THE HARDWOOD RECORD. 



21 



who were attempting to do anj-thiiig near 

 a legitimate businesjs. Manufacturers in 

 those days were not nearly so well posted 

 in the grading of lumber as they are to- 

 day, and the majority of them were not 

 nearly so well equipped for producing good 

 lumber, so that much of the lumber 

 shipped was of inferior quality and very 

 poorly graded; but no matter how much 

 a reduction in their invnice was justified, 

 a manufacturer would only believe that 

 such a reduction was dishonest and unfair 

 and would act accordingly. 



The condition existing in most of the 

 city marliets, and especially in Chicago, 

 among the dealers' of those markets, were 

 but little better than the feeling existing 

 between the mauufacturei-s and the deal- 

 ers. 1 well remember that when I fli-st 

 entered tlie lumber newspaper business, I 

 would go from office to office In Chicago 

 and I would find every lumberman think- 

 ing ill and speaking ill of almost every 

 other lumberman. 



The condition was one of aljsolute 

 chaos and could not have been worse. 

 When things are at the very worst, how- 

 ever, it is impossible that they can be- 

 come any worse, and, as they cannot stand 

 still, they must improve; and the improve- 

 ment dates from the conference meeting 

 at Marshfield. It ^v-as followed shortly 

 thereafter by tlie withdrawal of the hard- 

 wo;:d lumbermen from the M'hite Pine As- 

 sociation of Chicago and the organization 

 of the Chicago Hardwood Lumber Ex- 

 change. The next market to fall in line 

 was Cincinnati, through the organization of 

 its lumbermen's club. Then followed 

 Memphis. Jiichigan and Indiana in the 

 Tvay of local organization, and the National 

 association brought them all under one flag. 

 All of those associations have done good 

 work for their members and for the trade 

 at large; but without wishing to detract 

 from the credit due any other organiza- 

 tion, it must in all fairness and justice 

 be said that the greatest credit belongs 

 to the Cliicago Hardwood Lumber Ex- 

 change. 



* * * 



After the Marshfield meeting it was two 

 •years before any further steps were taken 

 toward securing uniformity in inspection. 

 It takes a long time to set large bodies 

 in motion, but after thinking the matter 

 over for two years' the trade made up its 

 mind tliat uniform inspection might be 

 attainetl. The leaven of the Marslifield 

 meeting began to produce visible results. 



Tlie next move was made by the Cairo 

 Lumber Exchange, in writing the Chicago 

 Exchange that it proposed to revise its 

 inspection rules and would like to have a 

 conference with the Chicago hardwood 

 lumljermen to see if an agreement might 

 not be reached wliereby Cairo and Chi- 

 cago could have identical rules. This was 

 about tlie 1st of March, 189.S, but a few 

 days later, by a remarkable coincidence, 

 the president of the Chicago Exchange. 

 Mr. II. S. Harden, received a letter from 



Mr. M. II. Coolidge, president of the Slin- 

 ueapolis association, along the same lines 

 as the Cairo letter. After diligent search 

 I have been unable to find those letters, a 

 copy of which I would very much have 

 liked to in.sert at this point. 



Cairo, of course, was only interested in 

 the rules on southern luml>er; Minneapolis 

 was only interested in rules on northern 

 lumber; Cliicago was interested in both. 

 Thus the conference on rules would need 

 to cover the entire field, and at a meet- 

 ing of the Exchange to consider the 

 proi>osition from Cairo and .Minneapolis, it 

 was decided that St. Louis, Cincinnati and 

 other markets should l)e invited to par- 

 ticipate in the conference. Accordingly on 

 March 12. 1S9S, the Chicago Exchange 

 issued invitations to the various associa- 

 tions in the western hardwood territory 

 to meet in Chicago on April 8 to take 

 part in a conference looking to the s'ecur- 

 ing of a set of Inspection rules to l_>e 

 uniform throughout the cjuntry. 



The invitation was that each associa- 

 tion should send three delegates and in 

 the course of time the invitation was 

 accepted by St. Louis, Cairo, Minneapolis, 

 Cincinnati and Memphis, and it became 

 evident that the meeting would be largely 

 attended. 



