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_ transportation - - quirements. 39 the mine to tide water at shipping point is transported to this section in various types of boats, varying in ton- nage from a small gchoones to craft carrying five or six thousand tons, and each schooner, barge or steamer varying in type of construction, some having two, some three, some four, some five and some six hatches: of different size; etc., so. that the termin- als, either at the loading or discharg- ing point, are not able to work to as good advantage as they could if_ they were loading or unloading ships. of practically the same type of construc- tion. As you, who have to do with the shipping of coal, know, the delays caused on account of loading 'and dis- charging are a serious loss, on account of demurrages that someone has to pay, either directly or indirect- ly. ¢ tt. therefore. "occurred. to = -us i owe had' ships of <<a. special type of construction, with a number of large hatches, they could be loaded and unloaded much quicker than the average boat today 'and could carry coal at a much less price than the present one. We then investigated as to the type of boat for water transportation which could be used to the best: advantage, whether it should be large barges, towed by ocean tugs, or schooners, or steam colliers, carry- ing a large cargo themselves and also towing barges. We finally concluded that, taking everything into considera- the most economical method of would be oby..steel, steam collier carrying about 7,000 tons in addition to coal for: its own re- 'When we first took up this coal question, we had no idea. of doing anything except for ouir own re- quirement, but the more we examined the situation the more fully were we tion, convinced that we could transport coal to the mutual advantagé of the vari- ous manufacturing industries in New England and ourselves. We, there- fore, decided to build three steam colliers, each about 400 ft. long, draw- ing 24 ft. of water, and to carry 7,200 tons of coal. This fleet will bing into Boston about 1,500,000 tons of coal per year, which is about one-half ef the total amount. of, soft. coal brought in last year from United States ports. "The total tonnage, per net register of these ships for Boston, will exceed that of any other line now entering that. port.. The tonnage, per net re- 'gister of ships of the largest lines now entering the port for the calen- dar year of 1906 was as. follows: eer bake oie Oe ees 367,053 AE oe bch oi yee 111,911 Bee LN i ve os 140,070 140,420 Me rine Lie... 6... Meee 4G > being constructed, . Massachusetts, are "THE. MarRINnE REVIEW Wilsons & Furness-Leyland... 148,636 Hamburg-Amrerican. 2.2)... 64. 0% 195,849 ner Vine oe is eds i 346,0 Leviand bine oy 4a 420,552 WRG Star ier i ie 540,752 "The total, per net register of the ships, that the Fore River Ship Build- ing Co. are now constructing es us' will be 586,698 tons. "In connection with the transport- ing of coal by these boats, I might say that we have excellent facilities at Everett for the discharging of the ships, and are now adding to the dis- charging and storage plant so that we hope to unload one of these ships, which' will carry 7,000 tons, in not over ten hours, and we will have storage capacity in Everett of néarly 100,000 tons. Our pocket, of storage! plant, will be connected by' rail 'with the Boston & Albany and the Béston & Maine Railroad systems, so that it will be possible: for the manufactu-er to purchase his.coal*t: o. b. cars in Everett and obtain a regular weekly supply, and we hope at a price con- siderably less than what is now being paid for 'same. Ultimately, we expect to load the ships in from five to six hours at a modern terminal that is now in which event we will be able to run the boats between the loading point and the discharging terminal with regularly and we hope that a ship will never be in pott ever one day. This will mean a great saving to consumers of coal (others, as well as. ourselves) and judging from the talks I have had with large manufacturers in eastern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire they appreciate that fact as well as we. "When it was finally decided upon the type of ships that we thought it advisable to construct, we looked about to. see who we should get to build them, and I think that we peo- ple here in New England, especially 'in to be congratu- lated that a ship building company exists in our midst that could give us 'a price which made it desirable for us to award the contract to them for the construction of these boats. I am sure that my associates were all very much pleased and gratified; that we were justified -in having these boats constructed here by the Fore River Ship Building Co. a home industry in every sense of the word, a large corporation having millions of dollars ment to about 4,000 people. For in these days, since we have lost from Boston and New England many of the. large -corporations that we. had in former days, it is not only desir- able to get new capital invested in \ invested and giving employ- . new: enterprises, but to foster, main- tain and help those we alpeady have 'todo a larger business. "One thing I wish to say in justice to the Fore River Ship Building Co. that, so far as I know, they have done everything up to the present time that' they agreed to do; that there have been- no delays, and that the ship Everett is being launched on time and will be delivered to us, so. fam told, at the time promised, which is greatly to the credit of the Fore River Ship Building Co., it seems to me, for, as you who have had to do with construction the last year, know how we have all been delayed on 90 per cent of our. construction work, long beyond | the contract limit. "Seeing, some of the gentlemen here, who spend much' of their time and energy in Washington, reminds me of how little the United States gov- ernment has done in the recent past to encourage the ship building indus- tries- of. the United: *States. I. fear. that few of.us realize the handicap- under which the shipping industry is being conducted by Americans at the present time. I have recently re- turned from an extended trip, having spent of my. time 58 days on the water, during which period my atten- tion was naturally called to shipping, and commerce connected therewith, and, as an American, I. must confess that I was not very proud of the fact that in the various ports I entered it was seldom that I saw the American flag. During the latter part of my trip I crossed the Pacific on a ship flying the American flag, the. Minne- sota. As you will rémember, there were two boats built by the so-called Hill interests down in New London, Conn:; a few years. ago, one -called the Minnesota and one the Dakota, both fine ships. The Dakota was lost recently and I was told that she would not be replaced, and that the Minre- sota was for sale and. that the ' Japanese were negotiating for its pur- chase. _I understood that the reason why the Dakota was not to be re- placed and the reason why the Minne- sota was for sale was because Ameri- can-owned ships could not compe<*e, under existing conditions, with for- eign-owned. vessels. I was also. told that an old American line running be- tween the. Pacific coast and Australia was about to discontinue for the same reason. "T . became fein convinced from what I saw and heard that, if the shipping industry expected to com- pete with England, Germany, France and Japan, the United States would have to do, for that industry in our