February 10. lUl.s 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



38e 



ican troops in France is being talked of by lumbermen here on 

 government business. Tlie portable house is favoreJ by the author- 

 ities of this government for use abroad, owing to the little labor 

 needed in setting it up. Portable houses will be sent over by the 

 shipload as soon as tonnage is available. 



Portable houses have also been adopted by the Belgian and l"reni-li 

 governments for reconstruction purposes in the invaded regions, 

 it is reported here, for the same reason that this tyjie of strueture 

 is liked by American officials. This country naturally would furnish 

 most of the portable houses needed by France and Belgium. 



The development of eutover lauds on a great scale after the war, 

 for the benefit of the returned soldier and city worker desiring to 

 go onto the land, is advocated by Benton Mac Kay e in a recent report 

 to the Department of Labor. He urges that there should be broad 

 and full cooperation between the federal government, the states 

 and the land owners, in carrying out tliis project. The stumps 

 should be pulled up and perhaps buildings erected for the settler. 

 The author says he sees signs of government tendencies in that 

 direction. 



The agricultural appropriation bill is passing the house this week, 

 making fair provision for the Forest Service, also for fighting the 

 white piue blister rust and other tree diseases and insects. 



Bills have been introduced in Congress to authorize the logging 

 of timber on the Red Lake Indian reservation forest, Minnesota, 

 and to grant to the state of Minnesota for forestry purposes a 

 numbi'r of unsurveycd lands on islands in the state. 



The Wooden Ship Program 



riiairnian Hurley of the shippin;; hoard recently stated that the hoard 

 had Ihc wood and steel necessary for shiphullding. but needs 300,000 addi- 

 tional workmen to build ships. They arc hcin;:; recruited in a voluntary 

 manner. For lack of labor the shipyards are reported as going at half 

 capacity or less. I.innbcrnii'n and shipbuilders from .Maine, here in Wasli- 

 ingtou. declare that good slilps can l)e built (if Maine timber without draw- 

 ing snpplies from the Tacitic Coast, the Sound or elsewhere. James Ilny- 

 worth. who Is in charge of the wooden ship production, is quoted as 

 authority for the statement that contracts for si.xty more wooden ships 

 are soon to be let. 



United States Forester Henry S. Craves, who had been in l'''rance since 

 the early spring, luis returned to Washington to take up important work 

 on this side of the Atlantic. 



There has i>een complete unification of the several organizations engaged 

 in relief work for the benefit of the .\merican forestry regiments, accord- 

 ing to I". S. Ridsdale, seerct.-iry of the American Forestry .\ssocintion and 

 treasurer of the welfare fund committee. ^Ir. Kidsilale announces that 

 contributions for tlie two regiments have been sutlicient to provide each 

 member of the organizations with a sweater, ioit that fuucls are needed 

 for otlier necessities for the men. 



A new national forest has be4>n created in Alabama. It now contains 

 22.500 acres, and it is expected that it will ultimately be increased to 

 150.000 acres. 



The total amount of timber cut on the national forests in the fiscal 

 .Tear lOlT was 840,012.000 board feet, as against 714..')0o,000 board feet 

 In 1010. 



.\bout 200 board feet of wood is used in the actual construction of the 

 average airplane. To obtain this material it is ordinarily necessary to 

 work over about 1.500 feet of select lumber, whlcli often represents all 

 that can be used for airplanes of 15.0011 board feet of standing tirnlK-r. 



.Vccording to one of the (lernian forestry journals, the kaiser, in lHO.s. 

 killed 1.905 pieces of wild game, including 70 stags, elk and i-oeiniek. .\t 

 that time he had slaughtered a total of 01,7.30 pieces of game, more than 

 4.000 of which were stags, and was the leading extermlimtor of wild life 

 Id the worlil. .\s a shmghtcrer fif men. women and ehildi*eu since 1014. 

 however, lie h;is l,een the foremost exterminator of liuman life in all history. 



Business Coming to Lumbermen 



It is reported that some lumbermen have been abusing the "gov 

 ernment business" label on their lumber shipments. The result is 

 a warning issued by Director of Lumber Downnian to the lumber 

 bureaus ami associations that tlie "government busine.ss" ])ass to 

 transportation should not be used except on inntirlal actnally 

 ordered by the government. 



Harilwood lumbermen who have stuff to sell will doubtless be 

 glad to hear that Andrew C. Sisman & Co., Detroit, has received a 

 contract for chests with which to etjuip submarine boats, and that 

 the Pacific Coast Sash & Door Company of Los Angeles and the 

 Bailey Table Company have received airplane contracts. 



Frank Fish estimates the orders received by his bureau from tin' 

 government at 2,300,000 feet. In aildition he believes that con- 



siderable more lumber has been supplied by it to government con- 

 tractors or others referred to the bureau by government officials. 

