Evening Star Newspaper, July 25, 1937, Page 47

MINES BURE By William A. Bell, Jr. MERICAN industries give the Government about $75.000 annually—have given nearly | $1,000,000 in 20 years—to sponsor motion pictures of their ac- tivities. Ever since 1916 the Bureau of Mines, formerly a branch of the Com- merce Department, but now an In- terior Department agency. has been producing movies of mineral and al- | lied industries and now has what is probably the largest library of educa- tional films in the world Bureau of Mines films have been ~ghown during the past five years to 272,523 audiences totaling 23,634,665 persons, mostly school children. They are so popular that every one of them is booked up constantly many months, | even as much as a year, ih advance. | Several weeks ago there were de- gcribed in an article by this writer | activities of three Government agen- in first aid through the medium of bureau films. Besides taking care not to include | in bureau films anything that can be construed as publicity, Leopold says he has to watch out for the presence of unsafe conditions, “We won't take a picture unless it stresses safety, unless all safety factors are present,” he said. “If we are filming in & factory where regulation goggles should be used, we are careful to see that these are on the eyes of the workers. Flywheels, cogs and geared machinery must be properly guarded. In a mine only closed lights must be shown.” Actual filming of the movies is done cies—Interior Department, Agricul- | .tural Department and Army Signal | Corps—in making their own movies— movies of their own work. Each has | numerous movie-making personnel laboratories, studios and elaborate | equipment. The Bureau of Mines motidn pic- | ture work. on the other hand, is a | one-man job, It is done entirely by | Morton F. Leopold. safety engineer who solicits the necessary funds, | writes the scenarios and directs pro- | ductions. Al of his work is done| from a small office in the Interior | Department's new South Building or | in the field. | Time was, says Mr. Leopold, when | <he used to have to “hold out a tin| cup” to get industry to put up the| money for movies which the bureau | wanted made. But now. he says. in- | dustries come to him as often as he goes to them. VWHEN an industry wants to have | a picture made or when one consents to co-operate with the bu- reau in & picture the bureau wants made, it must agree that no trade name. trademark or anything faintly resembling advertising shall appear tn the movie. The only credit which the industry receives—no matter how much it pays for the movie—is a brief acknowledgment preceding the film resentation of this film was made 1 h the co-opeshtion of was asked why out their own ude all the advert instead of paving the Gov- ernment for production and eorship of films bare of any sugaes- tion of ballvhoo. He ex it would be impossible for <to give to the films the widespread distribution obtained by the bureau through its experiment station in Pittsburgh. “Industries have discovered that the lic won't swallow blurbs,” he said State boards of edu- cation and boards of official reviewers or censors generally won't permit the £ghowing in public schools and sim- ilar institutions of movies which pub- licize any commercial product.” There is instance after instance to {llustrate the elaborate care that is taken to eliminate from films pro- duced under Bureau of Mines sanc- tion anything that will identify a commercial product. For the two- reeler, “The Story of a Spark Plug,” the co-operating manufacturer had to make a special spark plug, minus his trade name or other symbol of identification, and to buy 100 un-| marked shipping cases. A monster | sign was removed from the smoke ktacks of a large automobile plant before filming of factory activities could begin, while within the factory . the hubs and radiator caps of the cars that were to be filmed were masked. Two days were spent in painting over the name of a large cement company on & factory wall. J _EOPOLD chuckied at the recoliec- | “ tion of an incident resulting from | the showing of an oil movie at a con- vention of petroleum men in Chicago. Although the film had been viewed | and re-viewed by bureau officials to | * guard against revealing the identity of the co-operating oil company ex- cept in the statement of acknowledge- ment, a letter of complaint was re- ceived from a representative of a rival eoncer who said he had seen the co-operating company’s symbol on a barrel shown in the film. What kind of business was this? he hollered. Was | the Federal Government trying to | boost his competitor? Leopold took | another careful look at the film, and | sure enough there was the offending « svmbol. Its appearance was so brief that it occupied only 8 inches of film | and had been virtually impossible to | detect. But out it came, and apolo- | gles were made to the complainant. Several motor car manufacturers | end oil refiners have financed movies of national parks just to stimulate automobile travel. This kind of ex- | penditure, on films which lack direct promotion of any particular company or product, is known as “institutional publicity.” Industries also create good will for themselves by co-operating in Bureau of Mines movies which illus- trate safety devices and methods of £aving gas and oil and making inex- pensive and durable repairs to auto- mobile parts, machinery and home ap- ° pliances. Leopold believes many bureau films have been of incalculable value in educating people in the prevention and treatment of domestic, factory and motoring accidents. A widely cir- culated film illustrates graphically the danger of carbon monoxide; shows how to steer clear of it, how to treat persons who have been overcome. An- , other shows how the use of water in rock drills allays dust and prevents silicosis, commonly known as “miners’ tuberculosis.” The bureau recently released a one-reel film, “Follow the ‘White Marker,” which stresses the importance of driving on the right side of the white cement lines on high- ways. industries pictures ing they THE influence for safety exercised by ' Bureau of Mines films is shown by the saving of five lives in & Utah coal . Mine accident in the Spring of 1930. Storage room of the Bureau of Mines movie distribution c preparing reels for shipment. AU MAKES MOVIES Industry Stands the Expense and Morton Leopold, Mines Safety Engineer, Arranges Films on Mineral Industries for Exhibition by Schools and Organizations. THE SUNDAY get a date with a bureau film you have 2 put in far ahead of time, like a boy trying to date a popular debutante | or co-ed. 'I‘HE most expensive film ever made under bureau auspices was the | $100,000 “A Trip Through the Oil | Lands of Europe, Asia and Africa,” | financed by one of the Nation's big | petroleum refining companies. An- | other refining company paid $5,000 for the privilege of sponsoring & movie of Shenandoah National Park. Record STAR, WA |annual expenditure by industries for | | films of this sort was $175.000. The average is less than half that, each reel costing about $2,000. | | At this time the Bureau of Mines | ente Safety and first aid are stressed in all B ) n crew removing an injured man from the scene of a mine explosion. r in Pittsburgh showing clerk During the school year as many as 180 reels are shipped per day. —Bureauw of Mines Photo. by companies chosen by the co- operating industries with the approval of the Bureau of Mines. The industry which is doing the financing must pay all production costs, including actors and costumes where these are required. When a film has been com- pleted. copies are made and kept in storage at the Pittsburgh center. where they are any borrower. just like iblic library books, but usually harder to obtain because of the demand. To o Billions (Continued From First Page) Nation’ plete system of vouchers and checks and cards, and other details of keep- ing track of Uncle Sam's dollars, and making sure that not one of them iz diverted from the purpose for whicn it was appropriated and received presidential approval. JET us follow through a request ~ from a town or city for certain work 1t wishes to have done within its boundaries, and to which it be- lieves itself to be entitled under the provisions of the act. That is to say, the project must be one by which the public will benefit. It cannot fall into the classification of a private en- terprise. The first step is to secure a local sponsor for a given project. If a city, county or other political subdivision of a State or Federal Gov- ernment sponsors the project, it makes application to the State Works Prog- ress administrator, who forwards it to the Project Control Division of the W. P. A. in Washington. The W. P. A. investigates the appli- cation, and satisfies itself that it falls within the scope of the relief act. it approves the project. it forwards the application to the Bureau of the Budget. The Bureau of the Budget then gives the project its own atten- tion, and exercises individual author- ity of approving or disapproving. If the bureau, in turn, approves, it lists | the project with other approved proj- | 1| has in its film library 3.775 reels, which during the fiscal year ended June 30 were shown on 100,342 occasions—a 31 per cent increase over the previous fiscal year—to audiences totaling 8. 