The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 12, 1917, Page 8

rural schools are held in such light esteem would be extraordinary if she were still able to say she would like to g0 back to the country to teach. We must meet the competition of the city in hiring our teachers, We have to change conditions so that we can get the good teachers, and keep them.” So that is the first big thing that the consolidated school does. It makes a country school job look good enough to the teacher who is “urban-minded” as Superintendent Cavett calls it. Of course with such teachers there goes a whole lot that was formerly not con- sidered at all by the ‘“deestrict trus- tees.” The modern trained teacher knows how to make a subject inviting. She follows a leading method rather than a driving method. Very likely she knows how to teach domestic economy and the girls from the farms enjoy this course. If the teacher in one of these rural schools happens to be a man, he takes on a class in manual training as well as in geography, arithmetic and gram- , mar. Nearly all of the new consolidat- ed schools in Ransom county have provision for manual training or domestic science, work benches with a few tools and a small supply of lumber, - neat kitchens with tables, utensils and oil stoves. SCHOOLS ARE DEVELOPING SENSE OF PUBLIC POWER In winter these school kitchens sup- ply something hot for the pupils at noon, so that the ache of a cold lunch is somewhat relieved, and the district pays for it. It may be hot chocolate, soup, scalloped potatoes or something else, but whatever it is, it is good. Some of the districts where they have risen. to consolidation also have barns and they keep them supplied with feed at the public expense to care for the horses that the pupils drive to school in winter. s In some of the townships (consolida- tion in Ransom county unlike that in many counties and in some other states, is based on the township) the school authorities have public convey- ances that gather up the children and take them to and from school, paying some farmer a Treasonable sum to drive his team. Some of the more populous townships have as many as three such conveyances. Some times the parents furnish a team for their own and neighbors’ children and get a small fixed sum per pupil per day and the district does not gather them up. 2 And that suggests one other thing that is growing up in these consolidat- ed townships—the knowledge of how to use the public for the public bene- fit. Since consolidation has taken hold it does not seem to the taxpayers like a waste of taxes to pay better salaries for teachers, to build a footbridge across a river, to equip a teacher’s cot- tage, to hire buses. to carry the town. ship’s children to school, to build barns for their horses, and furnish the feed and a hot noon meal at public expense. They have learned that the public can serve itself in ways they did not dream befere. Most of these schools have several acres of land attached to them, and several have worked over the old one- room buildings into comfortable and roomy cottages where the teacher lives with his family the whole year around and becomes a respected influence and power in the neighborhood. This is a line of development that Mr. Cavett is cultivating, and already good results are beginning to be felt. But it is properly another story, as is also the unique way in which Ransom county is solving its building problems. Shall Lignite Resource be Lost? While the People Are Sleeping Private Capital Has Started to Develop Coal Fields of Northwest—Still a Chance to Save Part of People’s Heritage BY E. B. FUSSELL HEN ILewis and Clark, more than 100 years ago, crossed the country through North Dakota they had to import into this territory their sup- plies of wheat and flour. Today no North Dakota farmer would think of letting his own fields lie idle and im- porting wheat from some other state. It would be like carrying coals to New- castle. But when it comes to fuel North Da- kota is pursuing a policy that is just as foolish as it would be if it imported its wheat supply from Russia. With mil. lions of tons of lignite coal within the state, antharcite and bituminous is be- ing imported from eastern fields. In this respect the state has hardly ad- vanced from the time of Lewis and Clark, = Of course to encourage the use of the eastern coal has been good busi- ness for the railroads. They get their profits from the freight charges from Pennsylvania to North Dakota. When the Pennsylvania coal is all gone, they will be able to reverse the procedure, perhaps, ship the North Dakota lignite back to Pennsylvania, and collect freight again. But in spite of the inclination of the railroads to encourage the use of east- ern coal, two factors this year are go- ing to result in the use of more North Dakota lignite than ever before. One is the real coal shortage, accompanied, of course, by radical increases of price upon all standard grades of anthracite and bituminous. The other factor is improved methods for the use of lig- nite. CAN MAKE LIGNITE EASY TO SHIP Raw lignite, ton for ton, is not the equal of either anthracite ‘or bitumin- ous coal. For one thing, lignite has a 40 per cent moisture content which makes combustion more difficult. The “British thermal unit” is adopt- ed by scientists as the test of heating power. A pound of anthracite coal will produce about 13,500 B. T. U.’s, as they are called. A pound of bituminous coal will produce about 10,500 B. T. U.’s and a pound of North