236 AXNUAL REPORTS OF t)EPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



experience to assume charge of the management of the national for- 

 ests. The date on which, early in 1905, administrative jurisdiction 

 over the forests was transferred to me divides the 16 years, 1897-1913, 

 into two eight-year periods, of which the first was that predomi- 

 nantly of investigations, preparation, and public education, and the 

 second predominantly of administrative activities. Yet entirely 

 apart from the fact that the work of the earlier period made public 

 forestry possible in the United States, it yielded results of enormous 

 value in actual improvement of lumbering methods and widespread 

 introduction of forest protection. 



At the close of the nineteenth century lumbermen everywhere in 

 the United States were operating with a disregard of waste inherited 

 from days of more abundant supplies and lower prices. Stumps were 

 cut high, marketable saw timber was left in tops, and merchantable 

 logs were left in the woods. Further, the value of young growth not 

 yet merchantable and the money sacrifice involved in cutting small- 

 sized timber which, if left for a later cutting, would make rapid in- 

 crease in size and value, were almost unrecognized. The first fruits 

 of cooperation between the foresters of this department and private 

 owners who sought their advice were accurate computations of what 

 was to all intents and purposes money thrown away, that startled 

 into instant attention practical woodsmen who had previously con- 

 sidered themselves abundantly familiar with their own business. 

 The mere saving of unnecessary waste in lumbering was, indeed, not 

 forestry; but the demonstration that it afforded a neglected oppor- 

 tunity for profit was both a material gain for forest conservation 

 and an open sesame for the forester standing without the door of a 

 great established industry whose practices he sought to revolutionize. 



From the north woods of New York and New England to Texas 

 and into the far West swept the new gospel of closer utilization. 

 With or close behind it went the turning of attention to the value 

 of immature timber in the present stand. Operators began to reckon 

 on returning for a second and even a third cutting. Such a policy 

 involved of necessity consideration of the fire risk. Agitation for 

 organized fire protection by States began. The number of private 

 owners of timberland in large holdings who have entered definitely 

 on the policy of permanent wood production is as yet infinitesimal, 

 but the number of those who have adopted some substitute for the 

 old policy of immediate devastation and indifference to what may 

 follow is very large. This in itself is a result of the utmost impor- 

 tance from the standpoint of the public welfare. To it the work of 

 the division and later the Bureau of Forestry, now become the Forest 

 Service, directly led. 



Prior to 1897 the only State in which the forest question had re- 

 ceived any material recognition was New York, which had estab- 



