Trees to Tribunes (1937)

[Music] before tomorrow Chicago Tribune can be printed there must be paper and to make paper there must be trees thus natural production of tomorrow's Tribune begins in a wilderness on the North Shore of the Gulf of st. Lawrence let us journey there 1200 miles from Chicago into the North Country to the forests of the province of Quebec Canada here the Chicago Tribune has acquired vast tracts of timberland more than 2 million acres about the equivalent of the combined area of the states of Delaware and Rhode Island so that it will have a perpetual supply of trees for the manufacture of paper operations in the timber lands are continuous 12 months of the year but in a sense the cycle may be said to begin in the fall when shiploads of supplies are taken from Quebec down the st. Lawrence River to tribune towns on the rim of the wilderness bar once winter comes there is no getting in around except by airplane for snow and ice form impassable barriers in September and October ships some of them part of the Tribune fleet others chartered for the purpose carry a variety of stores down the broad st. Lawrence and across the Gulf to the towns and camps that lie on the edge of a wild frontier east of the eastern boundary of the state of Maine for half a year such Tribune communities as this at shelter Bay are frozen in and everything needed must be taken into the woods before I seals the gates to the outside world shelter Bay first of the communities to be built by the Tribune is a thriving town on the Gulf 400 miles northeast of Quebec and with millions of acres of virgin forest as its backyard so barren is the shoreline that ships must unload into scows and barges which are then told to shore gargles consist of food clothing and tools sacks of cement and bales of hay sugar and yeast butter molasses and beans barrels of flour and hogsheads of salt pork kitchen stoves axes candy and a thousand other articles annual requirements for example run as high as two and a half million pounds of hay and oats three hundred and thirty thousand pounds of potatoes a quarter million pounds of flour 140,000 pounds of pork 900,000 cigarettes and 7,000 pounds of tobacco shelter bay although an outpost of civilization with a population of only about 1,000 still has many big city conveniences such as hot and cold running water central heat an efficient sewer system electric lights and a well-equipped hospital excellent educational facilities are provided by a thoroughly modern school knitting seems to be as popular as it is in Chicago but bread is baked in an outdoor oven no less Hardy pioneers than the intrepid French explorers who sailed along the shore centuries ago the woodsmen and their families enjoy life much as the people do in Chicago life is simple on the North Shore but for both young and old it is a full life [Music] after the supplies have been dropped down the river and across the Gulf from Quebec the next task is to carry them by sledge truck and boat over land and across water to the various logging camps that lie back in what the loggers call the bush less than 20 years ago this was an impenetrable wilderness but today's who clawed your erodes bolts and bridges the backcountry has been made accessible and interior camps have been built at strategic points cash to base of one group of loggers at six months headquarters for the cutting crews is about 20 miles from shelter Bay on the southern tip of 30 mile lake about it lies the forest primeval mile after mile of rugged country in which are great stands of timber awaiting the acts of the woodsman in felling a tree the first operation is to clear away the brush here is a lumberjack notching a tree on the side toward which he wishes it to fall next he uses his saw the opposite side then there's a shout of timber and the tree topples and crashes the small branches or slash are trimmed off and later a burn otherwise they would dry out and constitute an invitation to the deadliest enemy of the florists fire no one is permitted to smoke in the woods and all about a fire guards after the tree has been cut into four foot lengths and stack the logs are carefully examined and stamped by the inspectors or scalars as they're called spruce trees balsam birch poplar and mountain ash are found in Tribune timberlands but only spruce and balsam are cut since they provide the best quality fibers for making newsprint paper every winter more than 2 million trees are cut according to a carefully planned schedule no tree is cut more than 18 inches above its base no young trees are felled and reforestation is encouraged though it is accomplished by nature so efficiently that no prolonged assistance from man is required to promote regrowth one day in the late autumn the wind comes from the north bringing snow and sending the mercury toward the bottom of the thermometer then until April the north country is held in the young relaxed grip of winter with temperatures as low as 50 degrees below zero days are short for not so far away as the Arctic Circle and work must move along briskly an important activity is that assigned to the cruising team travelling by dogsled the men choose a site and pitch their tent then they go through the woods measuring trees and marking dolls that are from 80 to 100 years old and hence are ready for the woodsman's axe cash too is now wrapped in a fluffy blanket of snow but the cabins are cozy and warm and the food is plentiful no need to call them twice swinging an axe in the woods in winter is guaranteed to work up a first-rate appetite not much dinner table conversation but a wholehearted devotion to the matter at hand music is a popular entertainment chopping trees all day doesn't in the least attraction their enthusiasm for an hour or so of skiing all through the winter the harvesting of trees goes on in a race against the