i8d 



THE HARDWOOD RECORD. 



The Ma.i\ About Town. 



HOW IT HAPPENED. 

 BEING A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE NA- 

 TIONAL HARDWOOD LUMBER AS- 

 SOCIATION FROM THE BEGIN- 

 NING OF CREATION DOWN 

 TO FRIDAY NIGHT, MAY 

 16. 1902 A. D, 



CHAPTER I. 



I have trif<l to tbink of something else, 

 but cannot. I cannot get a chance. I will 

 start and in will come someone and ask: 

 "How's the St. Louis meeting coming on?" 

 or, "Did you hear the changes the Michi- 

 gan people want in the rules?" or "Did 

 you hear about what So-and-So, down in 

 Cincinnati, said of you?" 



Then at night there are a lot of things 

 in connection with the meeting to keep 

 me awake. Then I am on the railroad 

 committee and have to struggle with that 

 matter. 



So it is impossible for me to get my mind 

 upon anything else, and I thought that if 

 you had no serious objections 1 would 

 write a history of the National association 



for this issue. 



* * * 



I have a mind of such formation that I 

 find it difficult to steer it around over the 

 country. It is set in its ways. When it 

 gets started along a road there is no head- 

 ing it off or stopping it until it gets to the 

 end or runs out of steam. 



When it gets a-going I can^t do anything 

 with it. You have, no doubt, in winding 

 the clock, touched off the alarm accident- 

 ally and been vexed that you could do 

 nothing to stop it, but just had to stand 

 back and let her rip. That is how I feel 

 about my mind. I can hear it grinding 

 away about the National association and 

 there is no way to stop it until after the 

 St. Louis meeting. I am sorry for you, 

 dear reader, but I can't help it. 



Let us just sit back and let ber grind 



The history of the National Hardwood 

 Lumber Association begins away back at 

 the time of Adam and Eve. Eve really 

 laid the foundation of this association. If 

 she had let the apple alone she would have 

 gone on living with Adam in the Garden 

 of Eden, and, there being no need of 

 houses or buildings of any kind, there 

 would have been no lumber business. 



I don't know what they sat upon or 

 slept upon, although, come to that, I don't 

 know that they ever sat or slept, but how 

 they could call It heaven if it wasn't 

 largely sleeping or sitting I don't see. Of 

 course they could have slept on the 

 ground, or sat on the ground, but that 

 would not have answered in wet weather. 

 How could anyone be perfectly baijpy, as 

 were Adam and Eve. setting out doors 

 without any clothes on, trying to look un- 

 concerned and it a-pouring down rain. 



There are a good many things about 

 this Adam and Eve business that I don't 

 understand. Before they ate the apple 



tlie.v didn't live in any houses or wear any 

 clothes or have any children. It doesn't 

 seem to me they could have had such an 

 awfully good time. -Vnd tlien there were 

 just two of everything, a male and a fe- 

 male, although I cannot see the idea in 

 that arrangement if there were to be no — 

 but there! let it go. Let us hasten for- 

 ward, as the novelists .say. Let us fol- 

 low Adam and Eve from the Garden of 

 Eden until we strike tiie sinister trail of 

 the lumber business and then trace it 

 down through the ages until it reaches its 

 grand culmination in the St. T>ouis meet- 

 ing. 



* * * 



You see, when Eve was e.xpelled from 

 the Garden of Eden she realized for the 

 first time that she had no clothes on, and 

 she pinned fig leaves together to cover 

 her, thus laying the foundation of the 

 clothing and dry goods business. Then 

 -\dam, no doubt, noticed for the first time 

 that he wasn't living in a house or any- 

 thing that way. He then probably built 

 himself some kind of a house,, thereby lay- 

 ing the foundation of the lumber business, 

 etc., and to insure the perpetuation of the 

 various kinds of enterprises which they 

 originated, Adam and Eve inaugurated the 

 custom of raising children. 



