water-power utilization 



Plant of Columbus R'ver Co., n Muscogee County, Georgia, on Chattahoochee River, which Heads in the 



Southern Appalachians 



nent timber supply, by securing legis- 

 lation that would prevent forest wast- 

 age, despoliation and the total stripping 

 of timber from vast tracts. Instead of 

 using the income — the natural reproduc- 

 tion — and a part of the capital — the orig- 

 inal forest — each year, put the capi- 

 tal to work — take care of existing for- 

 ests, and provide for new ones. If such 

 a plan had been adopted in Pennsyl- 

 vania fifty years ago, what would now 

 have been the condition of the state? 

 And what would, to-day, be the value 

 of a permanent and adequate timber 

 supply to the state? Mr. Practical 

 Business Man, suppose you answer ! 



)g «« )^ 



Water Transportation 



NO THINKING man will deny that 

 a comprehensive, well-developed 

 system of water transportation would 

 be wonderfully beneficial to the inland 

 commerce of the United States. But 

 to have a system of waterways, we must 

 first have the water. There is plenty 

 of water ; but, under present conditions, 

 550 



it comes too much in bunches. At one 

 season we have raging, swirling yellow 

 torrents, while at another we have 

 sand bars, shallows, and silt reefs. How 

 can this condition be modified ? Simp- 

 lest matter in the world. Five words 

 will explain : forest and flood water 

 reservoirs. Let us reforest the de- 

 nuded hillsides, mountain tops and 

 watersheds, so that the storm waters, 

 the melting snows, and the spring rains 

 will not carry down with them, in their 

 mad rush the stones, gravel, sand, and 

 silt, but will pass somewhat gradually 

 down from the hills. Then let us dam 

 the valleys at whose bottoms lie the 

 feeders of the larger rivers ; let us 

 equip such dams with gates for regulat- 

 ing the flow of the water into the 

 streams ; let the reservoirs be of suffi- 

 cient capacity to restrain any ordinary 

 flood ; and then let us so regulate the 

 outflow of water from them as to main- 

 tain a navigable stage even in seasons 

 of serious drought. We can then im- 

 prove existing waterways, and plan and 

 execute new ones, until the country is 

 covered with a network of canals and 

 streams made navigable bv man ; our 