809.496 inety per cent of the at- tendance at these films is student bodies—principally de school and high school—and the bureau has on file nearly half a million report cards complimenting individual films. The movies also are shown to groups in the industries of which pictures ects and sends this schedule President for his action These schedules forwarded tn the White House by the Bureau of the Budget contain all the information necessary for the President to gain a complete picture of the project sug- gested, together with the cost involved and other pertinent details ‘This schedule is carefully examined by the Chief Executive, and each project is approved or disapproved separately That is, one or more projects on a list may not seem to fulfill the pur- poses of the act in the eyes of the President, who then strikes it from the list. Such a project is marked for “deletion.” or it may be recommended for reconsideration after further in- vestigation. This is not always due 1o a failure to meet requirements of the act, but sometimes is necessitated be- cause of the desire of the President to use the funds involved for some other project that is considered more worthy. o the \\'HEN the entire schedule has been gone over at the White House and marked for approval, it is sent to the Secretary of the Treasury, accom- panied by a letter from the President. The Secretary of the Treasury then draws a warrant for the amount of money needed. This warrant does not contain on its face the full amount of money involved in all the projects | listed. but rather an amount sufficint to begin operations on the approved projects, as subsequent checks are drawn against the account, as the work | progresses. The Secretary of the Treasury then SHINGTON, D. C, JULY 25, ureau of Mines films Steel is an old, old story, but which the abore scene is taken 1937—PART FOUR. F-3 Road Signs Can Hinder More_’f@n . Above, a fully equipped rescue —Bureau of Mines Photo. the Bureau of Mines movie from tells it from the beginning Bureau of Mines Photo. have been made. to engineering so- cieties, chambers of commerce and all classes of civic, ary and religious organiza Within the past vea organizations the use of tions. 859 separate avail emselves of pict Rove have copies of Bureau of Mines r educational weeks ago a req nents mn- head of the Br | department ¢ the ish government film led on Leopold recently uss possibility of an ex- | change of films between the two gov- o] forwards this warrant. together with the President’s letter and the schedule of approved projects, 10 the controller general of the United States. The con- troller general then examines the listed projects and approves or disapproves according to his judement, and mayv thus reject or delete some project already marked for approval, if he chooses. ‘The lst schedule thing examined in the office of the controller general. The warrant itself as forwarded by the Secretary of the Treasury, comes in for close scrutiay before it is passed. The warrants are checked for correctness as to form and legality and if found satisfactory they are countersigned. If they are not found satisfactory they are returned to the Secretary of the Treasury with- out countersignatire, with objections stated In determining approval or disap- proval of the listed projects on the schedule, consideration is given to their legality—this is. if the work con- templated talls act within the purpose of the relief act and whether the fund aliocated is allocated under the proper heading of the act. as particular classes of projects come under various provisions of the act. All improper projects are deleted, and only approved ores are returned to the Treasury. is not the only Now begins the intricate system of checking individual projects within tne General Accounting Office. All ap- proved projects are recorded on green cards and on ledger sneets, one for each project, and these cards are filed numerically and alphabetically in ments. He said about 10 of the eau films are being used by educa- 1institutions throughout E eau is shipping its film rowers at the r day. Orders are “films to be shipped d are scheduled fc 1938, In many ir nd to reels a in the which in June where the of 180 ior ipment ances master files are filsd numerically and eve: the project, as it i< paid out, is recorded on the ledger sheet The \IEA.