History.— While the fact that argillaceous earth concealed a new metal had been known for some years, the first production of metal lic aluminum was not accomplished until 1824. when Oersted succeeded in making it by heat ing aluminum chloride with potassium amalgam. In 1827 Wohler obtained it by a closely similar method. In 1854 Bunsen and Deville indepen dently produced metallic aluminum by the elec trolytic process. The credit of pursuing the problem of a successful commercial process belongs to Deville, who persistently worked, first at Jaye!, then at Nanterre and finally at Salindres, with the double chloride of aluminum and sodium as his source. When cryolite was discovered, Messrs. Dick and Smith, at the sug gestion of Dr. Percy, made successful use of that mineral as a source of metallic aluminum. Deville accepted the improvement, hut finding the metal from cryolite quite impure, he re turned to his former crude material, adding the cryolite to his own mixture, however. De ville's process furnished the metal at a cost of $5 a pound until 1887, when several inven tions in other fields were applied to the com mercial production of aluminum. Since that
time the price has steadily dropped until it has reached its present normal of about 18 to 20 cents a pound. The war has had its effect upon aluminum as well as upon all other metals, but with the return of settled conditions lower prices will again prevail.
Production.— The French periodical. L'Echo des Mines estimates the potential production of aluminum by the world's existing plants as follows : United States and Canada. 75 , 000 tone Prance 20,000 " Switzerland. 20, 000 " United Kingdom. 12, 000 " Norway 16.000 Italy.. 7,000 ." Total r so, 000 tons The production of aluminum in the United States in 1916 amounted to 123,708,000 pounds.
In addition to this output of metal, there were produced 153,860 tons of aluminum sulphate, 27,257 tons of alum and 30,708 tons of -alumi num abrasives. (See ABRASIVES). In 1885 the commercial production of aluminum was 283 pounds. From that year to the present, includ ing the 1916 output, the total production of metallic aluminum in the United States has been 680,380,500 pounds.