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Copyright, Thb Habdwood Company, lal7 



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

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



THE HARDWOOD COMPANY 



Edgar H. Defebaugh, President 

 Edwin \V. Meeker, Managing Editor 

 Hu Maxwell, Technical Editor' 



Entire Seventh Floor Ellsworth Building 

 537 So. Dearborn Street, CHICAGO 

 Telephones: Harrison 8086-8087-8088 





Vol. XLIII CHICAGO, JULY 10, 1917 No. 7 



Review and Outlook 



General Market Conditions 



T N DISCUSSING MAEKET CONDITIONS the two questions 

 A usually asked have to do ■n-ith the probable demand from the 

 furniture factories and the trend which building operations are 

 liable to take. Comment on the furniture situation at this particu- 

 lar time of the year is more or less speculative as the furniture 

 exhibits are hardly more than just getting well started and do not 

 give an indication of what their bearing on the factory demand 

 will be. As usual the weeks prior to the shows saw a considerable 

 letup in furniture purchases. Of course this month can hardly 

 be expected to develop in any way other than as is usual with the 

 month of July. Prognostications, however, give ample reason for 

 believing that 1917 furniture shows will not show a sufficiently 

 marked reduction in buying to justify any apprehension having 

 to do with the ^demand for hardwood lumber for furniture purposes. 



In building work naturally a different situation holds. The prin- 

 cipal reason for growing slackness in building was directly the 

 price asked for materials and equipment going into building con- 

 struction. Of the generalness of this falling off in building work 

 there can be no two opinions, but the public as a whole will in 

 the course of time get used to most things and in this case the 

 present level of prices will gradually come to be accepted as usual, 

 and with the public at large eventually working into this frame 

 of mind, there will be a return to normal building activity. It is 

 hardly likely that there will be any boom in the building situa- 

 tion, but as far as the present activity is concerned, it is not slated 

 to last very much longer. 



With these two exceptions ju-actically every other line is per- 

 forming remarkably well. In automobile construction, wagon and 

 carriage construction and box making, in fact in practically every- 

 thing, the call has been brisk and the demand in excess of supply. 

 It has been argued that automobile production is being curtailed, 

 thus decidedly reducing the call for hardwood lumber going into 

 this purpose — this applying to the pleasure car. 



It is quite possible that the automobile trade is going through 

 some aligning as the. development in this industry has been so 

 phenomenal and spectacular that it has been difficult to keep a 

 proper check on the relationship between supply and demand. It 

 is necessary that there be every so often a period of checking up 

 so that the manufacturers wUl be able to lay intelligent plans for 

 the future. But even with reduced production of pleasure auto- 

 mobiles as a permanent feature of the business, the total produc- 

 tion, including trucks and similar commercial equipment, must con- 

 tinue to show increase rather than decrease. As the commercial 



and industrial vehicle contains considerably more wood than does 

 the pleasure car, there is only one result possible. 



So on down through most of the industries. Their basic business 

 is good and growing. The railroads admit net earnings are decid- 

 edly on the increase and every observing person is struck with the 

 indications of normal processes in all directions. The more nearly 

 we can continue in this same channel, the better off will the business 

 of the country be and there is no indication of any violent jumping 

 off the tracks. The only thing that can seriously disturb is the 

 withdrawal from manufacturing and similar work of the first sec- 

 tion of the drafted army. A reduction in the laboring force to this 

 amount must of necessity clip the wings of production in some direc- 

 tions, at least until the women power and inventive ingeniousness 

 of the people can provide means for filling the places either with 

 human hands or with substitute machinery, of those who leave for 

 the training camps. 



Aside from this one feature though (and lessening labor must of 

 necessity result in lessened production and decreased needs in raw 

 material), there is no one thing or combination of things which can 

 seriously disorganize the present situation which in the lumber busi- 

 ness is yielding growing markets and continued rises in price levels 

 in every direction. 



The Cover Picture 



NEXT AFTER EOBERT E. LEE, the greatest general produced 

 by the southern Confederacy during the civil war was Thomas 

 J. Jackson, commonly known as Stonewall Jackson. He received 

 the name at the first battle of Bull Run. His men, animated by 

 his example, stood their ground at the critical moment of the 

 battle, and saved the day for the Confederates. The name 

 originated in a remark by General Bee, another Confederate, whose 

 men refused to face the fire. He called to them: "Yonder is 

 Jackson standing like a stone wall." The name was fixed on him. 

 His highest military qualities, however, did not show in his ability 

 to stand like a wall, but in his capacity for quick decision and 

 rapid movement. His greatest victories were not gained by re- 

 sisting shocks but in giving them. The late Lord Roberts said 

 that if Napoleon had been afforded an opportunity to study Jack- 

 son's campaigns, he could have profited from them. 



The cover picture accompanying this issue of Hardwood Record 

 shows the boyhood home of Stonewall Jackson, twenty miles south 

 of Clarksburg, W. Va. The picture is from a calendar of the Sun 

 Lumber Company, "Weston, W. Va. A representative of this paper 

 recently visited the scene, prepared to photograph it, but a fire had 

 destroyed the dwelling, leaving only three ehimne.vs towering over 



