Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 90.djvu/876

 Wooden Ships to Save

The most important principle in wood con- struction discovered since Noah built the Ark

��By Joseph Brinker

��England

���Int. Film Scrv.

��New England has witnessed a rebirth of the shipbuilding industry. One thousand wooden vessels are being built in yards which have been idle since the days of the great American merchant marine

��SHIPS, ships and then more ships is the crying need of Great Britain to her new ally America, as expressed re- cently by Lloyd George, in a speech to Americans in London. England's fore- most statesmen realize the seriousness of the submarine problem. Submarines are being built faster than they are being sunk; merchant tonnage is being sunk fast er than it is being built. The submarine must be conquered.

England looks to America for help. New merchant marines must be launched quickly if they are to be of any avail. Without ships, we cannot deliver the supplies that we must throw into the balance.

Yankee ingenuity has risen to the occasion. While ship steel is scarce because of the great demands upon the steel industry for ammunition, rails and other kindred supplies, wood is plentiful and readily available. The problem thus resolves itself into one of providing the means

���William T. Donnelly, the designer of the new wooden ship capable of carrying more than five thousand tonnage

860

��whereby wood can be utilized for ships of sufficient tonnage to make their operation commercially feasible.

William T. Donnelly, a New York engineer and naval architect, has devised a construction for wooden ships capable of carrying 5,500 tons of freight, or approxi- mately twice the amount which any type of wooden ship heretofore built has been able to carry. His new design provides for a vessel 350 feet long, 50 feet beam and 30 feet deep. The new type of boat is almost entirely of wood. In each ship 1,500,000 board feet of southern yel- low pine take the place of 2,300 tons of steel.

Why Steel Took the Place of Wood

In the past, wooden ships have been driven off the seas by vessels made of steel not because the former were made of wood but because wooden ships had to be made smaller. Why smaller? Because our naval architects did

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