\'\\'HILF in the Treasury De- | “7 partmert, where approved proj- ects have been received, authorizations are issued to the W. P. A, authorizing prosecution of the approved projects and advising the allotment—that specifying the amount to be spent. This amount is sometimes less than that approved by the President. but it is never more. A project supervisor is then authorized by the State adminis- trator to proceed with work on the project Those projects which have besa aeleted or disapproved are not set up on the books of either the Treasury or the General Accounting Office. T) may be resubmitted, if their scope is changed or if other objections have been removed and may be subsequently approved. During 1935 and 1 “objectionable” projects involved thy that were sponsored by quasi-pu bodies: work on private property with no showing of benefit to the general public: indefinite description of tne work to be done or the purpose to be served: work on Federal aid highway roads by a local sponsor instead of by or under the direction of the Secreta of Agriculture; leased property without is showing the term of the lease as justi- | fying the expenditure. Approved proi- ects are often resubmitted on new schedules by letters of the President, changing the gcope or amount. The relief monevs are set up in bureau has as high as 100 coples of a subject for circulation they are three four months behind ment Leopold thinks it would be a good idea to make movies of governmental activities—the work of the G-men, of the Coast Guard, soil conservation agents, the Navy. the Army, all Fed- eral activities adaptable to effective filming. He would like to have some industry or industries put up $100.000 for the job. appropriation accounts and are req- iisitioned by the disbursing officers. These may be local disbursing agents, in the neighborhood of the project, or the central office in Washington to pav bills involving Nation-wide proi- ects, or the United States Treasury State disbursing officer, to pay local bills All these disbursing officers of the Government are bonded been subject to ingestigation before taking office. Past conduct and cur- rent accounts of every disbursing officer are checked before checks are forvarded for payment on any project. As an approved disbursing officer sends in vouchers for expendi- tures as the project progresses, checks are drawn and the amount charged against the allocation on ledger sheets in the General Account- ing Office. 'l‘HE exactness exercised with re- spect to these pavments may be appreciated from the fact that the smallest expenditure made must fall precisely within the purpose of the act and the project for which it re- ceved presidential approval. For example, if monevs have been Ap- proved for “improvement of a school playground by grading.” not one penny can be spent on that project for any other purpose than grading |If, for example, a voucher warded that covers purchase of a | sandbox for that plavground it is not approved. Likewise, the tools bought must be for rading” and | purchased only for the purpose stated. | There ix minute scrutiny of every ex- They Help Experienced Motorists Report Highway Markers Often Confusing—Maps Found Best Tourist Guides. O YOU believe in signs? If 50, you a posts to trouble, aceording to that a successful tour still is based tour and road condi- tions. Many tourists, says Mr. Russell, have recently reported sign posting of such low order as to mislead and con- fuse those who travel haphazardly. Signs have been found pointing in exactly the wrong direction, while in many instances the signs have been turned just enough to send tourists off on the wrong fork at an intersec- tion of highways. Signs frequently | are posted for purely selfish or com- mercial reasons, leading tourists into streets that unnecessarily detain | them. Many signs are designed to | indicate alternate routes that may have no appeal to the tourist who is | interested in reaching his destination as quickly and conveniently as pos- sihle In the past few years there has been such a marked increase in sign post- possibilities in date of and have | the filed | is for-| ing as to lead to the questionable | conclusion that it is no longer neces- sary to have any advance information or to consult maps. The swingback | to the earlier and sounder principle about being forearmed by being fore- | warned is & natural result of the hard | lessons learned through touring from ‘ “sign to sign.” | Ssafety advocates are finding that | motorists who tour without the aid { of good counsel and the latest maps are more prone to accidents. The danger lies chiefly in the need for ab- | rupt stopping at every intersection to | read the sign posts. If a ourist does not have all of his advance towns | well in mind he finds it necessary to ‘(‘UIHF! up each intersection to get his bearings. This takes time, and | to make up for this Joss he is tempted to step on the gas in between signs Coming to each intersection at too high a rate of speed has its obvious hazards. By consulting his road map and obtaining a few facts from his auto- mobile club, one motorist was able to get out of a large Eastern city with only a little suburban traffic. There are at least two dozen ways of enter- g this city from one point of the compass, whereas sign posts are seen pointing the way to it only on a half dozen routes. Much of this routing | is of the “crross” variety, involving secondary roads and special streets To benefit by this convenience it is not possible to relv on signs. On week ends and holidays it saves con- siderable congestion to be able to avoid the more heavily traveled routes, UNDER the newer plan sign posts are used for confirmation rather ample advance information as to de-4 apt to get into trouble when vou gn a-motoring. 