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Show Discarded Silk Stockings Help Keep U. S. Guns Booming American ingenuity has scored another triumph. Millions of pairs of discarded silk hosiery, hitherto useless for textile reclamation, are now serving an important war purpose powder bags. Woven from reclaimed silk, powder bags are used to hold explosive matter to generate the power to discharge dis-charge shells from major caliber guns. Silk burns completely and leaves no embers, hence eliminating the necessity of cleaning the barrel during action. In the first month of the collection campaign American women turned in 2,500,000 pairs of discarded silk stockings. vXt&Wm sC'&vl 1 -V X f 'fg ?: CT"" 0 JX :-; '1 J Silk stockings which can no , longer be worn are being collected collect-ed in stores throughout the country coun-try as shown in picture above, jor conversion into powder bags. Many women's clubs, too, are engaged en-gaged in this important work. j Right: Removing the cotton , parts from discarded silk stock- ings before processing into pow- j der bags. Here Mrs. Mary Gla- , du cuts and sorts material. I r I 4"- ,l X U VXsMXX ft - . Any stockings made entirely of silk or containing mixtures of silk are useful for conversion into powder bags. They should be washed before they are turned in for reclamation. Left: Sewing primer caps for powder bags from cloth made of discarded silk stockings. Fifteen pairs of old stockings provide sufficient cloth for an average i size powder bag. ! m i iniw-'..'."!"'''.! BV. 4 "T OZ(Z stockings, after having cotton parts removed, are fed into a picking tender which shreds the material. Here Daphis Duchaine, ge 67 and with four sons in the service, feeds the machine. It takes husky men to lift the heavy powder bags into the bi guns. Hold your ears! Here go those silk stockings! v x -NV I Layers of silk cloth are cut to specifications u ith a power knife. |