In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

chapter 6 A New Industry growing up, Chanute’s father Joseph stressed that energy and perseverance were necessary to achieve success. After becoming part of the workforce and watching his coworkers, the budding young engineer wondered why some of his acquaintances had worked hard throughout their lives without becoming wealthy. There must be something else he did not know, and the eighteen-yearold Octave theorized to his father: “I can see only one reason—it is how clever or cunning the person is. Moreover, circumstances are all important; they elevate men of little wealth and hold back many of talent.” In due time Octave learned that a person had to meet the people and capitalize on the circumstances that opened the doors to success and wealth; and, sometimes the mysterious quality of “personality” also made things happen—or not. Trying to capitalize on the circumstances in the early 1880s, and knowing that a first-class railroad required one wooden tie for every two feet of track, or 2,600 ties for each mile, Chanute gave more thought to the necessity of preserving wood. The hurried railroad construction into the outskirts of civilization had quickly depleted the once-plentiful timber supply, as trees were cut for railroad ties, poles, and bridges faster than nature could replenish them. Placing ties into the ground sped the natural decaying process, thus workers needed to replace them every few years. This presented an enormous waste, and a related question was even more thought provoking: “In the country known as the American desert, about 500 miles west of the Missouri, rainfall drops down to 6 to 9 inches a year. Here the soil is abundantly rich, but nothing can be grown without more moisture. It is of the greatest importance for us to know whether the cutting away of forests does diminish rainfall, and if by planting trees we can increase it.”1 Preserving natural resources deserved much more attention than it had previously received. Having used a variety of wood in bridges and tracks, Chanute thought he was familiar with its idiosyncrasies, but he soon learned better. Robert Thurston, professor at Stevens Institute, had included timber in his lecture on construc- A New Industry 139 tion materials, and De Volson Wood had incorporated Thurston’s lecture notes in his textbook on the resistance of materials.2 This provided Chanute a first source of factual information on wood and the causes for its decay. As part of the 1880 federal census, the government initiated a survey of the nation’s forest resources, including their economic properties and uses. Initial results forecast a rapidly diminishing timber supply, so it appeared of vital necessity to prevent its wholesale destruction. With this precept, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) appointed a committee in 1879 to investigate the best method to retard decay in timber. Secretary Bogart prepared a circular letter and mailed it to railroad managers and chief engineers. “Several processes had been in use in Europe for many years with satisfactory results, but the same result had not been the rule in the United States. Whether these failures have been due to imperfect preparation, or because we have blindly followed the foreign methods, we are not prepared to say; but the whole question is so important that a report of our failures even more than that of our successes, would be of great value to engineers.”3 This mailing received hardly a response, because most railroad men believed that ties would wear out mechanically before they would rot and that it was cheaper to renew ties than to spend money on preservation chemicals.4 Finding the topic of wood preservation intriguing, Chanute asked in January 1882 to take over the chairmanship of the ASCE’s Preservation of Timber Committee . He prepared another circular letter and added with his characteristic dry humor: “Please keep this Circular and Card in a conspicuous place until you have answered it.” The ASCE mailed about one thousand letters with a postcard, self-addressed to Chanute at the Erie, to practically everyone who may have had any experience with the subject. This time, there was a good response. One of the first people to respond was Hugh Riddle, who had recently advanced to the presidency of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad. His roadmaster had informed him that their road had treated ties in the 1860s, but to ensure success, the work had to be done with care. Several other American roads had...

Share