[Newspaper]
Publication: The Anacortes American
Anacortes, WA, United States
vol. 20, no. 35, p. 1;2, col. 1-5;1-2
GLASS FACTORY
SOON TO START
WILL EMPLOY A FORCE OF
100 MEN AND WILL RUN
TWO SHIFTS, NIGHT AND DAY
ALL RAW MATERIAL TO BE
FOUND ON ORCAS ISLAND
CAN BE DELIVERED IN
ANACORTES FOR $2.50 PER TON
Will Have the Tremendous Advantage
of Escaping the Excessive Fright [sic] Freight
Charges on Glass (Lowest Feight [sic] Freight
Rate From Pittsburg Is $15 per Ton)
Finished Glassware $75 per Ton.
The Machinery and equipment of the Anacortes Glass company's plant is being overhauled, and, without doubt, will begin to operate within the next month or two. When once under way there is not a single valid reason why the Anacortes Glass Fastory [sic] Factory should not operate at a good profit and work a shift of 100 men night and day.
About 200,000 tons of glass are used annually on the Pacific coast, and thus far one only factory operating, that at San Francisco, produces about 10,000 tons, leaving a balance of 190,000 tons, which must be purchased on the East with all the added cost of high freight and breakage.
The situation at Anacortes is ideal for a glass factory, and nature has so abundantly stored the raw materials for glass manufacture in these islands right at a convenient salt water port that it seems as is if a glass factory in Anacortes must operate at a large profit.
Plant of the Anacortes Glass Company Soon to Commence Operations
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The raw materials used in glass manufacture are sand, lime and soda ash. The Anacortes Glass company owns a large deposit of silica rock on Orcas island. The company also owns a bed of lime rock. This latter, in particular, is of very much better quality that the average lime rock in the East.
The process of manufacture at Anacortes will be to grind the silica rock to the consistency of sand and mix it with the lime rock similarly treated. The materials are mixed in the proportion of 100 pounds of sand to 33 pounds of lime. The cost of these materials, ground and delivered at the factory will cost about $2.50 per ton, a price, considering the superiority of the island limestone, which is lower than the average cost of the same materials in Indiana or Pennsylvania.
Crude petroleum will be the fuel used. Oil is cheaper and more effective than coal or wood, and can be purchased in tanks at Anacortes for 3 cents a gallon.
Nature has bestowed a protective tariff on Anacortes glass that will count tremendously from month to month. The lowest freight rate on glass from Pittsburg and St. Paul is $15 per ton. Electric light globes carry a freight rate of $50 per ton and finished glassware of $75. The significance of the situation is that glass of a superior quality can be manufactured at Anacortes as cheaply as in the East, and, at the same time, can find abundant market up to 200,000 tons annually, right on the Pacific coast, at transportation charges which are only a tithe of the cost of bringing glass from the East.
The factory in Anacortes is located most advantageously, being on the Great Northern railroad and but a block from tidewater on Fidalgo bay. The plant is completed and ready for operation and has cost the company $30,000 and is paid for.
The buildings cover an area of 21,500 square feet and consist of a furnace house, 60x120; a warehouse, 60x120; oven house, 27x70; material building, 40x70; engine and boiler house, 30x34; blacksmith shop, 16x20; building for rock crusher and rolls, 20x24; and office building, 22x24; also a concrete oil tank built in the ground to hold 20,000 gallons of crude oil.
The company has an up-to-date continuous tank furnace, having a melting capacity of 30 tons and working capacity of 15 tons daily, and is one of the very best glass furnaces for its size in the United States, the cost of furnace and annealing ovens being $10,000.
The whole equipment is modern and up-to-date and is the best that money can buy. Glass bottles, fruit jars and insulators will be principally mae on machines operated by compressed air, but druggists' bottles will be made in moulds blown by the mouth.
Glass blowers who have worked in the Eastern factories have been engaged to work here as soon as operations commence.
Another furnace, the size and capacity of the present one, will he put in during the summer of 1910 and both furnaces when running will keep 100 men employed.
