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Mesabi
Mesabi , range of low hills, NE Minn., once famous for its extensive iron ore deposits. The ores were found in a belt c.110 mi (180 km) long and from 1 to 3 mi (1.6-4.8 km) wide between Babbitt and Grand Rapids, occurring in horizontal layers (up to 500 ft/152 m thick) near the surface and mined by ...
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coal
coal fuel substance of plant origin, largely or almost entirely composed of carbon with varying amounts of mineral matter.
Types
There is a complete series of carbonaceous fuels, which differ from each other in the relative amounts of moisture, volatile matter, and fixed carbon they conta...
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shale
shale sedimentary rock formed by the consolidation of mud or clay, having the property of splitting into thin layers parallel to its bedding planes. Shale tends to be fissile, i.e., it tends to split along planar surfaces between the layers of stratified rock. Shales comprise an estimated 55% of ...
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age grade and age set
age grade and age set differentiation of social role based on age, commonly found in small-scale societies of North America and East Africa. Age sets are a type of sodality (nonresidential groups that cut across kinship ties and thus promote broader social solidarity) of young men who usually coope...
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Jiangxi
Jiangxi or Kiangsi , province (1994 est. pop. 38,930,000), c.66,000 sq mi (170,940 sq km), SE China. Nanchang is the capital. The largely hilly and mountainous surface is drained by many rivers; the longest is the navigable Gan, which flows NE to Poyang lake. In Jiangxi's fertile soil and mild...
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Mandarin
Mandarin [Port. mandar =to govern, or from Malay mantri =counselor of state], a high official of imperial China. For each of the nine grades there was a different colored button worn on the dress cap. Mandarin Chinese was the language spoken by the official class and was based on the Beijing di...
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taconite
taconite low-grade iron ore, a flintlike rock usually containing less than 30% iron. Resistant to drilling and to the extraction of its contained metal, the rock was long considered worthless. Experiments begun in 1912 by the American scientist Edward W. Davis and continued by him for nearly 40 yea...
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steel wool
steel wool abrasive material composed of long steel fibers of varying degrees of fineness that are matted together. The coarser grades are used to remove paint and other finishes, the finer grades for polishing or smoothing a finished surface. Steel wool is much used in kitchens for cleaning and po...
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octane number
octane number figure of merit representing the resistance of gasoline to premature detonation when exposed to heat and pressure in the combustion chamber of an internal-combustion engine. Such detonation is wasteful of the energy in the fuel and potentially damaging to the engine; premature deton...
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meatpacking
meatpacking or meat-processing, wholesale business of buying and slaughtering animals and then processing and distributing their carcasses to retailers. The livestock industry is among the largest in the world. In the United States, the plains of the Midwest and Southwest provided good conditio...
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