effi- iently are operating this interesting milk farm, one of the best of its size | in the world. A HE dairy farming proposition | worked out so satisfactorily that several vears ago the Naval Atademyl‘ representatives engaged in the home- | ly business of producing pork prod- { forghe midshipman mess. IA!-] the 150-acre. hog farm located | several miles from the Annapelis campus has been yielding more.than 100,000 pounds of fresh dressed pork annually. - To most of us, the super- lative feature of the meat manufac- turing is that pork is made econom- Duralumin Girders for Big Airship ADOZEN MILKING MACHINES ARE USED in ;HE FIVE DAIRY STABLES attke NAVAL ACADEMY DAIRY FARM ARE BUILT OF CONCRETE ically from the leftovers of the “mid. dies” mess.” All the table scraps are handled in 4 most sanitary manner after each meal in covered and are hauled as soon as possible | where thie portly and voracious pork- tan wagons to the distant yards and pens ers banquet on the by-product Our national seamen have b Strong as Steel Yet Light as Spruce HEN it comes to a matter of choosing the champion Samson of modern metals or their alloys, duralumin, the material used in the manufacture of the girders of the mammoth ZR-1, United States Navy airship, now near- ing completion at Lakehurst, N. J., is easily the record-holder of light- weight and unusual strength honors. Dyralumin came to this country as a foreign-born immigrant during the world war, and because of its match- less properties of exceptional strength, lightness of welght and ability to re- sist corrosion, it was immediately ac- cepted as a worth-while citizen—in the making. 3 If you can visualize some dwarf even smaller than the mythical Lilll- putian of fiction carrying an automo- bile around.on hls shoulders, you wil} be able to gain an idea of the strengtl of the bantam-weight duralumin, for this alloy. s really as strong as such an imaginary midget would have to be. Although duralumin weighs only one-third as much as structural steel, it is_as strong as. the best steel of that desciption. 4 In the building of the great ZR-1— the largest airship ever constructed on American soil—Uncle Sam has ex- erclsed every precaution to eliminate doubt and danger and to reduce the ordinary risk of locomotion above the clouds. This massive greyhound of the sky will be as safe as it is possi- ble to. make a rigid alrship. All ma- terial and every appliance used in her bullding were carefully tested in every conceivable manner before they were accepted for use in the gigantic air vehicle. 7 > The girders of an airship must be strong as steel, yet they must also; be light as spruce or willow. No other metal or alloy éxcept duralumin sat- isfies these critical specifications for the construction of the important por- tions of the skeleton of a rigid aire craft. UT at the testing shops of the bureau of standards near Cleve- land Park, some of Uncle Sam’s hired men, at the behest of the Navy De- partment, have subjected dura- lumin airship girders—exact counter- / ALTHOUGH ONE OF THESE DURALUMIN GIRDERS WEIGHS ONLY ONE-THIRD OF A POUND PER RUNNING FOOT, IT WILL CARRY A BEAM LOAD OF 125 POUNDS PER LINEAR FOOT. parts of those used in the ZR-1—to all kinds of strength tests to ascer- tain accurately all the -data possible about the ability of these important aircraft appliances, to withstand serv- ice stresses and strains. You would be surprised to see how strong these curious wedge-shaped girders really are. One of them, fourteen and one- half inches high and sixtéen: feet long, weighs only five and one-third pounds. Notwithstanding that, when used as a beam it will support at one time elghteen girls, whose av- erage weight is 111 pounds. The same girder used as a column to hold up & platform will sustain the weight ! of a half-hundred girls of similar in- dividual avoirdupols. - Duralumin girders weigh only one- third of & pound per linear foot, yet where ‘they are used as ‘beams for test purposes’ and exposed to loads evenly distributed they will ‘carry a burden of 125 pounds per ‘running foot. € In the recent government tests one of these girders sixteen feet in length falled when used as & beam only when a load of more than one ton was applied. . When used as & column similar girders resisted collapse until loads as heavy as 5,600 pounds apiece, were applied. Ina word, one of these girders used as a .column fs capaci- tated to support.a weight more- than 945 times as heavy.as the weight of the sustaining’ column. ' The