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Show I FORD DECLINES I 'BOOTLEG COAL Offer Said to Have Been Made to Divert Fuel For West DETROIT. Aup. 31. (By the A8-BOi A8-BOi tated Press.) Henry Ford todav refused to avert B shutdown of his n utomobile pinna here September 1 at the expense of the domestic con! users of the northwest, tt was learned learn-ed by the Associated Pre Wednea-il.iv Wednea-il.iv from a reliable source. Aerordlnjr to this Information Mr. Ford charge that priority conl con--Mrnorl to the northwest has been offered of-fered him by coal brokers in telegrams tele-grams reachlntr this office here. The manufacturer refused to purchase the fuel holding it would not bo a humanitarian hu-manitarian act to fiilce conl int. r. ! d ' to relieve the suffering of men. wo men and children during the coming winter. Mr. Ford w;is quoted BS saying thnt "coal bootleggers" had offered to "steal this coal" and sell It to him. Reports emanating from a Wait Virginia Conl company that Fjord" had refused shipments at normal prices was explained at the Word plants It was asserted that the fuel so offered was steam coal, a product of Ittlo ii- in the Ford Industries because it contains a high sulphur content A low sulphur conl Is required for blast furnace work. Ordinary stam conl It was explained, would ruin the met-tals met-tals used In the Ford plants I 'nlv about 30 per cent of the coal used in the Ford factories here can be of the stenm ariefy. it wns sfitecl. Despite the often repeated determination deter-mination of Mr. Ford to cios his factories fac-tories here unless he can obtain the kind of coal he needs at normal prices, the Detroit Industrial district took heart today when It wns announced an-nounced the General Motor corporation, corpora-tion, employing between 75.000 and 100,000 men. han a 30-day supply of coal available. Closing of the various plants of the corporation. It Wns explained, ex-plained, WOi,)d affeqi hundreds of thousands of workmen employed by concerns depending upon Genera Motors Mo-tors for various materials |