The invitation having been i.ssued by 

 the Cliicago Exchange, it devolved upon 

 that Exchange to make preparations to 

 take care of the meeting. The meeting 

 was called for Friday, s'o that only two 

 days could l>e available in which to do the 

 work, and when it was considei-ed that it 

 would take probably until noon for the 

 delegates all to arrive, it only left a day 

 and a half in which to reach an agree- 

 ment. It was evident that the work would 

 need to be pushed very rapidly, as the 

 delegates had never worked together and 

 were, in most eases, unacquainted, with 

 one another. It seemed rather doubtful 

 wliether they could get their various 

 views on insiiection harmonized in that 

 short time, and it was certain that they 

 could not unless thorough preparations' 

 were made for getting them promptly or- 

 ganized and down to business. I talked 

 this matter over with Mr. A. R. Vinnedge, 

 who was the chief promoter of the enter- 

 prise among the Chicago lumbermen, and 

 an informal conference was held in the 

 Schiller restaurant on the evening of April 

 •5. There were present; A. R. Vinnedge, 

 L. B. Lesh. E. S. Pierce and myself, and 

 the question of making arrangements for 



the meeting was discussed. 



* * * 



I stated it as my opinion that a set of 

 national rules should have a national or- 

 ganization back of them to jiush the work 

 of securing their adoption tliroughout the 

 country, to hold the lumbermen in line 

 and to call meetings for the revision of 

 the rules, etc., and I proposed the or- 

 ganization at the coming meeting of a 

 national association of hardwood lumber- 

 men. . 



This matter was thoroughly discussed 



and it was finally agreed that tliat was 

 the proper course to pursue. 



"But," said Mr. Vinnedge, "in effecting 

 this organization we cannot infringe too 

 greatly uijon the time of the convention. 

 It is absolutely necessary that an agree- 

 ment be reached. If this meeting ad- 

 journs without reaching an agreement on 

 rules, it may be a good many years be- 

 fore another attempt will be made; and 

 we must make arrangements so that the 

 organization of the National association 

 will take as little time as possible." 



Messrs. Pierce and Lesh were skeptical 

 as to whether it would be i>ossible to go 

 over the entire set of inspection rules and 

 reach an agreement in so short a time 

 without attempting anything else. 



"Why," said Mr. Pierce, "you know that 

 last winter we put in all our spare 

 time for three months preparing a set of 

 inspection rules, and we only had our- 

 selves to consider. Now when the people 

 from Memphis', St. Louis and all other 

 markets get together, each with different 

 ideas of inspection, which must be har- 

 monized, how in the world are we to do 

 it in so short a time?" 



To this it was replied that the work 

 could be done by subdividing it, by ap- 

 pointing a large committee on rules, di- 

 viding it into subcommittees and as- 

 signing to each a certain work. No com- 

 mittee could go over the entire set of 

 rules in that time. It would be impossi- 

 ble; but it might be possible for a com- 

 mittee to reach an agreement on the rules 

 on oak ^\'ithin that time. It would be 

 possible also for another committee to. 

 agree on a rule on poplar. The northern 

 woods, on which the insiiectioii is very 

 similar, could be ihandled by another com- 

 mittee, and so on; and we would still 

 have time to form the National associa- 

 tion. 



After further discussion along those 

 lines, I was requested to prepare a plan 

 of organization, embodying it in a consti- 

 tution and by-laws, and s'ubmit same to a 

 future conference. This was to save the 

 time of the convention and to hasten the 

 work of organization. 



This work I did and tlie document was 

 presented to a future conference and ap- 

 proved after some modification; and when 

 the time came to call the meeting to order 

 on April 8, the Chicago lumbermen had 

 arrangements pretty thoroughly made. 

 * * * 



Each of the markets invited sent three 

 delegates, with the exceiition of Meiuphis, 

 which only sent one, M'r. E. E. Good- 

 lander, and Cincinnati, whose luml>ermen, 

 under the energetic leaders'hip of >Ir. 

 W. A. Bennett, came to Chicago in a spe- 

 cial car to the number of thirteen, ilr. 

 Bennett stated that he saw no reason 

 why the number of delegates should be 

 restricted to three, so he brought along all 

 he could induce to come. 



The meeting was called to order at 11 

 a. m. in one of the parlors of the Great 



