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Copyright, The Hardwood Company, 1918 

 Publithed in the Interest of the American Hardwood Forests, the Products thereof, and Logging, Saw 

 Mill and Woodworking Machinery, on the 1 0th cind 25th of each Month, by 



THE HARDWOOD COMPANY 



Edgar H. Defebaugh, President 

 Edwin W. Meeker, Managing Editor 

 Hu Maxwell, Technical Editor 



Seventh Floor Ellsworth Building 



537 So. Dearborn Street. CHICAGO 



Telephones: Harrison 8086-8087-8088 



Vol. XLVI CHICAGO, DECEMBER 10, 1918 No. 4 



General Market Conditions 



AXY REPORT OX THE GEXEKAL HARDWOOD SITUATION 

 today would be a close duplication of similar reports for the 

 last month. The same causes and effects hold with a little more 

 emphasis ou the strength of the hardwood situation than existed 

 two weeks ago. The high spots are seen in the mental attitude of 

 the man who sells and the man who buys. Economic and physical 

 influences are not affecting the situation so much today as is what 

 the buyer and the seller thinks. 



Summarizing the psychology of the situation, it appears that the 

 manufacturers of lumber and veneers have more confidence today 

 than they did two weeks ago and in spite of the fact that stock is 

 being sold at below list prices. Purveyors of lumber have reached 

 the point where they are quite willing to keep always in touch 

 "with buyers and to continue their canvasses and solicitations, 

 realizing that it is good policy to do so. However, they are becom- 

 ing more and more convinced of the futility of attempting to force 

 the market and increasingly confident of a wonderful future ahead 

 of them. 



There is a good deal of stock being bought, although far less than 

 normally. However, a close analysis of records would without ques- 

 tion show that the bulk of orders has been placed where the 

 stock is actually needed and where the question of price is not 

 predominant. In fact, there is a total absence of any record of 

 sales having been accomplished where the incentive to buy was 

 nothing stronger than a question of low price. It is an absolute 

 fact that radical cuts in price lists are not getting business and will 

 not get it. The buying trade is not yet in position to know just 

 what it wants, as a large part of the woodworking trade was made 

 over to war work and has not yet determined what its needs will 

 be for commercial i^urposes. 



Thus manufacturers of trim and other supplies for construction 

 purposes have not yet gotten even started. It is, nevertheless, an 

 absolutely safe prophecj' that there will be a deluge of building as 

 winter breaks up. There is every natural and economic reason 

 why this should be. When the period of heavy demand from all 

 woodworking sources then meets the short supply which is inevita- 

 ble, any little falling off in prices which has occurred will be quickly 

 absorbed. The only cause which may keep j^rices on a downward 

 trend would be a gradually lower wage scale and lower cost of opera- 

 tion, and there does not seem any likelihood of this coming about. 

 Surely, one cannot anticipate with any degree of hope that timber 

 and log values will be less, and with the combination of high labor 

 and high raw material decreased operating cost is impossible. 



A Census of Standing Timber 



A MOVEMENT IS UNDER WAY to take a census of the stand: 

 ing timber of the United States. The movement has not yet 

 advanced much beyond the resolution stage. The massmeeting of 

 lumbermen which was held in Chicago, November 22, passed a 

 resolution advocating such a census, and the announcement was 

 _ made at that time that the Natioiial Lumber Manufacturers ' Asso- 

 ciation would assist if the work were undertaken. The regular 

 decennial census will be taken next year, and it is presumed that 

 the timber count will be made a part of that census, if the plan 

 is carried out. 



This will not be the first attempt at a timber census in this 

 country. A dozen or more years ago the Bureau of Corporations, 

 apparently having a vague glimmer of an idea that something of 

 the sort should be done as a preliminary step toward prosecuting 

 a mythical timber trust, decided to proceed. Four hundred thou- 

 sand dollars, more or less, were spent in collecting figures on stand- 

 ing timber in many parts of the country, but not in all parts. 

 Voluminous preliminary reports were published. Part IV alone of 

 that report covered 933 printed pages. It is a safe guess that these 

 reports were never read through by any human being except the 

 proofreaders in the printing office, and they were hired to do it. 

 The job was not finished. It was left undone after spending hun- 

 dreds of thousands of dollars on it. The whole thing seemed to 

 peter out without reaching any conclusions that could be accepted 

 as final. Failing to strike the trail of any lumber trust, the Bureau 

 of Corporations called off the forces and quit. In that way ended 

 what might have been a timber census. By adding, subtracting, 

 multiplying, and dividing, people have been able to use those in- 

 complete figures to show a total timber stand in the United States 

 of 2,800,000,000,000 feet. In the absence of anything better, this 

 total has been tentatively accepted. 



Let it be hoped that the present movement toward a timber 

 census will be more successful. If it is undertaken, it will be 

 more successful, because it will proceed in a business way, and will 

 be quite different from the former project that started with hun- 

 dreds of thousands of dollars on a wild goose chase after a timber 

 trust, and ended like the journey of the man who set out for the 

 end of the rainbow to get a pot of gold. 



A timber census ought to be compiled. It is a big undertaking, 

 but no bigger tlian many others which have been successfully 

 carried out. The acreage of corn is known; the bushels of pota- 

 toes are recorded; the head of cattle, sheep, horses, and hogs, and 

 the number of eggs and pounds of butter are compiled by census 