80 say thousands of experienced tourists who have followed sign- Frederick C. Russell. While admitting a marked improvement in highway routing and sign posting, they contend upon the use of authentic maps and than for initial guidance. great many tourists get by with a fair degree of =success by following State and United States route num- bers, it is a matter of observation that whenever detours are met such “hand-to-mouth” tourists find them- selves unable to proceed by selecting alternate routes. Avoiding the de- tours is one of the essential features of any well-conducted Summer or Fall tour. Unless one has the lay of the land, knows his cities and has consulted his maps sufficiently to know of possibilities in the way of «alternative routes, he simply takes the detours and road construction as it comes. And it comes hard! Sign posting still is handicapped | by lack of uniformity, in spite of im- | portant strides in the markings along national routes. Most of the trouble lies in cities and towns where there is not only variation in the size and | kind of markings, but in the loca- j tions for signs. Too often the tour- ist has to crane his neck to read signs, sometimes overlooking safety signs while he is trying to decide which way to turn next. The well- conducted tour is fashioned on a dife ferent order. Before starting, the modern tourist obtains through route maps of the principal cities he plans to traverse. It saves him many a headache. In one Eastern city a large direc- tion sign definitely points to & by-pass | which 1s not only a longer but a less | easily traversed route. If one ignores this sign he meets another one later which actually leads out of the way to get to the next large city. A Rlance at one of the small-size tour- st maps of the city would show that the easiest way through is to ignore the sign. | Much by-passing has been lacking in judgment. Often by-passing 1t a difficult process for the traffic au- thorities by virtue of the peculiar lay- out of the city. In numerous cases it is far simpler to drive straight down Mzin street, rather than to attempt mileage and time saving the so-called “through rot ists are findine that by following the main sfreets of some cities they bene- fit by faster traffic and traffic signals that do not tie them up & long. On rainy nights visibility is better on the wider, better lighted streets Signs need not be taken too liter- ally. In touring. the driver &hould know enough about hir routing in | advance to avoid any pitfalls ocea- | sioned by trusting to luck that he will always find the right sign in the right place While a penditure before the requested check is drawn. If the project exceeds in cost the amount allocated, vouchers Aare not approved after the allocation has been used up, although in special instances and at the discretion of the President additional funds may be made available, according to the circumstances., The General Accounting Office is housed in the old Pension Building | in Pension Park—one of Washing- | ton's historic buildings, which makes up in charm what it lacks in floor space. due to the great columns thar rise from the first floor straight as arrows (o the roof, with the other | stories opening on to narrow galleries ! surrounding this center open court Within the various offices are filed millions of cards identifving the W. P. A. projects all over the country, Likewise, there are thousands of ledger Sheets, all neatly and accurately tabu- lating to the last red cent the money Uncle Sam is expending. One wonders, looking at them in countless rows, covered all over with their precise entries, how it ever all comes out straight. And as one who personally experiences the greatest difficulty in subtracting or adding check stubs, I doff my hat to those 2 ] %‘OME \F \ DONT BELIEVE TS WIGGLIN?> AW- CEADY, YOU KNOW "ALEX" BELL KEPYY INA Y/EASY COWDER BOTTLE AND IT RAISED OP. OVER NIGHT 'THOSE WERE THE HAPPY DAYS! -witsime S ; 7 WATCH (T 3UCKt s MOVING AWREADY, BETCHA | QY NEXT WEEKVZL HAVE A GOA CoNsTRICTOR OR SUMPIN' o v ikl Wil Wy a 0 ) il ’1, nm“’ ‘[l' Wl WHEN_LIGHT- NING 00D SALES] MEN VISITEDTHF Dreams.” N e @em@s S AW 47 How LO;AJIG< >EORE AX“EY W? 7 CEMEMBER "EM ONTH VARIOUS \}/ COIRNERS INY/ SEASON ‘2,? i i, i 2 /4 WH / ERRY —By Dick Mansfield Ml?