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1903] MARINE REVIEW AND MARINE RECORD, --_a9 IN CLIPPER-SHIP. DAYS, According to the San Francisco Chronicle, California is re- sponsible for America's pre-eminence in international yacht rac- ing. The discovery of gold put a premium upon record-breaking sailing ships for the run from Atlantic seaports "around the horn." Eastern ship yards began striving for great sailing speed. The creation of the splendid California clipper ship was the re- sult, They were a novelty in ocean racers that commanded the admiration of the maritime world and won for their skippers the reputation of being the most skillful and daring sailing masters in the- world. : What was learned and evolved by the construction of the famous California clipper ships practically established on the At- lantic seaboard of the United States a school of world experts in the art of designing and building ships of wonderfully swift sail- ing ability. The ingenuity and skill of the builders, combined with the unrivaled seamanship of' the Yankee skippers, placed Americans in the lead as sailing racers of the sea. These clipper ships were built to carry all the spread of sail possible, and their captains became noted for the way they would drive their ves- sels, never reefing a yard of canvas night or day except in a heavy gale, while old-style ships would be plowing along timidly with more than half their sails furled. The clipper ships decade from 1850 to 1860 marked the height of America's maritime su- premacy. From about 1835 to 1850 the reliable old Blackball liners sailed back and forth across the Atlantic as passenger and freight carriers. They were comfortable, but clumsy ships, each peculiarly marked with a big black circle upon the foretopsail. But the introduction of steamships steadily forced these slower vessels out of business. Then came the next epoch of sailing ves- sels, the Baltimore clipper type, built for greater speed, and seen on the Atlantic from about 1840 to 1850. Meanwhile the success of steam was creating a demand for faster sailing to meet the new competition, and the extra clippers developed, beginning in 1843 with the 750-ton Rainbow, and reaching a climax in 1855 in the completion of the clipper ship Great Republic, a vessel of 4,550 tons, with a length of 325 feet. These sea racers suddenly became a cominercial necessity after the rush of gold hunters to California, for it was a matter of big profits to the ship that could land her merchandise first at San Francisco without the expense and uncertainty of breaking cargo and moving it across the Isthmus of Panama for reshipment in another steamer, al- ready overcrowded with gold-seekers and their personal baggage. So it happened that the extreme clippers came to be called Cali- fornia clippers, and they outsailed everything' on the seas from 1850 onward for twenty years. Then, as a modification of these swift sailers, came the half clippers--ships with less mountainous canvas and greater. carrying capacity. Their epoch was about the decade 1860 to 1870. Most of the splendid California clipper ships, having performed their original function by hurrying mer- chandise to San Francisco in the exciting times of the '50s, were sold to foreigners or remodeled to carry less canvas and a smaller crew. When the demand for the fast California clippers was at its height along about 1850 every ship yard on the Atlantic coast with the necessary facilities was engaged in building clipper ships. The principal clipper ship yards were McKay's, near: Boston, and Webbs, at-Néew York. From the McKay yards were launched in quick succession the Staghound of 1,550 tons, the Flying Fish of 1,600 tons, the Bald Eagle of 1,600 tons, the Flying Cloud of 1,700 tons, the Westward Ho of 1,700 tons, the Empress of the . Seas of 2,250 tons, and the Sovereign of the Seas of 2,400 tons, and then a little later the amazingly big Great Republic, a mam- moth clipper ship of 4,550 tons, a leviathan among sail craft as large as the Great Eastern was among steamers. But the Great Republic never made the trip to California. Her upper deck was burned off before she started, and she was repaired and slightly modified and sold to France for a transport, to be used'in the Crimean war, in which service it was said of her "no steamer could catch her when.she had a whole-sail, leading wind." A good many of the clipper ships were bought by England and France in the hasty -effort to secure adequate and fast transports to hurry troops to the Crimean war. How really fast the' California clipper ships were, those ves- sels ranging from_1I,600,to 4,500 tons, may be better understood when it is stated that at that time a vessel of 1,000 tons was a wonder for size. The-California clippers, built primarily for the California trade, found their way all over the world, and on all seas, aroused astonishment, not only for their lofty masts and un- precedented spread of canvas, but for their matchless speed and re- markable gracefulness. How very large the California clipper ships were may be seen in the following authentic performances, which stand and will stand as world's sailing records, for there will never again be sailing ships like those splendid California clippers. Steam has forever relegated them to oblivion. : 1851--Flying Cloud; New York to San Francisco, 13,610 miles; 89 days; sailed 374 miles in one day. - 1853--Flying Dutchman; New York to San Francisco and return; discharged and loaded, wharf to wharf, 27,220 miles; 6 months, 21 days. San Francisco to the equator, 2,380 miles, 11 days, 9 hours; rounded Cape Horn, 6,380 miles, 35 days. 1853--Trade Wind; San