tests showed that one of these astonishing- ly strong girders would carry a beam 10ad of 1,000 pounds or a ¢olumn bur- den of 2,600 pounds indefinitely, In addition to being the champion lightweight and serviceable airship girder material, duralumin. is also outstandingly important, inasmuch as the material resists corrosion as well . as does pure aluminum, Duralumin is resistant to wind and weather de- terforation, while it is not injured by exposure to salt air and water. The alloy has to be heat-treated to de- velop ity remarkable strength, for in HOUSAND TONS OF ‘CANNED CORN" FOR THE ACADEMYS COWS. 1 the NAVAL ACADEMYS STABLES v | thirty-two first men mess More recently a pértion of the annual home-fed meat crop h been sweet-pickled or smoked. Anxious parents in all parts of the country who have sons that are mid- shipmen at Annapolis may be assured that the boys are provided with plen- ty of the best food of every descrip- tion that money can buy. Painstak- ing care is taken In the purchase and preparation of all foodstuffs. The meat shop, bakery and kitchens at the Naval Academy are the acme of |cleanliness and sanitation. Daily the |bungry “middies” consume between one and a quarter and one and a half tons of meat. All of this meat ex- |cept the pork is purchased and is of ithe finest quality.” All the meat is |caretully inspected and examined by |representatives of the United States |bureau of animal indusiry and naval experts before it Is accepted and sanc- tioned for preparation and use on the spacious tables of the Annapolis din- ing hall * ok ok % 'EN butchers and their helpers are kept busy fn the Naval Academy {meat shop cutting meat for the mid- shipman mess and for the families of the naval oflicers and instructors. All the scraps from this butcher shop are Isaved and subsequently rendered into |2 non-edible grease that is sold for soap making. This only goes to show the thoroughness of organization and the attention that is paid to the econ- servation of every possible source of revenue. The dining hall is one of the larg- est mess halls—if not the largest—in use. It is about 100 by 500 feet, and seats 2,800 comfortably. The organ- ization and functioning of the mess hall activities are so perfect that 2,500 midshipmen and their instruc- tors can be served in the huge mess hall in exactly thirty minutes. ‘Whenever we read about the large quantities of food that are consumed at a single meal by one of our large circus companies we are amazed. The daily consumption of food at the Naval Academy is probably one and {one-half times as much as that of the largest circus. A special bake shop is maintained and is manned by and second grade bakers. One of the unique feats of this branch of the culinary depart- |ment is to convert four barrels of | flour daily into 1,600 loaves of white bread, 100 loaves of rye, and 100 loaves of graham bread. Pie is served once a week, It takes {2t least 400 large ples to satisfy the pastry hunger of the midshipmen. | Whenever cake is on the bill of fare | more than 360 pounds have to be | baked ot go around. Twice a week {the “middies” enjoy iee cream—100 | gallons of It at each serving. The officers in charge of the Naval Acad- cmy commissary have to keep books {on preserve purchase and home pro- duction. Their investigations have demonstrated that it is cheaper to { make the jam, jelly marmalade and preserves than it is to buy them. As a consequence, the Naval Academy { cooks now preserve more than 100 tons of fruit each fall. The kitchen at the Naval Academy is a model of scrupulous sanitation. It is so clean that you can almost eee your reflection in everything y i some of the wizardry into play that tion of complex nautical enigmas in tion plant. Uncle Sam does not ex- pend a single cent for feed for the {hungry hogs at the naval farm. The scrambling squealers pile on avolrdu- Dois at the rate of a pound a day for five to seven months, when they {weigh between 225 and pounds and are ready to butcher. the fattening porkers get to eat is carefully selected, fresh garbage. The uaval hog farm is one government establishment that makes money for your Uncle’Samuel every season. The formation of the hog-feeding enterprise was consummated in this way: been paid by the Naval Academy di- {rectors to haul away the garbage daily. The authorities finally learned that one of these men after several tal from transporting the garbage to his home farm and there converting it into hams, sausage and bacon to pay for a 250-acre