}ilgr Py 7 TR, q SHi A5| 12, OF > [ 05,42 : s g /MAKES I rj}wmnum Q 2 ] s | tireless and painstaking individuals under the supervision of the comp- troller general. who can break up billions, fling them all over the coun« try. and when vouchers stream in, make it all come out even again. It is our guess that if Congress appropriated $9,680.000.000 and one= | half cent instead of the $9.680,000.« 000 that was appropriated altogether, that one-half cent would turn up Jauntily at the end of the final ac- counting. to exclaim. with a mis- chievous flip, “If you expected me to get lost in the shuffle, youre very much mistaken.” Automotive Briefs G The co-operation being extended General Motors to the national mov ment for highway safety wag described to local General Motors officials re- | cently at a luncheon of the General | Motors Club of Washington. D [o; | This meeting was one of 24 being held this month by General Motors clubs in leading cities throughout the Nation at which the problem of street | and highway accident reduction was discussed, according to A. I. Smith, chairman of the meeting The companies in the automobile | industry have joined hands in the Au- tomotive Safety Foundation, which has a safety fund of half a mullion dollars for the remainder of this year, | This fund is being used to support | the work of the national organization that was, prior to the establishment of the foundation, carrying on cer- tain highway safety activities. Mem- | bers of the club here were requested | to take a personal interest in sound local efforts directed toward safer stree's and highways. The program included & sound mo- tion picture, summarizing the films that have been produced by General | Metors and its divisions in the inter= ests of safety. Floyd Akers, president of the Cap- itol Cadillac Co., La Salle and Cadillan distributers, at 1222 Twenty-second street, entertained as his guest, Ralpa De Palma, famous automobile race driver, at the luncheon meeting of tha Lions Club last week. De Paima ad- dressed the club members and guests on the subject of safety of present- day automobiles, as deteloped through years of racing and test driving. De Palma is at present touring the coun- try in the La Salle which he used in special exhibition work at the Ine dianapolis Speedway this year. Mold Easily Found. THE microscope can't be fooled Two bottles of tomato catsup may appear equally red and alluring on the shelf, but the microscope will reveal immediately if one was made from sound. well-ripened fruit and the other from cracked, sour and moldy stock. A flattened drop of tomato material between two plates of glass, when ob- served through the microscope, may show filaments of mold. The analyst examines successive “fields of view" by moving the slide on the microscope stage. He then calculates what per- centage contains mold—commonly re- ferred to as the “mold count.” If it is beyond normal for good stock pre- pared under suitable manufacturing conditions, the shipment represented by the sample, and the shipper like- wise, are subject to legal action. Tomato products continue as the most important fleld for the mold counter’'s activities. The Microanaly- tical division of the Food and Drug Administration does, however, use the method for jams, jellies, fruit butters, strained vegetables, butter and other foods, with such variations of tsch- nique as differences of tissue structure and other factors require. J. F. Pritchett, who had seen the movie, “When a Man's a Miner,” was one of five men trapped after an ex- plosion. He recalled scenes in the movie in which were shown methods by which entombed miners may bar- ricade themselves and conserve their supply of fresh air until rescue crews arrive, Pritchett promptly organized the trapped men, retreated to a dif- ferent section of the mine and erected 8 barricade, where they remained in safety until rescued the next morning. Leopold estimates that within the next three or four months nearly 1,000,000 miners will have been trained WHAY DO You REMEMBER = ANSWER YO LAST wasng' QQUESTION, ° HERE DID JOKN WILKES BOOTH HIRE THE HORSEON § WHICH HE MADE HISESCAPE: QNS'WS\%eysTABLE EoLi:EIé‘?G}SW STREE T, MNEXT WEEKf) WHERE WAS THE NATIONAL ORSE o GUTTER AFTER.A HEAVY _& (RAIN AND POY THEM IN ——~ A BOYTLE OF WATER AND DECLARE ‘THEY D TURN YO SNAKES 2 VVE WATCHED ANO WAICHED FROM DAY Yo DAY For SUCH CHENOMENA BOT NEVER | SAW Y COME YO CPASS. OEMEMBER, “THIS S > (R.F MARTIN, HOTEL ,GROCERY : ANOD LIVERY S5TABLE : HAP:?ljog Tg(MOMROE (GACE CO 4