Show build huge plants and power dams to supply 2 billion pounds aluminum for U S defer defense X UM for national defense mines or fields plants r Is 1 2 alcoa 3 reynolds WA A aluminum co of canada aluminum plants Is K g 1 2345 alcoa f 6 reynolds 7 reynolds fall 1941 go pah e 10 11 op by alcoa noc A 9 op by reynolds 12 op by bohn co 13 op by union carb 4 14 op by olin corp canadian plants 15 aluminum co of canada sells to U t E electric power generating facilities william knudsen director general of estimates the U S will need an annual production of 1600 million pounds of aluminum for national defense map alap shows where bulk will be produced plants indi indicated by pouring ladle symbol nos I 1 to 5 are now producing at combined rate of million pounds by mi middle of 1912 1942 19 12 will reach million plant 6 produces 40 million pounds and plant 7 nearing completion 60 million proposed government plants will produce in millions of pounds when completed 8 9 10 11 90 12 70 13 60 and 14 30 part of canada 15 production has been contracted for ft by united states special to western newspaper union washington D C what has been happening happening li throughout gho ut the united states during the last few weeks would have constituted a phenomenon anywhere but in a democracy from sauk center to gay broadway a fellow could take his girl to the swell est dance in town with no more capital than a couple of battered pots and pans in oklahoma city solid citizens drove downtown to hurl their skittles and double boilers at a target painted on the posterior of an effigy hitler then let them lie there for uncle sam to pick up in harrison N Y a dog bit a girl scout soliciting old aluminum from house to house he was a german police dog of course gypsy rose lee exhibiting rare form sic contributed a pan dance and more than americans did their bit in the drive to collect scrap aluminum for national defense in a few short the threat of hitlerism had brought the light silvery metal off the kitchen ranges of the nation and dumped it all over the front page for just as world war I 1 has been described as a war of steel world war II 11 was rapidly developing into a war of aluminum world war I 1 was a static and surface affair fought from fixed positions world war II 11 is characterized by lightning like movements of highly mechanized fighting forces airplanes and tanks rule the land while airplanes and swift modern modem battle fleets fight the battle of the atlantic eighty to 90 per cent of military airplane is aluminum for alloys of the metal as strong as structural steel are only one third as heavy modern tanks use the aluminum for gun platforms interior fittings and wherever else it can be employed efficiently to save weight and gain maneuverability battleship uses more than a million pounds several times as as much as the whole city of new york rounded up in the pot and pan drive restricted use this explains why you can no longer obtain aluminum for egg poachers for refrigerator trays for streamlined trains hair curlers bridge girders or chewing gum wrappers gone to defend its country aluminum is needed in quantities the like of which peacetime america never imagined much less consumed the united states annual military requirements of aluminum when the defense program gets into full production have been estimated at from pounds to pounds a year and up suppose we take pounds the estimate of william knudsen director general of as a fair average that is twice as much aluminum as the entire world pro deuced only five years ago it is roughly equal to the entire world production of 1940 notwithstanding the gigantic war machines that were built in terms more familiar to all of us it is more than twice as much aluminum as this coun country try has consumed in all its history for cooking utensils and electric refrigerators combined what is being done to meet this challenge A great deal some of it by private enterprise some of it by the government some by the two working together the aluminum company of america alcoa since it was the only producer of virgin new aluminum in the united states until this year was first to get under way with defense expansion what it has done is summed up in the recent report of the house military affairs committee on defense progress aluminum price decline in 1938 this company finished the year with an inventory of a stock of aluminum equal to the normal requirements quire ments for a year As of the date of april 3 1939 congress had authorized the navy to build planes and the army such a program required no expansion of production facilities inasmuch as a years supply of the metal was on i hand band however late in 1938 this company inaugurated a program with additions since made to it calling ing for the capital expenditure of over instead of an increase in the price of aluminum as there has been in practically all strategic and critical materials in some instances as high as per cent there has been a decline in the price of approximately 14 per cent all the testimony given before this committee was to the effect that the aluminum company of america had given per cent operation cooperation co had not only used its own money for expansion pan sion but of its own initiative took steps to treble its production alcoa by july 1942 will be producing pounds annually seven new plants aided by loans totaling some the reynolds metals company long a fabricator of aluminum this year entered the business n ess of making the metal at lis te rhill ala one of its two plants is already in operation and at long view wash another is nearing completion together they will make pounds a year is reported to have recommended to the war department the construction of seven new golem government plants according to the reports these would be run by private companies three by alcoa one by bohn aluminum and brass corporation one abne by union carbide and carbon and one by the olin corporation these plants would add pounds a year the metals reserve company a government corporation has contracted with the aluminum company of canada to obtain about pounds to be delivered during 1942 1944 secondary or reclaimed aluminum for the metal can in some ways be used over and over again will add further tonnage the pots and pans collected in the recent drive for instance cannot be used for making bombers but they might be re melted and used to make army field kitchen equipment or to dl quiet steel thus freeing other aluminum for airplanes the steel industry which burns up one half pound to five or six pounds of aluminum in the making of each ton of steel may well consume pounds next year aluminum paradoxically is the most plentiful of all the metallic elements known to man it is in the clay under our feet in the rocks high on a nearby hill in the water we swim in and often in the very food we eat aluminum is never found in the native state as iron copper and gold are it is always locked tight in chemical combination with other elements napoleon III awake to the advantage of light aluminum cavalry equipment would give him over his enemies offered a fortune to the french scientist who could find a cheap way of producing the metal which then cost a pound but it was not until 1886 that an american youth charles martin hall unlocked the secret and paved the way for aluminum at its present price of 17 cents halls process still the basis of the aluminum industry makes use J forging an aluminum propeller blank defense aircraft will require re many times the number of aluminum num forgings forg ings the V U S consumes in peacetime of an electrolytic furnace this large rectangular pot is filled with the stone me like ice found only in far off greenland but manufactured synthetically in large quantities here powerful electric current is introduced into the passes through it heating it to a molten mass and leaves through the lining of the pot A white substance like powdered sugar called which is merely alum aluminum chemically combined with oxygen is dissolved in the molten the electric current decomposes the the oxygen passing off as gas and the then i molten aluminum heavier than the sinking to the bottom of the pot the aluminum is then tapped into ladles and poured into ingot at intervals |