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Show VALUE OF A SUCK 10 Tl RAILROADS The current issue of "The Bulletin," the organ of the Southern Pacific Bureau of News, carries a timely and interesting article illustrating the economic importance of taking care of plain, old-fashioned burlap sacks. The article follows The magnitude of a pathway 850 miles long, carpeted by a continuous strip of burlap twenty-three inches wide is somewhat difficult to comprehend, compre-hend, but just such a carpet could be made If all the burlap sacks consumed con-sumed on tho Southern Pacific (Pacific (Pa-cific system) in one year were sewed end to end. Imagine this strip of burlan between tho rails frnm Snn Francisco, Cal , to Gila, Ariz., and you have a good idea of what an enormous amount of these containers are consumed con-sumed on this railroad every twelve months During the year endod June 30, 1.015, 700.000 sacks were purchased by the Southern Pacitic or were received as containers of material enough burlap twine to encircle the earth twenty-one twenty-one times The value of these sacks would have purchased any of the following items: 1 modern freight or passenger locomotive. lo-comotive. 2 s(eol passenger coaches. 20 fifty-ton stecl-underfraine box cars. 1G.000 track shovels. 330 typewriters. Or it would have pair the average wages for one month of 320 employes. Is there not a duty resting upon us' to give kindly consideration to the gunnysack? It has proven a friend in need and there is hardly a thing so commonly used In railroad operation opera-tion so badly in need of a friend. Let It receive care within our hands. It Is remarkable how long a sack will last and how often it can be used until It roaches tho "pension" age. Even then it possesses value when suitably cut up as a burlap wrapper for small articles. It is common to seo an othorwise good sack, soiled from grease or dirt, due to being used to keep Intact a few track bolts or nuts, or its value destroyed by grease wiped from machinery, car axles, etc. A small piece of" burlap recruited from a "pensioned" sack would have served the purpose ably and well. oo |