elements in order to cut the scheduled volume of timber before the coming of spring getting the timber out of the woods is a difficult problem some of the logs are transported by horse-drawn slabs to rivers and lakes where they're piled on the ice to await the spring thaw and where the banks of rivers and lakes are inaccessible to sleds logs are sent to bargaining down icy shoots you with the end of winter the waterway is open to traffic and like takes on a quick and temple now the streams leap and roar and the great harvest of logs cut in the winter and piled on the ice continues its journey from the forest to shelter Bay and other towns built by the Tribune on the Gulf of st. Lawrence occasionally the frozen logs are difficult to dislodge and then dynamite is used to break the jam and set the camera on its way at the mouth of the river the logs are stopped by booms and fed onto conveyors which carry them to the parking drums these are huge steel cylinders in which the logs revolve and toss against one another by friction the bark is removed and the logs emerged slick and shiny then they're conveyed to the waiting ships and piled in the holes and on the deck at Franklin a hundred miles of Seoul southwest of shelter Bay is another Tribune town here logs dropped from a sluice directly into the ship's hold where crews arrange them in shipshape manner a few miles for the south is como Bay the newest Tribune settlement where the Tribune is building a new town power plants and paper mill all during the navigation season from june to october ships are loaded and push off for the Tribune paper mill that's our old at the western end of Lake Ontario the trip requires from a week to ten days during a single season as much as 150,000 cords of pulp wood are shipped by boat from the timberlands to the mill where they're converted into newsprint paper as soon as a steamer arrives at the mill the logs are lifted from the hold by dereks then they're picked up by a chain conveyor and stacked in mountainous piles containing as much as a hundred thousand cords of wood such a reserve stock is needed since the tribune consumes more than 2,000 tons of paper in a single week time was when the logs were handled by men then this ingenious device the orange peel grab was invented logs are now carried from the piles to the conveyors more quickly and with little hazard to the workmen the grab picks up a load in its jaws swings it around and deposits it onto the cable conveyor and a transfer Junction the logs go on to another conveyor that carries them to rotating washing drums then they're discharged into a sorting conveyor and inspected by men who select logs for both mechanical and chemical processes newsprint used by the Tribune consists of approximately twenty-five percent chemical poke and seventy-five percent mechanical pulp mechanical pulp gives paper the porous light characteristics that enable it to absorb paint on high-speed newspaper presses chemical Pope gives it strength and flexibility large that pass inspection are placed on the salt tables and are cut to two foot lengths those with slight defects are placed on the carriage of the woodpecker a name given this machine by the Tribune engineers who developed it at the mill all defects are removed before they move on from the sorting conveyor some logs go to the chipper which reduces them to small chips which are sent to the digester to be mixed with acids in the chemical or sulfite process complete control of chips and acid is maintained in the sulfite digester in order to obtain a uniform poke there is no deviation from the highest standards throughout the mill to ensure a superior grade of strong white paper logs for the mechanical process are placed in a battery of grinders each of which can transform 12 cords of wood into high-grade pulp every 24 hours the logs are forced under pressure against huge grindstones water flows over them continuously and from the bottom of the machine issues a steady stream of pulp and frequent intervals samples are taken for analysis of the check on quality both mechanical and sulfide pulps are thoroughly combined in mixing tanks with chemicals to color and brighten the paper the props are then beaten together more water is added and the mixture is pumped into the papermaking machine where it flows on to wire screens that form an endless belt as it passes over the screens the water drains off and the forward motion of the screens clauses the top fibers to interlace and become taper when the paper leaves the screens it passes between two large rollers that squeeze out still more water then it goes through another series of rollers that squeeze and dry it further finally it passes through 32 drying cylinders filled with live steam and covered with blankets to absorb any remaining moisture the final touch is given by steel calendar rollers that polish the paper and give it a smoother finish next it is rewound on steel spindles and wrapped in extra heavy paper made at the mill from the course of fiber screened from the newsprint paper has been made from trees the next step is to transport it from the paper mill to tribune tower into the hold of one of the tribunes fleet of ships go the rolls of paper weighing approximately 1,800 pounds each then across lakes erie st. clair huron and michigan moves the parade of paper to Tribune warehouses near the mouth of the Chicago River a few more steps and trees will have become Tribune's thus man's struggle with the elements comes closer to fruition soon by the magic of printers ink that paper will live as a Tribune instead of a tree will become the pages on which will be recorded completely and without compromise the events of the day throughout the world here at the tribunes own dock the ship's tie up then the rolls of paper are lifted from the whole two conveyors that take them in Swift