44 HISTORY OF LUMBER INDUSTRY IN NEW YORK. 



Northwest as well. The two principal markets were at Albany and 

 Tonawanda. 



Albany was the center of a great lumber trade sixty years ago, and 

 at one time surpassed all other points in the amount handled and 

 volume of business. In 1872 there were 43 wholesale firms, with 

 yards grouped in the "lumber district," who handled, in the aggre- 

 gate, 660.000,000 feet that year, their total sales amounting to over 

 $15,000,000. Over 1.500 men were employed in the yards unloading 

 and loading vessels, or in piling lumber, their total annual wages 

 exceeding $600,000. But owing to increased facilities for making 

 direct through shipments from the mills to the retailers, combined 

 with unfavorable discriminations in freight rates, the business at 

 Albany has declined so largely that the amount of lumber handled 

 this year will not exceed 200,000,000 feet. The White Pine from this 

 market is shipped chiefly to New England (including Boston, Newport, 

 Fall River, and Nantucket), to Long Island, the Hudson River towns. 

 New York City, the West Indies and South America, the Azores and 

 Africa, and Australia. The shipments of spruce are confined mostly 

 to Greater New York, Long Island, and Hartford. 



Tonawanda. unlike Albany, is a market in which all the lumber han- 

 dled comes from outside the State — from the great pineries of the North- 

 western States and Ontario. Still, some mention of it seems pertinent 

 on account of the volume of the business done there. Next to Chicago 

 an< New York City, it is the greatest lumber market in the United States 

 or Canada. The entire stock received is reshipped by rail or canal to 

 other places, wherein it differs from Chicago and Greater New York, the 

 latter places consuming a large portion of their lumber receipts within 

 their own limit>. 



The business at Tonawanda commenced in 1857, when its first cargo 

 of lumber was shipped from Canada by Brunson & Co. In 1865 it had 

 become an important point in the general lumber business of the coun- 

 try, and its trade increased steadily until 1890, when it attained its 

 maximum volume. In the latter year the receipts from the Great 

 Lakes at this port amounted to 718,650,900 feet, to which may be added. 

 13,039,600 lath and 52,232,300 shingles. Their combined values indi- 

 eate a business that year of over $16,000,000. The number of persons 

 employed— yard men, planing mill hands, stevedores, and office men — 

 is estimated at over 3,000, their aggregate annual wages exceeding 

 $1,500,000. But the shipments have declined materially within the 

 last ten years, the receipts in 1900 being reported at 396,429,483 feet. 

 This decrease is due to through shipments from the AVest of carload 

 lots direct to the retail yards in the Eastern States, and to disadvantages 

 in freight rates. Still, the lumber business at Tonawanda is immense, 

 employing a great many men and distributing a large amount of money 

 annually in wages; and, as a distributing point for New England and 