 He says that Chief Inspector Hoover of his association has made 

 arrangements with the signal corps of the army to use the National 

 Hardwood Lumber Association's inspection service on airplane 

 material. 



Mr. Fish estimates that 12.j,000,000 feet of thick oak is reciuircd 

 for making wagons, carts and trucks for the L'nited States Govern- 

 ment. He says that seventy-two contractors for these vehicles are 

 buying their hardwood supply direct from the lumbermen, although 

 it has been reported that the vehicle people have a central pur- 

 chasing committee. 



The government wants 500 pieces of clear oak 22' long, ■>" wide 

 and 2'4" thick for lifeboats to be carried on large ships. Some 

 .1(1(1,000 feet of chestnut and oak switch ties and a quantity of 

 low-grade hardwood lumber will be needed in the construction of 

 the government twin powrlcr mills at Xashville, Tenn., and Charles- 

 town, W. Va. 



Orders for 12,000,000 feet of lumber have recently been given 

 to the Alabama-Mississippi Emergency Bureau for constructing the 

 , big government shell factory at Williamsburg, Va. 



Major Charles R. .Sligh and Oswald West, ex-governor of Oregon, 

 recently appeared before the senate committee on commerce and 

 severely criticised Pacific coast lumber interests, especially the 

 sjiruee men, and in particular George S. Long and the Weyer- 

 houser timber and lumber interests, whom they charged with pre- 

 venting rapid production of spruce timber for airplane stock for 

 the American and allied governments. They said that this policy 

 on the part of the lumber people was due to the alleged fact that 

 in producing spruce on a large scale they would necessarily have 

 to cut a lot of spruce and fir which the government does not want 

 and which tliey could not well sell. Sligh and West urged that the 

 AVest Coast Lumber Kmergcncy Bureau be reformed and that one 

 exiH'rt niMU lie |ilace.l in charge of lumber production for the gov- 

 ernment in the I'ucilic Northwest. It is rumored that W. H. Bloedel 

 of Seattle h&s been selected for this work. 



Charles Piez, general manager of the Emergency Fleet Corpora- 

 tion, has issued the following statement: 



The work of the state councils of defense and of the agents of the 

 rublic Service Reserve is enrolling 2.">0.000 skillcil workmen for the United 

 States shipyard volunteers is of permanent importance in the early win- 

 ning of this war. lor on earnest labor ilepends the early lonstrui'tlon of 

 our merchant liceis. Within tiO days tluee luigi' government yards will 

 be completed, and soon thereafter more tlian 00.000 workmen will be 

 requireil to furnish for tliem tlie three eight-hour shifts necessary If these 

 yards are to turn out their ships according to sciiedule. Tlie Shipping 

 lioard now lias 710 sliipways ; 302 are for wooden ships and 414 arc tor 

 steel construction. The yards in which they are cstabllsiied are only work- 

 ing one eight-hour shift per ilay six days a week. This is monstrous. If 

 we are to keep ahead of the submarine wc must run three shifts per day 

 tifty-two weeks in tile year. 



Our program calls for the construction in 101s of eiglit times the ton- 

 nage delivered in loll! at a cost of more than a billion didlars. The ship- 

 ping boaril has the iii'cessary yards, the materials and the money: all 

 tliat is lacking is a spirit in the nation that 'will send a quarter of a 

 million .\mericaii uieehanlcs into the yards to give their best and most 

 erticieiit work. 



1 am sorry to say at tlie present time the native born American Is not 

 the mainstay of the shipyanl. for he is there only to the extent of thirty- 

 five per ci'iit of the men employed, and to the extent of sixty-live per cent 

 we are f(U-ceil to depend .ill fni-eign-born labor. 



Income Tax Ruling 



The inc e tax regulations were also issued recently. They 



include the following: 



Depletion — Timber. — In the case of timberlands. the fair market price 

 i.r valui' of timber standing March 1. 1013. or the cost of the timber where 

 till- purchase was made sulisequent to March 1. I!tl3. will be the basis for 

 calculation id' di'plelion, and this value as of March 1. 1013. or cost when 

 subsciiuently piir<-hnsed. is not to be exceede<l for purposes of deduction 

 in returns of Income. The whole of iiuch value is to be distributed over 

 the entire amount of standing timber on these respective dates. 



Article 173. forporatlons owning timber land and logging off the tim- 

 ber and manufacturing it into Uimber, will, it the timber was acquired 

 prior to March 1. 1013, be permitteil to exclude from gross income cither 

 through a deduetlon from gross receipts or through a charge into the cost 

 of manufaeturliig tlii' tlmbir into lumber, an amount equivalent to the 

 fair market price or value of the standing timber as of March 1. 1013. 



