TAPPI Discusses "Paper Prevents Battlenecks

Eastman, ODT Director, Hints End of Cross Hauling— Gay of OCS Urges Elimination of Waste—Meeting Featured by Displays of New Wartime Packaging

A Staff Report

T^EATURING the slogan "Paper Prevents Battlenecks", the Technical Associa­

tion of the Pulp and Paper Industry met the week of February 15 at New York's commodious Hotel Commmodore. Os­tensibly, it was the 28th annual meeting and the usual business of electing officers, reading papers, and listening to after-din­ner speakers went on apace. Actually, however, the TAPPI members met t o worry and to comfort one another about the war, government control, and to let loose a tremendous blast of publicity about the necessity of paper in the pressing busi­ness of the moment—that of knocking out the Axis.

The association's blues were not allayed when Joseph B. Eastman, director of the Office of Defense Transportation, hinted a t the Monday luncheon that "cross haul­ing" of goods might be stopped because of transportation shortages. Eastman said that though it was a principle of business in the United States to allow anyone to sell where he could, the demand for efficiency of wartime transportation was forcing his office to consider all possibilities for im­proving conditions. One way was to reduce cross-hauling. Difficult to accom­plish by legislation because so much is involved and there would be so many up­sets in markets and manpower allotments, Eastman asked industry to solve the prob­lem itself. The association also heard i t ­self praised for its excellent record thus far in saving transportation facilities through the use of heavier capacity loading and making packaging and trucking changes.

E. R. Gay, of the Office of Civilian Sup­ply, followed Mr. Eastman with a num­ber two blow when he remar&ed that not all paper and paper board production was essential to the war effort. Our best esti­mate of requirements is somewhat below present levels. He said:

You can count on the active assistance of the Office of Civilian Supply in meeting your problems. When it becomes neces­sary, we will see that mills making the most urgently needed grades get the first call on available supplies. You should try to make the wanted grades—strive to make the maximum use of available pulp by using waste by avoiding waste.

Completing the one-two-three punch was Arthur G. Wakeman, chief of the Pulp and Paper Section, WPB. He said that needs were 15,000,000 tons of paper and board ; supply of wood pulp would be

8,500,000 tons, and newsprint, already cut 10 per cent, would be cut a like amount in the second quarter of the year. To the assembled Tappites this meant that full plant capacity would not be used during the war and somewhere—idle machines and nonprofits.

"This is a challenge t o the industry," said Mr. Wakeman, "and a magnificent op­portunity for it to give tangible proof of its ingenuity." T o the manufacturers who were already doing without chlorine and many other chemicals, the challenge, which was to use waste paper and other waste fibers up to the limit to eke out the supplies of wood pulp, seemed not at all difficult of attainment.

Part of the business was the election of officers. Members had voted for the re­election of Ralph A. Hayward, Kalamazoo Vegetable Parchment Co., a s president, and the office of vice president went to Vance T. Edwardes of the International Paper Co.

Receives TAPPI M e d a l

To the first president of the associa­tion, Harry Fletcher, went the TAPPI medal, the eleventh to be given in the 28-years of the group's existence. Granted specifically for technical achievements benefiting pulp, paper, and paper board, the medal was presented t o Mr. Fletcher, president of the Fletcher Paper Co., by Robert B. Wolf of the Weyerhaeuser Timber Co.

Keying to the Battleneck slogan and mutely expressing the hopes and fears of the industry was an exhibit, the first ever attempted, of paper and paper products. Here was displayed in serried row and consecutive booths the paper ammunition of war. In paper packs were the rations of the Quartermaster subsistence labora­tory for mountain, jungle, and desert troops. Each ration is packed to meet different conditions and contains differ­ent foods. Here was shown the methods of packaging dried onion soup, preserved butter, salt tablets, Ration D cigarets, and the myriad other foods which the Army requires for the soldier's emergency diet.

Paper to replace metal containers was illustrated by paper packages of yellow fever vaccine, pistol balls, and tobacco. Other items now made from paper or pulp products, each replacing a critical material were gaskets to replace cork, shipping con­

tainers to replace jute and burlap, plastic tubes for dental cream to replace metal foils, a n d paper cans for tooth powder to replace steel.

The Army engineers showed how spare parts are wrapped in paper and then treated with chemicals which impreg­nated the covering and made a water­proof, rust-preventing package. On dis­play w a s a Browning .50M 2 machine gun, wrapped in a cellophane envelope. Tucked in the envelope at strategic places were paper tubes of dehydrating salts.

Ray o n , offspring of chemical pulp, came in for a great deal of attention and shown were rayon items for varied uses such as aerial t o w targets, and flare, bomb, frag­mentation, and naval mine-laying para­chutes. Lint-free wiping cloths for clean­ing the range finders, binoculars, and peri­scopes o f the Navy illustrated to the pa­trons th.e precise needs and interlocking demands of modern war.

Startling, too, was the almost empty booth which was to feature the use of laminated paper in airplane construction. Here, signs said, were wing-rib sections, fuselage doors for the AT-6, hatch chan­nels, a n d trailing edge ribs. Though these were not on display, they bore testi­mony t o the adaptability of a paper in­dustry a t war.

M i n i n g & Metallurgical Engineers

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program., twice expanded, now provides for nearly 100 times that amount annually. The goal announced by the W P B in February 1942 was 362,500 tons per year, because of the development during the year of satisfactory types of incendiary bombs other than magnesium. This ob­jective fcias been somewhat reduced, but the capacity of the plants already built or under construction will be huge.

Mr. Wilson further revealed that only one of t l i e Government's eight new mag­nesium plants was completed, but that, "The progress and operating results of the others are satisfactory and there is little reason t o doubt that all eight will attain full production early in 1943".

Regarding aluminum, Mr. Wilson stated that t h e 1942 production figures were more t h a n three times 1939 production of 163,545 tons and, including recoverable scrap a n d contracted ingot from Canada, the 1943 supply of aluminium for the United States will be over seven times that of 1939. A substantial part of the in­crease w a s said to have occurred during 1942 as the 1941 production was only 307,500 tons.

Regarding the supply of bauxite it was stated tnat many new mines had been opened during the past year, principally in Arkansas. Production of domestic baux­ite jumped from 375,307 tons in 1939 to 900,000 tons in 1941. This increased tre­mendously in 1942 and is going higher.

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