Items of Interest March 17, 1917 Issue

Items of Interest

"I predict that in the lives of the younger men now before me there will be seen from ocean to ocean in the United States the greatest system of highways to be found anywhere in the world," was the prediction of Senator Bankhead, chairman of the Senate committee on post-offices and post roads, when speaking recently in Atlanta, Ga., at a meeting held for the purpose of accelerating the building of the Bankhead Highway through the southern states. "The present Federal appropriation of $85,000,000 is but the beginning of the work that the national Government will shortly be doing in the matter of road construction," he said.

A soap factory in Lourenco Marques, Mozambique, started in 1914 with a capital of about $15,000, and an output of 600 cases, or 35 tons a month, has at present a capital of $60,000, and an output of 6000 cases a month. The soap is made entirely from vegetable oils and is in two qualities,—"mottled" and "yellow." The latter quality, which is said to be suitable for all toilet purposes, is made solely from coconut oil. The factory is run practically on the products of the district, only about 6 per cent of the materials used coming from abroad. These are mostly sodas and silicates.

A comparatively little known but valuable tree, most often called slash pine, is fast replacing long-leaf pine in many sections of the South, says the Forest Service. In some respects it is considered a better tree than the long-leaf pine. Its growth is more rapid, its yield of turpentine larger, and its wood is the heaviest, hardest, and strongest coniferous wood grown in the country. The chief causes for the rapid spread of the tree are its frequent and abundant seed production, its rapid growth, its ability to endure the shade of other trees, and its capacity to adapt itself to a wide range of environment. The tree is destined to play an important part in the future of the cut over lands of the South. As an example of the high money returns obtained by turpentining the tree, it is stated that in one instance in South Carolina a twenty year old stand averaged 520 trees an acre, each of which yielded one cup. The turpentine operator paid the owner ten cents a cup, or a total of fiftytwo dollars an acre, for the privilege of tapping the trees.

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