engineers, apparently, to make it appear that the street railway's part is fulfilled when they generate the current, and that the matter of taking care of it afterwards is something with which they have no concern, and that it can go out and do anything it wants to. We have sat still and allowed it to damage our pipes, and have said nothing at all about it. I feel that we are not bound to go to them on our knees and ask what we shall do. We have got no satisfaction so far, and I think we ought to force a test case of some kind and press it to a final conclusion in our highest courts, so as to enable us to protect ourselves. I do not think it is up to us to go to expense to take care of the current coming from electric lines. It is up to the street railway companies to take care of what they generate.

THE PRESIDENT: Is there any further discussion on this subject?

MR. EGNER: Mr. President, I merely wish to say that I was very glad indeed to hear that a gas man like Mr. Miller has adopted the system which he described. I proposed it more than ten years ago, and I am still talking about it. Ten or twelve years ago I investigated and was impressed with the advantages of that system.

MR. MILLER: If I may have the last say, Mr. President, I had that in use twelve years ago in Oil City.

Mr. Egner: Well, I do not know about the date to a certainty, but that is a plan which I have been recommending for a long time.

MR. MCDONALD: I have had it in use for about five years, and during that time I have become satisfied that you simply transfer the location of the trouble and do not get rid of it.

MR. STILLSON: I would like to see this discussion carried a little further. I would like to know what success has been met with from the use of insulated pipe or insulated couplings, that will prevent the current from flowing on our services. If there is something that can be done in that line, would like to hear what results have been obtained from anybody who has

tried them. After hearing them, would like to state the result of some tests which I made.

The PresidenT: Gentlemen, Mr. Stillson wants to know what success insulated couplings have met with, and has some more remarks to make after his question is answered. Can anyone enlighten him on insulated couplings? Somebody in the room must certainly have used insulated couplings.

MR. STONE: Mr. President, I do not like to talk too much about this subject. I have used them, and so far as I know they seem to work all right. They reduced the amount of current on the line to a minimum. While the couplings have not been on for a long time or for a length of time sufficient to tell definitely just what the result will be, from what tests we have made since we put the couplings on they seem to show that they will answer the purpose and do the work.

MR. MORTON: I should like to ask Mr. Stone how far apart he puts the insulated couplers. It seems to me that the distance between would have a considerable effect upon their efficiency.

MR. STONE: We have one line that is laid with the ordinary coupling joints, and it has no electric current at all. On the line that we insulated we put them in every four or five hundred feet.

MR. GOODNOW: Mr. President, we have had some experience in this line. On a part of our high pressure distribution system we had to combat this trouble. We have had occasion to renew portion of a line about thirteen miles long, and as a means of prevention we have put in about three miles of six ich enameled pipe. This is just about completed, and the object was, of course, to insulate the pipe from the current traveling in the ground. We expect this to prevent the current getting on the pipe, and therefore not being obliged to leave it. We also, at another point further down, have put in insulated joints in enamel pipe in connection with a patent coupler. Previous to insulating it we found a very large amount of current traveling on this pipe. The trolley tracks in the vicinity were in very bad condition. They were improved, however, and also changed from single to double

track, which, of course, made a much better condition of affairs, and with the introduction of these joints in the line there has been a desrease of current in some instances if from 80% to 90%. This state of affairs has been going on for about six years. We are awaiting results from what we call enamel pipe, which is pipe enameled and baked twice on the outside; what result we will get from that can only be told by continued use, and we hope to know more about it in a year or two.

MR. D. McDONALD: Mr. President, I move that it is the sense of the members of this association, based on experience, that nothing that the gas company can do will protect our underground pipe system from destruction by electrolysis so long as the street railway companies use the earth for the return of its current. I would like to offer that as a resolution, so that we may go upon record as taking action in regard to this matter.

THE PRESIDENT: There is a motion before the house, Mr. McDonald. That would be out of order, I think, at this time.

