M USCLE SHOALS is a war legacy. . Before 1916 our chief source of supply of nitrates needed in the manufacture of munitions was Chile. It was thought that if we entered the World War we should have some means of producing those nitrates in this country. The National Defense Act was passed June 3, 1916. Clause 124 of that Act authorized the President to select one or more sites in this country where cheap water power could be developed for the purpose of extracting nitrogen from the air. The nitrates produced were to be used for munitions in time of war and in the manufacture of fertilizers and other useful products in time of peace. The Act further provided that the plants should be operated solely by the Government and not in conjunction with any other industry or enterprise carried on by private capital. President Wilson chose the Muscle Shoals at Florence, Alabama, on the Tennessee River. Power was needed for construction work, and the first thing done was to enter into a contract with the Alabama Power Company, which had a steam plant at Gorgas, the mouth of a coal mine, 90 miles south of Muscle Shoals. The plan of work at Muscle Shoals called for three dams, two navigation dams and one power dam, two nitrate plants, two electrical steam plants, power house, lock, industrial village, and the purchase of a large tract of land and the Waco lime quarry. When the armistice was signed in 1918, $105,000,000 had been expended, two nitrate plants and the steam plants were completed and some