Aluminum can be extracted only from a single widely- 
scattered and generally little known mineral called bauxite, 
and the expense of extracting it from that mineral is very 
heavy. The presence of aluminum in the earth’s crust was 
known to scientists for many years before it was actually 
isolated and obtained in metallic form. It was a young 
American, Charles Martin Hall, who made the momentous 
discovery, in 1886, that has given aluminum to the world. 
He was only 22 years of age at the time, and a student of 
Oberlin College. Mr. Hall applied for a patent covering 
his discovery, in the year named, but it was not issued until 
1889. The patent expired in 1904. 
In 1888 Mr. Hall associated himself with some other 
yeung men in Pittsburgh, and formed the Aluminum Com- 
pany of America. These men are the pioneers of the alumi- 
num industry, and, except as death has thinned their ranks, 
they and their company have developed aluminum, in the 
short space of 38 years, from a laboratory curiosity into cne 
of the most important metals of everyday use. It was 
under the guidance of these men that aluminum in the 
United States was reduced in price from $8 a pcund to 25 
cents pound, and its uses extended to such a degree that 
it is now a necessity of civilized life. 
In the year 1888 there was no consumption of aluminum 
at all; today the world is consuming the metal at the rate of 
250,000,000 pounds a year. This indispensable metal is 
chiefly the product of labor. A ton of the material has a 
value in excess of $500. The raw materials, unimproved 
by labor, required to produce this ton of aluminum, are not 
worth over $25. Least valuable of all is the bauxite, which 
must be mined, treated, transported and put through an 
elaborate chemical process. Coal must be mined, trans- 
ported, and its energy turned into steam; limestone must 
be quarried, transported and treated; common salt must be 
produced and put through an extensive chemical process to 
produce soda ash; cryolite is produced in the Arctic Circle 
and brought from that distant field; fluorspar is mined at 
considerable hazard and expense, and is highly treated; the 
carbons used are the product of elaborate manufacture, using