648 



AMERICAN FORESTR^' 



try and consider what an enormous per- 

 centage of them are and have been 

 roofed with shingles. How many cases 

 have come under your observation in 

 which the shingles were the cause of 

 the fire? How many cases in which 

 the shingles actually spread the fire to 

 adjoining properties? 



The great values and the great losses 

 by fire in this country are not in shingle- 

 roofed buildings, and never were. 



If shingle roofs are really the "cri.u- 

 inals" that they are painted why do 

 not the statistics show it? Why do the 

 insurance companies compete so stren- 

 uously for frame residences, farm 

 houses and barns, school houses, 

 churches and public institutions, roofed 

 with shingles, if shingles are "Not a 

 covering, but a crime"? Why do they 

 rate these properties among the lowest 

 in the list, and then give away from 

 40 to 55 per cent of the premiums to get 

 the business, if ''Shingles are a crime"? 



Where was the "Conflagration" for 

 which shingle roofs were responsible? 

 Doubtless some fires have been started 

 in shingle roofs and some have been 

 communicated in that way, but I do not 

 know of any statistics which tend to 

 show that shingles are a peculiarly bad 

 hazard. The analysis of thousands of 

 fires attributed to "sparks," taken as 

 they run, shows as many fires in build- 

 ings not having shingle roofs as in 

 buildings having shingle roofs. This 

 fact is noteworthy, because there are a 

 greater number of buildings roofed 

 with shingles than with any other 

 material. 



It would be natural to expect, there- 

 fore, that any comparison by numbers 

 of fires would show a greater number 

 of fires in shingle roofed buildings, but 

 that is not the fact in this case. 



The appeal to experience and to sta- 

 tistics alike acquit the shingle roof and 

 damns it defamers. 



How about structural uses? 



Wood construction is as old as the 

 human race. Fire proof construction 

 may have had "a look in" in the Stone 

 Age, but it was not a winner in the 

 race for civilization. As for iron and 

 steel and concrete and plaster and ce- 

 ment, their story is a short one, and 



their comparative merits as all-around 

 and economic and livable are not es- 

 tablished. 



Admit that they have certain dis- 

 tinctive merits tinder certain conditions 

 and limitations, and you have given 

 them all the credit that they are en- 

 titled to. 



It is certain that iron alone is an 

 unfit substitute. Examine any annual 

 report of fires in a State or city and 

 vou will find abundant evidence of that 

 fact. 



Concrete and iron, properly combined 

 and proportioned, are a worthy pair 

 for certain purposes, but, although their 

 number is less than one per cent of the 

 whole number of structures, they con- 

 tribute a very large percentage to the 

 fire waste. 



Fire and electrolysis and water and 

 changing stresses are fatal to their life 

 and usefulness. As to the safety of 

 life and limb in unsprinklered "Fire- 

 proof" buildings, the indictment against 

 them is more terrible than against any 

 other class. 



And yet we would not say that an 

 unsprinklered fire proof building is a 

 "crime." 



Their record in every great confla- 

 gration is a record of total loss of con- 

 tents, and for the most part, worse than 

 a total loss of structure. 



A sprinklered fire proof structure, 

 properly constructed, is about an equiv- 

 alent of a "mill-construction" (wood 

 interior) building, from the fire hazard 

 standpoint. 



Edward Atkinson ahvays held that 

 the mill construction was the better, 

 and for many years discriminated 

 against the fire proof sprinklered in 

 favor of the mill sprinklered structure. 



The records of the New England 

 Factory Mutuals are a monument to 

 his sagacity in that respect, during his 

 life time. 



What about timber construction ? 



To paraphrase Daniel Webster, "The 

 world knows it by heart." Dry wood 

 will burn. Wet wood will not. You 

 must evaporate the water first. The 

 Automatic Sprinkler solved that prob- 

 lem. It wets the wood while the fire is 

 small, and keeps it wet until tiie fire is 