Dakota lignite coal from 6,500 to 7,000 B. T. U.’s. Of course, it costs just 4§ much to move a ton of lignite 100 miles as to move a ton of anthracite the same dis- tance though the lignite has only half the heating power of the anthracite. The moisture in the lignite also dis- courages its use, So if methods could Billions of tons of lignite coal deposits like this are in North Dakota. Some lie in the open and can be dug out with a steam shovel, in other cases it is necessary to run a shaft and conduct regular mining operations. be devised for lessening the bulk of the lignite and cutting out the mois- ture, so that the consumer would not have to pay freight on water, a big gain would be secured. Such methods apparently have been worked out at Scranton, N. D., where a new briquetting plant has recently been installed which manufactures briquets by a new process, without the use of a binder. The briquet company owns its own coal mine immediately adjoining the briquet plant. Coal from the mine is taken into the briquet plant and pul- verized into a fine powder. The powder is heated and then is pressed into briquets. WILL MINE COAL BY STEAM SHOVEL The briquets are heavier and mere solid than the coal. They contain no moisture. While the lignite coal has heating power of only 6,500 B. T. U.’s, the briquets havé a heating power of 11,500 B. T. U.’s, which is greater than the heating power of the best bitumin- ous coal and is nearly as great heat- ing power as anthracite coal possesses. The Scranton people, who claim to This is a pile of lignite coal briquets made by the new process, without binder at the Scranton factory. It is claimed that this process will bring lig- nite into wider use than has ever been possible before. be backed by New York capital, are going after the briquetting proposition on a big scale. They own a half sec. tion of coal land at Scranton, said to contain 16,000,000 tons of coal. They have in operation now one briquetting plant, capahle of producing 72 tons of briquets a day when operating three eight-hour shifts, and ground has been graded for the erection of eleven other plants. The plant thus far built has . cost about $100,000; the twelve plants when in operation are calculated to cost $1,000,000. The Scranton people expect to put in a steam shovel immediately for the mining of their coal to reduce costs. Their coal is well located and easy of access, At the government coal mine near ‘Williston, described in a previous arti- cle in the Leader, the cost of mining was $1 a ton, while at privately operat- ed mines in the same vicinity the cost ranged around $1.50 per ton. But at Scranton, by installing the steam shovel method, the pro- moters of the briquetting enter- prise expect to mine their coal for 7 cents a ton. This is not the statement of the writer. It is the statement of E. G. Fernholtz, the manager of the briquet- ting plant. . Fernholtz, his father and his brother, perfected the briquetting process in use at Scranton, the -only process thus far in use for the making of briquets without a binder—making briquets that consist of nothing but pure coal. EXPECT TO UNDERSELL COAL FROM EAST Fernholtz is not in the- business of making briquets for his health. He charges a royalty of 25 cents per ton on every ton of briquets made by his process. ; REAL The New York capitalists who are backing the project are not in the business for their respective healths, either. They count on making a good, fat profit after paying the Fernholtz royalty. : 5 his is what Fernholtz says about - the cost: “We can manufacture briquets at a PAGE EIGHT cost of a little less than $1 per ton. This inculdes the cost of mining, the 25-cent royalty, cost of operation of the briqueting plant, interest on invest- ment and working capital and depre- ciation. “If we didn’t have to allow for in- terest, working capital and deprecia- tion, the cost would be only about 45 cents per ton.” The Scranton briquetting plant counts upon being able to sell its product for about $5 per ton, load- ed in cars at the mine.” To this will be added the cost of freight and the profits of one or two mid- dlemen before the briquets reach the consumer. At this price, the Scranton people believe, they still will be able to undersell the east- ern bituminous and anthracite. If Fernholtz’ figures are correct, and there is every reason to believe that he knows what he is talking about, the lignite coal situation furnishes a striking commentary on the profits that are going to be made by the pri- vate handling of one of the state's richest resources, a resource that has now, for the most part, passed out of the control of the people into the hands of the private speculators. STATE STILL OWNS SOME LIGNITE -LAND If é.ny readers of the Leader buy briquets for fuel this winter they will have a chance to figure out for them. selves how much they pay for profit and how much for coal. The price of briquets to the consumer probably will be somewhere around $7 per ton, varying according 'to the distance from Scranton. If -the consumer will find the freight rate from Scranton to his town and will deduct this from the' price he paid for his briquets, and then deduct another dollar for the outside cost of manufacturing the briquets, what is left will be the amount of the profits taken by the manufacturer and middlemen. Governor Lynn J. Frazier of/North-. Dakota, who is taking a lively inter- est in the problem of getting a better and cheaper fuel supply for the people . (Continued on page 16) i