PKOFITS LUMBER MARKETS. 43 



uary 30, 1902), places the output of northern New York for 1900 at 

 533,339,072 feet, of which 230,649,292 feet was spruce for the pulp 

 mills; the combined product of the Adirondack and Catskill forests 

 for the same year at 651,135,308 feet; the number of employees in the 

 sawmills of northern New York at 8,617, with annual wages aggre- 

 gating $1,846,930; the number of employees in the pulp mills at 9,382, 

 with annual wages aggregating $3,040,478. 



The preliminary summary of the Twelfth Census concerning saw- 

 mills, planing mills (operated in connection with sawmills), and 

 timber camps, places the total amount of timber from all sources 

 sawed in New York State in 1900 at 878,448,000 feet, and the value at 

 $12,364,362. 



PROFITS OF THE INDUSTRY. 



In many localities within the State there are lumbermen who have 

 amassed large fortunes and attained prominence on account of their 

 wealth. Their well-known success has created an impression that the 

 lumber business is an exceptionally profitable one. This, however, is 

 not the case. There is very little money in buying logs, sawing them, 

 and marketing the product. The rich lumberman, in almost every 

 instance, owned large tracts of timber land, and his wealth represents 

 the appreciation in value of this kind of property; in his ordinary 

 business — that of the logging camp and sawmill — he made a fair living 

 profit, and nothing more. People seldom make much money in log- 

 jobbing or in sawing "custom logs." The lumbermen who owned no 

 timber lands, and had to bu}^ their logs or stumpage, were obliged to 

 do business on a narrow margin of profit. Thorough experience, com- 

 bined with the utmost economy in connection with every detail, was 

 necessary to avoid a failure. Of this latter class some, through thrift 

 and business tact, secured a comfortable competence before old age 

 ended their activity; some barely held their own; while, as in all other 

 kinds of business, the percentage of failures far exceeded that of success. 

 But the men who owned the forest lands from which their mills were 

 stocked could keep their business going on a low market that would 

 ruin the operators who had to buy logs, saw the stock, and depend 

 upon the market for a margin. The landowners could run their mills 

 during a period of financial depression, and, although they were getting 

 nothing for their stumpage, were always on hand and in the market 

 when there came a rise in prices. 



LUMBER MARKETS OF NEW YORK. 



In addition to the ordinary Lumber business connected with forest 

 and sawmill, there were in the State of New York great lumber 

 markets or distributing points where lumber was sold, not only the 

 product of the State, hut immense shipments from Canada and the 



