HARDWOOD RECORD 



IS 



monly classed as minor species, are coming into use. The outi)ut 

 of such is not large, but a tendency to closer utilization of the 

 forest resources of the country is indicated. 



A general advance in values is apparent. That fact is clearly 

 brought out in a table reproduced in this issue of H.iKDWOOD 

 Eecobd but no figures are put forward to show whether this ad- 

 vance is sufficient to cover the increased cost of stumpage and the 

 higher wages now paid. It, therefore, remains uncertain whether 

 the sawmill operator is deriving any advantage from the slow and 

 general advance in lumber values, which average thirty-five per 

 cent higher than they were twelve years ago. 



It is stated that o,ver half of the country's production of lumber 

 goes into building and rough construction, one-tenth into boxes, 

 one-twelfth into car construction, and rather more than a fourth 

 into other uses. Exports were larger and imports smaller in 1911 

 than in 1910. Estimates show that the country's forests contain 

 enough timber of all kinds to last about sixty years, at the pres- 

 ent rate of cutting and not counting on new growth. 



The report is largely statistical and makes a bulletin of forty- 

 five pages. It is published by the Department of Commerce at 

 Washington, D. C. 



New Orleans Desires Federal Levee Control 



THE UNUSUAL SENTIMENT wherever there has been any 

 manifest interest in the inexcusable conditions leading to a 

 semi-annual recurrence of floods in the Mississippi basin has been 

 that the situation can best be controlled by the Federal govern- 

 ment. The i)lan has been advocated on numerous occasions that 

 the government should take over supervision of the entire work of 

 constructing and maintaining suitable reservoirs and levees to check 

 the flood waters as much as possible in the upper river and its 

 tributaries and to confine the Mississippi to its banks in its lower 

 courses. The trouble has been that no concerted action has been 

 taken with this end in view. Hence it is gratifying to note the 

 spirit of a mass meeting held at New Orleans with the idea of 

 creating public sentiment in favor of the passage of the Newlands 

 River Eegulation bill at Washington, D. C. E. H. Downman, a 

 prominent cj'press manufacturer of New Orleans, as chairman of 

 the general committee in charge of the movement for federal con- 

 trol establishes a direct connection between it and the lumber 

 business. 



According to reports, the meeting was rather remarkable be- 

 cause of the personnel and determined spirit of those present. The 

 specific purpose was the passage of a resolution to the effect that 

 the Newlands bill be passed, which purpose was successfully car- 

 ried out. 



While this meeting was highly satisfactory in its character, it is 

 necessarily but a forerunner of what must follow if the national 

 legislature is to feel sufficient pressure to force it to adopt a bill 

 placing in charge of Uncle Sam the proper regulation of the Father 

 of Waters. It is planned to carry the campaign to the valleys of 

 the Mississippi, Ohio and Missouri rivers and it is earnestly hoped 

 that the same enthusiastic reception will be given to the work in 

 those sections of the country as was accorded it at the meeting at 

 New Orleans. 



An Opportunity 



IT HAS BEEN MAINTAINED in these columns on numerous oc- 

 casions that the lumber interests have overlooked and still are 

 o/erlooking numerous opportunities for gaining favorable hearings 

 before the public in the never-ending controversy between the 

 products of the forest and the substitutes which are doing so much 

 to supplant them. Another suggestion along these lines seems 

 opportune and has to do with a medium which apparently would 

 be ot much more value than previous media used for the purpose of 

 establishing the truth regarding products of the forests of this 

 country in the minds of the general public. 



The American Newspaper Publishers' Association of New York 

 City is an association of newspaper interests established with the 

 avowed purpose of preventing certain abuses in newspaper publica- 



tion and of ridding newspapers of the misuse of their reading 

 columns. It would appear that it would be an exceedingly simple 

 matter to get truthful facts about the lumber business in its var- 

 ious ramifications in the hands of this organization, which is essen- 

 tially a central point for distribution of information of the right 

 kind. If it is sincere in its expression of intent — and it surely 

 must be — such a course could not but be of vast value to pro- 

 ducers and wholesalers of the various products of the forests of 

 America. 



Forest Service Resumes Publication of 

 Price Lists 



'-|-'HE UNITED STATES FOKEST SEEVICE has decided to re- 

 *■ sume the compilation of lumber prices. This work was discon- 

 tinued some months ago because it was thought that the records 

 maintained by the lumber associations were sufficient. The 

 necessity for some official record of current lumber prices being 

 maintained by some department of the government has been ap- 

 parent. Use of the price records kept by the Forest Service has 

 been made in law suits and in hearings before the Interstate Com- 

 merce Commission. Such an otficial record has a value in many 

 directions. J. E. Ehodes, secretary of the National Lumber Manu- 

 facturers ' Association, has just published a letter received from 

 Franklin H. Smith, statistician of forest products of the Forest 

 Service, whose ofiice is in the Federal building, Chicago. The 

 letter says: 



Instructions have been issued by the forester, Mr. Graves, covering the 

 compilation of lumber prices and approaching closely the plan originally 

 instituted in 190S, which was carried out up until a recent date. I am 

 sure you will be interested in knowing that this record will again be 

 made available, since the matter was discussed by you with the forester 

 following the discontinuance of the work on the part of the service. 



Briefly, the plan to be followed is to have a comparatively small num- 

 ber of representative mills in each of the principal producing regions 

 report prices at which actual sales have been made on selected grades, 

 which, though limited in number, will show the range of the entire list. 

 These reports are to be compiled for each quarter of the calendar year, 

 with such comments as are necessary to explain fluctuations in prices. 



Much of the detail of this work will devolve upon the Chicago office of 

 the Forest Service, and I hope it may be possible for you to extend the 

 fullest official co-operation. At an early date I will lay before you the 

 detailed plans of the work. 



Mr. Smith has authority to work out the method by which 

 these records will be obtained. It is proposed to record the f. o. b. 

 mill prices only and not delivered prices of various species at 

 jobbing centers. Mr. Smith" seeks the co-operation of the lumber 

 manufacturers necessary to make this work complete and valuable. 



The resumption of this work by the Forest Service not only 

 means much of direct benefit to the lumber trade but, of still 

 greater importance, it indicates a continuance of the policy of 

 co-operation between the government and the lumber industry, 

 which will make the work of each more effective and without which 

 both factors will be material losers. 



Chestnut in Door Work 



WE AEE LED TO THINK, in this day of rapid transit and con- 

 tinual intermingling and intercommunicating, that provincial- 

 ism is largely a thing of the past and every part of the country 

 knows in every detail all the time what every other part of the coun- 

 try is doing. Moreover we intermingle our wood products in what 

 seems like a pretty thorough manner, shipping birch into the South 

 and oak from the South into the North, redwood and California 

 pine into the East, and hardwoods to the West, but just the same 

 there is more or less provincialism both in the manufacture and use 

 of doors. There is quite a section of the East, for example, in 

 which the solid chestnut is an important item, while in other sec- 

 tions of the country a chestnut door would be something of an 

 oddity. In other words, there are doors such as birch and oak 

 in the hardwood line that are familiar the country over, and even 

 the chestnut door may be met with now and then in every section 

 of the country; but there is an eastern territory in which the chest- 

 nut door is about as familiar an article as the birch door in the 

 North and the yellow pine door in the South. This territory takes 