farm. Figuring that if the average farmer could make attractive returns from such activities the United States govern- ment could do at least as well, the maritime leaders consulted with the Department of Agriculture. the out- come of the conferences being the es- tablishment of the grainless hog farm. Approximately’ 600 pigs are now raised annually and fattened, while from 350 to 400 feeders are also pur- chased and toned up for butchering on an exclusive menu of table Jeft- overs. The first few years the 100,000 pounds of pork that were butchered were only adequate to satisfy the fresh pork demarid of the midshi: the condition that It comes from the rolling mill it is less than one-half as strong as structural steel. Strange to tell, though, & week or ten days after it has been heated to a tem- perature of approximately 480 de- grees Centigrade and then quenched in ‘cold watér, the extraordinary duralumin develops strength as great 4s that of the best. steel used for lmodern building purposes, * ok % % URALUMIN is an alloy of alumi- num,. copper and magnesium. Generally speaking, the miracle alloy contains-about. 82 per cent aluminum, 3.5 to 4.5 per cent of copper and one- half of 1 per cent of magnesium. Duralumin was produced initially by a German ~metallurgical chemist named Whilm, It was introduced to the United States about seven years ago mnd was developed at the urge of the United States Navy for rigld afrship girder construction. Duralu- min has a tenslle strength of 55,000 pounds per square inch of surface, while the tensile strength of struce tural steel ranges from 55,000 to 65,- 000 pounds per square inch. In the form of flat sheets, duralumin now costs about 40 cents a pound, while in the form of tubing. it sells for $1 a| pound. they customarily devote to the solu- | the perfection of their pork produc- | All that| Several farmers had previously | years had accumulated enough capi- | gaze upon. Every conceivable ele trical and mechanical device that les- | sens hand labor is in use. Even the potatoes are soaked and washed by machinery and many bushels of them {have to be groomed for table use {every twenty-four hours. | Automatons of one kind or another | measure, » prepare the food {for the ovens. All the dishes are washed and dried mechanically. It is unlik that there is any cullnary | department in the country that can {eclipse that of Uncle Sam's prize | sailor school. The ship kitchens on | shore abound with every conventence |and facility. TUncle San contends jthat there is considerable in this theory that the measure of the mam }1s the kind of food he eats. Actord- ingly the national midshipten have {abundant wherewithal to satisfy their lumberjack appetites. Machine to Plant Trees. |/HE forest service possesses a mechanical means of _planting from 10,000 to 15,000 tree seedlings & day. Previous to the adoption of thi# machine, the planting was done by hand at the rate of 1,200 to 1,600 trees each day per man. The machine was designed to set out cabbage and tomato plants but has been found to operate equally well with trees. It is about thg size of an ordinary mowing machine and is run by three men and two horses. One man drivea the team while the two others handle the seedlings. The machine makes a furrow in wWhich the trees are set at any de- siredl distance, and an automatlo de- vice Indicates where they should be dropped. Two metal-tired wheels push and roll the dirt firmly down around the roots. This is a very desirable fea- ture, because the trees are apt to die if this precaution is not taken. Two attachments make it possible to place water and fertilizer at the roots of each seedling. Another at- tachment marks the line on which the next row of trees is to be planted. ‘Where Freezing Helps. V/HEN building deep shatts through soft and moist ground, the min- ing engineer very often is confronted by difficoities that up *o a short time ago seemed to be unsurmountable. For instance, water often spurts from the ground, and it has happened that water flowed from the walls of the shaft in such quantities that it could no longer be controlled by powerful pumps. A very novel method was some time ago discovered which en- ables the mining engineer to continue snd complete work. The ground through which the shaft is to pass is frozen solid, which makes the work much easier, doing away with the |aanger. The freezing is accomplished | by means of cold air pumped through tubes into the shaft, or by the cir culation of very cold solutions.