procession to the warehouses where there is stored a stock of newsprint paper sufficient to satisfy the needs of several months while the ships are being unloaded some of the roles are sent directly to tribune tower by tunnel rolls proceed from the ship by gravity to the tunnel in the warehouse where they were carried down a steep incline by a cog railway during the winter months when navigation is impossible thousands of tons of newsprint or removed from the warehouses heavy rolls are handled with ease by tiering machines that can be moved to any section of the warehouses paper is rolled from the stack to the machine that lowers the roll to a dolly on the tracks of the railway the tunnel connecting the warehouse on the river's edge to tribune tower on Michigan Avenue is a quarter of a mile long and 60 feet underground hundreds of rolls of paper are moved every night at the rate of two a minute they attain a speed of 35 miles an hour before they pass over a braking device that slows them down as they reach the unloading platform in the sub-basement of tribune tower there a mechanical tipping device unloads the rolls onto a ramp down which they move to an automatic elevator the elevator is geared to the same speed of two rolls a minute and so the paper moves continuously from the warehouse through the tunnel up the elevator to the floor of the real room underneath the presses the empty dollies move automatically from the platform to a compressed air gun that starts them on their return trip through the tunnel to the warehouse as the rolls are unloaded from the elevator on to the real room floor they're carefully unwrapped and inspected and rolled on to press room dollies on an average weeknight the presses consume more than 275 rolls representing 458 thousand pounds of newsprint paper each reel holds three rolls of paper and as fast as one roll is exhausted Pressman fit a new roll into place and lock it into position all this activity is characteristic of Tribune to parents because lakes and straights are frozen in the winter months The Tribune by such methods ensures the production of millions of Tribune's every week the year around founded in 1847 the tribune is chicago's oldest newspaper from its modest beginnings to its present service to the community and to the nation it is an outstanding example of the American principle of private initiative within Tribune Tower the staff goes about the daily business of producing a newspaper across the city desk passes the news of metropolitan Chicago to be scanned by the copy readers over this department presides the city editor directing his forces saw that the news of the day will be accurately reported interestingly presented from the Press Association's and hundreds of Tribune correspondents comes the news of the country by telegraph to be handled here a similar desk is in charge of the cable editor to whom comes news from outside the United States sent by Press Association's and by Tribune correspondents in foreign cities 24 hours a day the cables bring the day's history as it is made and reported across the seas under the direction of the sports editor our experts who write the story of baseball and football of golf and tennis of horse racing in boxing and all the other recreational activities of this sports-loving nation still another important department is that of finance and business we're trained writers present the news of markets and trade directed by the Metropolitan editor are five separate neighborhood newspapers which are a part of the sunday tribune and here is the sunday room itself a busy department where under the direction of the sunday editor are many sub departments and features on all topics of special interest writers keep Tribune readers well-informed whatever is worthwhile in the Arts and Sciences is interestingly reported by trained observers some of our people the world over saying and doing the Tribune readers should know about if they are to live happier richer and more useful lives seeking to answer that all-inclusive question such is the objective of Tribune reporters cameramen feature writers and editors [Music] and supervising these various men and women each trained in his or her special field while the assistant editor in chief and the managing editor who coordinate their output into one harmonious whole ready for use by the writers is a splendidly equipped reference library and a reference file room containing more than 3 million clippings 700,000 photographs and 75,000 engravings long ago the Tribune realized the value of pictures in bringing people and events vividly and unforgettably to its meters and so every day scores of pictures of pretty some of them supplied by photographic services some taken on the scene by Tribune photographers and still others posed in the tribunes completely equipped studio watch for last over vital characters in the lives of readers are Tribune comics sometimes as light in humor but more frequently drawn to focus attention on a civic our national problem the editorial cartoon is given front-page position by the Tribune to make the engravings from which Tribune illustrations are printed the pictures to be reproduced whether drawings or photographs or placed before a camera in the engraving rule the shutter is snap and the image is recorded on a sensitized negative glass plate the light from a flaming art transfers the image to the zinc plate after it has been powdered with Dragon's Blood and heated the zinc plate is etched in an acid bath removed from the bath the plate is washed and goes to the router a man with a sure I and a steady hand who cuts away excess metal it is then mounted on a metal base now the engraving of the cartoon or strip or photograph is ready for proofing in order that the artists the editors the engravers and all others concerned may inspect the finished product you