Senate Hearings Confirm Low Cost Alcohol From Wood, But Not o[ Building and Remodeling Wood Alcohol

Washington, March lO.-There may be some argument, and apparently there is, as to the availability of money for home building or home modernizing, but certainly there is no questioning the fact that norv is the economical time to build or remodel. Such is the information that has been afforded a large group of Senators, repeatedly and repeatedly- by gne specialist after another throughout recent w-e^eks. These men, bankers, building and loan association offrcers, insurance men, most of thim executives in the country's most influential monetary institutions or repre- senting state and other sectional groups of such institutions have appeared to give testimony-before a sub-committee of the powerful Senate Committee on Banking and Currency which is considering the bill to create a naiional mortgage discounting institution to be known as the Federal Home Loan Bank.

The Mr. Average Citizen who wants to knorv what his banker or other credit source really thinks about building or remodeling at this time should listen in on some of these hearings. Whenever the question is raised the answer is a strongly affirmative "y.r," that now is the time to spend on the home.

"I answ-er your question, Senator, by saying, certainlya most affirmative certainly," replied one witness. "My institution has helped thousands to own their homes, and through all of our years of operation I have never seen a more favorable opportunity for creating home values. The young man who wants a home, or the family that needs home_repairs is cgazy not to take advantage oi the present incredibly low cost of materials. We know home -values, we know material costs, rve have observed business cvcles and we say that for those rvho can obtain the funds oi the credit, this is the smart time for them to invest in their home."

The question of whether this is or is not the time to build is incidental to the main issues raised at the hearings as to whether there is a need for new mortgage money and whether the proposed bill is the proper vviy-of producing it. Some bankers and insurance men are oppbsing thE present bill. Nevertheless, they agree that this is the time to build or improve. Building and loan, homestead and similar associations, lumber and other building materials groups and those who have dealt more intimately with the home building problem, including the Presideni's Conference on lfome Building and Home Ownership, generally favor the bill. Their records indicate there lsin acute shortage of available mortgage money for home building and home owning purposes. They also say that now is the time to build or remodel and urge that the Home Loan Bank will make this possible for thousands of families.

Lumberman Makes Slow Recovery

Carrol W. Smith, vice-president of Western Plywoods Co., Martinez, who was seriously iniured in an automobile accident on the Redwood Highrivay-last December, is still in the hospital in San Francisco.

Attends Utah Convention

A. C. Horner of the western office of the National Lumber Manufacturers Association, San Fran,cisco, returned March 14 from a two rveeks' trip. in the course of which he attended the convention of the Utah Lumber Dealers' Association in Salt Lake City, March 4 and 5. He also visited Las Vegas, Nev., Los Angeles, San Diego, and Encinitas in ,connection with building ,code work.

NOT WOOD ALCOHOL, despite its origin. Ethyl or grain alcohol, the alcoholic basis of wines or beer, may now be made from wood in commercial quantity and quality, we are told by The Industrial Bulletin of Arthur D. Little, Inc., (Cambridge, Mass.).

Alcohol was made from cellulose, the material of woody fiber, over a century ago, but despite continued endeavor by chemists, no process capable of commercial development has been discovered until recently. Nor,r' we have it, according to The Bulletin. We are told:

"One hundred and thirteen years ago the celebrated French chemist, Braconnot, astonished the members of the French Academy by exhibiting samples of fermentable sugar and alcohol which he had made through the action of sulfuric acid upon linen rags.

"The disclosure did not appreciably raise the m:irket value of old shirts, but Braconnot pointed out that it did reveal a method of making grain alcohol from wood. This Arnould succeeded in doing in 1854.

"Ever since that time there has been an almost continuous series of efforts to develop the method into a process capable of commercial operation at a profit.

"None of these, however, succeeded in permanently establishing themselves, although shortly before the war the du Ponts built a plant at Georgetown, South Carolina, which operated successfully for several years under the Ewen ct Tomlinson patents, producing ethyl alcohol of the highest grade from Southern pine-wood waste. During the same period another and larger plant was constructed at Fullerton, Louisiana, by Standard Alcohol Company, to operate the same process. Although yields of tol gallons of exceptionally high quality ethyl alcohol were secured per ton of wood waste, as contrasted with only Zfi gallons from a bushel of corn, operation proved unprofitable chiefly because a sufficient supply of wood waste to permit operation at anything like capacity could not be secured from the only near-by sawmill.

"A new and evidently far more efficient method is now disclosed by two English chemists. Auden and.Joshua, in the issue of The Journal of the Society of Chemical Industry (London). It has the advantage of permitting continuous rather than batch operation, as formerly, and yields of alcohol as high as 35-4O gallons per long ton of dry wood are reported. If these can be substantiated in large-scale operations, the way would seem to be open for the production of alcohol at low prices and in vast amount. and a new source of income madi available to the languishing lumber industry.

"The principle underlying all these processes is that under the action of heat and pressure in the presence of acid a large proportion of the material of the wood is diverted into fermentable sugars, which, when extracted, yield a solution very similar to molasses, and which is subsequent- ly fermented and distilled in the manner usual with molasses itself. The product should not be confounded with wood alcohol, since it is identical with the potable spirit produced from grain."

W. L. AISTHORPE VISITS S. F.

W. L. Aisthorpe, o{ the Aisthorpe Lumber Co.. Chico, recently spent a felv days in San Francisco on business. Mr. Aisthorpe is one of the most progressive dealers in Northern California, and he is assisted in the running of the yard by his two sons, Harry and Fred. He reports that considerable home building is being held up in his locality by inability to obtain loans.