OCR Text |
Show KNOW you R A Vj NEIGHBOR CHILEAN NITRATES FORM EXPLOSIVE CONTENT VOR ALLIED WEAPONS OF WAR Transformed from their peacetime peace-time role of serving as quick energy en-ergy foods for agricultural crops the world over, war-vital nitrates of Chile now form an important element in the high explosive content con-tent of powerful, death-dealing weapons of far-flung battlefields. Buried under miles, of shifting, drifting sands, in one of the most desolate regions known to mankind, man-kind, lies this great desert storehouse store-house of Chile, which the Good Neighbor to the south has opened to the arsenals of world democracy. democra-cy. The nitrate region lies on the northern boundary of Chile, extending ex-tending south for a distance of 500 miles, but less than 100 miles in width. Scorching winds, and the shriveling heat of a burning sun have seared every living thing in this desert land. Where only a few misplaced drops of rain fall once a decade, even the tortured surface of the barren wastes has withered a deep brown. Just why Nature should choose this inaccessible inacces-sible spot to bury one of mankind's man-kind's most valued treasures will .ro unanswered through the agcs. rorlmps It was Nature's Inexplicable Inexpli-cable way of compensating a region reg-ion so otherwise devoid of natural features and resources. In peace time, nitrates and their by-products of iodine, nitrate of potash, sulphate of soda and common salt have been widely used in the agrioultural industry. Nitrogen, phosphate, and potash have long been considered as the three most important fertilizer elements el-ements for farm crops, especially those grown annually on the same soil. The biggest American nitrate ni-trate consumers have been in the past cotton and tobacco farmers in the South, where the growing of a single crop year after year has impoverished the soil. But the world is at war, and now Chile's great nitrate beds have become almost priceless, furnishing fur-nishing the prime source for powerful pow-erful explosives which shower death over vast battlefields. The huge volume of the nitrate industry is proceeding on a much swifter and more thoroughly modernized mod-ernized scale of production, due to developments of recent years. Power shovels have supplanted hand labor in extracting the much sought caliche. The lumps of crude ore are now loaded by electric elec-tric shovels into motor trucks or cars drawn by electric locomotives for delivery to the refineries or "oficinas." A new refining method meth-od has also been developed whereby where-by caliche containing smaller amounts of nitrate may be profitably profi-tably extracted, and a larger amount of nitrate recovered. With such a large-scale industry carried on in a. desolate region utterly devoid of natural resources, resourc-es, but necessarily inhabited by thousands of engineers, chemists and workmen, one may wonder how these hardy inhabitants maintain themselves. Water is obtained from the melting snows of the towering Andes through pipe lines extend-' ing for hundreds of miles, following follow-ing railroads and producing miniature mini-ature oases at measured distances along rail routes. Foodstuffs also are necessarily transported, entering en-tering the nitrate area on a large scale in order that food-growing materials may be sent out. Hundreds of scientists are studying the caliche in Chiles vast storehouse for the production of many future commodities. And their reality will still further add to the bewilderment of, the world at Nature's queer visitation of a priceless heritage upon the barren wastes of one of the world's most desolate regions |