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Show WONDERS OF COAL TAR. Although most persons are aware of the importance of coal tar derivatives deriva-tives in a general way, perhaps few realize how many useful products are derived from the volatile matter released re-leased from burning coal, which formerly for-merly passed off as black smoke without a thought being given to its possible value. About 1802 the first by-product coke ovens were introduced in the United States, through the operation of which this volatile matter was saved for re-distillation, resulting in the production of ten fundamental materials, known as benzene, toluene, i xylene, phenol, cresol, napthalene, anthracine, methylanthracene, phen-anthere, phen-anthere, and carbazol. From these are produced countless derivatives, from which we obtain many drugs, dyes, perfumes, flavoring flavor-ing extracts, explosives, poisons, fertilizers, fer-tilizers, and an almost endless list of commercially important commodities. Among the well known drugs so derived de-rived are salicylic acid, aspirin, phen-acetin, phen-acetin, antipyrin, and cocaine, besides more than 900 dyes. The sugar substitute, sub-stitute, saccharine, more than 300 times as sweet as cane sugar, is produced pro-duced from toluene, which is also used in the manufacture of the powerful pow-erful explosive known as T. N. T. To enumerate all the useful products pro-ducts manufactured from what was once considered waste matter would require much space, but the foregoing will give some idea of what has been accomplished in this direction through scientific research and experiment within a comparatively few years. That the future holds even greater possibilities for tho utilization of materials ma-terials heretofore considered worthless worth-less can hardly be doubted. |