OCR Text |
Show OGDEN AS A CEMENT CENTER. The visit to the plant of the Ogden Portland Cement company, made by a large party of business men of Ogden on Sunday, calls attention to the fact that there is developing to the north of this city an industry of large proportions which promises to make Ogden the cement center of the intermountain country. Cement, as an investment, has appealed to Ogdenites, and already al-ready there is more local money in that industry than In any other manufactory except that of beet sugar production. The men who have financed the property near Brigham City, while originally from Chicago, are now claimed by this community by right of annexation. The promoter, H. & Baker, has been a resident of Ogden bo far back that memory runs not to the con-i trary. So that in adding the Ogden-Portland Cement company to the list of Ogden investments, we are wholly within our rights. We are informed that the Brigham City plant is capable of producing cement at as low a figure as any factory in the United States and this is true by virtue of the fact that there exists in the 2,000 acres, on the edge of which the plant is built, a condition, making for economy in manufacture of the finished product, which is not to b found in any other part of the world There is marl enough to run tho present plant at its capacity 700 years, and underlying the marl is that other essential of cement, clay, in equal abundance. Heretofore, in Michigan and elsewhere, the marl has been dredged from the bottom of lakes, after stripping the overburden at considerable con-siderable expense, and the clay has been transported, in many cases, from great distance, and nowhere, except at the Brigham City site, have marl and clay been obtained associated in strata, one overlying the other and both obtainable at the least possible outlay in equipment equip-ment and energy. The best feature to this is not that it means a large margin of profit by reason of the reduced cost of production, but that it assures as-sures an expansion of the industry as there is no rivalry to be feared, for any danger of unfair competition is eliminated by reason of the unequaled natural facilities, and no market within a thousand miles, at present railroad rates, can be held to the exclusion of tho Ogden Portland Cement company's output. . We are informed that the company now has in contemplation the doubling of the Capacity of their plant. The original plans called for the erection of units, and it is not beyond the possibilities of the industry that these 500-barrel unit3 will go on increasing until un-til the industry to the north of us takes rank as the largest cement producer in tho United States. |