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HARDWOOD RECORD 



care what is going to Imppcn wliile lie lives and while ho and his 

 family occupy the liouse. He builds it to use, to enjoy. He con- 

 structs something which he knows will be satisfactory. If he is 

 able to stand the expense, he may indulge his tastes with the richest 

 woods of the tropics, and combine colors without number; but if his 

 means are moderate, he still has the pick of the wealth which this 

 country 's forests afford. A wooden house may be cheap enough 

 for any man, or expensive in the highest degree. Enough carving 

 may be put on a single panel to pay for the brick to build a flat. 



The argument whidi is advanced to the effect that builders should 

 use brick because that material will not burn is without much merit 

 so far as residences, particularly suburban residences, are concerned. 

 If a fire starts in a brick house the building is apt to be ruined. 

 How much better is it to have a few cracked and blackened walls 

 left standing after a fire than to have a frame house completely 

 consumed? The fire risk has some weight in city blocks, where fires 

 are apt to spread into conflagrations; but the argument loses nearly 

 all of its force when applied to the isolated house. It is even over- 

 worked in the city block, for slow-combustion structures of wood 

 have many a time proved superior to steel and concrete. 



References to buildings of brick and stone in countries across the 

 sea are poor arguments against the use of wood in this country. 

 It would be as appropriate to cite the bark clothes of the Papuans 

 as an argument against the use of wool cloth in this country. The 

 Europeans use so little wood because they have so little. When they 

 had plenty they used much; and there are wooden houses in England 

 now standing and in good condition that are not only three times 

 as old as any brick house in America, but older than any brick 

 building in England. 



Gifford Pinchot's New Book 



ANEW BOOK has been written by Gifford Pinchot, and pub- 

 lished by the J. B. Lippineott Company, Philadelphia. It 

 is a small volume and can be read in two hours, but the reader 

 will likely pick it up again from time to time and spend several 

 other hours with it. The title is ' ' The Training of a Forester. ' ' 

 It is important that the title be clearly understood; otherwise 

 some might infer that the book is a treatise on forestry. It is 

 not that. Its subject is the forester, not the forest. Its reading 

 is worth two hours of the time of any business man who deals 

 with men — who gives orders or takes orders. 



Gifford Pinchot was formerly United States forester. While 

 strictly speaking, he was not the founder of the Forestry Bureau 

 of the Government, he was its organizer and builder. He took 

 it when it amounted practically to nothing, and made it one of 

 the most eflScient machines for the transaction of business that 

 has ever existed anywhere. He was a marvelous organizer. He 

 gathered about him a corps of men who were able to work with 

 the minimum of ' ' lost motion. ' ' He would not permit a man 

 •to do what a cheaper man could do as well. He demanded that 

 every man put his efforts into the highest-class work he was 

 capable of doing, and to waste no time with details which he 

 could leave to another. Theodore Eoosevelt on more occasions 

 than one publicly acknowledged his indebtedness to Pinchot for 

 suggestions, ideas, and plans. 



The book just published deals with the training of a forester, 

 but much of it applies equally well to the training of any other 

 business man. Of the forestry student Mr. Pinchot says: "To 

 stand well at graduation is or ought to be far less the object of 

 a forester's training than to stand well ten or twenty years 

 after graduation." Students of things other than forestry could 

 profit by remembering that suggestion. 



The following quotation from the book will appeal particularly 

 to lumbermen: "The forester cannot succeed unless he under- 

 stands the problems and point of view of his country, and that 

 is the reason why foresters from other lands were not brought 

 into the United States in the early stages of the forest movement. 

 At that time practically no American foresters had yet been 

 trained, and the great need of the situation -was for men to do 

 the immediately pressing work. Foresters from Germany, France, 



Switzerland, and other countries could have been obtained in 

 abundant numbers and at reasonable salaries. They were not 

 invited to come because, however well trained in technical forestry, 

 they could not have understood the habits and thoughts of our 

 l)eople.' ' 



Speaking of men generally, the author says: "In my experience, 

 men differ comparatively little in mere ability, in the quality 

 of the mental machine through which the spirit works. Nine 

 times out of ten, it is not ability which brings success, but 

 persistence and enthusiasm, which are usually, but not always, 

 the same as vision and will. We all have ability enough to do 

 the thiniis which lie before us, but the man with the will to 

 keep everlastingly at it, and the vision to realize the moaning 

 and value of the results for which he is striving, is the man 

 who wins in nearly every case." 



The spirit in which a man should go into a good fight and 

 stay in it is thus spoken of: "It is inevitable that the forester 

 must meet discouragements, cheeks, and delays, as well as periods 

 of smooth sailing. He shbuld expect them and be prepared to 

 iliscount them when they come. When they do come, I know 

 of no better way of reducing their bad effects than for a man 

 to make allowance for his own state of mind. He who can stand 

 off and look at himself impartially, realizing that he will not feel 

 tomorrow as he feels today, has a powerful weapon against the 

 temporary discouragements which are necessarily met in any work 

 that is really worth while. Progress is always in spirals, and 

 there is always a good time coming. There is nothing so fatal to 

 good work as that flabby spirit under which some weak men try 

 to hide their inefficiency — the spirit of 'AVhat's the use?' " 



The point of contact between the forester and the men with 

 whom he must deal is thus explained: "The practical men with 

 whom the forester must do his work — lumbermen, cattlemen, 

 sheepmen, settlers, forest users of all kinds — are often very much 

 his superiors in usable knowledge of the details of their work. 

 Their opinions are entitled to the most complete hearing and 

 respect. There is no other class of men from whose advice the 

 forester can so greatly profit if he chooses to do so. He is 

 superior to them, if at all, only in his technical knowledge, and 

 in his broader point of view wTiich he has derived from his 

 professional training. It is of the first importance that the 

 young forester should know these men, should learn to like and 

 respect them, and that he should get all the help he can from 

 their knowledge and practical experience. 



The following quotation is one in which most men of large 

 affairs will agree with Mr. Pinchot: "There is no more valuable 

 subordinate than the man to whom you can give a piece of work 

 and then forget about it, in confident expectation that the next 

 time it is brought to your attention it will come in the form of 

 a report that the thing has been done. Wlien this master quality 

 is joined to executive power, loyalty, and common sense, the 

 result is a man whom you can trust. On the other hand, there 

 is no greater nuisance to a man heavily burdened with the direc- 

 tion of affairs than the weak-backed assistant who is continually 

 trying to get his chief to do his work for him, on the feeble 

 plea that he thought the chief would like to decide this or that 

 himself. The man to whom an executive is most grateful, the 

 man whom he will work hardest and value most, is the man who 

 accepts responsibility willingly, and is not continually under 

 his feet. But the wisdom of letting a good man alone is no less 

 commonly understood. It is sometimes as important for the 

 superior officer not to worry his subordinate with useless orders 

 as it is for the subordinate not to harass his superior with 

 useless questions. Let a good man alone. Give him his head." 



It is now announced that by a process of shredding, boiling and 

 treatment of refuse with chemicals, a Frenchman has succeeded in 

 producing artificial wood which gives good results as planks, beams, 

 laths, mouldings, etc., of various sizes and shapes. The material 

 is worked like natural wood and is said to be especially adaptable 

 to the manufacture of match stems. 



