Then there is columbium, the American metal. It is strange that an
element named after Columbia should prove so impractical. Columbium is a
metal closely resembling tantalum and tantalum found a use as electric
light filaments. A columbium lamp should appeal to our patriotism.
The so-called "rare elements" are really abundant enough considering the
earth's crust as a whole, though they are so thinly scattered that they
are usually overlooked and hard to extract. But whenever one of them is
found valuable it is soon found available. A systematic search generally
reveals it somewhere in sufficient quantity to be worked. Who, then,
will be the first to discover a use for indium, germanium, terbium,
thulium, lanthanum, neodymium, scandium, samarium and others as unknown
to us as tungsten was to our fathers?
As evidence of the statement that it does not matter how rare an element
may be it will come into common use if it is found to be commonly
useful, we may refer to radium. A good rich specimen of radium ore,
pitchblende, may contain as much, as one part in 4,000,000.
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