'\ c>^^2^^iiA^^&^:;^^ii>^m^]^ 



Copyright, Th» Babdwood Compani, 1917 



Publithed in (he InleresI of the American Hardwood Forests, the Products thereof, and Logging. Saw 

 Mill and Woodworking Machinery, on the lOlh and 25lh 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. XLIV CHICAGO, NOVEMBER 25, 1917 No. 3 



Review and Outlook 



^Sn, 



General Market Conditions 



GKAXTIXG THAT THE NECESSITY for finding markets is 

 occupying a fair share of hardwood operators' thoughts, nev 

 ertheless the big thing today is production. Labor difficulties are 

 Jiouuting day by day. Not oulv is labor demanding, and possibly 

 with some justice, steadily iucreasing -wages, but (and this is the 

 more serious consideration) its supply is increasingly unsteady and 

 its quality growing steadily inferior. 



Gatherings of lumbermen of late have taken serious cognizance 

 of the growing menace from labor, but as a whole the trade seems 

 to continue more or less up in the air as to what the remedy or 

 remedies may be. In the last analysis it will undoubtedly be found, 

 as the importance of adequate lumber production as a factor in the 

 prosecution of the war is more generally un(lerstoo<l, that the 

 assistance of the government in maintaining more adequate labor 

 facilities may be looked forward to. 



As the situation now stands, however, the wages which labor is 

 commanding, its decreasing efficiency and material addition to the 

 cost of manufacture due to uncertainty of supply — thereby in- 

 creasing the proportion of overhead — are definite insurance against 

 lessening values in hardwood lumber. Mounting costs have had 

 the further effect of awakening the lumber trade as it never before 

 was awakened to the necessity for accurate cost records, and lumber 

 going on the market today is priced with much more regard to the 

 actual cost of turning it out than it ever has been. This modern- 

 izing of methods will be a permanent feature of lumber production 

 in the future — proljably even more than it is today. 



On the other side of the fence, that is, the merchandising or 

 marketing of sawmill products, the same conditions are in control 

 of the situation which have been for the past few weeks. From 

 the marketing angle the most serious consideration at present is 

 probable government action curtailing production and embargoing 

 shipments of items, on the now famous list of 500 so-called unneces- 

 sary articles. The possibility of closing down on the manufacture 

 of these items is of course giving great concern to those whoso busi- 

 ness it is to make them, and it is only natural that with such an 

 uncertain prospect, the outlay for raw material should be kept at 

 a minimum. As one instance, the pleasure automobile using as it 

 does hundreds of thousands of freight cars every year, will probably 

 be one of the first to feel government regulations. There are al- 

 ready reports of cancellation of orders for lumber going into pleas- 

 ure car construction, and automobile dealers everywhere are report- 

 ing the practical impossibility of getting deliveries on new cars. 

 The automobile business is one of the first to feel the pinch of 

 government action because of the immense bulk of freight room 



used. Utiior industries in pruiiortion to pleasure car manufacture 

 are not so vitally important individually, but the government will 

 without question limit the production of many articles in' which 

 hardwood lumber plays an important part. This seems to be an 

 assured fact and this probability seems to have been realized by 

 the lumber trade. 



The threatened curtailment and embargo have been the feature 

 developments of the past couple of weeks, but aside from this the 

 situation has maintained a more or less steady progress, marked 

 mainly by development of the movement looking to the more 

 general turning over of industry to war purposes. It is but natural 

 that the lumljer trade should be considering as its principal objec- 

 tive the possibility of best meeting the country's needs in this 

 its greatest crisis. 



Make Good on Your Resolutions 



TT IS A VERY SIMPLE MATTER for the president of an asso- 

 1 elation in convention to appoint a committee on resolutions, and 

 it is equally easy for that committee to compile a flowery message 

 of support — usually the abstract or general meaning of the word is 

 embodied. It is easy for an association assembled in convention to 

 unanimously adopt such a resolution and sad to say, the con- 

 vention delegates usually find no difficulty whatever in immedi- 

 ately forgetting the spirit which it was intended the resolution 

 should inspire. 



A resolution adopted by a representative convention of busi- 

 ness men giving flowery assurance of unwavering support to the 

 government and the country is meaningless and a waste of valuable 

 time unless in voting for its adoption each member feels the inspira- 

 tion of real loyalty that should make his vote a i)crsoiial pledge and 

 a lasting obligation rather than the merely automatic function of 

 parliamentary law. In other words, the resolution should stand for 

 a concrete something; for a resolve to make a sincere effort in 

 every case to meet the requirements for government service and 

 government supplies. 



Illustrating the usual absence of the connecting link between 

 the resolution and ultimate action, a group of southern operators 

 was asked to sui)mit bids on specifications for a few unusually large 

 oak timbers. Such a timber could be gotten out of an occasional 

 tree, but because the dimensions were so unusually large as to be 

 almost ridiculous from the standpoint of normal demand, the re- 

 quest was treated more or less as a joke and as a result that body 

 of men went directly against a resolution of loyalty and support 

 which it had adopted five minutes before. 



The government specifications as they finally stand have in the 



