20 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



first place, the mountains are nonagricul- 

 tiirai. There lias been no wholesale ten 

 ileney to clear them for farming. Profitable 

 farming exists, as a rule, only in the valleys 

 anil on the lower slopes. Many sporadic 

 attempts have been made to farm the higlier 

 mountains, especially in .the southern Appa- 

 lachians, but the farms have been small and 

 generally unprolitable. .Vfter the pioneers' 

 patience or cnduranci- has been exhausted 

 the forest has slowly crept back and re 

 claimed the land, from which it never should 

 have been removed, 



Tn the second place, inaccessibilitj' ac- 

 counts for th(^ continued forest character of 

 the Appalachian region. With the low prices 

 which prevailed until a few years ago, it 

 did not pay to bring the timber down from 

 the higher mountains. So it was allowed to 

 remain. 



While other causes may have had local in- 

 fluence, these conditions in the main account 

 for the fact that the Appalachians have 

 maintained their hardwood production. 

 Xevertheless, some of the Ajipalachiaii 

 states have gone back badly. Kentucky 

 and Tennessee show heavy declines. In 

 these states the lumbermen have gone far- 

 ther and farther into the forest, until, even 

 in the most inaccessible jiarts, little virgin 

 growth remains. 



It is only in the extreme portions of the 

 mountains that the cut has held up or in- 

 creased. Maine, New Hampshire and Ver- 

 mont in the North, and North Carolina in 

 the South, show increased cuts. Not one of 

 these states, however, shows anything like 

 the production that Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky 

 or Tennessee has shown in the past. 



The plain truth is that in The .Appa- 

 lachians, as in the other regions, the hard- 

 wood lumbermen are working upon the rem- 

 nant.s. The supply is getting short and 

 the end is coming into sight. 



In view of existing situation, it is impor- 

 tant to consider as closely as possible how 

 long the hardwood supply will last. To 

 reach any conclusion on this point we must 

 know, approximately. Imw muili h.-iidwood 

 we arc using yearly, and we must know or 

 estimate the available supply. 



While we know within reasonably close 

 limits how mucii hardwood is used for the 

 manufacture of lumlier, we do not know how 

 much is cut for other purposes. Knormous 

 quantities are required each year for rail- 

 road ties, telephone and other poles, piles, 

 fence posts, and fuel, and a great amount is 

 wasted in lumbering and manufacture. The 

 present lumber cut of 7';; Ijillion feet repre- 

 sents probably not one-third of the hard- 

 woods >-early used; 23 billion feet yearly is 

 certainly not a high estimate. 



The amount of standing hardwoods is still 

 moi'e uncertain. There has been no census 

 of standing timber, and there have been but 

 few estimates. The largest estimate sets 

 the figure for hardwoods at 400 billion feet. 

 If we are using hardwoods at the rate of 25 

 billion feet per year, this would mean six- 

 teen year«" supply. The conditions during 



the past few years suggest no reason for in- 

 iieasing this estimate. \ distinct differ- 

 iiicc exists between the softwood and the 

 hardwood situation. The supply of soft- 

 woculs east of the Mississippi is running low 

 almost as fast as that of hardwoods. Of 

 softwoods, however, a large supply exists on 

 the I'acific Coast, which will suftice for a 

 number of years after the eastern supply is 

 exhausted. There is no hardwood supply in 

 till' l:ir West. When the supi)ly in the 

 central and eastern states is gone there will 

 be no other source to which to turn. 



Only within the last eight years have 

 prices begun to reflect the dwindling supply, 

 though the immoderate cutting away of this 

 resource has been going on for decades. 



Considering the impoverish<'d supply and 

 the tremendous demands on the part of all 

 the industries for timber, there is nothing 

 surprising about the increase, which seems 

 not quite to have kept pace with the increas- 

 ing prices of softwoods. This is rather re- 

 markable in view of the shorter supply, but 

 is probably due to the fact that softwoods, 

 forming (he main bulk of the lumber supply, 

 have led in establishing prices. 



Along with the increase of prices there 

 has been an almost constant, and an en 

 tirely necessary, relaxation of the rules by 

 which lumber is graded and sold. The latest 

 and most significant change is that made by 

 tlie National Hardwood Lumber Association 

 at its meeting in Atlantic City iu May, 

 1907. Heretofore only even lengths, such as 

 0, 8, and 10 and 12 feet have been upon 

 the market. The changed rules allow even 

 lengths down to -1 feet and 1.5 per cent of 

 odd lengths above 4 feet. Smaller standards 

 of thickness are also allowed. Many other 

 equally significant changes are included. It 

 emphasizes the fact that we are down to the 

 rock liottom, and require every sound piece 

 of hardwood lumber that can be put u]>ou 

 the market. 