And so the lumber Ijusiness was 

 launched primarily by a woman. There 

 is a woman at the bottom of almost every- 

 thing, but it may surprise many of you 

 to know that when you dig down to the 

 cornerstone of the lumber business, that 

 cornerstone is a woman. 



You will understand, however, that at 

 the very beginning the lumber business 

 was not the lumber business especially. 

 It was the beginning of the lumber busi- 

 ness, but it was not the lumber business. 

 .Tnst as when a man leaving his door, goes 

 up tlie street toward a defective place in 

 the sidewalk, falls through and breaks his 

 leg. You could not say when he stepped 

 out of his door that he was ia the leg 

 breaking business, and j'et I contend that 

 he had begun to break his leg as soon as 

 he left the door. 



The first house that Adam lived in was 

 probably a cave, but did not prove satis- 

 factory. I don't know whether you ever 

 lived in a cave for any great length of 

 time, but my advice to you is not to try 

 it. The ventilation is nearly always bad 

 and there is a tendency to accumulate a 

 large number of fleas, so that I can 

 imagine Adam and Eve becoming every 

 day more disgusted with the cave, until 

 they one day devised a cheap kind of a 

 house of some kind and moved into it, al- 

 tliough I cannot believe they had much 

 to move, and would not have moved it if 

 they had, because of the fact that it would 

 have tended to contaminate the new house. 

 Adam probably had a few war clubs of 

 assorted sizes, which might have been dis- 



infected and moved. Eve may have had 

 a few rude utensils such as a stone ham- 

 mer for pounding beefsteak, etc., but no 

 doubt Adam could carry the whole out- 

 fit under one arm. 



But let us hasten on or we will not be 

 able to get the history of the National 

 Hardwood Lumljer Association in the 

 spvTce at our disposal. 



CHAPTER II. 



After considering the matter and seeing 

 how slowly I am progressing I have con- 

 cluded not to attempt to condense a his- 

 tory of the National Hardwood Associa- 

 tion into the compass of a newspaper ar- 

 ticle. Instead I will write a brief sketch 

 of the origin of inspection rules. 

 * « * 



After the events narrated in the forego- 

 ing you must imagine that a considerable 

 stretch of time has passed. It is useless 

 for us to attempt to follow the growth of 

 the lumber business day by day, for we 

 have not the time nor space. 



We will pass lightly over the centuries, 

 scarcely touching even the high places, 

 until we come down to the time of Noah 

 and the building of the ark. 



The building of the ark was the second 

 epoch-marking event in the grand march 

 of the human race onward and up\vard 

 toward the National Hardwood Lumber 

 Association. It stands out, bold and clear, 

 as an evidence of what great strides had 

 been made in the art of carpentry, and in 

 the sawing, hewing and manipulating of 

 lumber. 



The closest and most painstaking study 

 of the methods employed at that time, 

 fails, however, to disclose any trace of 

 inspection rules. If there were any in- 

 spection rules extant at that time history 

 has left no trace of them. 



When we consider, however, that the 

 only way to publish a set of rules in those 

 days was to carve them on stone, and that 

 it would have taken a hundred yoke of 

 oxen at least to move them around over 

 the country, it is not surprising that none 

 were published. 



I read, though, not long since, of a num- 

 ber of French scientists who, in digging 

 among ancient ruins in Asia, came upon 

 some curious writing carved upon stone. 

 Some of the characters used are such as 

 are used in other ancient inscriptions, but 

 the most eminent authorities on such mat- 

 ters are utterly unable to make head or 

 tail of this particular writing. They claim 

 to be able to read it, but say that when 

 read it doesn't mean anything, which has 

 led a good many lumbermen to believe it 

 may be an ancient set of hardwood lumber 

 inspection rules. This is merely guess 

 work, however. It could be claimed, with 

 equal probability, that it was an article on 

 the free silver question. 



No, it cannot be asserted with any de- 

 gree of certainty that there was such a 