Below are given the details of cost of manufacture and the freight and selling price of glass. These figures can be readily verified, and on account of their dependable character are significant of the splendid profits which may be expected from glass manufacture in this city:
Cost of making 8,000 20-oz. insulators
in two shifts of 9 hours each:
7600 lbs of sand at $2.50 per ton $ 9.50
2600 lbs lime at $2.50 per ton 3.25
2600 lbs soda ash at $27... 35.10
1200 gals. oil for melting glass
at 3¢ per gal................. 36.00
Pressman and gather wages at
$3 per M ...................... 24.00
6 boys to carry insulators to
annealing ovens ............ 6.00
2 engineers at $3.50........ 7.00
2 furnacemen ................. 5.00
2 batchmen ..................... 5.00
2 common laborers.......... 4.00
Superintendent ................ 5.00
Office expenses ............... 5.00
40 barrels to pack insulators in
at. 25¢ ............................ 10.00
Freight on 5 tons of insulators
to terminal points ........... 15.15
______
Selling price of 5000 20-oz.
insulators. f. o. b Seattle, Portland
or San Francisco......$320.00
Cost of manufacture 8000
insulators ................. 170.00
_______
Profit one day run.....$150.00
Cost of making 50 gross bottles in two
shifts of 9 hours each:
7600 lbs sand at $2.50 per ton... $ 9.50
2600 lbs lime at $2.30 per ton... 3.25
2600 lbs ash soda at $27 ton..... 35.10
12 boys to carry bottles to
annealing ovens .................... 12.00
2 men to pack and sort bottles.. 5.00
2 men to tend annealing ovens.. 5.00
Freight on 3 tons of bottles... 15.15
Cost of blowing 30 gross
bottles at $1.60 per gross....... 80.00
______
Selling price 50 gross bottles
at $5.50................................ 275.00
Cost of manufacture............ 165.00
_______
Profit...................................$110.00
Profit one day run insulators.. 150.00
Profit one day run bottles...... 110.00
_______
Total profit one day............ $ 260.00
Profit on ten months' run..... $ 67,600
Manager's salary.............. 1,800
Sales agent‘s salary.......... 1,500
Sales agent‘s expenses...... 1,200
Depreciation on plant. ...... 3,100 < _______
$ 7,600
Total net profit on ten months run .............$60,000
Which is 120 per cent on the capital invested and $30,000 of this amount is made on account of the saving on freight. This estimate is based on an output of 10 tons of glass per day. Five tons of glass being made into insulators and five tons in bottles.
The buildings and machinery of the Anacortes Glass plant cost $30,000, and is paid for. Aside from a few small current bills, the company owes nothing. There is no watered stock, and, so far as we have been able to learn, the affairs of the company are being administered in a thoroughly business-like manner. Following is the statement of their financial condition as it has recently been submitted to the banks:
Statement of financial condition of Anacortes Glass company January 1. 1910:
Cost of plant at Anacortes
(labor and material) .......$ 25,624.75
Real estate ..................... 3,850.00
Miscellaneous expenditures.. 2,832.49
Bills and accounts receivable 1,450.00
Raw material on hand ............ 309.00
Cash on hand .......................... 62.71
$ 34,128.95
Liabilities --
Paid up stock ...................... $ 32,339.74
Bills payable ......................... 1,000.00
Unpaid current bills ............... 618.36
Profit and loss ........................ 170.83
________
$ 34,128.95
When asked regarding the future operations of his company, E. A. MacKay, secretary and manager, said:
"Several of our stockholders have increased their holdings recently. Our present condition is good; we owe practically no debts and we will be able to start business on a sound financial basis. We shall sell some more stock simply for the purpose of accumulating a working fund. Every dollar paid in on stock has gone into buildings and land and machinery. Our asssets are not on paper, they are material and can be pointed out to any one. We need $10,000 for a working fund to maintain the plant for 90 to 120 days. That is the time it will take for us to realize cash from our manufactured articles. We can begin work within two weeks after this money is raised and can run continuously. We shall employ 100 men.
Following are the names of the present stockholders and the number of shares paid up to January 1, 1910:
N. Jerns, Bellingham.................9772
E. A. Mackay, Bellingham....... 3841
C. E. Funnell, Bellingham........ 3000
I. N. Thomas, Bellingham........ 2600
J. E. Mitchell, Bellingham........ 2000
C. S. Gerhart, Bellingham........ 2000
Henry Bush, Vladivostock....... 1000
I. B. Jones, Anacortes.............. 1000
Mrs. M. E. G. Smith, Bellingham 1000
J. A. Largaud, Point Rob'ts....... 1000
Maxim Smith, Bellingham......... 850
Mrs. M. E. Pease, Anacortes...... 600
Walter A. Largaud, Point Rob‘ts..500
J. J. Bell, Bellingham.................. 500
Mrs. C. S. Gerhart, Bellinghnm.. 300
John Korshin, Bellingham........... 500
L. J. Hawkins, Bellingham.......... 375
H. W. Whitford, Bellingham........ 250
J. Walter Page, San Francisco...... 225
Mrs. Mary Neely, Anacortes........ 225
T. H. Saddler, Bellingham............ 200
John Zettler, Bellingham............. 180
H. L. Dolph, Anacortes................ 120
Mrs. Philena Thomas, Burlington 100
_____
Total.......................................... 32,339