The Hardwood Record 



VOL. XIV. 



SaTURDAV, JUNE 28. 1902. 



No. 6 



The Hardwood Record. 



PUBLISHED 



EVERY OTHER SATURDAY 



BY 



C. V. KIMBALL, 



134 MONROE STREET, - CHICAGO, ILL. 



ENTERED AT CHICAGO POST OFFICE AS 

 SECOND-CLASS MATTER. 



TERMS OF subscription: 



U. 8., Canada and Mexico $1.00 per year. 



Foreign Countries 2.00 per year. 



ADVERTISING RATES ON APPLICATION. 



The cost of advertising: In the Wanted and For Sale 

 columns will be found at the head of that department. 



ADVERTISING INDEX ON PAGE 25 



Contributions on subjects of interest 

 to lumbermen are invited from any 

 person. Subscribers and others arc re- 

 quested to notify us of changes in per- 

 sonnel or organizations of hardwood 

 lumber firms. We desire especially to 

 receive particulars of installation of 

 new plants, transfers of property and 

 timber holdings and experiments in 

 new methods of manufacturing or the 

 utilization of by-products. New publi- 

 cations of interest to the trade, including 

 catalogues, stock lists and circulars will 

 receive attention if sent to this office. 

 Our columns are also available for 

 criticism and comment on any article 

 published or for news of any sort con- 

 cerning the hardwood trade. 



Our readers will confer a favor when 

 writing to advertisers if they will state 

 that they saw the advertisement in the 

 Hardwood Record. This is little 

 trouble and costs nothing, but it helps 

 us and is information wanted by the 

 advertiser. 



THE BUSINESS SITUATION. 



The stream of prosperity coutiuues to 

 flow steadily, banls full. The overflow of a 

 year or two ago has subsided, but all 

 the little creeks and feeders are running 

 comfortably and steadily, the mud has set- 

 tled to the bottom and everything is serene 

 and lovely. 



Great profits or great losses are only 

 possible, as a rule, in .times of violent 

 clianges, such as attend panics or the re- 

 action therefrom. Business men are not, 

 as a rule, making great profits at this time, 

 not so great as they were making a few 

 years ago, but almost universally they are 

 securing comfortable and satisfactory re- 

 tiu-ns. 



Prices are on a much higher basis than 

 they were during the depressed years 

 which followed the panic of 1893, and if 

 what a man bought cost him no more at 

 the present than it did during the lean 

 years, if his raw material and his labor 

 were no more expensive, and he could se- 

 cure the present prices for his product, he 

 would indeed be accumulating wealth at a 

 very rapid rate. The fact is, however, 

 that while the price of his product is ad- 

 vanced, so also is the cost of everything 

 entering into the productiou and distribu- 

 tion of his product, until his profits are 

 only slightly greater than they were dur- 

 ing the lean years. 



The pri('-e of his product may have ad- 

 vanced 50 per cent over the isrices of four 

 or five years ago, but there are many in- 

 terests among which that increase must be 

 divided. Everyone is entitled to a share 

 of the present prosperity and there has 

 Ijeen time sufiicieut since prosperity came 

 to the countr.y that the division is being 

 pretty generally made. For instance, if 

 a man be a manufacturer of furniture and 

 his product is selling at an increased price, 

 that increase must be divided and sub- 

 divided until everyone connected with the 

 production of the raw material, the trans- 

 portation companies, the labor in his fac- 

 tories, the groeeryman of whom he buys 

 his groceries, the merchants of whom he 

 buys his other supplies, the street sweep'ers 

 and, in fact, nearly everybody in the 

 United States has received a share of it. 

 After all of this has been done the manu- 

 facturer of furniture finds his profits only 

 slightly greater than they were before. 



So in spite of the general prosperity the 

 business man is not. as a rule, getting 

 rich with any undue rapidity. As before 

 stated, his profits are slightly larger, but 

 a very little increase iu the cost of his 



living or carelessness In the management 

 of liis business will absorb his extra profits 

 and leave him no better off than he was 

 before. Constant vigilance is the price 

 of success. 



That is where prosperity fools a good 

 many people. A man will say: "1 am 

 getting a large advance in price on my 

 l)roduct and I am, therefore, justified in 

 increasing my expenditures for living pur- 

 poses and increasing my capacity by 

 building additions to my factory," and so 

 on. when in fact his margin of profit is 

 only slightly greater than it was during 

 the years when he felt the need of strin- 

 gent economy in evei-y department. 



Business in all lines at present is very 

 good, but now. as always, it is a good busi- 

 ness principle to be conservative. When 

 business began to revive after the panic, 

 a good many business men made a good 

 deal of money by plunging and speculat- 

 ing, but there is nothing in such action at 

 the present. Prices are probably at their 

 lughwater mark and in some instances are 

 beyond the safety point. This seems to 

 us to be a splendid time for going slow 

 and being careful, and doing business on 

 strictly conservative lines. 



We do not mean that we see any special 

 prospect of any sudden reaction or slump 

 in prices; it means that we do not see any 

 pro.spect in the other direction, and, in 

 fact, it is probably time for a slight re- 

 action in prices in some lines. 



It is natural and inevitable that when 

 prices start upward they cannot continue 

 the advance indefinitely. It is also na- 

 tural and inevitable that before they stop 

 they will go too high and that a reaction 

 will be in order. Everybody seems to be 

 doing well at present, with nobody break- 

 ing records. Business has settled down to 

 a humdrum level and while that level is 

 considerably higher than it has been at 

 times past, the same caution and conserva- 

 tism which was necessary at the lower 

 level is necessary at the present. 



In the lumber business conditions are 

 about as outlined above. As a rule the 

 lumbermen are not making extraordinary 

 profits, but as a rule all are doing fairly 

 well. The dealer gets more for his lumber 

 than he did in years past, but his lumber 

 costs him more, his freight costs him 

 more and his labor costs him more. The 

 manufacturer is relatively more prosper- 

 ous than the dealer, but his logs cost him 

 more and in everything which enters into 

 the production and transportation of his 

 product, the cost is increased so that the 