MR. D. McDONALD: Then I will withdraw it for the present. Any testimony that we can give will aid us at some future time, and if we can protect ourselves it is our legal duty to do so. I would like to see some action started.

MR. VON MAUR Mr. Chairman, there are about fifty miles of high-pressure wrought-iron pipe around St. Louis, and it is all equipped with insulating couplings placed every three hundred feet. This pipe has been in the ground for a period of eighteen months, and, thus far, no trouble has been experienced from electrolysis. Where the pipes pass under street railway tracks, several insulating joints are placed between the lengths on both sides of the track, and at least one length of pipe is boxed in and surrounded with pitch. There was one case where the insulating joints were omitted on either side of the track, and that pipe was very badly

eaten out.

I do not think we can say anything final on insulating joints as yet, but the above has been our experience to date.

We expect to make an electrolytic survey in the near future.

MR. WITHERBY: Mr. Chairman, there is no question which affects the gas industry more than this question of the effect upon underground mains by electrolytic current. The gas company was in the field first in almost every case. The electric railway companies have come in secondarily. It seems to me fair that the man who was on the ground first should have the best right, and there is no reason why the gas companies' mains should be used as a return feeder, or that they should be used as wires, whichever way you may wish to term it, for the purpose of bringing the current back to the trolley company's power house. The trolley companies should be made to put in the return feeders themselves that will be capable of carrying the return current. If they will only do that, which they can do very readily, it will take care of most of the trouble, or at least 95% of it. They fight it on the ground that it is expensive. Copper does cost money. And they refuse, in a great many cases, to even co-operate with the gas or water company, and they will probably continue to do it until they are forced to define their position or are threatened with heavy damages. Some of the trolley companies have been co-operating with the gas and water companies, and have removed the trouble so far as it is possible to do so, but in other cases they have absolutely refused to do anything; have absolutely declined to have anything to do with it. I think that this association ought to go on record, and if it cannot be done in any other way, then we ought to bring a court proceeding and make a united effort at some one point where our position will be fairly safe, and make a test case, and force it through until the courts of the United States make a decision.

MR. RICE: Mr. President, I am very glad to hear these remarks on the legal side of this question. I will say no more on that side of it except to say that I endorse the sentiments which have just been expressed very heartily. I think that the attention of this Institute should be directed very strongly to the Peoria case, the first case mentioned in the report of the Committee on Electrolysis. I had the privilege of talking recently with one of the attorneys in that case. The report

of the master in chancery was favorable at all points to the position of the water company. Of course, the water company would stand in the same relation as the gas company would in such a matter. The trial judge, Judge Grosscup, however, removed this case from the master in chancery, which, I understand was a very unusual proceeding in such a case! He removed it on the ground that he wished to hear more testimony. This was in 1901. Five years have passed by without a decision. Petition after petition has been sent up to this judge asking him to reach a decision in the case. One of the gentlemen here has spoken about a test case being brought. Here is a test case. Here is a case which raises all the points which should be brought out. They are brought out well in this case. It seems to me we might do something towards lending our influence, either severally or jointly, towards bringing this particular case to a conclusion. The conclusions of the master were favorable, and eventually it would seem as if the conclusions of the judge must be favorable also.

MR. WITHERBY: Mr. Chairman, this is not a thing, as I view it, that we ought to leave in any sort of an unfinished condition. We ought to be sure of our rights and then take a stand one way or the other. There are lots of small gas companies today that are losing thousands of dollars annually because of the trouble they are having with electrolysis. Many of them, perhaps, have not come to a full realization of the extent of the damage which escaping electricity is doing to their services, and may not, until they find their entire system is broken down. They find stray appearances of it once in a while, or may find sections of pipe which they have to replace. They take it out and put it away possibly as a witness for some future time. It lies around for about a year and then it is thrown into the waste pile. There are some of the more extensive systems where the damage from this source has become so serious that negotiations are now pending between the street railway system and the gas company as to a final settlement of the difficulty. I think this Institute ought to come to the front and place itself in a position which cannot be misunderstood.