Brown and White Vol. 18 no. 27

              meeting of a s c e the annual meeting of the am erican society of civil engineers was held on wednesday and thurs day of this week at new york on thursday the society made an ex cursion by special train to bethle hem here they went through the plant of the bethlehem steel co and the members were guests of the steel company for luncheon in the afternoon a number of the members visited the university to see the equipment and grounds and especially to see the laboratory which mr fritz has given us senior elections at the elections for the senior class book committee held on wednesday noon in saucon hall the following men were elected : t r davies o it smith r f crump j l becker c f lincoln fi d kerr and r f wood much curiosity has been aroused at the storage of some structural steel in the lot on the corner of broadhead and packer ayes this steel will be used in the construc tion of the bridge at new street and is stored at the present site until the spring continued on third page prof franklin talks on principles of the gyroscope the regular meeting of the me chanical society on wednesday evening was unusually well attend ed due no doubt to the main fea ture of the evening — a lecture by prof franklin on the theory and application of the gyroscope for the convenience of the lecturer the business portion of the meeting was transacted in the large lecture room of the physics laboratory after which the major portion of the assemblage adjourned to the regular meeting room in williams hall for a little social time following the call to order by president crump the minutes of the preceding meeting were read by secretary baumgartner 11 and accepted as read after the routine business had been transacted the first speaker of the evening mr p a lambert 12 was called mr lambert's paper dealt en tirely upon the the discussion of the method employed by the inter ocean steel co of illinois in the conversion of sera iron into tires for railway cars the president of the inter-ocean co by the way is a lehigh m e of the class of 92 while the superintendent is an alumnus of the class of 90 mr lambert having spent the greater portion of the last summer in the employ of this company was well qualified to discuss his subject which was handled admirably and liberally applauded prof franklin's lecture was next on the program and it was most interesting and instructive the lecturer first endeavored to thoroughly explain the fundament al principles of the gyroscope after which he discussed its application first for the elimination of rock ing in ocean plying vessels and sec ond to the principle of the mono rail car all the kinks in the lec ture were illustrated with large lan tern slides and could not after the professor's explanation but have been perfectly understood by all present prof franklin also had quite an extensive assortment of mechanical contrivances which he continually employed in illustrating his theory the real feature of the evening was the actual operation of a miniature monorail car on a suspended rope this lecture was the same that the lecturer had re cently given in new york before a gathering of the leading scientific men of the country he was very enthusiastically applauded power from peat was the sub ject of the paper by mr p finn civil engineering dept testing mine materials during the past few days a series of interesting tests have been made by the civil engineering de partment in the fritz laboratory these tests are being made under the direct supervision of mr wil liam griffith 76 and mr eli tay lor conner both of scranton pa the tests which are being made are to determine the supporting power of columns of various mine ma terials the history regarding the insti tution of these tests is interesting and briefly is as follows : for a number of years there have oc curred in scranton numerous cave ins clue to a portion of the city's being built over the coal mines these cave ins have been the cause of serious loss in the past and a constant source of danger but nothing organized was done to wards their prevention recently however there occurred a collapse under one of the public schools that caused one corner of the building to settle in a threatening manner fortunately the collapse occurred on sunday when there were no children in the building — otherwise the serious result due to a panic could only be conjectured this last cave in aroused the people of scranton to the great danger existing and there was much agitation for steps towards making conditions safe as a re sult of investigations the mayor of the city consulted john hays ham mond the celebrated mining en gineer with regard to the situation mr hammond's advice was to ap point an advisory board to study conditions and make recommenda tions for improvement following this advice the following board was appointed : w a lathrop lehigh 75 ; john flays hammond ; l b stillwell lehigh lion 07 of new york ; r a f penrose of phila and d w brenton presi dent a 1 m e of denver this board has appointed mr griffith and mr conner to make tests on the material available for mine supports mr griffith is a lehigh graduate of the class of 76 and at present is a consulting min ing engineer and geologist mr conner is a mine superintendent and manager of considerable ex perience the tests made have been on columns of the same character and proportions used in the mines the materials are sandstone slate bony coal mine props fire clay crushed stone coal culm and the like the continued on third page profs merriman mckibben and w j douglas 94 editors within the past week there has been published by william h wi ley & sons the american civil en gineers pocketbook the publica tion of this book is of unusual in terest to lehigh men in that there have been three lehigh men con nected with it prof mansfield merriman prof f p mckibben and walter j douglas 94 in scope the book is quite similar to most engineers hand-books there are thirteen sections to the book each written by a man of recognized authority on the subject of which he has written prof merriman is editor-in-chief of the book and in addition to performing the ordinary duties as editor he is responsible for the section on mathematical tables the various sections as they ap pear in the book are mathematical p nmes by mansfield merriman m a s c e ; surveying geodesy railroad location charles b reed associate prof civil eng at m i t ; roads and railroads walter loring webb m a s c e ; materials of construction ru dolph p miller superintendent of buildings borough of manhattan new york city plain and rein forced concrete frederick e turneaure dean of college of en gineering university of wiscon sin ; masonry foundations earth works ira o baker prof of civil eng u of 111 ; masonry and tim ber structure walter j douglas m a s c e ; steel structures frank p mckibben prof civil eng lehigh university hydrau lics pumping water power gard ner s williams prof civil hy draulic and sanitary engineering univ of mich ; water supply sewage and irrigation allen haz en m a s c e ; dams acque ducts canals shafts tunnels al fred noble and silas it woodard m's a m s.c e ; mathematics and mechanics edward maurer prof mech univ wis ; physics meteorology weights and meas ures bureau of standards index by clinton l bogert jim a m s c e prof merriman's work consist ed of editing the book his section on mathematical tables includes the usual data found in tables of this character arranged in easily accessible form prof mckibben's section of the book deals with steel structures a subject with which he is particular ly well versed and which he pre sents in a clear and lucid manner continued on second page tne brown and white no 27 lehigh university south bethlehem pa friday january 20 1911 engineers hand book published january meet of mechanicals important tests at fritz lab vol xviii electricals hold society meeting members listen to interesting papers at january meeting at the regular monthly meeting of the electrical engineering so ciety three addresses were made the attendance at this meeting was not what it should have been and the men are urged to be more in terested in these meetings as many side points may be gotten from them professor franklin gave a short talk on the faulty design of dy namos and showed several exam ples of failure due to poor design or a mistake in design wilson 13 gave a good account of lighting on trains he out lined the various kinds of train lighting and also gave the advant ages and disadvantages of each type stair 11 gave a more complete account of the senior electricals trip than that recently published in this paper and filled in the spaces with amusing anecdotes after the meeting the customary feed was served in the library the question of admitting fresh men to the society has not been fully determined as yet and due notice will be given when a definite conclusion has been reached