can industries by the war were constructive in effect. They built up, they extended, they diversified our industrial life.

Some of the most interesting effects of the war were to be seen in industries which, if judged by quantity of output, are relatively unimportant. Yet the war proved in many cases that the existence of such industries in this country was vital to our military security and economic prosperity. The industrial effects of the war may be shown best by selecting for detailed description in this and the following chapter a few of the industries in which the changes resulting from the war conditions were most striking and at the same time most typical.

At the time of the outbreak of the war in Europe, the American glass industry was supplying the domestic market with a large proportion of its window glass, bottles, lamp chimneys, and pressed glassware. The up-todate American mills were equipped with excellent automatic and semi-automatic glass-blowing machinery. We were dependent upon Germany and Austria, however, for certain special but very important glass products. These included chemical or laboratory glassware, important not only in our universities but also in the research departments of many of our great industries, and optical glass of the highest grade, used for lenses of field glasses, range finders, and periscopes. Although these products were made to some extent in the United States, we were largely dependent on foreign countries for our supply.

Laboratory ware includes flasks and beakers; graduated ware, such as burettes and pipettes; apparatus for testing; extraction apparatus and condensers; sugartesting ware; reagent bottles; and ground ware. Some

of these products are required by many of our important industries in their research work the testing of processes and the analysis of materials and products. Laboratory tests and analyses are essential to the technological processes of such varied industries as iron and steel, sugar, fertilizers, rubber, cement, soap, oil refining, textiles, explosives, dyes and other chemicals.

American glass manufacturers were called upon to supply the domestic demand for chemical and scientific glassware. The war, by eliminating foreign competition, gave them a free field for development. The research and experimental work done in Europe and made public enabled them to prepare satisfactory combinations of materials. The United States Bureau of Standards coöperated in improving the quality of the war products. One of the leading manufacturers of American chemical glassware described his experience thus:8

When we decided to go into this line we employed the best chemists we could find. The idea was to get quality, so that after the war our quality would be known and we would have a chance to sell on a quality basis. We experimented and we made glass which, from all chemical standpoints, was superior to the original German production. The ingredients and the way they are mixed are probably different. It is a superiority that we hope will continue indefinitely, because the demand in this country has been for a better quality. The distinctive requirement is for quality, glass that will stand the laboratory tests.

The technical problem is in the mixing of the materials, and it requires skill in the manufacture of it. We had trouble in getting skilled labor with technical experience. It took us about six months to really get a production that was satisfactory.

Optical glass is used for the lenses of field glasses,

3 United States Tariff Commission, "The Glass Industry as Affected by the War" (1918), p. 16.

range finders, periscopes, and other optical instruments. Its production was perfected in Germany after careful experimentation and scientific research. The best known factory in this line is the Jena Glass Laboratory. It began in 1884 to produce optical glass in commercial quantities. Its founders were aided in their research by liberal subsidies granted by the Prussian Government. During the year ending June 30, 1914, the United States imported rough-cut and unwrought glass for optical purposes valued at $617,700, almost one-half of which came from Germany direct. This glass was ground and polished in this country. During the same year the importation of lenses and optical instruments amounted in value to $720,560.

The decline in imports of optical glass, owing to the blockade of the British Navy and also to the commandeering for war purposes of the relatively small production in the United Kingdom and France, stimulated production in this country. Optical instruments are a vital necessity in military operations, particularly for artillery. Unless equipped with accurate fire-control instruments, modern armies cannot operate. The greatest skill and technical knowledge are required to prepare glass that will pass military tests. No small task, therefore, confronted the American manufacturers in developing this new branch of the glass industry. With the assistance of the Carnegie Institution of Washington and the Bureau of Standards the difficulties were surmounted and excellent optical glass was produced in quantities sufficient to supply our military needs.*

Great Britain, like the United States, had depended before the war on Germany for the greater part of her supply of optical glass. Early in the war her military 4 Ibid., p. 12.

operations were hindered by a shortage. The report of the British Committee on Commercial and Industrial Policy, after pointing out the dependence of Great Britain upon Germany for optical and chemical glass, continues:5

The supremacy of the German manufacturers was due not only to their superior scientific knowledge and organisation, but also to the support derived from the steady requirements of a large standing army. Since the outbreak of war it has been necessary practically to create the industries in this country from the foundation and the efforts made with Government assistance under a department of the Ministry of Munitions specially established for the purpose appear already to have met with a considerable measure of success.

The main lines of action have been the making of agreements by the Ministry of Munitions, and, where necessary, by the War Office, Admiralty, and Ministry of Munitions jointly, with selected firms, under which in return for Government financial and other assistance they have created plants to produce a required output of adequate quality and variety under specified conditions, the fulfilment of which is supervised by a Government representative with wide powers, including the control of prices and methods of manufacture and the enforcement of a fair-wage clause and the right to secure the training and employment of female and unskilled labour. In certain cases such agreements have been made for a period of 10 years, and provide for the maintenance of a specified war reserve of the material manufactured and the availability of the plant for Government use in the event of future hostilities, and an important feature is an undertaking by the departments concerned to specify in purchasing optical instruments that they shall be fitted with British-made glass. In other cases advances or other arrangements have been made for the erection of buildings and the supply of modern machinery. Scientific assistance in solving numerous problems has been given by the Ministry of Munitions, and by numerous and eminent scientific men and institutions through the Ministry.

British Blue Book, Cd. 9032 (1918), p. 7.

We are satisfied that the continuance of commercial and scientific assistance and of detailed control on the lines already followed will be necessary for a considerable period. This necessity is, we believe, fully admitted by the manufacturers themselves, who recognise also that such assistance must have as its object and condition the attainment and maintenance of the highest standards of quality.

It is clear, moreover, that, in order that the industries may have time and opportunity to adapt their organisation to peace conditions and to train an adequate supply of skilled workers, very special measures of protection against foreign competition will be required at the outset, in view particularly of the great strength and reputation of the German firms. Having regard to the peculiar circumstances of the industries in question, we think that these measures will be regulated most effectively by means of the prohibition of imports from whatever source, except under license, of certain kinds of glass and optical instruments to be specified from time to time by the organisation referred to in the following paragraph.

America at one time had a good sized surgical-instrument industry, but about 1900 the Germans began to win the American market from our manufacturers. Their competition just before the war was being felt keenly even in the few lines in which we had for many years retained the advantage. In 1914 from 75 to 90 per cent. of our domestic consumption of instruments was being imported, and American production was confined to instruments of brass, copper, and other nonferrous metals, to large iron instruments, such as veterinary tools, to hypodermic needles, and to the filling of special orders. Germany's position had resulted from well organized large-scale production, highly skilled laborers, relatively low labor cost, efficiency in selling, and a good supply of raw materials.

The curtailment of imports from Germany in 1914 created a shortage of steel instruments in the United