Several great industries use hardwood 

 tiinl>er nu.inly or almost exclusively for 

 their r^iw material. Notable in this list are 

 hardwo.id lumber manufacturing, the coop- 

 erage, turniture, and vehicle industries, and 

 the industries engaged in the manufacture 

 of musical instruments, Collins, and small 

 woodenware. All of these would suffer 

 greatly and some would fail entirely ujion 

 the exhaustion of the hardwood supply. 

 Other industries, such as the manufacture of 

 agiieultural implements, freight and passen- 

 ger cars, boxes and crates, use immense 

 quantities of hardwood. 



Hardwood lumber manufacture affords an 

 example of the damage already done. It 

 has been shown how hai'ilwood lumber pro- 

 duction in Ohio was cut down over one-half 

 between 1890 and 1906. The decrease in 

 products between 1900 and 1905, aKJCording 

 to census reports, amounted to $7,212,343, 

 or 57.4 per cent, and the rank of the indus- 

 try in the state fell from the fourth to the 

 twentieth place. The number of employees 

 fell from 10,689 to 6,442, or 40 per cent. 

 In Indiana during the same period the 



lumber industry fell from the third to the 

 eighth ])lace; the value of products decreaseil 

 27.1 per cent; the number of wage-earners 

 decreased 42,6 per cent, and the wages paid 

 decreased 36.6 per cent. 



Lumber manufacturing is the first among 

 the industries to feel the blight of an ex- 

 hausted timber supply. When the local sup- 

 ply ceases this industry must stop. 

 Most other industries which use hardwoods 

 can go on, bringing their supplies from a 

 distance. Only with the failure of the en- 

 tire supply arc they seriously damaged. 



In much the same way the cooperage in- 

 dustry must be near the forest. Slack coop- 

 erage employs a great number of hardwoods 

 and is distributed through many states. 

 Tight cooperage makes use of the best 

 grades of white oak almost exclusively and 

 centers in Kentuck}' and Tennessee. The 

 pressure of the timber 'supply is already 

 heavy on this industry. If the oak supply 

 should fail, the tight cooperage industry will 

 largely cease, and some other container for 

 liquids will have to be found to replace 

 wood. As yet little progress has been made 

 iu securing substitutes for the oak cask ami 

 barrel. 



The manufacture of furniture probably 

 calls for more hardwood than any other in- 

 dustry, and employs hardwood almost exclu- 

 sively as raw material. In 1905 there were 

 2,482 furniture establishments in the United 

 States, with a capital of .$153,000,000 and an 

 annual product valued at $170,000,000. In 

 reports made to the Forest Service 538 of 

 these establishments reported the annual use 

 of 580 million feet of lumber. It seems 

 jirobable that the industry requires upward 

 of 20 per cent of the entire hardwood pro- 

 duction. The public is so much accustomed 

 to hardwood furniture that furniture of any 

 other material would not be acceptable. 

 Failure of the hardwood supply would doubt- 

 less terminate the furniture industry as it 

 is now carried on. 



As in furniture, hardwood is the chief 

 material in the manufacture of musical in- 

 .struments, especially pianos and organs. 

 Maple, poplar, elm, oak, chestnut and bass- 

 wood are most largely used. Foreign woods 

 are used only for veneers, for which pur- 

 jiose large quantities are not required. 



In 1905 there were in the United States 

 3,143 establishments for the manufacture of 

 vehicles, with a capital of $149,000,000 and 

 a yearly product of $155,000,000. No indus- 

 try stands in a more threatened position, so 

 far as supply is concerned, than the manu- 

 facture of wagons and carriages. It re- 

 quires the best hardwoods, and even now 

 these are obtained with extreme difficulty. 

 Hickory and oak are used in the largest 

 quantities, and vehicle manufacturers be- 

 lieve that the hickory siipply of the country 

 cannot last over ten years longer. Attempts 

 to substitute other woods or other materials 

 for hickory in vehicle manufacture have 

 largely failed. The vehicle industry, like 

 the furniture industry, cannot exist on its 

 present basis without hardwood timber. 



