The first big call on the wire rope producers was for submarine nets to protect the fleet bases and harbors. There were supplied to the Navy, for this purpose, 2,820,520 feet of rope, and it was regular rope that was required in this service, for the German submarines had developed a way of slashing through the earlier and lighter nets. For the new type the rope ranged from an inch and a half to three-quarters of an inch; but it wasn't merely a matter of shipping reels of rope. Almost all of it had to be cut into lengths and attachments made, for these barriers were designed in sections. This necessitated, for the Navy order, 153,000 fittings. The Army Ordnance Bureau used nearly a million feet of rope for nettings, which was shipped to various coast forts. The whole volume of wire rope for nettings was furnished within four months. [Illustration: CUP CHALLENGERS, DEFENDERS AND SAILING VESSELS OF ALL TYPES SECURE THEIR RIGGING WITH WIRE ROPE] Another interesting order was from the Quartermaster's Department, which called for 6,852,500 feet of rope and the manufacture of 300,000 pairs of traces, requiring 3,000,000 splices. These are what are called thimble splices, and, while fitting one of them is ordinarily half an hour's work, the Roebling plant, with a force chiefly of men who were utterly unskilled, was turning off ten thousand pairs of traces a day at the peak of production on this order. This harness, for artillery purposes, was on English designs, adopted after considerable delay, but by means of which a horse, when shot down, could be eliminated from the gun team in half a minute. The Spruce Production Bureau took over 8,000,000 feet of rope, the Emergency Fleet more than 12,000,000 and the Fuel Administration drew on at the rate of 2,500 tons a month. And all the time the mines and mills and ordnance plants, locomotives, cranes and all other manufactures kept getting largely increased supplies of rope to carry on their own war-driven work. Altogether the orders come to a figure that is hard to visualize. [Sidenote: 84,000,000 FEET OF ROPE AND A HALF MILLION FITTINGS] But the climax, the call that taxed the wire rope makers most heavily and kept the arc lights burning in the mills was for the 84,000,000 and odd feet of rope and half million fittings which were required by the Naval Establishment for the North Sea Mine Barrage, which put a prompt and distinguished shackle on the German submarines. The fitting of this rope was a task of moment, calling as it did for delivery of the rope in lengths and made up ready for attachment on the ingenious plan which the mine involved. It was all done with time to spare. The Adriatic Barrage, an even more ambitious project since it dealt with a depth of 3,000 instead of 900 feet, was all ready to be laid when the Armistice was signed. This took over 12,000,000 feet of rope.