Matches

small splints of wood coated at one end with chemicals easily set on fire. The first matches were made by dipping one end in sulphur or brimstone. These brimstone matches were lighted by sparks made by striking steel and flint together, and caught in tinder or dry linen scraped fine like lint. The first improvement was a match dipped chiefly in potash and ignited by sulphuric acid carried in a bottle for the purpose. About 1829 an English chemist announced the invention of lucifer matches, coated chiefly with sulphur and phosphorus, and ignited by rubbing on any dry, gritty surface. Before the invention of matches it was necessary to keep fire over night by covering up coals with ashes. In case the fire went out live coals must be brought from a neighbor's, even miles away.

As late as 1860 matches were made in blocks the size of a match box and were split not quite apart. The heads were so inflammable that in detaching one match or in rubbing the palm of the hand carelessly across the heads the entire box was set on fire not infrequently, and was a total loss.

Safety matches are made by coating the match with one chemical and coating a striking surface with the other chemical required to produce a fire. Matches may be dipped in potash, for instance, and carried in a box on which a strip of sandpaper has been coated with phosphorus. The matches cannot be set on fire without rubbing the potash end on the phosphorus. We import about $150,000 worth of safety matches a year from Sweden.

In France, the making of matches is carried on by the government at an annual profit of $4,000,000. The Japanese are experts in the manufacture of matches. They supply the entire Chinese empire, the latter having no suitable wood for the purpose. Civilization uses 3,000,000 matches a minute. 50,000 matches crackle every second. Americans use as many matches as all the rest of the world put together.

American matches are made of clear white pine. A match factory is a large establishment employing many people. The pine must be of the best quality. It is first sawed into heavy plank and is piled in yards to season thoroughly. When dry the planks are cut into match lengths and all knots are discarded. The blocks are fed to the machine by placing them on end on a conveyor. The blocks come under a set of forty-eight circular knives that rise and fall like the tick of a watch-four times to the second. Each time the knives descend forty-eight splints are gouged off. Each time the knives rise forty-eight splints, still upright, are forced an eighth of an inch up into as many holes in a flat steel link. An examination of a match shows that one end has been squeezed into a hole. The steel links form an endless chain that carries the splints in groups on a long journey. First they pass through a bath of paraffin to make the wood catch fire readily. Next the ends of the splints pass over rollers that elevate chlorate of potash from a reservoir, and, after the chain has traveled a while to dry the potash, the splints, still standing like bristles in a brush, rub across a second set of rollers that apply the phosphorus that ignites with friction. Finally, over half an hour after the splints were thrust into the link, they are punched out by a set of pins and fall on a belt that carries them to packing tables. Here girls with nimble fingers fill the boxes, wrap and pack for market. Two men are able to operate two machines and look after all the belts, carriers, and baths. With the aid of five packers they turn out 24,000 matches a minute, or, if there be no stop or miscarriage, 14,400,000 matches in a day of ten hours.

The annual United States output of lucifer or friction matches, as ascertained by the last census, reaches the incredible number of 1,440,000,000 boxes. In the United States some forty manufactories have been united in what is known as the Diamond Match Company, with a capital of $15,000,000. Its principal factories are at Oshkosh, Wisconsin. The largest single factory is at Barberton, Ohio. The extent of the American match industry, according to the twelfth census, is as follows:

See Fire; Flint