Francisco to New York; 13,610 miles; 75 -days. 1854--Flying Cloud; New York to San Francisco, 13,610 nules; 89 days, 9 hours. : ss i 1854--Comet; Liverpool to Hong Kong, 13,040 miles; 84 ays. 1855--Mary-Whiteridge; Baltimore to Liverpool, 3,400 miles; 13 days, 7 hours. : ' 1857--F lying Dutchman; San Francisco to New York, off Staten Island; 80 days. : ee 1859--Dreadnaught ; Sandy Hook to Liverpool, 3,000 miles; 13 days, 8 hours. ae: bot _ 1860--Andrew Jackson; New York to San Francisco, 13,610 miles; 90 days, 12 hours. eee eae 1870--Young America; San Francisco to lightship off Sandy Hook, loaded, 13,580 miles; 80 days, 20 hours. et 1872--Young America; Liverpool to San Francisco, 13,800 miles; 96 days. nae FUTURE OF STEEL TRADE, ~ : In the course of an editorial review of the past and the proba- ble future of the steel trade the London Iron & Coal Trades Re- view remarks that very few industries can show the same re- markable expansion. An industry that has been so progressive in the past is hardly likely to stagnate in the immediate future. "So far as the output of steel is concerned," says the London publication, "the United States led the world in 1902, as in many previous years, only more so. The total output of Bessemer and open-hearth steel in that country during 1902 was practically 15,000,000 tons. This figure cannot adequately be appreciated, except by the appreciation of the fact that the total volume of steel produced throughout the world was not, in 1894, more than 12,851,000 tons, or fully 2,000,000 less than the output of steel in the United States alone in 1902. Probably the. total steel output of the world in 1902 will have been 35,000,000 tons, the five lead- ing countries having unitedly produced rather over 32,000,000 tons. In other words, the world's output of steel. today is fully eight times that of only twenty-two years ago, the outout of 1880 having been only a trifle over 4,000,000 tons." What is to be said as to the future? asks our. contemporary. 'We have seen that during the last twenty years the age of steel may be said to have been created, or, in other words, the output of today is three times or more what it was in 1894. This progress may be main- tained, or it may not. The general impression is that it will. The recent rate of growth may not be kept up. There must be, as there have been, ebbs and flows. But it is possible to conceive of an increase during the next twenty years equal to that of the past, and, not only so, but some recent writers even speak of such development as if it were a sure thing. If so, we shall in 1923 be producing from 20,000,000 to 25,000,000 more tons of steel than we are turning out today.. What country is to furnish this vast increase?. The current belief is, of course, that it must be mainly supplied by the United States.. This is, at least, very probable. But the United States is now depleting its best iron ores at the rate of over 30,000,000 tons a year, which at the present rate of exhaustion means in twenty years fully 500,000,000 tons of exist- ing ore resources. It is not improbable that when this event hap- pens the United Kingdom may resume its primacy to a much larger extent than even the most optimistic can now anticipate." NEW DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE AND LABOR. A pleasant ceremony in the office of Secretary Cortelyou of the new department of commerce and labor attended the transfer in Washington on Thursday last of the several bureaus, most of them having to do with shipping, that are to be included in the new department. The chiefs of all the bureaus, the control of which passed to the new department, gathered in the secretary's office, and in addition there were a number of distinguished people present, including Secretary Moody of the navy department. Secretary Cortelyou made a brief address concerning the objects and aims of the department and there were several responses. In - addition to the bureaus of corporations and manufactures created 'by the new law the department of commerce embraces control of the following: The census bureau, formerly under control of the interior department; the lighthouse establishment, steamboat in- spection service, bureau of navigation, United States shipping commissioners, national bureau of standards, coast and geodetic survey, bureau of immigration and bureau of statistics from the treasury department; the bureau of labor, fish commission and the bureau of foreign commerce, the latter being transferred from the state department. . NEW SYSTEM OF OFFICIAL NUMBERS. A new system of official numbers for American vessels went into effect-on July 1, when the bureau of navigation joined the department of commerce and labor. The new series of numbers begins at 200,000, and hereafter new vessels will be numbered seriatim in the order of application for official number, regardless of the initial letter of the vessel's name, and of rig or motive power. Thus the official number will indicate approximately the date of build of each new vessel hereafter, being permanently marked on its main beam. : In a telegram which reached the. state department last week H. G. Squiers, United States minister at Havana, reported that the coaling station treaty and the treaty defining the status of the Isle of Pines had been signed. The coaling station treaty pro- _ vides for the lease to the United States for the purpose of erecting naval stations tracts of land at Guantanamo, on the southeast coast, and Behia Honda on the northwest coast. The other treaty clears up the doubtful political status of the Isle of Pines by the ~ provision that it shall be under Cuban sovereignty. - :